…in ZOMBIESCOPE
A Note From The Future!
(This post revised 5/19/2012)
This post was originally about me putting Doclopedia stuff on the fiction blog, but that didn’t work out, so I’m moving it back here. In fact, as of 5/19/2012, the fiction blog (over on Blogger) is living on borrowed time.
So here are some Doclopedia posts, just to fill in the blanks on this blog.
The Doclopedia #375
Drunken Inventors: Pietro Gavolini
One night in 1958, while blasted ass drunk on wine at his house outside Rome, noted inventor Pietro Gavolini got the idea to build a machine that could control the weather. He hastily scribbled out his plans for it, including estimated costs and potential profits, then passed out. The next day, nursing a hangover that should probably be enshrined in a Hangover Hall of Fame, he stared bleary eyed at those same notes and thought “Son of a bitch! I just might be on to something here.” Later in the day, when he felt almost human again, Pietro expanded on his notes and called in a few orders for things he would need.
Unfortunately, Pietro soon figured out that he was coming up against brick walls to his genius…while he was sober. So in the name of scientific advancement and the Italian wine industry, he uncorked a bottle or three. Every night for two weeks. Including Sundays.
Eventually, Pietro finished his machine and promptly fell asleep for two days. After that, he spent another week drying out and then decided to test his device out. A snow storm in Rome in mid-July seemed like a good test and it worked! Besides sending many people to church in the middle of the day and making the already crazy Roman driving experience that much more dangerous, once the storm stopped, the 16 inches of snow melted quickly and caused flooding in the streets. Pietro danced about with joy.
Over the next couple of weeks, he did more tests, including…
A tornado in the German countryside
A lightning storm in Mexico City
Heavy rain in Texas (this last was very welcomed)
A hailstorm in Alexandria, Egypt
After that, it’s all history. Pietro took his invention and hid it away before very anonymously offering the services of “The Weather Maestro” to the nations of the world at pretty reasonable rates. Once he had a few hundred million salted away, he had the payments made to various charities and such. Eventually he built a self aware computer to operate and protect the machine, after which he retired to a tropical island with several beautiful women and a lifetime supply of wine.
The Doclopedia #376
Drunken Inventors: Lurdak Mab 26
On all of Proycon 4, there might have been three scientist/inventors as brilliant as Lurdak Mal 26. Of course, they would have also been sober more often than he was, since Lurdak was pretty fond of a nice cold glass of Viimi urine with a sulfuric acid chaser…about ten times a day. By about 28:00 at night, the noted scientist would be ready to fall down.
Now, for many years Lurdak kept his drinking confined to his off hours. He never tippled at work, even in the depths of winter when the Viimi urine was especially strong and tasty. Nope, it was strictly invent incredible stuff during the day, get falling down snockered at night.
That is, until his wife Mibaj Sep 17 left him for a traveling borfka salesman. After that, he started having “just one drink to get the morning started”. Pretty soon he added a couple of cocktails at lunch, then a little “bracer” in the afternoon. Before long, he was a full time drunk.
Even after he went full tilt into the bag, Lurdak was still creating great things that astounded other scientists. Unfortunately, his luck ran out when he created the Transtemporal Viewing Portal. Oh, it was a totally amazing bit of technology, being as it allowed you to create a 50′X50′ window into the past. His first two public showings drew huge crowds and soon Lurdak sold his patent to the Rildek Corporation, who made tens of thousands of them and set them up like theaters. Sure enough, millions of folks bought tickets to the very first showing of “Walking With Skurfisaurs”.
The problem came about when, 20 minutes into watching a day in the life of the planet 52 million years earlier, the Master Control overheated and Lurdak was passed out drunk and didn’t realize it. When the Master Control hit 375 degrees Celsius, the Transtemporal Viewing Portals all got a huge power surge and became transtemporal Doorways. Hungry carnivorous Skurfisaurs could suddenly see and get at all of the tasty looking people in the present, which they did. Not much later, everything from huge plant eaters to insects to plant spores & seeds to bacteria started coming through. By the time somebody got to Lurdak’s home and got him awake, the shit had hit the fan. Worse yet, it took five days to shut down all of the Doorways.
Now, four years later, Proycon 4 is a much different world. The environment in the present turned out to be much better than the one in the past, so the Skurfisaurs not only flourished, they got larger. And smarter. And hungrier. By the second summer, most of the surviving Proyconians were living in isolated walled cities and hoping those damned Skurfisaurs would stop getting smarter. It was a bleak existence.
On the bright side, Lurdak Mal 26 stopped drinking and is now three and a half years sober. He’s in hiding from the Skurfisaurs, the law and his fellow Proyconians, but by golly, he’s stone cold sober while doing it.
The Doclopedia #377
Drunken Inventors: Gungok The Clever
In the time of our oldest mothers, Gungok was the smartest man in our tribe. It was Gungok who looked at the shell of a cracked egg and then at the mud drying on a herd of wild pigs and then went and made the first clay pot. It was he who figured out that smoke would make the bee swarms calm so we could get honey with only a few stings.
It was he who also discovered that if you put honey and berry juice and water into the clay pots and let them set for a few days, you would get the happy drink. After that, Gungok made and drank much of the happy drink. In the mornings, he would not be looking well.
One day, in the winter when there were no berries and so no happy drink, Gungok got an idea and went off on his own for 9 days. The people were putting their things on sledges so they could drag them south many days, to a warmer place. They did this every winter back then. They were only 2 days from leaving when Gungok came back with a new type of sledge.
It was a great thing, this sledge, because it was much larger than the others and had two round things halfway down it’s length on the outside. It did not drag, it rolled like a stone does downhill. Even better, Gungok was able to load the new sledge with as much as three old sledges would hold, but could pull it by himself!
The people liked this, so they stayed there more days until they had made four more of the new sledges. Then they went south easily, reaching the warm lands much sooner than before. Everybody liked that.
When spring came, Gungok told them they should go farther south, where it might be warm all the time. The people knew Gungok was smart, so they went south. After many days, they came to the land where we now live. It is a good place.
Everybody treated Gungok well and he did not have to hunt or sleep alone. Best of all for Gungok, in this new place, berries grow all year and he always had happy drink, even in the winter.
Many years later, Gungok was very old and died, but the people did not forget him. This is why every year on the longest day, we pour happy drink on the place where he was buried.
