This is One of My Favorite Stories Too

"This is by far my favorite story of all those I have written.

After all, I undertook to tell several trillion years of human history in the space of a short story and I leave it to you as to how well I succeeded. I also undertook another task, but I won't tell you what that was lest l spoil the story for you.

It is a curious fact that innumerable readers have asked me if I wrote this story. They seem never to remember the title of the story or (for sure) the author, except for the vague thought it might be me. But, of course, they never forget the story itself especially the ending. The idea seems to drown out everything -- and I'm satisfied that it should." --Isaac Asimov

The Last Question by Isaac Asimov © 1956

The last question was asked for the first time, half in jest, on May 21, 2061, at a time when humanity first stepped into the light. The question came about as a result of a five dollar bet over highballs, and it happened this way:

Alexander Adell and Bertram Lupov were two of the faithful attendants of Multivac. As well as any human beings could, they knew what lay behind the cold, clicking, flashing face -- miles and miles of face -- of that giant computer. They had at least a vague notion of the general plan of relays and circuits that had long since grown past the point where any single human could possibly have a firm grasp of the whole.

Multivac was self-adjusting and self-correcting. It had to be, for nothing human could adjust and correct it quickly enough or even adequately enough -- so Adell and Lupov attended the monstrous giant only lightly and superficially, yet as well as any men could. They fed it data, adjusted questions to its needs and translated the answers that were issued. Certainly they, and all others like them, were fully entitled to share In the glory that was Multivac's...(click here to continue reading)

Changing Vistas

I need to get back
stand away
step aside
reflect from a distance

cause being so enmeshed like
I am
is sufficient to blind me
to even the most obvious

The Primacy of Consciousness

So, Tell me? What are you good at?

There is this great place one minute away from my perch the way the crow flies. It is a park. A large expanse. Affording many treasures for summer tourists to seize. You can find lots of history, all sorts of museums, acre after acre of rolling emerald lawns. Reminder to self: *Post link here*.

Now then, it has its fair share of visitors year round...They are found often gathering around the many kinds and types of street performers.

What I'd like to do is set up a place on the grass, sit there reading or writing, somehow looking approachable.

You walk by.

Next to me you find a sign, You wonder cause you want to come and sit down...

The signs says... So tell me, What are YOU good at?

What would you say to that question?

I think it could be insightful because you are more likely to open up

to a stranger, a beautiful stranger to spark your imagination

I am awake and addressing the burrs that are festering in my brain

You know sometimes I wonder if I come across a bit touched as in odd or well weird or freaky and if so, to what degree

It is much like me to be unaware of the kind of impression I give to others

I really have no idea obviously, by some of the reactions I get

I see that many assume quite a bit and judge me accordingly

This is maybe something new I will be learning how to do

That and judging others reactions to me

I feel very strange

Like an alien

learning the earth ways,

I'm all ears and eyes...

Good Citizen Goody Moondrop

For my therapeutic assignment I am to leave my place of seclusion called home and go to the library.

At the library I am to interact with the librarian inquiring as to her services as a research assistant.

Instead my head is telling me to stay in bed and do nothing but sleep my life away.

Away from this self imposed treachery present in each one of my steps.

The temptation is strong to escape to dream land

Very strong, attractive, luring

And then so says the reasoning part of me

No... let's not do nothing, let's do something

Anything but nothing

So here I am blogging about nothing

With intent toward my greater good

Now off to my domestic responsibility...

Cool things occur to me as they perkle up from these mysterious places in the brain

Seemingly odd things can occur to people who are growers of their own smartness
I think about it in terms as what subconscious speaks in
It speaks in pictures, like dreams
This is a daydream this morning mood of mine
I tell my subconscious to deal with these things
Proper during sleep and stop interrupting me

The Impressionable Mind

The first time I heard the name "Jesus Christ"
was when my mom
used it as a swear word.
Seriously, Swear to God
I was about 10 y/o before I learned different.

The Mechanisms of the Mind

Patterns
Patterns
are the mind's paper
Metaphors
Metaphors
are the mind's ink
Intention
Intention
is the mind's publisher

What else would you think?

Something I'm really on the fence over...

I live in the furthest furthest furthest southwest corner of the continental United States. The way the crow flies, I'd be in Tijuana, Mexico (TJ) in ten aeronautical miles.

This proximity, being the case, there is an awful lot of debate over illegal immigration round here. It gets hot and heated and a lot of attention.

People are concerned. A lot of people are. And then there's me.

I'm so on the fence here.

I mean irrespective of the religious implications, I really do want to help the less fortunate and it is also in my natural nature to want to love my neighbor.

When I imagine it, I see what US economic engines could do to rally people together around the resources all over that land. The standard of living would rise across the board for a lot of people down there and all it basically would take is some direction and organization of some sort. I wonder what a group of western philanthropists could do if given a region for a test spot. I wonder.

I am for restrictions on the border absolutely, and the laws in place are effective when they can be enforced. It's just that if it were my job to tell a little Mexican girl she had to leave her classroom because she is on the wrong side of the border, it would wear on my heart something terrible.

(Oh what's a mother to do? I worry worry worry over you kids)...

And into my field of vision occurred

...
a tiny, almost imperceptible dot. As the dot came into sharper focus, it became wider as I watched

At a certain point it became so wide, this point of darkness

that I was within in it

Absorbed

Engulfed

I realized that this was a portal

I crossed into

And that little tiny

nearly imperceptible dot

is in my field of vision all the time