Former Plan Files

It is by caffeine alone that I set my mind in motion
By the beans of java, my thoughts acquire speed
The hands acquire the shakes, the shakes become a warning
It is by caffeine alone that I set my mind in motion

There it is again. Some clueless FOOL talking about the "Information Superhighway." They don't know JACK about the net. It's NOTHING like a Superhighway. That's a BAD metaphor.

Yeah, but suppose the metaphor ran in the OTHER direction. Suppose the HIGHWAYS were like the NET. All right! Severe craziness. A highway HUNDREDS of lanes wide. Most with potholes. Privately operated bridges and overpasses. No highway patrol. A couple of rent-a-cops on bicycles with broken whistles. 500 member VIGILANTE POSSES with nuclear weapons. 237 ON RAMPS at every intersection. NO SIGNS. Wanna get to Ensenada? Holler out the window at a passing truck to ask directions. AD HOC traffic laws. Some lanes would VOTE to make use by a single-occupant-vehicle a CAPITAL OFFENSE on Monday through Friday between 7:00 and 9:00. Other lanes would just SHOOT you without a trial for talking on a car phone.

AOL would be a giant diesel-smoking BUS with hundreds of EBOLA victims and a TOILET spewing out on the road behind it. Throwing DEAD WOMBATS and rotten cabbage at the other cars most of which have been ASSEMBLED AT HOME from kits. Some are 2.5 horsepower LAWNMOWER ENGINES with a top speed of nine miles an hour. Others burn NITROGLYCERINE and IDLE at 120.

No license tags. World War II BOMBER NOSE ART instead. Terrifying paintings of huge teeth or VAMPIRE EAGLES. Bumper mounted MACHINE GUNS. Flip somebody the finger on this highway and get a WHITE PHOSPHORUS GRENADE up your tailpipe. Flatbed trucks with ANTI-AIRCRAFT MISSILE BATTERIES to shoot down the KRUD Traffic Watch helicopter. A little kid on a tricycle with a squirtgun filled with HYDROCHLORIC ACID.

NO OFFRAMPS.

Now THAT'S the way to run an Interstate Highway system.

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					(created by helder@ci.ua.pt)

The Phonetic Alphabet

Coaster Trip, Summer 96, Hit 22 coasters in seven days:

• Big Dipper -- Geauga Lake (Ohio)
• Blue Streak -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Cedar Creek Mine Train -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Comet -- Hersheypark (Pa)
• Corkscrew -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Disaster Transport -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Double Loop -- Geauga Lake (Ohio)
• Gemini -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Iron Dragon -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Magnum XL-200 -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Mantis -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Mean Streak -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Mind Eraser -- Geauga Lake (Ohio)
• Mine Train -- Hersheypark (Pa)
• Predator -- Darien Lake
• Raging Wolf Bobs -- Geauga Lake (Ohio)
• Raptor -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Sidewinder -- Hersheypark (Pa)
• Superdooperlooper -- Hersheypark (Pa)
• Viper -- Darien Lake
• Wildcat -- Cedar Point (Ohio)
• Wildcat -- Hersheypark (Pa)

Plus, earlier this season, we've hit 8 others:

• Batman, The Ride -- Six Flags Great Adv. (NJ)
• Comet -- from Crystal Beach, now at Great Escape
• Great American Scream Machine -- Six Flags Great Adv. (NJ)
• Riverside Cyclone -- Riverside Park (MA)
• Rolling Thunder -- Six Flags Great Adv. (NJ)
• Runaway Mine Train -- Six Flags Great Adv. (NJ)
• Steamin' Demon -- Great Escape
• Thunderbolt -- Riverside Park (MA)

Not bad numbers for before the summer solstice!

"The factory of the future will have two employees: a man and a dog. The man will be there to feed the dog. The dog will be there to keep the man from touching the equipment." Report on Business, 10/03/1996

AREA MAN ENCOURAGED TO GIVE UP THE FUNK

DETROIT--Area lawyer Gene Belmont was encouraged to give up the funk Saturday night at a downtown Detroit dance club. Entertaining clients from out of town, Belmont brought the guests to TJ's House of Funk, and proceeded to dance and socialize. At the evening's high point, with many patrons dancing ecstatically, bandleader Jesse Gardner asked Belmont enthusiastically to relinquish control of the funk. "Give it up, baby, give it up baby," Gardner said. "You gots to give up the funk." He later added, "Unnhhh." Though as of press time it was not known whether Belmont released the funk, sources close to the lawyer say he was more than prepared to give it up.

"Digerati -- n.pl., People highly skilled in the processing and manipulation of digital information; wealthy or scholarly techno-nerds."

New York Times Magazine, 3-1-1992, pg 12

Industry Fact: When Elvis Presley died in 1977 there were 37 Elvis impersonators in the world.

Today there are 48,000.

If the current trend continues, by the year 2010, one out of every three people in the world will be an Elvis impersonator.

Audio Village ad
Oct 1993 _MIX_ magazine

Imitation Hemingway Contest Winner

By John Browne published under the Creative Commons license.

The Bug Count Also Rises

In the fall of that year the rains fell as usual and washed the leaves of the dust and dripped from the leaves onto the ground. The shuttles drove through the rainy streets and took the people to meetings, then later brought them back, their tires spraying the mist into the air. Many days he stood for a long time and watched the rain and the shuttles and drank his double-tall mochas. With the mochas he was strong.

Hernando who worked down the hall and who was large with microbrews came to him and told him that the ship day was upon them but the bugs were not yet out. The bugs which were always there even when you were in Cafes late at night sipping a Redhook or a double-tall mocha and you thought you were safe but they were there and although Enrico kept the floor swept clean and the mochas were hot the bugs were there and they ate at you.

When Hernando told him this he asked how many bugs.

"The RAID is huge with bugs," Hernando said. "The bugs are infinite."

"Why do you ask me? You know I cannot do this thing anymore with the bugs."

"Once you were great with the bugs," Hernando said. "No one was greater," he said again. "Even Prado."

"Prado? What of Prado? Let Prado fix the bugs."

Hernando shrugged. "Prado is finished. He was gored by three Sev2's on Chicago. All he does now is drink herb tea and play with his screensavers."

"Herb tea?"

"It is true, my friend." Hernando shrugged again.

Later he went to his office and sat in the dark for a long time. Then he sent e-mail to Michaels.

Michaels came to him while he was sipping a mocha. They sat silently for awhile, then he asked Michaels, "I need you to triage for me."

Michaels looked down. "I don't do that anymore," he said.

"This is different. The bugs are enormous. There are an infinity of bugs."

"I'm finished with that," Michaels said again. "I just want to live quietly."

"Have you heard Prado is finished? He was badly gored. Now he can only drink herb tea."

"Herb tea?" Michaels said.

"It is true," he said sorrowfully.

Michaels stood up. "Then I will do it, my friend," he said formally. "I will do it for Prado, who was once great with the bugs. I will do it for the time we filled Prado's office with bouncy balls, and for the time Prado wore his nerf weapons in the marketing hall and slew all of them with no fear and only a great joy at the combat. I will do it for all the pizza we ate and the bottles of Coke we drank."

Together they walked slowly back, knowing it would be good. As they walked the rain dripped softly from the leaves, and the shuttles carried the bodies back from the meetings.