Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts

Thursday, January 14, 2016

Slaying Daemons: The Dark Side of the Keyboard

Once more unto the breach, dear friends. The raging war outside our wall persists, and circumstances seemingly beyond our control loom large.  

A sense of agnostic despair tells us to ignore the carnage, to pretend evil doesn’t exist, and to that end we silently recite the Serenity Prayer, especially that one liberating line—serenity to accept the things we cannot change. But those other lines haunt us. We don’t want to remember them, and yet we do: The courage to change the things we can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
There sits the keyboard.
An unassuming object, it is neither good nor bad. Once touched by human hands, it becomes something else entirely. A rabbit hole of endless sordid distraction and entertainment, or a powerful weapon against dark forces, against the Goliath many see but cannot acknowledge.

But when the blast of war blows in our ears…We hear the screams, we see the invisible daemons in our midst, cloaked and deadly. It’s time to fight. We sense it, deep inside our souls. It’s overwhelming and we want to hide, we want to close our eyes and cover our ears. The rabbit hole beckons, offering hours of superficial escape with which to pass the time.  
Or close up the wall with our English dead. Will we have the courage to change the things we can?
There sits the keyboard. Once more.



"Are you up for this? Are you? Look, I just need to know...because the city is flying. We're fighting an army of robots. And I have a bow and arrow. None of this makes sense. But I'm going back out there because it's my job, okay?" ~ Avengers: Age of Ultron




Note: All background images purchased from www.Fotolia.com.

Monday, October 12, 2015

Curious ROBOT Visits the Library

Inspired by one of my favorite childhood stories.


This is ROBOT. He was a good little android and always very curious.

Today ROBOT and his friend, The Cyborg in the NextGenSkin, were at the library.
ROBOT couldn’t believe the number of books on the library shelves. He’d never seen so much paper in one place before. The books were covered in a thick layer of dust, and cobwebs stretched across the bookends.
 
 
ROBOT and The Cyborg in the NextGenSkin pushed the cobwebs out of the way as they read the titles, trying to find the right one.

“Wherever could it be?” ROBOT muttered to himself.

They’d gone to the library for a particular book. An out-of-print book that wasn’t in their memory bank, a book they heard might be dangerous for NewSociety.

A banned book, purported to exist in only one location.



“I found it,” The Cyborg in the NextGenSkin said. “Over here, in the back.”

Curious ROBOT made his way to the corner, and took the damaged, faded book from his friend. ROBOT examined the cover, the insides, the brittle binding. He held it to his nose, inhaling.


Ick. No wonder NewSociety closed down all the bookstores and libraries. It was a terrible aroma that reeked of old paper held for too long by human hands.

“That’s the one,” Curious ROBOT said. “Let’s go.”
“Aren’t you going to read it?” his friend asked.
“I don’t need to,” Curious ROBOT replied. “I read about it. Same thing, right? Don’t you just love the challenge of finding books that aren’t in the system? Like a puzzle.”
“Sure. I guess.”



Curious ROBOT and The Cyborg in the NextGenSkin took the banned book outside, set it on fire, and watched it burn down to ashes on the concrete.

Then they went home.
 



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