Maybe forty minutes ago I was preparing to make mashed potatoes. The water came to a boil, I reduced the heat to a simmer, covered the pot, set the phone timer to fifteen minutes and started to watch a video version of Asimov's classic short story "The Last Question" on YouTube. It's about mankind's unending effort to find a way to reverse entropy and bring the cosmos back to life, all the way down the line without obtaining a solution until uncounted trillions of years in the future, the all-knowing cosmic computer, the only thing that still exists in the nothingness that the cosmos has become, finally figures out how to effect creation out of nothing. I became engrossed in the video and quite forgot about the time; then just as the video came to the thrilling climax where the cosmic computer commands "Let there be light!" the timer went off next to me -- and loudly, too: "BBRRINGG!". Boy, was I startled!^^
As an aside, I'd wanted to add a little horseradish to the mashed potatoes, but found my supply had gone bad. I ended up using wasabi instead, and it actually turned out pretty good, even without gravy.
No comments:
Post a Comment