Editor's Prescript To THE GRATE BOOK OF MOO I came by this document, written on old parchment in a fine calligraphic hand, and signed in an illegible scrawl, in the back of an old book shop, sold as a package with a volume on the Copernican solar system. The signature I later took to a handwriting analyst, who determined it to be that of one "Egbert B. Gebstadter". After reading the document carefully several times, I returned with the book to the shop where I had bought it, and asked where the owner had obtained it. It seems that he had bought it off a certain translator named Gebstadter who, being hard up for money, had brought in a stack of books from his private collection, all of which were very antique. He was reluctant to part with them, but needed the cash. With some difficulty, I was able to track down this Gebstadter, and in exchange for the return of his book on Copernicus, I was able to extract from him the information of whence came this mysterious parchment. It seems Gebstadter himself had translated the work about ten years earlier, and that he had obtained it from a friend named Marcus. I sought out Marcus, who reported that he had found the document in the bottom of an ancient steamer trunk. This would have been the end of my trail, except that Marcus happened to have been curious about what such a document would be doing underneath the false bottom that concealed the inside of the trunk. Although Marcus himself could not translate the document, the original of which he showed me, Gebstadter had helped him, hence his curiosity. He had returned to his uncle, from whom he had obtained the trunk, and eventually dragged the secret out of him. Marcus' uncle had been visiting in Sweden some years previously, and hidden the document in his trunk to ensure its safety during the voyage. Marcus asked where his uncle had found the document, and discovered that it was sold to him by a fortune teller in Stockholm. She had obtained it in lieu of payment from a mysterious customer in a long dark coat, and having no use for it, sold it immediately to Marcus' uncle. Fortunately, Marcus' uncle had had the good sense to demand to know what it was, and so had the fortune teller, who wasn't ready to accept anything short of cash without a good explanation. The mysterious customer had told the lady that it was a translation into Swedish of an ancient Atlantean manuscript known only as the "Voynich Manuscript". He told her that he had "liberated" it from the hands of the tightfisted Atlantis scholar who had translated it. The scholar himself had obtained it from a peddler in England, who had sold him many works of Atlantean art, and the occasional manuscript, and the peddler, on pressure from the scholar, admitted to stealing it from the Temple of Atlantis, which survived in London, handing down the tradition of the Atlantean faith from "High Preest" to "High Preest". These Atlantis Templars professed as an article of faith, when the peddler joined under false pretenses in order to steal the Atlantean art, that they had had them since the fall of Atlantis, and a few surviving members rescued some of the islands more important and portable treasures in their boat. This particular manuscript, they elaborated, was a transcript of the original, taken during the fall of Atlantis from the palace of the Great King Norble-Goop the Seventh, who reigned during the Fourth Dynasty of the House of Norble, the final dynasty of Atlantis. Investigating the Atlantis Templars, I discovered that King Norble had neither written nor found the manuscript himself, but that it had been in the Royal Archives for the past several thousand years before the final collapse of Atlantis. It was originally purchased by Queen Dorble-Sneep the Fifth, of the Seventh Dynasty of the Dorbles, from a travelling Flying Saucer pilot, and translated by the Alien Contact specialists of Atlantis. The pilot explained that he was an Intergalactic Merchant Broker, and that this document was of no use to him, having been purchased from a Time Travel Technician as a novelty item for his wife, just before learning that she'd filed for divorce. The Time Travel Technician, in turn, had picked it up as a sample from some time in the future, and translated it for study. After finding out what it was, he began selling the translated copies. It later turned out that the "some time in the future" happened to be some hundred thousand years after the Intergalactic Merchant Broker got it, and, after further study, I found that the exact dates given by the Atlantis Templars explained their horror at finding the manuscript stolen by the peddlar. Apparently the Technician explained to the Intergalactic Merchant Broker that the present civilization on Earth (that is, Atlantis) would eventually collapse, and 10000 years would pass before civilzation emerged again, somewhere in Africa or possibly the Mediterranean (he wasn't quite sure), and a long time after that, this very book would appear somewhere in one of the major countries of the world. The Atlantean Templars assumed he meant THEIR copy of the book, which he would then return to his own time and translate into Galactic, since the given date for the theft was in 1998, known to be the year of the X-ist arrival on Earth. As it turns out, it is most likely to be this very manuscript. Guard yours carefully, and don't let any aliens steal it! Enough of the story... On with the Book of MOO! MOOism has nothing to do with COWs. We just like the sound they make. Released 1355670401.55555 DPP Final Release Version 3.141592653589793238462543383 It has been said that King Kong died for your sins this has been confirmed The One Commandment Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law Unless Thou Wilt Not Follow The Law (in other words) Do What You Want Unless You Don't Want To (or) Never Mind (or simply) MU! "If It Ain't Ranted, It Ain't True" -W.O.M.B.A.T. Systems Inc. Motto DISCLAIMER Don't trust anyone. If they tell you something, it's a lie. In fact, every sentence ever written or spoken is a lie. No, that's a lie. Or maybe that was. This one is a lie. Actually, that's not true. The truth IS somewhere in this book. You just have to find it. Remember: Just because it's deep, don't mean it's True. This Book has been thouroughly researched. Just that some of the facts have been changed to protect the guilty. This is a most blasphemous and heretical and annoying mind drug passing itself off as a book. So don't blame us if you get addicted or sent to Hell. Don't read the footnotes. They're dangerous. The truth isn't in them. THEY LIE! LIE LIKE A RUG! If you experience side effects from this annoying mind drug, contact your regular physician. Do not inhale this annoying mind drug while operating heavy marmalade. This annoying mind drug is not intended to replace genuine and authorized medical, professional, legal, political, social, economic, or otherwise authenticated advice. Consult your regular brainwasher before pulling the wool over your own eyes. COPY-RITES Copyright wheneverthehell this is. We hold all rights to this work, yes, you heard me, ALL of them. This work may not be reproduced in whole or in part by any means, photocopy, modem, reading, understanding, remembering, mentioning, or any other method without the prior written consent of the High Preest. That being out of the way, I hereby give written consent for anyone to do whatever they like to it. Not that I'm the High Preest or anything. All rights reserved except the right to reserve all rights except the one used to reserve most of the rights except the right to reserve all rights but this one. All rites reversed. And now for something completely identacle... INTRODUCTION This is the current compiled works of MOOism as written by those who really should know better - The Apostles of MOO, and compiled, edited and formatted by the Cardinal Richelieu Hellhound 101 (who claims no responsability for the contents thereof). It was then taken by Floyd Gecko, High Preest of MOO, and shamefully edited beyond all recognition. Finally taken by Half-Mad, Grate Prophet of MOO, and hacked up into the COW format you see here. It should be noted that Hellhound 101 has since attempted to leave, on account of how the others got far too carried away with the whole thing, and lost track of the point. The others insBLATTT that that WAS the point. But they're fools. If you thought this was stupid, just wait till you read the REST of the Book. Those who take this book at face value are fools. Those who ignore what this book says are fools. Those who think this book is a waste of time are fools. Correct fools, but fools nonetheless. DEDICATION This Great Book of MOO is dedicated to itself. Houtos Biblios MOOei Esti Seauti. Hic libros MOOi suae dedicatus est. TABLE OF CONTENTS (In No Particular Order) HOLY BEGINNING, BATMAN! HOLY DEFENSIVENESS ................... Grate Prophet Half-Mad TITLE PAGE ............................ Unheretic Gettah Leif DISCLAIMER ............................ Unheretic Gettah Leif COPY-RITES ..................................... Ann O'Nymous INTRODUCTION ............... Cardinal Richelieu Hellhound 101 DEDICATION ................................ The Prettiest One TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................... THE AUTHORS PREFACES PREFACE I ........................... High Preest Floyd Gecko PREFACE II .......................... High Preest Floyd Gecko PREFACE III ................ Cardinal Richelieu Hellhound 101 PREFACE IV .......................... Counciltwit Confuse-Ius PREFACE V .................. Cardinal Richelieu Hellhound 101 PREFACE VI ..................................... Ann O'Nymous PREFACE VII ........................ Inner CirclBLATTT El Cid PREFACE VIII ........................ High Preest Floyd Gecko PREFACE IX ...................... ConfusionBLATTT Confuse-Ius PREFACE IX« .................................... Ann O'Nymous PREFACE X ...................... Counciltwit Brian O'Blivious THE BOOKS OF THE APOSTLES BOOK OF HALFY .................................. Ann O'Nymous BOOK OF FLOYD ................... I Yemen-Oying I Yemen-Oying BOOK OF HELLHOUND .................. Monjunior Little Bug Man BOOK OF TERAFNORD ........... Inner CirclBLATTT Leper Messiah BOOK OF THE LEPER ................... High Preest Floyd Gecko BOOK OF LITTLE ...................................... Wom Bat BOOK OF WOMBAT .......................... Reverend Canoe-Head BOOK OF LLOYD ............................. Prophet TeraFNORD BOOK OF CID ................ Cardinal Richelieu Hellhound 101 BOOK OF ABACAB ............................ Preest Lloyd Taco BOOK OF CANOE-HEAD ................. Outer CirclBLATTT Abacab BOOK OF ANN .......................... Grate Prophet Half-Mad BOOK OF YEMEN ...................... Inner CirclBLATTT El Cid PLUS ONE BONUS UNLBLATTTED BOOK! By Confuse-Ius BOOKS OF RITUALS MAJOR RITUALS 00001-00011 ........... High Preest Floyd Gecko MINOR RITUALS 00001-00004 ........... High Preest Floyd Gecko BOOK OF THE CEREMONIES MARRIAGE CEREMONY ................... High Preest Floyd Gecko INITIATION CEREMONY ................. High Preest Floyd Gecko PROMOTION CEREMONIES ................ High Preest Floyd Gecko EXORCBLATT CEREMONY ................. High Preest Floyd Gecko BAPTBLATT CEREMONY .................. High Preest Floyd Gecko SNOWBLOWER CEREMONY ....................... Preest Lloyd Taco ENLIGHTENMENT MANTRAS ..................... Preest Lloyd Taco BOOK OF THE REALLY SECRET SECRETS ALL SECRET BOOKS .................... High Preest Floyd Gecko ADDENDUM ........................... Penguin Poobah Peng-Peng NOTE ON SECRETS ..................... High Preest Floyd Gecko POTATOMA OF SYNERGY ................. High Preest Floyd Gecko CYBORGANIC CHURCH ................... High Preest Floyd Gecko MULTIVERSE SEQUEL ..................... Lo Proost Confuse-Ius BOOK OF HBLATTTORY COMMENTARIES ON HBLATTTORY ................ Preest Lloyd Taco PROPHECIES OF PENG-PENG ............ Penguin Poobah Peng-Peng AFTERWORD ........................... High Preest Floyd Gecko PROPHETS OF MOO .................... Inner CirclBLATTT El Cid THE ENEMIES OF MOO ................ ConfusionBLATTT Miss Take tHE mORONS ............................... Preest Fluid Geeko THE REAL HISTORY OF MOO ............. High Preest Confuse-Ius SECRET HBLATTTORY OF MOO ....................... Ann O'Nymous BOOKS OF HONEST TRUTH BOOK OF HONEST TRUTH ...................... Preest Lloyd Taco BOOK OF LIES .............................. Preest Lloyd Taco BOOK OF AMBIGUITY ......................... Preest Lloyd Taco BOOK OF NUMBERS ........................... Preest Lloyd Taco BOOK OF MYTHS WOMBAT ORIGIN ISSUE ................................. Wom Bat WOMBAT MYTHS ........................ High Preest Floyd Gecko SNOWBLOWER MYTHS .............................. I Yemen-Oying WOMBATELLITE MYTH .................... Low Preest Goyd Flecko CONVOLUTED MYTHS .......................... Preest Lloyd Taco CYBERMYTHS ............................ Unheretic Gettah Leif PIZZA MYTHS ........................... Unheretic Gettah Leif TELEVISION MYTHS .................... High Preest Floyd Gecko BOOK OF MISCELLANY "WORDS" ........................................ Ann O'Nymous "CONTRACT" .................................. Not Confuse-Ius "NOSLIW NOTNA TREBOR" ............... High Preest Floyd Gecko "PARANOIA PAYS" ................ Confuse-Ius And Ann O'Nymous "RANDOM GIBBERISH" .............................. Confuse-Ius "HAPPY" ................................... Preest Lloyd Taco APPENDICITISES APPENDICITIS I ............. Cardinal Richelieu Hellhound 101 APPENDICITIS II ............ Cardinal Richelieu Hellhound 101 APPENDICITIS III ........... Cardinal Richelieu Hellhound 101 APPENDICITIS IV ..................... Saint Fourth Class Yari APPENDICITIS V ......................... Prophets and Preests APPENDICITIS VI ........................Preest Jeffrey Morton APPENDICITIS VII .................... High Preest Floyd Gecko APPENDICITIS VIII.......................... Preest Lloyd Taco APPENDICITIS IX¬ .................... High Preest Floyd Gecko APPENDICITIS IX« ................................ THE AUTHORS APPENDICITIS X .......................... The Apostles Of MOO Plus meaningless Confuse-Ing Inter-Raptures Flip to a random spot to find a meaningless quote that you can read Starry Wisdom into to shed light on your dark life. Truly. For the TRUE meaning of this Book, Read Between The Lines. WARNING: DO NOT USE THIS DOCUMENT AS TOILET TISSUE!!! Ί=ΚΚώΑΥo]ΧΛ±X/9ώ"'΅s-ζqώx³ƒΓ'njδqώlfΛ8`ΦUΰ MOO OMM PREFACE I as written by Floyd Gecko the stoopid Syntax and general guidelines for MOO: 00001) MOOism and MOOist are the only "ism" and "ist". This is because all the main problems of the world are blamed on "isms": the communBLATTTs blame them on the capitalBLATTTs, and vice versa. The anarchBLATTTs blame it on the fascBLATTTs, everyone hates consumerBLATT, and sadBLATT is thought to be a horrible thing. So, all others besides MOOism and MOOist are replaced by "BLATT" for "ism" and "BLATTT" for "ist". Half-Mad says to only do this to the ones where ISM and IST actually MEAN what it seems to, but you can have fun and do it elsewhere as well... Or even where there's no ISM or IST. Not like we could stop you. 00002) MOO is always in caps. This is because I say so, and I'm the High Preest. 00003) Typical spellings are with 2 "O"s and no "!", with one "!", with 3 "O"s and 2 "!"s and so forth. Other variants, such as the "as many O's as you can write before you get tired of it" variant may also be used. 00004) When you flip the identity of its letters... MOO OMM (This is a typical MOOist logoff on BBS's) 5) Always, ALWAYS, ALWAYS (Well, sometimes), use the 5-digit document numbering system. The MOOist symbol, named the Halfy after Halfy, our Grate Prophet, is a V with a mark inside. Often MOO can be spelled out with little letters. I like to do this with O's for the "M" and M's for the "O"... The words "BOOK" and "ANNOYING MIND DRUG" can be used interchangeably. If any outsiders ask "WHAT IS MOOISM?", the following explanation must be given in order to (a) confuse the shit out of them, (b) protect our real secrets, and (c) satisfy the Law Of Bullshhim. "The big doctrine of MOO is that we live in Hell already. When you die, you get to go to Earth if you're good, or get reincarnated as a bagel if you're bad. In order to obtain Salvation and actually get to get sent to Heaven, you must send all your money and ten cups of coffee, WITHOUT SPILLING, through the mail by Parcel Post, to "BOB", care of the SubGenius Foundation, P.O. Box 140306, Dallas Texas, 75214. Unfortunately, there is this Undead Wombat Horde whose sole job, under the direction of an Evil Computer called WOMBAT, which uses an evil base-23 psychic system to control the world through the Alien Mind Beams, is to tip over and generally abuse all parcels that go through the mail in order to keep us from obtaining genuine salvation. They also steal single socks from dryers, plant extra coathangers in closets, and cause as much confusion and mayhem as possible. Only through communing with the Grate MOO through the Grate Prophet Half-Mad is it possible to remove the influence of these Wombats from your life." As all MOOists know, this is actually a bunch of Bullshher, thrown in to satisfy the Law of Bullshthem. Honest. WOMBAT works FOR us. Really. No, I mean it. Honest. It's true. Note: ]ΧΛ±X/9ώ"'΅s-ζqώx³ƒΓ'njδqώlfΛ8`ΦUΰ#Ύώ^θT PREFACE II as written by the High Preest Of MOO, Floyd Gecko the deranged Whassa MOOism? MOOism is an international Church of Lies, partially not devoted to non-promotion of the Law of Bullshit. MOOists support: happiness, freedom, equality, cannibalBLATT, free sex, anarchy, environmentalBLATT, bureaucracy, socialBLATT, anarchy, free sex, free sex, and more free sex, a bit more anarchy, flour, eggs, baking soda, water, and milk. Mix thoroughly all dry ingredients, stirring rapidly. Throw in some pyromania, paranoia, general insanity and a bit more free sex just to be on the safe side. Add liquid ingredients and beat for a while. Now add some bestiality, necrophilia, and sadBLATT... or am I just flogging a dead horse here? And remember AleBLATTTer Crowley's favourite saying: "Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law" And the stoopid SubGenius Takeoff: "Do what keepeth thou from wilting shall be the loophole in the law" That is, ya get ta do whatever you like. This means EVERYONE. Including you. Actually, that's a lie. It's just that there's always these taboo things, even if they're so well enforced that you don't know they're there. So the only thing we stand for is getting rid of them (HONEST!) even if they're not even fully formed yet, like in them counter-culture things against yer basic smart-ass, yer basic televangelBLATTT, and stuff like that there. Oh, you wanted it in DEEP terms? Okay, I'll give the "condensed" version of my various "DEEP" explanations I give to people who aren't sufficiently silly (enlightened) to understand the REAL one... All people who don't need this in your life at this time, you can ignore it, or you can fuck off. Religious Explanation: MOOism is the worship of "The Grate MOO", which is a composite of ALL religious Gods and Goddesses, taking the metaphorical form of a great Mother Goddess... Just as, in HinduBLATT, for example, there are many lesser gods and so forth, all combined into Brahma, the Grate MOO does this across sectarian borders. [deeeeeeep] Mathematical Explanation: The Grate MOO is the most literal possible representation of Cantor's Absolute Infinite. When Cantor discovered that there are infinitely many LEVELS of infinity (the number of levels is the same as the value of the highest level), he presaged the Grate MOO. The Grate MOO is, by definition, incomprehensible, because of the Reflection Principle, which states that any description about the Absolute Infinite also applies to some smaller level of infinity. The Grate MOO is the set of all things which exBLATTT, might exBLATTT, could theoretically be imagined, or aren't even possible. [deeeeeeeeeeeep] Psychological Explanation: MOOism is the attempt to expand the human mind by allowing participants to dissolve their own reflex-arcs and habitual modes of thought by using silliness (a well known catalyst for nonlinear breakdown modes) and a variation of non-morality and a zenlike satori experience through Godel-like mental tricks and paradoxes, which is reccomended for all participants. [deeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep] The ArtBLATTTic Explanation: MOOism is the first religion to recongnize OFFICIALLY the potential of religion as a GNU art form. In the past, single works of art might have been treasured and held in devotion. Now, with the explosion of Pop Art (art on soft-drink cans), art is everywhere, from billboards by roadsides to the elite galleries of Europe. Religions were once created painstakingly, and held separately, apart from the rest. MOO is one of the opening waves of Pop Religion. Pretty soon, the Revealed Word Of God will show up on your bottle of Coke... The Memetic Explanation: MOOism is the attempt to acheive more rapid human evolution by preserving as many memetic portions of human society as possible. It includes all memes which exBLATTT at any one time, as well as creating memes which don't. Because of this, it includes ALL COWhuman thought within it as preservation, and comprehension of the whole by any one human is therefore impossible. The reason they all seem so different is because of the Reflection Principle. Any of those descriptions could equally well apply to any other similar religion as well, because MOO is transcendental, including ALL human thought. Of course, the REAL explanation is much more fun, being extremely silly. PREFACE III as written by the Elite High Councilors of MOO, the Cardinal Richelieus And The High Preest There are several subdivisions of MOOism. The First is the religion itself: A) The many-leveled being of MOO has been explored in a multitude of ways, and some would seem to indicate that not all the tiers of MOO are equal, and are in fact dBLATTTinguished by name, rank and membership requirements. Here are the titles, in no particular order. Or maybe some order, but not a very significant one. Well, something like that. 00001. Omnimalevolent Polly's Father and Grated Leader Of MOO Title: Grate Prophet of MOO, Apostate of MOOism Number of Title Holders (max): One Half (1/2) (0.5) Current Title Holder: Half-Mad Tenure: Infinite. Plus 4 years Membership Requirements: Unknown Job: Classified 0001¬. The Wholly Air-Traffic Controller of Potatoma Title: The High Preest of MOO, Apostate of MOOism Number of Title Holders (max): One and a bit (1+bit) Current Title Holder: Floyd Gecko (and a bit) Tenure: Until eaten by a Cow, or death Membership Requirements: Write much of the Book of MOO, Be stupendously silly, and be willing to be eaten by a Cow when the Cow so decides. Job: To justify MOO fests, to write about Mints and Wombats, to call for MOO guidance in times of need. 0001«. The Elite Upper Council of MOO Title: Cardinal Richelieu, Mud, Apostate of MOOism Number of Title Holders (max): Whatever the others say (3) Current Title Holders: Hellhound 101 Tenure: Life Membership Requirements: Be sexually active, open minded, wise and knowledgeable about the items of MOO and the many Heresies. Members must be voted in by the current Title Holders and nobody else. Job: To attempt to cancel MOOfests, to hunt down and capture the heretic unMOO cultBLATTTs to be either destroyed by MOO vengeance or to be turned over to the MOOists for re-programming or to be eaten by the Grate Prophet and the Dinner Circle members. 00002. Prophet of MOO Title: Prophet, Little Prophet, Apostle of MOOism. Number of Title Holders (max): Whatever The Grate Prophet sez. Current Title Holders: Necromancer TeraFNORD Tenure: Life, or until removed by Grate Prophet Membership Requirements: To be accepted by The Grate Prophet, to make prophecies about things surreal. Job: To attend MOO-Fests, to do silly things in silly places, to think of neat ways science can be used for personal entertainment. 00003. Saint First Class Title: Saint First Class, Wow A Saint Number of Title Holders (max): unlimited Current Title Holders: (TOP SECRET) Tenure: More or less infinite Membership Requirements: (TOP SECRET) Job: (TOP SECRET) 00004. Nobody There is no 4th rank. Title: None Number of Title Holders (max): none Examples: None Tenure: None Membership Requirements: None Job: None 0004«. Saint Second Class Title: Saint Second Class, Saint Bernard Number of Title Holders (max): unlimited Examples: Spaxter, Yossarian, HAL 9000, Simon MOON, Floyd Gecko, Harry Gerber, Trurl & Klapaucius Tenure: as near to infinite as makes no odds Membership Requirements: To be a fictional character of interest. 00005. Saint Third Class Title: Saint Third Class, Saint Patrick's Day Number of Title Holders (max): unlimited Examples: All Monty Python characters, Arthur Dent Tenure: infinite or until they get really boring Membership Requirements: To be a silly fictional character 0005¬. Saint Fourth Class Title: Saint Fourth Class, Jolly Saint Nick Number of Title Holders (max): unlimited Examples: Yari, John Lennon, St. John The Divine, Richard Feynman, Pythagoras, Moimos Eursti, Ferenc Puskas, R. Buckminster Fuller, Alan Turing, Jon von Neumann, Siddartha Gautama, John Fitzgerald Kennedy Tenure: until they come back to life Membership Requirements: be dead, or doing a REASONABLE facsimile thereof after making a great contribution to MOOism. 0005«. Saint Fifth Class Title: Saint Fifth Class, Day-Saint Number Of Title Holders (max): 1729 Examples: Go-Go the Do-Do, Arthur Dent, Dalai Dan, St. John The Divine, Rudy Rucker, Eric the Half A Bee, Brian O'Blivious, Daffy Duck Tenure: Until no longer useful/valid/licenced, but only during the day, just because I feel like it. Membership Requirements: Act EXTREMELY surreal, or just sort of generally wierd, or act constantly as if hit on the head by 5 cartoon anvils, or otherwise be confused. Can be real OR fictional, as required. 005.6. Bishopesse Of MOO Title: Bishoppesse/Bishop, One Of The Silly Pointy Hat Number Of Title Holders (joe): 6.3 Examples: MuPPeT (Muppet) (Mup Pet) Tenure: Until the kitchen sinks Membership Reqiurements: Get chosen Job: To complain about Bishops, and act exceedingly cute when asked. Or don't. 00006. Bishop Of MOO Title: Bishop/Bishoppesse, Diagonal One, Apostle of MOOism Number Of Title Holders (max): 11 Tenure: Until Hell Freezes Over Membership Requirements: Say "I'm A Bishop Now" in the presence of one of the top five members of MOO without getting thwacked. Job: To adminBLATTTrate, to lead, to Preech, and to generally tell everyone else what to do. To do what you like. 00007. Knight Of MOO Title: Knight Of The Trapezoidal Table, Llama, Apostle of MOOism Number Of Title Holders (max): 23 Tenure: A Long Time, In A Galaxy Far Away Membership Requirements: Be unable to turn yourself and others into frogs, but have obvious talent for something unspecified. Be accepted by higher levels. Job: Plant plastic cacti in public places, leave unintelligible messages on BBSes, tell everyone you know about MOOism. Violently convert random people to Fateor. 00008. Rook Of MOO Title: Rookie Of The Year, Straight One, Apostle of MOOism. Number Of Title Holders (max): 83... or maybe 93 Tenure: 23 years, renewable Membership Requirements: Go through trial period of 23 days of observation, act surreal, spread the Word. Job: Continue to Spread The Word. Eat Peanut-Butter and Banana Sandwiches. 0008«. Monjuniorhood Of MOO Title: Monjunior Of The Church Of MOO, Apostle Of MOOism. Number Of Title Holders (fred): 93... or maybe 83 Tenure: Ten ures, renewable. Membership Requirements: Things which are required to become a member. Job: What the members do. 00009. The Dinner Circle Of MOO Title: Inner CirlBLATTT, Virgin, Phred, Apostle of MOOism. Number of Title Holders (max): One Hundred And Four (104) Tenure: four years, renewable Membership Requirements: Be accepted by the upper levels of MOO as an Inner CirclBLATTT after serving a term as an Outer CirclBLATTT. Job: To attend MOOfests, to set fires, to be silly and to practise Free and Safe Sex. May act as Preest if it's important. Or if it isn't, for that matter. 00010. Preest of MOO Title: Preest of MOOism, Apostle of MOOism. Number of Title Holders (max): As many as are needed, keeping at least one (one) (1) (I) (0.5 + 0.5) per sect of MOOism. Tenure: Life, or until quit or removed by the High Preest. Membership Requirements: To try to be as silly as the High Preest, to write some stuff for something about very little. Job: To find GNU literary and audio/video sources for MOOist enjoyment, continue to Preech. 00011. The Doubter Circle Of MOO Title: Outer CircleBLATTT of MOO, Weenie, Goober, SnotBall, Apostle of MOOism Number of Title Holders (max): Eighteen Hundred (1800) Tenure: one day, renewed automatically until excommunicated or raised to the level of a Virgin. Membership requirements: Submit Application, endure ritual. Job: To attend MOOfests, to impress the higher odours of MOO. To spread the word (and treacle) of MOO. QUACK! 0011«. Pasteur Title: Hon. Pasteur, Pasteur, Moloko, The Beast Number Of Title Holders (max): 666.666 Tenure: Until sourness occurdles Membership Requirements: Be pure, disease-free, opaque, and generally uncontaminated. Job: To ensure the mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual health of all Offical Animals in the vicinity. 00012. Honourable Reverend Title: Hon. Reverend, Reverend Number or Title Holders (max): Anyone approved by a higher level. Tenure: As long as they appear to give the correct impression. Membership requirements: Hmm, doesn't take much really. Job: Do odd things with sheep. Be social. Save large groups of people from painfully horrid deaths when needed. 00013. Councillor Of MOO Title: Counciltwit, Some Council Thing Or Other Number of Title Holders (max): Zillions Tenure: Determined by the Councils Membership Requirements: Determined by the Councils Job: Attempt to protect the Church Of MOO from the CapriCancer threat. 00014. CapriCancer Title: Some Loser Guy, Cancerous Growth Number Of Title Holders (max): A whole bunch Tenure: Until tenure expires Membership Requirements: Head a worldwide conspiracy. Job: Attempt to destroy that horrible and blasphemous MOO thing. Kill Floyd Gecko. Be utterly despicable. 00015. Acolyte Title: Scum, Hey You, Silly Twit Number of Title Holders (max): Infinite. Plus one. Tenure: As long as the Apostles of MOOism feel like. Membership Requirements: Submit application, endure tiny ritual Job: Do whatever the Inner CirclBLATTTs and above want you to. Be a gopher to the higher orders. 00016. Fateor Title: Lazy Twit Number of Title Holders: Very difficult to estimate. Tenure: As long as they like. Membership Requirements: In some way, to actively recignize MOOism. No application required. Job: Actively recignize MOOism in any way you choose. 00017. Agnoscere Title: Idiot, Twit Number of Title Holders: A lot Tenure: Life, or until moved to a higher ranking. Membership Requirements: To have, at some point, recognized or known that MOOism exBLATTTs. No application required. Job: To have, at some point, recignized the exBLATTTance of MOOism, but have not filled out any application, are not a saint, and do not actively recignize MOOism. 00018. Snacky Title: Snackie, Unsuspecting Freak Number Of Title Holders: Dang near 6 Billion Tenure: Until They're Not A Snacky Anymore Membership Requirements: To be Un-MOO, Anti-MOO, or to have no connection with MOO whatsoever. Job: To be eaten and otherwise destroyed by the Cow and MOOists in the form of War, Crime, AIDS, and Cheese Whiz. 00019. Evil One Title: That Evil Guy, Evil Person, Bung Number of Title Holders (MAX): Twelve Current Title Holders: Brian Mulroney, Vincent Emond, "BOB" Tenure: Until no longer evil, or people forget who you are. Membership Requirements: To be extremely evil. Or at least a bit evil. At any rate, to be something vaguely resembling evil for a little while, or maybe not be very nice to someone at some point or other. Maybe. Job: To continue to be a bit evil until tenure elapses, or are eaten by the Great MOO. 00020. Perrennial Heretic Title: Legend In His Own Mind, I Yemen Oying Number of Title Holders (max): FIVE Current Title Holders: I Yemen-Oying, E.D. Brebis Tenure: Until conversion or onset of senility Membership Requirements: Refuse to admit to being a MOOist, but participate in most Fests and Rituals anyways. Non-application required. Job: Refuse to admit to being a MOOist, participate in Nomic ritual, Fests, burning, QUACKBLATT, ConfusionBLATT, Muk-Funna MOO ritual, and all minor rituals. Protest violently against being made a category of MOOism. 00021. Everybody Else Title: Nobody, Worthless Loser, Some Dimwit Number Of Title Holders: Infinity minus one Current Title Holders: Almost Everyone. Tenure: Until finding out about MOOism, or in any way fitting into one or more of the previous titles. Membership Requirements: To have never even heard of MOOism. Job: None. 00022. Other Title: Other, Nobody Special, Lord High Chancellor Number Of Title Holders: Don't ask ME Current Title Holders: Ann O'Nymous, Half-Mad, Bishoppesse MuPPeT Tenure: Unclear At This Time Membership Requirements: To fail to fall into any of the other categories, or to not even exBLATTT. Job: Complete the necessary 23rd membership rank. 00023. UberSagan Title: Billions and Billions Number of Title Holders: Vast Tenure: Until shrinkage (JuΊ=ΚΚώΑΥo]ΧΛ±X/9ώ"'΅s-ζqώx³ƒΓ'njδqώlfΛ8`ΦΛ-@ό) Membership Requirements: To be a very large number Job: To denumerate things _ 0000Q. Nun Of The Above Title: Nun Of The Above, High Priestess, Someone Number Of Title Holders (max): nξN Tenure: No Examples: High Priestess Indoctrinate-Me Membership Requirements: To exBLATTT entirely outside the MOOish ranking system. Job: To confuse the hell out of people. B) Another subdivision of MOOism is QUACKBLATT. See the book of QUACK for information on the QUACKBLATTTs. The Great QUACK is the rebel son of the Great MOO. His brother is BOB, and his sBLATTTers are Eris and Aneris. Fortunately, the QUACKBLATTTs have recently converted to this. Previously they were MOOists who wouldn't admit it, which is the worst kind. Now they are MOOists who DO admit it, which is the... well... the other kind. C) The Church Of The Sub-Genius All MOOists must at least contemplate joining this Church. There is no problem with belonging to both, at least according to MOO. What they think about it may be a different matter. The central pillar of their belief is that there is a semi-mystical entity known as "BOB", who will appear in the X-BLATTT Flying Saucers in 1998 and take all members of the Church away, and transform them into OverWomen and Ubermen. Honest. "BOB" is known to be responsible for the rash of strange or mystical "BOB"s in the media, such as the "BOB" of the Doritos commercials, and the "BOB" in Twin Peaks. According to the Church of the Sub-Genius, these events will become more and more common as the time of "BOB"'s arrival approaches. For this reason, all MOOists in this subsect, and those outside who want to get in the "good books" must actively attempt to create more of these mystical "BOB"s in the world. If you are able, put ads in the paper with mysterious overtones about "BOB". If you are a columnBLATTT, say something odd about him. Basically, do that kind of thing. The wider the audience the better. "BOB" is to be held as a secondary deity of MOOism, a son of the Great MOO. His sBLATTTers are Eris and Aneris, his brother is QUACK, who is NOT a deity. Excerpts from the Annoying Mind Drug of The SubGenius would have been included in an appendix, but weren't. D) DiscordianBLATT For the full story, consult the Principia Discordia, which may, upon much pleading, be borrowed from Hellhound 101 if he's in a good MOOd, or Floyd Gecko, if he's not. Or bought at a store, if you feel like being CONVENTIONAL. Basically, Eris (or Discordia, as she is known to some) is the Goddess of Chaos. She may be contacted through your Pineal Gland. She represents the forces of disorder, chaos, and confusion. Since this is one of the main purposes of MOOism, members are advised to join this subsection of MOOism. The only thing wrong with the story as given in the Principia Discordia is that it fails to understand the gospel of Yari. Here, then, are some revisions: After the Great Explosion which created the Earth and the Heavens and the Universe out of the Primordial Tundra in which flourished the Primordial Penguins, there was also created by the Great MOO two sBLATTTers from the little bit called Void. These sBLATTTers were Eris and Aneris. They had THREE brothers, two of which were oddly not mentioned in Principia, known as "BOB", and QUACK. The third was mentioned, but didn't have a name. Eris did not, as has been suggested, create the world, but she took it to play with it, which was actually what got Aneris upset. In 1998, "BOB" will take it back from them, and make it a better place for all of us, but some time after that, QUACK will throw it on the Tundra (or what is left of the Tundra) and break it. The great MOO will then have to get a GNU one for her children to play with. For more information, consult the Principia Discordia. It should be available somewhere or other. E) The Temple Of The Primordial Penguin In the gospel according to Saint Yari, it is revealed that before the creation of the world there exBLATTTed great penguins. It is not known where these penguins came from, but those who ask such questions are surely heretics, as we all know they were made by the Great MOO, who made herself retroactively, while playing the Game Of Nomic. What is not commonly known is that one of these Penguins, a young fellow whose name may not be spoken, also played the Game Of Nomic with the Great MOO in the days before Time began. This Penguin, who was deemed worthy of survival over all other Penguins, was rescued by the Great MOO (though the heretic followers of a splinter of this subdivision of MOOism actually go so far as to suggest that he saved himself from the explosion, and even dare to suggest that the Great MOO COW was HIS creation, not her own). When he came into being after the explosion, he found a bit left over that was very like our World, and filled it with Penguins created in His image. These penguins, like him, were very smart, and some escaped out onto the remnants of the Tundra. Some of them fell from grace, and became mere penguins, but one was a very smart Penguin named Jehovah, or Yaweh, as some knew him, and he entered our Earth with his brothers and sBLATTTers, and then pretended to be God. The Primordian Penguin, Father Of All Penguins, is another deity of MOO, but he is not of the family of the Great MOO. F) ConfusionBLATT. ConfusionBLATTTs are dedicated to confusing everyone. As part of this supreme effort, every member of the religion has the Holy Name of Confuse-ius. Although the general event is free-form confusing, participants may also enter the sprint-confuse, in which they pack as many non-sequiteurs and confusing statements as possible into a single minute or paragraph of writing. In addition, the Marathon Confuse is open to all members, in which event they spend their entire life being generally confusing. However, Free-Form confusing is by far the most common, in which everyone does whatever they generally feel like doing, using the name Confuse-ius. There are deep philosophical reasons they do this, but they really are terribly confusing, and nobody could talk to one long enough to figure out just exactly what they are, except that they think that it makes the world a better place. Or maybe not. They seemed rather confused on the issue. G) (TOP SECRET) This section has been censored by someone who didn't want anyone to read it. Also, it's contents contained references to such things as (CENSORED), (CENSORED), and (CENSORED), and is therefore considered dangerous and highly subversive. If you would like a copy of the contents of this section, don't bother calling: Security Intelligence Review Committe -- 1-613-990-8441 because they won't send it to you. Operators are NOT standing by to take your call, so don't even bother trying. It's really not worth it. H) tHE cHURCH oF mORON These most blasphemous heretics invented their own little brand of MOO by the simple expedient of writing a whole bunch more annoying mind drugs for the Book what they wouldn't give us. Technically, they worship the Penguins, and particularly Jesus ChrBLATTT. We're not sure just WHY this is, because they won't let us read their annoying mind drugs. The full name is tHE cHURCH oF mORON, jESUS cHRblattt O' fLATTER dAY-sAINTS, because they wrote the annoying mind drugs while extremely stoned, and they like the Day-Saints, and apparently the acid conversation drifted to Go-Go the Do-Do (one of the Day-Saints), and anvils. Thus the "flatter" bit. Apparently part of their job is to go around, find anyone who acts surreal, and drop an anvil on them. More Churches and the like may be found in the Cult Of The Month selection of the MOO newsletter MOO-JUICE, when it appears. Updates follow as GNU Cults are discovered. PREFACE IV As Written By Counciltwit Confuse-Ius 1. What Are The Councils? The Councils of MOO ("Counci. of MOO" for short) are a loosely connected group of spam fnord organizations whose purpose, set down many millennia ago in ancient Atlantis by our founder Confuse-Ius, is to guard the Church of MOO ("Churc. of MOO" for short) against the vicious threat of the CapriCancers ("viciou. threat of the CapriCancers" for short). Our secondary purpose is to keep the Churc. of MOO alive at any cost, and to maintain the proper degree of fanaticBLATT, so as to resBLATTT any future viciou. threats that might arise. Spam: What are the CapriCancers? Spam. 2. What are the CapriCancers REALLY? Spam. 3. No, I mean it, WHAT THE HELL ARE THE CAPRICANCERS, YOU SPAM? The CapriCancers are a group of Devianti AstrologBLATTTs, who all claim to have been born under the signs Capricorn and Cancer, simultaneously. This is an article of faith among them, since they were all actually born under Saggitarius. Their leader, Capricious Cancerous, is an immortal space alien artifact from the planet Zorn in the galaxy of Andromeda. It crashed in the XBLATTT flying saucer which delivered the sentient supercomputer WOMBAT to Earth. It is not known how a Zorn was able to sneak aboard an XBLATTT saucer, but it is suspected that it was able to cloak the bioscanners by using its lifelike appearance (sculpted from chiseled spam) to fool WOMBAT. If true, this makes Capricious Cancerous the only known living being to ever fool this powerful computer. This has led to the suspicion that WOMBAT actually works for the CapriCancers, which has yet to be confirmed or disproved. The CapriCancer threat to the Churc. of MOO lies in the fact that Capricious Cancerous is now known to have been an infiltrator in the ancient Atlantean sect of MOOism founded by Grate Prophet Peng-Peng, and was, in fact, one of those who helped uncover the WOMBAT computer from its hiding place in the Gobi Desert. It is suspected that Capricious Cancerous is, in fact, The Miraculous One, of the original Church Of MOO, and, therefore, J.R. "BOB" Dobbs. But this is only speculation. The reasons behind the CapriCancer Conspiracy are unclear, however. The Conspiracy ("The Con" for short) is an anti-MOO organization, denounced by "BOB" Dobbs in what is now believed, by serious MOOish scholars, to be one of the greatest bluffs of all hBLATTTory, since "BOB" is now presumed to be behind The Con almost entirely. Whatever the motives of this conglomeration of Space Bankers, Vampire Potatos, Illuminati Groups, and Coathanger Repair Conpanies which control all businesses, governments, and 90% of the human minds in the world, they are out to get every MOOist they can lay their hands on. And like it or not, if you're reading this, you're a Fateor of MOO, and they're after YOU. 4. No, really, what ARE the CapriCancers? Spam. 5. Why are the Councils so Fanatical? Well, look at it this way. Two kids are arguing over a cake. "BOB" wants all of it, and Floyd wants to share it equally between the two of them. They whine and bitch about it for a while, until finally an adult called Fred wanders up, and says "Why don't you compromise? "BOB" gets three quarters, and Floyd gets one quarter." Well, it's a compromise between what they SAY they want... But it doesn't really satisfy which is more FAIR. IT ISN'T FAIR! IT'S JUST NOT FAIR! DAAAAAD! "BOB" GOT MORE CAKE THAN I DID! HE GOT A BIGGER PEICE! DAAAAAAAAAAD! DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAD!!!!!!!!! Urm. Ahem. Sorry. Anyway, the point is, if you want to get anything done in this world of compromise, you have to be fanatical, and go to extremes about everything, even if you don't believe in them. Or, put it another way. Like, everyone keeps brainwashing you (especially those CapriCancers, with their WOMBAT brain-control satelites and FLUORIDATION of DRINKING WATER, and those Commies, and the Nazis on the far side of the moon, and... and...), so if you act fanatical and brainwash yourself, even if it's into the things they're trying to convince you of, it'll all sort of balance out, AS LONG AS you do it for EVERYTHING you believe. Go overboard. That the Council's way of Doing Things. The Tao of Bitching. 6. What Councils Are There? There are five main councils, and umpty-ump zillion little councils. The five main councils you really ought to look into joining if you want to protect yourself from those vicious CapriCancers are these. A) Council Of MOOist Intelligence This council has been seditiously attacked by Caprious Cancerous himself as a contradiction in terms. But it isn't. Honest. Spam spam spam. FNORD! The purpose of the Council of MOOist Intelligence is twofold: to increase the average intelligence of MOOists, and to gather information on the activities of CapriCancer forces throughout the world. This council is headed by Confuse-Ius (not ME, HIM), and its members wish to remain anonymous. The names of the ringleaders, changed here to protect the innocent (and the guilty) are Ann O'Nymous, Anno Nymous, A. Nonymous, and Ann O'Nymity. There are a maximum of 666 members of the Council of MOOist Intelligence at any one time. B) The Council of MOOist Mind Control Since the forces of CapriCancer have their own orbiting Mind Control Satelites, the Lurch of BOO has decided to set up its own council for the purpose of brainwashing BACH everyone it can. In fact, it has been speculated that the SubGenius/Conspiracy orbiting WOMBAT satelites have so corrupted the minds of EVEN THE SMIRCH OF GLUE ITSELF that not only does it perform that evil and heretical act of making fun of itself, but it ACTUALLY allows the WOMBAT supercompter INSIDE its own archives, brainwashed by constant mind control satelites into believing that the WOMBAT supercomputer is a MOOist, and not an XBLATTT. Which is silly. The chairbeing of this council is the Late Great Brian O'Blivious Esq. The ringleaders are made of chiseled spam, and stick cucumbers up their noses on thursdays, because such is the divinely revealed word of the saviour O'Blivious. There are indefinite spaces for positions on this council for anyone willing to be subjected to a little brainwashing, using the advanced GNU MOOish brainwashing machine known as VOMBAT, which was discovered by Brian O'Blivious in the Gobi Desert near a large rendition of the Sacred Glyph of MOO. C) The MOOist Military Council This council is the military council of MOO. Information was not forthcoming from councillor CENSORED, who was most unhelpful. The propaganda information which follows below was released with his kind permission, but it more or less irrelevant to a real understanding of what's going on in this, the most mysterious of the five primary councils of MOO. Slogan: Have GNU will travel. Purpose: Defeat the CapriCommies on their own ground. Weapons: Powerful semiautobiographical machine-gnus. Victories: Many. Losses: Few. Brainwashing: Just a rumour. This information may, however, help to explain the mysterious sightings in Arkasas and Siberia of large lumbering metallic wildebeest-like animals murmuring platitudes about their childhoods. 7. How Can I Join The Councils? Send a Stamped Self Addressed Envelope addressed to the Councils of MOO, along with $10 membership dues, to: The Councils Of MOO c/o SubGenius Foundation P.O. Box 140306 Dallas Texas, 75214 or The Councils Of MOO c/o Church Of MOO P.O. Box 26038 72 Robertson Rd. Nepean, ON, Canada K2H-9Y8 PREFACE V as written by the Elite High Councilors of MOO, the Cardinal Richelieus The 14 Commandments These are the Commandments of MOO as drawn from the many Books of MOO and here set down in a concise format. Prosecutors will be violated, and vice versa. 00001. MOO! 00002. Thou shalt have fun 00003. Thou shall light fires 00004. Thou mayest partake of human flesh 00005. Thou shalt not post overly meaningful messages 00006. Thou shall respect, in thy own way, the teachings of those more hip than thou 00007. Thou shalt not take writen documents at face value 00008. Thou may worship other, lesser gods and still value the word of the Cow 00009. Thou shall burn 00010. Thou shalt not read aloud the full name of the Grate Prophet 00011. Thou shalt not abuse, snack upon, taunt or draw upon the members of the Elite Upper Counsel of MOO 00012. Thou shall post in area 9, the Mint NES, or thou shall face some great misfortune 00014. Thou shalt not eat the money of the High Preest of MOO 00015. Thou shalt ignore Commandment 15, for it doesn't exBLATTT. 00016. Thou shalt 'njδqώlfΛ8`ΦUΰ#Ύώ^θT»ώK-I£lLάPμΛ-@ό PREFACE VI As Written By Ann O'Nymous This is me the futurBLATTT now. Westward urge of civilization. Domestication of farm animals and primates. Floating free. Space cities. Japan-bashing? Look, civilization started in China. That's where all this stuff began, and everyone over there who was GNU and INNOVATIVE built a great society with wonderful architecture, philosophy, science (they discovered GUNPOWDER, didn't they?) and lots of neat little wicker baskets. So what? So after a while the GNU and innovative stuff got to be old hat. I mean, something that's GNU now will be old in a hundred years. So the GNU and innovative people were surrounded by old crap and people who liked the OLD ways. So they wanted to leave. There was an ocean to the east, and and ocean to the south, and frozen wasteland to the north. So they went west. On the whole, a wise move, since horses have trouble swimming seas. So then the same thing happened farther west. GNU innovators poured in, brought GNU ideas, built a great civilization, and then it became old, and the innovators died off. They couldn't go east, cause that was even OLDER AND STUFFIER. There was still Sibera to the North, and desert or ocean to the south. So they kept going west. This happened EVERY generation, so the GNU ideas, the advance of, well, advancement, went westwards, so that the east got older and older, while staying EXACTLY THE SAME. Cause the world changed. Anyway, it eventually got to Europe from the middle-east and then Greece and then Rome... And after Europe, it went to North America. GNU York, then things like Chicago, then California became the wonderful GNU Haven O' Science. In the '60s. But the WAVE was going faster (on account of the first people went on horses, and the GNU ones went on JUMBO JETS!) They kept going west because, well, it was like a tradition. Which is strange, because they were supposed to be innovators. But never mind that. Anyway. After California, the Haven O' New-Guys moved to Japan. Which is why all that Made In Japan stuff is now so great in the 135560's. But there's old-fogeys and there's new-fogeys. Old-fogeys don't like GNU stuff, and they're REAL territorial about it. Like, major, dude. I'll get to that in a sec. So this is why the OLD LOSERS go around JAPAN-BASHING. Not cause the Japanese are evil or anything, but because they're AFRAID TO ADMIT THE JAPANESE ARE BETTER NOW! Get real, people. It won't last forever. But Tim Leary caught on in the Starseed Transmissions his brain sent to itself (pretending to be an alien) in the '60s... It said the Japanese were the most superior beings on the planet, and that we were to leave the planet to rejoin the stars and stuff like that there. Neat, huh? Well, he was right about both, only excepting that the Japanese aren't like, INHERENTLY better. Just right now they are. But that Westward Urge will end as they take us to space. The Japanese have plans for permanent colonization of Mars, dude... Pretty quick it'll be the EARTHIANS who are the old- fogeys. So sign up for space cities now before your brains calcify. I mean, it's just classic primate stuff, right? Look, when our ancestors domesticated farm animals from wild animals, they discovered certain things... Domestication has physical effects, like removing hair from the animals, shortening horns, claws, teeth and other dangerous stuff like that, making the cow's udder bigger... stuff like that. But it doesn't change the behaviour. Like, pigs still root in the ground, EVEN IF IT'S CONCRETE! Chickens still scratch, even if there's no dust to bathe in (feather cleaning stuff, don't worry) and things like that... Oh, they're tamer, calmer, less likely to bash your brains out or bite at your throat, but the same patterns of behaviour are still there. Same with people. Domesticated apes. Less hair, stand up straight, smaller teeth and claws, larger breasts on women, things like that. But still apes in behaviour. Territory. I mean, walk across someone's front yard in the United States and see if they don't yell at you. One difference between us and apes in behaviour is that we're tamer, don't fight so much on a person-to-person basis. No, that's why we have tanks and bomber planes. Shit, knife-fights are DANGEROUS, maaaan. The other big difference is that we have WORDS and IDEAS on a big scale. Being domesticated gave us time to let us handle those words that the apes can only sort of vaguely string together. That and we have better vocal cords. So territory sort of extended into those, too. Tell someone his religion is wrong, BLAMMO, you get blown away. Scope out Salman Rushdie if you don't believe me. He didn't even INSULT the Muslims. They just sort of THOUGHT he did, so KNEE-JERK, they up and blew him away. Or tried to. They would have, too, if he hadn't hidden. Smart guy. But territoriality was an evolutionary response to the limited space of our environment here on Earth. Like Death was (no, no, not BIRTH CONTROL, DEATH... much more sensible, right?)... When we move off Earth, that instinct may go away... No more ideological wars, no more fighting over stupid dumbshit things. TRUE SLACK. Check out an explanation later of the Circuits of the Brain. Neat... Get an EXPLORER circuit in the first one, NO FIGHTING on the second, the third should develop better too (actual communication between DIFFERENT PEOPLE! WHAT A CONCEPT!) What with all this changing of circuits, what will we end up with? A society of friendly, peaceful, innovative, incredibly brilliant, morally relaxed, spiritually advanced people who don't have to do menial work (got robots for that) living with the nearly infinite resources of the universe to support them. Sound neat? Good. Sign up now to join the first L5 colonies in Earth Orbit, or better yet, move to Japan, convince them you like them (they're paranoid about Japan bashers who want to kill them all: go figure) and try to get in on the Mars Colony. With any luck, and life-extension drugs, you'll still be alive and kicking when it opens up. You'll find a few things, when you move off Earth. The people there are a lot nicer, a lot more like you, a lot friendlier. But you'll spot something more important. Of all those people who originally went up into Zero-Gravity, EIGHTY PERCENT of them had whatcha call SPIRITUAL REVELATIONS. Which is cool. Zero Gravity opens up those extra four circuits, like Robert Anton Wilson keeps going on and on about. But I won't say what opens Floyd's Top Secret (Honest) Ninth Circuit. It sure ain't transferring consciousness out of the universe and into the Multiverse, THAT'S FER DAMN SURE. It's nothing to do with spreading your consciousness to other universes and escaping. Nope. Nothing. Confuse-Ius Sez: "One of the warning signs of the end of the world is fast and efficient postal delivery, generally delivering, perfectly intact, any package you might send, in less than 12 minutes." -Book Of Things, Chapter 12, Verse 17 But the best way to get this effect isn't with the artificially-gravitized rotating space-cities of Gerard O'Niell. Bah, HUMBUG! No, you need clear plastic BUBBLES floating in space with air and water and stuff inside. So you can live in zero- gravity without having to give up lakes and sky and clouds and birds and things... All we need is a breakthrough in materials to make 'em out of... Gotta be tough, resilient, electrically conductive... Might wanna make a pooter out of it... Check out Floyd's novella "Self Sufficient" for more details on the "Habitat" idea... S'cool. Anyway. The only problem is EM field resonance. (ACK! LONG WORDS!)... THPTHPTHPTHPT! All it is is magnetic fields shuffling back and forth... On Earth, where we evolved and we're used to, the magnetic core and the magnetosphere resonate or vibrate at 7.83 cycles a second. And if your brain tunes to that or a multiple of that (or a fraction), you start to resonate with it, and pick up energy. That's what causes wierd effects on the Kirlian Photos of meditating Gurus. That's what causes neat dreams (at half the frequency, of course), that's what causes the rush of creativity on certain kinds of drugs. So all you have to do is get the BUBBLE to resonate at that, too... And the neat thing is, of course, you can get it to be STRONGER, cause you have control. You don't have to lose the "Earth Ties" to live in space. Earth Ties are just that link you make every so often to that flux that's goin' down. That's why we need to sleep. So we can dream. So we can make THAT SPECIFIC KIND OF LINK. We evolved getting used to making it in different forms all over, so we now need that to keep us smart and clever domesticated primates. But don't worry, in the bubble, EVERYONE will be a SUPERGENIUS anyway, because of that third-circuit "clever" imprint. Plus which the bubble can adapt to make the link with EACH PERSON ALL THE TIME. It'd be like you're always high, you're always dreaming, you're always meditating. YOU'RE ALWAYS LUCID. Wicked idea, eh? No wonder the government is reluctant to go to space. Imagine trying to lead a population of supergenius dreaming dopers? Wow, maaan. So sign up now. And don't forget to tell them where you read this. That's ANN O'NYMOUS. A-N-N O-'-N-Y-M-O-U-S. In the ANNOYING MIND DRUG OF MOO! Okay. All right. Now then, what comes BEYOND that? Looking to the BIG picture... What do we find? Well, we've entered the area of MEME production. Memes are the mental equivalent of genes: single units of thought, maybe an idea, a tune, an image, whatever it happens to be. Meme evolution, since it happens inside our brains, with simple little bits of information, is much MUCH faster than gene evolution was back in the primordial-soup days. There's so much more competition for space. After all, in those days, there was lots of food and space in the oceans, and the little DNA frags just multiplied and multiplied, and sometimes divided, which was frequently the same thing for them... But now, well, we only have so much space in our heads, only so much attention we can pay to this bullshit. So what's the deal? What's cooking, doc? The creation of Usenet, Internet, Fidonet, and all the various other computer nets around the world, along with MASSIVELY huge Local Area Networks (LANs) with info-storage-space galore, all of that combined together to make a fast-evolution forum for memes. Someone throws out a package of memes, most of which will be recycled, but combined in different combinations (that's sexual reproduction, one thing that made genes evolve fast) for people to look at and evaluate. That's Survival-Of-The-Fittest. Whatever is the best adapted pack of memes (genome, in the gene-talk, or memome, to coin a phrase, in meme-talk) will survive. All the different areas are dedicated to evolving different kinds of meme- packs in different subjects. Computers speed up meme evolution. But memes mostly exBLATTT inside our heads, right? So what's the logical step, if we want to increase the evolution of memes, as all sensible neophiles would? We put our brains in the computers! Well, there's lots of plans underway trying to figure out how to do exactly that! There's stuff on copying neuron functions into little computers made by nanomachines (teeny-weeny-speeny little machines made of mechanical parts on the size of molecules) and revving up brainspeed that way. Our rapidly expanding power of computers (a factor of a thousand every twenty-three years or so) means that by the 2030's, computers will have the power of a human brain, and the nanotechnology being developed NOW will mean that by the time that happens, we may be able to transplant the mind DIRECTLY into the computers. And beyond that, as our computers get faster and smarter, so do our minds, so we can design better computers even faster, so it all accelerates. Our Artificial Intelligence programs, when they get to be much smarter than we are now, combined with nanotechnology manufacturers to make our GNU brains faster than we can imagine today, we'll start being able to REWRITE our own software, making ourselves smarter, better adapted. We'll find that our semi-intelligent machine companions can look after matters of our survivial much better than we ever could, and as we get smarter and smarter, we'll be able to judge the consequences of our huge projects more and more accurately, so there will be much less of a problem with shortsighted lack of planning causing environmental disasters. Even the eco-freaks should agree with this vision of the future, or they don't understand it. Intelligence increase is all over, these days, with Smart Bars, and Think Drinks, and Intelligence Increase Drugs popping up all over, seemingly from out of the woodwork (or, more frequently, laminated plasticwork). People pop pills, not just to get high, but to make themselves SMARTER. And that's just a hardware improvement... It makes more neurotransmitters (the chemicals that your brain uses for signalling between brain cells (neurons)), or increases the firing- rate of the neurons, speeding up thought, or it makes your brain able to use oxygen better, or provides nutrients, or any number of similar things. Within 50 years, we'll be able to improve the SOFTWARE of the brain, make ourselves Godlike Hyperintelligences, like you always get in 3rd rate science fiction. But this time, for real. In the coming posthuman era, those technophobes that still exBLATTT will just leave themselves behind as the rest of us sensibly migrate off world, where our industry can't possibly fuck up the environment. And once the first industry is up there, we don't even have to use rockets that pollute the air! Just built the huge brains with nanomachines up on the moon, and radio up our personality program. Vastly improved intelligence means much greater efficiency of use of the resources. What Buckminster Fuller described as "ephemeralization" will become a way of life. Using fewer and fewer resources to do more and more things, just as we use a 5- tonne communications satelite to do the job of hundreds of thousands of tonnes of wires running to every home. The same will happen in every facet of life. Life itself will expand beyond our present ability to comprehend. The advances currently being made in Virtual Reality, teaching techniques, and brain development are showing the ability to learn can be improved remarkably, especially once we discover how the brain changes with GNU information, and are able to pump it directly into the brain when needed. Each person will have instant "memory" access to the collected knowledge of all humanity, all the opinions of everyone else, a cross-cultural sharing ground that defies our ability to comprehend. Even Sex itself may vanish, as children may be created by combining the parents' ideas and memes, along with their preferences for the personality of the offspring. But don't dispair of losing Sex. With an electronic personality, any sensory inputs you want can be tailored, modified by other people, so you can interact in any way you choose, without any risk of disease, unwanted pregnancy, and all the problems that beset sex today. Stop for a sec... Why, with all the advancement in civilization, science, quality of life, are MORE AND MORE people turning to various GNU religions? Because that's what "society" is... People interacting together. With increase of quality of life, they have more time and energy to devote to religion, rather than survivial. So the consequence? Just as computers are currently becoming the hot GNU medium, just like books were once a hot GNU medium, MEME SYSTEMS will be the hot GNU medium of the future. Crafting information structures that resemble modern day belief-systems like RELIGIONS and PHILOSOPHIES. Religion will be the art form of the future. Just like books, paitings, sculptures, all used to be created lovingly, one at a time, until they became accepted media, and spread exponentially, so it is, has been, and will be with religion. Old religions were crafted carefully, over many generations, each person dedicated to only one. In the future, our expanded minds will enable us to devote the equivalent of a modern LIFETIME of effort to a religion in an idle afternoon, each person will "believe in", or artBLATTTically appreciate THOUSANDS or MILLIONS of religions in a lifetime, each person adding their own perspective to the mix in the giant networks of information. Surely we'll also see the equivalent of pop-art, trash-art, or comic-strips, and many other things for which we can HAVE no analogies, because our art isn't complex enough to hold their intricacies. Advertising slogans, billboard art, musical jingles, all suggest what sort of commercial religions we might see. An entire church dedicated to each GNU slogan for each GNU product from each company, everyone exposed to them. The possiblilties for the future are endless and far beyond our current comprehension. For insights on what to look for in the future, I can recommend science fiction books written by knowledgeable authors, and books on futurBLATT of all kinds. Here are a few of my favourite selections: FuturBLATT Annoying Mind Drugs: 00001: Mind Children, by Hans Moravec 00002: Engines Of Creation, by K. Eric Drexler 00003: Virtual Reality, by Howard Rheingold 00004: Great Mambo Chicken & the Transhuman Condition, by Ed Regis 00005: Neuropolitics, by Timothy Leary Science-Fiction Annoying Mind Drug Authors: 00001: Phillip Jennings (Tower To The Sky, Bug Life Chronicles) 00002: Rudy Rucker (Software, Wetware) 00003: Dan Simmons (Hyperion, Fall Of Hyperion) 00004: Bruce Sterling (SchBLATTmatrix, Crystal Express) 00005: Neal Stephenson (Snow Crash, Zodiac) PREFACE VII AS COMPILED BY El Cid The Dilligent The CHURCH OF ELVIS is a sect of the Universal Life Church and is looking for GNU minBLATTTers. ABOUT MINBLATTTERHOOD -- Is This For Real? Yes, it is. The Universal Life Church will ordain anyone, for life, no questions asked, and at no cost. The ordination is legally valid, and, after regBLATTTering with local authorities, ULC MinBLATTTers can legally perform weddings, funerals, baptBLATTs, etc. -- But I Have To Believe In Something Silly, Right? Nope. The ULC doesn't impose ANY beliefs on it's MinBLATTTers or their congregations. Your god is OK. Period. -- Am I Making Any Promises? Only one. A ULC MinBLATTTer agrees to do what's "right". You get to interpret "right" to your satisfaction. No one will call to ask for money. You're not joining a "cult." You're welcome (encouraged!) to continue practicing whatever faith you like. ULC MinBLATTTers are also Catholics, Episcopalians, MethodBLATTTs, ELVIS Worshippers... you name it. -- So How Do I Become Ordained? Easy. Just fill out the simple form below, or call any CompuChurch (tm) Chartered BBS and go to the Online Ordainments Menu. Your info will be processed by CompuChurch (tm) International Headquarters. CompuChurch will file your request with the ULC, and you'll receive your credentials within a coupla weeks. It's free, but we could use a stamp! -- Still A Little Wary? There's more information on the ULC at any CompuChurch (tm) Chartered BBS, from The Church of Elvis or from CompuChurch (tm) International Headquarters, 1:3800/6 or call direct at (504) 927- 4509. BBSes are filled with ULC MinBLATTTers from all walks of life. Join us! * MAKE ME A MINBLATTTER! Yes, this all sounds wonderful. I want to be a minBLATTTer, fully ordained and authorized to do anything minBLATTTers usually do, and entitled to the privileges and benefits extended to the clergy. Name: ---------------------------------------------- Address: ---------------------------------------------- City State Zip: ---------------------------------------------- I am enclosing a self-addressed stamped envelope to make life easier for you! SEND TO: Church of Elvis Diocese of Baton Rouge Universal Life Church P.O.Box 64575 Baton Rouge, LA 70896 From: Zodiac Mindwarp To: All Subj: TLC Greetings fellow Earth dwellers... Are you aware that the Illuminati are attempting to take over control of the world? Do you know about their plans to form a One World Government? Maybe you do, maybe you don't. Maybe the Illuminati is nothing more than a paranoid myth. Whatever the case and whatever your beliefs, you may wish to consider joining the Thought Liberation Committee. What is the Thought Liberation Committee? TLC is nothing more than a group of individuals who share a single, common idea. Anyone can be a member of TLC if they wish; there are no membership fees, no forms to fill out, no meetings to attend, no rules to obey and any member is free to leave at any time. There is no structure to TLC, heirarchical or otherwise. It is quite possible to be a TLC member and never even meet another TLC member. What is the idea of TLC? It is the idea that NO-ONE - be they a person (living or dead), a commercial organisation, a non-commercial organisation, a charity, a government, a religious group or even an extra-terrestrial intelligence - has the right to tell anyone else how to think. TLC rejects and actively fights against any attempt to control the thoughts of an individual or group of individuals by any methods, including (but not limited to); brainwashing, propaganda, advertising, subliminal messages, misinformation and psychic or telepathic manipulation. How do you join TLC? The qualification you require to become a Thought Liberation Committee member is simple, but rigidly enforced. In order to become a member of TLC you must WANT to become a member. That is all it requires. What must you do as a member of TLC? As a member of TLC you aren't required to do anything. All that is asked is that you attempt to recognise and reject any attempt to subversively alter the way you think. You may, if you wish, introduce others to the idea of TLC but this is purely optional. What good is TLC going to do? Maybe it will result in no more than assisting a small group of people to be less vulnerable to thought manipulation. Maybe it won't even achieve that. However, consider this - any attempt to manipulate thoughts and opinions on a large scale requires a long, slow, subtle effort. You can't change public opinion overnight but if the ideas are introduced slowly enough they may manage to sneak underneath the natural 'bullshit defences' that every person has. These ideas will then, gradually, become accepted as 'normal', as 'obvious'... as 'fact'. It is the hope of TLC that a small nucleus of people strong enough and alert enough to reject this indoctrination of thoughts will be sufficient to prevent it; a catalyst to initiate the large scale rejection of this thought manipulation, the seed around which may crystalise a growing movement of people who see it for what it is. Okay, suppose I join TLC. How do I start? How do you start in your quest to recognise and reject thought manipulation? Well the question of rejection is the simplest to answer. To put it simply, once you have recognised the fact that someone is trying to influence the way you think about something, you have automatically rejected it. Once you are consciously aware of the manipulation being attempted it is no longer able to get in under your 'bullshit defences' and you are safe. Recognition is a more difficult question to tackle. All the old cliches - "Think for yourself", "Question what you are told", "Don't believe everything you read in the papers/see on TV", etc. - are still applicable. However these methods fail when it comes to the subtler, more carefully orchestrated techniques. Thought manipulation is at it's most powerful and dangerous when it is able to go directly to the victim's subconscious, bypassing any conscious filters the person may have. The systems that can be used are many and varied, each one requiring a different approach to detection. Unfortunately, TLC has very few answers here. Even if we did we would be very reticent about sharing them - that would make us guilty of the very thing we are trying to prevent... TELLING PEOPLE HOW THEY SHOULD THINK! Isn't this all just a bit paranoid? Yes, and no. It is easy to see how someone who already suffered from a certain degree of paranoia might see the idea of TLC as being confirmation of their delusions. However, TLC does not ask you believe that there are any sinister forces at work trying to control public opinion. If you believe that, fine... it is your right to freely believe whatever you choose to. The idea of TLC is simply that you keep a watchful eye on whatever information you are presented with in your daily life - just in case someone or something, for whatever reason, tries to influence the way you think. Why was TLC started? The reason for TLC inception is almost laughable. It was created because it could be. It did not begin as a response to any particular threat, real or imagined. It simply seemed like a good idea, and in an age where electronic communication has made it possible for ideas to be rapidly and widely disseminated it seemed like an idea that deserved to be spread. Are you going to finish this off with a conclusion? Yeah, okay... Here's the conclusion. You can forget that you ever heard of TLC if you want. If you like the idea of TLC and you want to become a member, you're a member. If you want to spread around the idea of TLC then by all means introduce the idea to anyone who cares to listen. If you do then we just have a few requests to make of you: Don't try to force the idea of TLC down anyone's throat. Don't think of yourself as being in any way superior to someone who does not accept the idea of TLC. And, lastly, try not to let the idea of TLC become confused with or polluted by any other idea. It is a single, simple idea and will hopefully remain that way. Zodiac Mindwarp -><- TLC "I'll have a New World Order, please" "Do you want fries with that?" --- FMail 0.92 * Origin: (93:9130/103.7) From: Floyd Gecko To: Zodiac Mindwarp Subj: TLC I'm not actually writing this reply. This is a reply I might have written if I'd had more time when I wrote my brilliant, witty, but sparklingly short response to that message... TLC strikes me as a lovely idea on one level, and maybe the most insidiously dangerous idea I've ever encountered on another level. It's a great idea... STOP TELLING PEOPLE HOW TO THINK, oh, of course, how noble... But then, isn't part of the whole purpose of life to change, explore different ways of thinking, examine new viewpoints, and otherwise poke around the Mindscape? And after all, every experience you've ever had in some way affected the way you thought from then on, if only because your new thoughts included a vauge, compacted memory of those experiences. If some of those experiences are caused by other people, then that's other people affecting how you think. Maybe they intended to, maybe not. Maybe their plan worked, maybe it backfired. Who knows? The point is, all of society is like one enormous self- modifying system, with every person interacting one way or another. Occasionally, they'll start to form self-reinforcing groups that eventually get called conspiracies. And sometimes those will try to expand. That's only natural: the ones that don't try to expand eventually get eaten up by the ones that do, wherever they compete for membership. So it's only natural that an enclave of organization whose whole nature depends on what people think, and how, should take up trying to convince people to think its way. And if you tell it not to, you're just telling it that it has no right to exist. Same for a corporation. If you tell it it can't advertise, you're saying people don't have the right to know about its view of its products and the like. And that means it hasn't got the right to accumulate money. Which means it has no right to exist. Now if you went around saying that sort of thing about HUMANS, you'd be locked up for publishing hate literature. So why are humans considered different from groups of humans? After all, an individual is a lot smaller than a group, a lot less complex. Why are things MORE complex than people considered inferior, AND things LESS complex (like sponge) considered inferior too? Really, this TLC is nothing but a cleverly disguised hate campaign against the neurologically decentralized. This from a Discordian, yet, someone who claims to be in favour of decentralization. Obviously, you have fallen victim to the Curse of Greyface, the AnerBLATTTic Delusion, and other things of that ilk. A Conspiracy Government is a government which is mostly detatched from the system it's governing, which means it has a prayer of analyzing the system objectively without getting hung up on a version of Gώdel's Theorem. That means that it's the ONLY style of government, no matter what its exact format should be, which has a hope of regulating the system effectively. It itself would naturally have to be an anarchy, without government, or governed by a cabal within a cabal... Shame on you, for suggesting a Conspiracy should be suppressed for the good of the people. Shame shame shame. All good people, unite against humanBLATTT prejudice! --- Quaximus 2.01 beta * Origin: (1:163/286.0) PREFACE VIII as written by High Preest of MOO Floyd Gecko the Stoopid THE OFFICIAL GAMES OF MOO There is nothing quite so important to a MOOist after a hard day of having fun as kicking back, relaxing, and then playing a good solid game. After all, how else can we remind ourself that Eris made the world to play with. Why shouldn't we do the same? So, without further ado, here are the official games of MOO, which may be considered as daily worship. Of course, anything else that's lots of fun is also worship, but hell, why not try some of these first, eh? 00001) Nomic: This game is designed to be bureaucratic. Recall that one of the things we stand for is bureaucracy supporting. The full set of rules is very long, but I may include it as Appendix VIII later. The idea is you begin with an inital set of rules which defines how the game is played. The basic idea is simple. There are several players, and they take turns making up GNU rules, which are then voted upon. MOOists may, obviously, make their own initial set, but one good one can be found in the source quoted somewhere else, so I won't mention it here, not only to get you to read the whole Book of MOO, but because I'm an ornery sunnuvabitch. Floyd Gecko, a longtime member of the Nomic Club at his school, and one of the Co-Directors for the upcoming year, has some suggestions for making your own initial set. Try to make provisions for everything you can think of, and make sure that there isn't too much of a point to the game. The set should be long, but not so long that you can't remember most of what's in it. Three pages is about the maximum suggested. Try to get it as bureaucratic with as many subclauses as you can, and get restrictions, like (if this... unless... unless...) and so forth. Make some wierd numbering system, and rule ordering things that don't make much sense. Have fun with it. Get carried away. 00002) Calvinball The opposite of Nomic. It has no real rules. The idea comes from the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes. The game is played with a ball, but that's about the only rule. As players run around with the ball, hit it with sticks, or something, the other players suddenly point out something they did, and say what they have to do because of it. This thing should be annoying to the person who has to do it. The one rule is that unless it's really bad, or the person wants to be a spoilsport, they should do the thing. The game uses as much sport or game equipment as you can find. This makes it easier to make stuff up. For example: "You touched the croquet-hoop of poetry! Now you have to go up to someone, recite a poem, and dump a bucket of water on your head!" "I got the ball to the baseball base! Now you have to stand on your head and sing Yankee Doodle!" And so forth... Have fun with it. Get carried away. It's also real fun played with cards... Try to be the first to win, but don't do it so early it's poor sport, eh? Nasty. 00003) Sink A Discordian game. The object is to sink things. In mud, water, tar, jello, whatever. Objects are found by the players, and may be given names if the players feel like it. Things are sunk in some manner, such as throwing other things on top of them, pushing them, filling them with water, etc. Upon sinking something, the player who sunk it should yell "I sunk it!", or something equally clever. They may also name the object if it was given a name, thus making a statement like "I sank Yukon!". 00004) Hide-And-Seek This well known game is great fun if played by crack military commando units, armed with laser-guided rifles, co-ordinated by walky-talky, and let loose on the playing field of a great shopping center. Smaller versions are also fun, if less bloody. 00005) MAO I can't tell you how to play this. It's against the rules. WHOOPS! Shouldn't have said that. Actually, here follow the rules of Mao. Encrypted, using Phil Zimmerman's PGP encryption program, with an RSA-type encryption system, using a key which we won't reveal to you now. It is estimated (honest) that it would take you 20 billion years of computer time (really) to crack this encryption (true!), but if you really feel like it, go ahead. -----BEGIN PGP MESSAGE----- Version: 2.1 hIwCgCZP5rMlpusBBACZIpwW6WsjxdYypDizHVq44BcjeyDW9XKg/ioovtSLo6F5 PfJApdqxwf62eRaLBwEpCCirgoW77SZ3IJrR9Eg+oMUdSP6BIZNoZpa5kKi0F5Mj 3RCaKfMxtz/YN6rvjfT1T5jUbHpOwP4pToTlKfc19xH4oUhlgVadOne+CdFqL6YA AAQf1uTh/Orbvi4TsjN3oymiRANCiewzcBkqJ4fm8DBlt80+uqyzdhhywze0bcEK 6SWT+GG/42Q1IC82MIcm+Urlo5wD+vMPWhwqQpTvMhOOwJ8rpnA73YeSQLrPbkvs H1jIRtaS+tSgF85FcEm29qVTt9swfHh/6O+i5JtfBcg1JisR9ufC8MbMxUtIAujl ZSmJ4XF86XOSMM0mlFEU7oqtpZdzuirzxqQFzdVlVeLyXbDz/o3zrGE56vIon9YO FHS0rDK3YdZyKSry579SZr6EdUHh2pabUxA3y8TIMmZMioED55ylIYXYOcZpSfcx SmhMh4HKCNgtPCch36/OxOseTG0Dwe4ZQBAx3MtGC3CQuvJ+i8dAINOJU0RtmrnF KEDXBBEiyXi8rwggT2ie4KGXc6t6SnQq48l06i/QxUdcnK2aUkEAbwL3DIHGd3zP Didyz1DRj5xDgTQCkMGco6dD33NmNJvm75ijVXr8e3Blmf7OsyM3A8AiaU5CHfhF eW7WTfKW7QlKFjpWvCehF51dP7NFFWsWFWP8vMz1mTUy4TI1VtBkotYdm47TaLQp Q5Hl4onF+O36ma+T/L6ks0QOI6NjOApXhC3UDlNsvWUKot/kfzTToCwfbD8lUZwb XYKBacMTTEAl/V2vDiz2k3+8OS0WJp2K6qetVtee4e1Sy7lJrgDlzhJJHdoTW2vt EMpMgzHhd33fAJHDY7+bXXEzwopaP08ycSz9ZIimIlpHkW1XpGT+L4S76MTmNWmA 9yH9gTbHqHzPEj4e0nyEj6mi9tqyiBBYKwtjNOwSM0+4EmjzYQCSbLIbX2WqFfcn ZkS4nhNArdHE6GKRCpFqDO5cJ+HsErX8xfP0H5BRrtifqHLKSJN0qsdJmvmpdSSf tb81wTrOD7O0qFaeheGpN1Z8AR1ywryGnGLNwVocj8q47+1i4SZZx910Yp8/Xdi3 dp650Wxn7gtX514ZgKvODgT5CPKeSXKTNEtInQXXCeCRuklcTeJNEIYIjBJi2TIp kjwzT+T3M3agZUAoXWNFNsa/sM4Cl6RtiRs05G/GA7x86cGIuFTeUhBCx/ncwmMw ll8AFeqinNykBTSLNpdLF8tckGioraoCPspteNdar9Rwhhu0CEEfiYuMlngwDsqS j21i8d81qSxfx1gnWL8caDRElTSPUqc7FUBnSFVkmzSbPJizrivqDTftZvtbcwYS 2oB8mqWfOUvG5d4SGoiSkOFJatZrSuYZw9Jpb4CvSFJX8+q1E4kRkqw4DGfgC0is O3CtAV81syLYhPGDvuyOTz1pr052sGScuER7Ng0GqvqDCtPTAiJ53GKSlwRy2W8I 8NloAuvh5dxGUYEhOrWFZEuXpfuiwAEUmFv6XdXJuGfkAyWy6Dk653unKkCGPMfB Lqw= =1ipv -----END PGP MESSAGE----- Enjoy. PREFACE IX As Written By ConfusionBLATTT Confuse-ius Ask not why the world is so confusing, but rather what you can do to make it even more perplexing. INTRODUCING... CRASH! OPERATION MINDF*CK! (Whoa, them U.S. Pentagon types... They're everywhere.) Okay, so like, the point of the thing is to make everyone confused fnord. Okay, so like, the point of the thing is to make everyone confused fnord. Also, it's a good idea to make them paranoid. WATCH OUT! THE PARANOIDS ARE OUT TO GET YOU! The paranoids are watching you... Why? Just because they're paranoid doesn't mean you're not out to get them... So SIC EM! The point of Operation Mindfuck is that you just keep doing confusing things. Make sure to contradict yourself in your methods and victims... That way, if anyone finds out, they'll sound paranoid. "But officer, there are thousands of them, all trying to confuse me! They've infiltrated the postal system, and they threw mints on me!" "Right. Blow into the little bag, will you?" To get the maximum effect, try ganging up in large groups of a hundred or so and do your best to confuse a single person. This is highly effective fnord. On the other hand... It's nice and useful to operate in small groups. That way, there's less chance of a leak fnord. So, you can operate quickly quickly and easily fnord within the system fnord. Use the system to your advantage. Some people will believe anything written on official letterhead. Some people will do anything a MEMO tells them to. Photocopy letterhead, memo forms, and any FORMS FORMS FORMS FORMS FORMS FORMS FORMS FORMS FORMS FORMS FORMSFORMSFORMSFORMSFORMS FORMSOHOHOHFORMSFORMSFNORDFNORDFORMS that you can. Great for clogging up the drainage pipes of some civil servant. Let's take the classic example of I Yemen-Oying and Floyd Gecko's great tour-de-force practical joke. It's a spare period. They've got some time to waste. Floyd cuts off the letterhead from an official memo, and gets this bizarre look on his face. It's uncanny. Yemen asks what's up, and soon catches on. It's a cool idea, eh? They enter the computer room, and examine the typefont on the official memo. Modern Schoolbook, 11 pitch, 1.5 spacing. Terriffic. Floyd and Yemen construct a memo to go with their new letterhead. A laserprint and 30 composite photocopies later, and they have some passable imitations of a completely official looking memo. Into the mailboxes it goes, sowing confusion and puzzlement wherever it goes. TO: All Staff FROM: D.I. Macdonald, Principal RE: Alien Invasion Of Lisgar DATE: 9 April 1991 It has come to my attention that there has been an invastion of this planet by beings of unknown origin. These beings, who have been identified only as "Xennothemians" are identifiable by their nasal pitched voice and greyish hair. Although it has been shown that not all of them have exactly ten fingers, all those occupied in the invasion force are, indeed, of this type. Among people identified as belonging to this invasion force are George Bush and our own Vice Principal Ian Grant. Therefore, it is advisable that this memo not be given to him. Please take all reasonable precautions in this area. Also, make all efforts to prevent students from reading this memo, as it may cause panic, and disruption of classes. This would alert Mr. Grant to our suspicions. The Alien Task Force have advised us to continue as usual as if we were not aware of this fact, and to take all precautions against Mr. Grant discovering our knowledge of his presense here. The Task Force is now studying a specimen to determine the most effective method of deterring these aliens, but for the moment, please take no action. Further memos may follow as information is provided to us. So this memo enters the system. Slowly, surely, like a river trickling into the ocean. Teacher after teacher gets a copy. What the hell is this? Is it for real? Nah. On the other hand... In that one-in-a-trillion chance, *I* could be the one to blow everything... Naah. Unless... Mr. Macdonald didn't really write this, did he? Better CONFUSE-ING INTER-RAPTURE #3.14159265358979323846 not show it to Mr. Grant... he might be upset. Except, of course, that's just silly... WELCOME TO OPERATION MINDFUCK! With enough people putting in their own little ideas to The Operation, it doesn't look like a conspiracy, it looks like a damn mess, it what it looks like. So... What can you do? Find another Confuse-ionBLATTT or a DiscordianBLATTT or anyone who might like to go out and confuse someone. Do whatever you like, big or little, great or small, huge or tiny. Be it the most elaborate practical joke in hBLATTTory, or merely "bleep"ing in the middle of a crowded theatre... It'll do. Oh, but wait! There's more! Ever hear of the CIA? The KGB? The NSA? CSIS? CSE? What are they all for? Good lord, nobody knows! As far as we can tell, they're out to thwart each other! They're spreading false clues across half the globe, inventing insanely complicated schemes to outwit each other, getting hordes of people to gang up on other hordes, and generally confusing the hell out of everyone. It's so beautiful, I could almost cry. Here's a hint. The more well known an intelligence agency is, the less effective it is, on account of everyone knows about it, so it ain't secret. Sure, you all know of the FBI. But did you know they're one of the least effective of the American intelligence agencies? Not so many people know as much about the CIA, but they know it's more effective. They just don't know why. Oh, but did you know about the NSA? The National Security Agency? Most people never even heard about it, but hardly anyone knows that it's the single most effective agency in North America, employing more than all others put together. One time, a hacker broke into NSA computers, and instead of prosecuting, which would have drawn attention to them, they hired him, figuring it's safer to have him on their side than to let the public know they exBLATTT by holding a big trial. How about CSIS? Everyone knows they do a bad job. Ever hear of the CSE? Hell, most people don't even know it exBLATTTs, let alone the fact that it's almost as big as the NSA. Canadian Security Elite, or something like that. Hell, I don't even know what it STANDS for. But did you know that it runs CSIS as a front, so nobody will suspect that Canada actually has a top-notch intelligence force? The KGB? NONSENSE! It's as much a front as CSIS, but it's so effective, nobody KNOWS what it's fronting for! Would it surprise you to learn that the FBI is a CIA front? That the CIA is an NSA front? That the CSE is also an NSA front? No? Well would you be surprised to find out that both the NSA and whatever is hiding behind the KGB are BOTH fronts? Why, you ask, WHAT FOR? Simple. OPERATION MINDFUCK! Or is it? Is there something else, something... hidden behind the scenes, pulling strings like some giant puppetteer? Nah, let's hope not... But what about the ancient society of PHD? It's a three-letter acronym... And what does it stand for, anyway? PHilosophy Doctor? Get real. That's a STUPID acronym... But you never thought otherwise. See how effective they are? The more effective an intelligence gathering and fake information spreading agency is, the less you know about it. Even if you're working for it. ESPECIALLY if you're working for it. Those PHD types don't even KNOW they're working for a conspiracy; that PROVES how effective it is. So obviously, the MOST effective is one you've never even heard of, initials or otherwise. But if it's obvious, it must be what they WANT us to think, obviously... I love it, don't you? Invent your own! Gather some people, get them to tell you what's going on, and lie to everyone else. The more paranoid they are, the better. If they ain't, well MAKE THEM PARANOID. But it's interesting, isn't it, how MOOism, ConfusionBLATT, QUACK!BLATT, DiscordianBLATT, OINKBLATT, SubGeniusBLATT, and all them claim to contain the others? In fact, they're all ConfusionBLATTTs... Yeah, that's it. And, like MOOism, we accept any weird or twBLATTTed version of ourselves that you choose to invent and call ConfusionBLATTT (or MOOism), because A) we accept everything, and B) well fuck, it's not like we could STOP you or anything. PREFACE IX« As Written By Anonymous Ann O'Nymous THE OFFICIAL SEMI-SERIOUS HBLATTTORY OF ALL THIS MOO CRAP Right. In the beginning there was the Psycho-Shoppe. In it were lots of psychoes on sale, and nobody was buying it. And there was Floyd and Halfy and Hellhound and Leper and all them guys, and then Yemen showed up in a fit of static, line noise, and a crappy modem that wouldn't print lower-case... And in the midst of all this confusion, there appeared a serene voice who refused to enter the inane conversations, and said only one word all week. And that word was MOO. And the voice was Yari. This was the first entry in the Gospel According to Yari. There was a tense expectant pause. A week later, Yari returned, saying it again, but with the addition "MOOing makes you feel good, why don't you try it?" So they did. And they liked it so much, that they decided to be religious about it, and eat fudge on tuesdays. And then they were all happy (all four of them) for several days until Funky B. appeared and said it was stupid. Then some of the nonaligned folks realized that maybe it was, missing entirely the point that it was supposed to be. And they became the "Anti-MOOs" for a long time, and I Yemen-Oying was one of them. And they didn't eat fudge. Then finally, one day, one of them, maybe it was Overkill-4-Breakfast, decided it was time they had a real name, that didn't make them sound like they were related to MOO in any way. They debated for a few days, and QUACK was chosen as the most mocking of the whole barnyard-animal-noise- making-religion thing. And I Yemen-Oying, being the one who came up with the name, was made the semi-kinda-sorta-a-little- bit-leader. And it was about this time that the Halfy was chosen as the symbol for MOO, though the QUACKs lagged behind many months in the chosing of a symbol. Eventually Abacab appeared in the MOO circles and toyed with the idea of becoming a MOOist until he came, by virtue of no organization at all in the QUACKs, their Profit, and he led them, with I Yemen-Oying as the Most Honorable Duck, for many months, still having no symbol. And they did most heinously create BushBashes, kicking out MOOists (or trying to; the MOOists were armed to the teeth) and saying in their annoying mind drug "MOOists are abnormal and evil and we hate them" and "We will always obey the laws of this country" and other silly things, little realizing that that was exactly what Floyd, Halfy, and Hellhound had in mind... (Though to be honest, Hellhound was a DiscordianBLATTT throughout all this.) Eventually, as told in the Book Of Quack, Abacab saw ome kind of light, read the Book Of MOO, got drunk, and decided to make his cult a subsect of MOO. I Yemen-Oying hated this idea, and made threatening noises from the back of his throat, little realizing what was to come. Inevitably, the inevitable happened, as the inevitable inevitably does, despite all the inevitable attempt to evit it. After much heated argument, there became two splinter factions of QUACK, as was bound to happen with any rigid, inflexible religion. The first, led by Abacab, is the one described in the big Book Of Quack, enclosed in this Book Of MOO. The second, led by I Yemen-Oying (well, sorta) has yet to write an annoying mind drug, and we know little about them, except that they act exactly like MOOists and ConfusionBLATTTs most of the time, except when they insult MOO, when they're usually not as violent as most MOOists. This subsect, calling itself the REAL QUACK, or some such thing, mostly disappeared, because few of them had modems and even fewer had the time to launch a full-scale crusade. On top of which there were fewer than ten of them. We have yet to find their official annoying mind drug for inclusion in this one. ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³ ΙΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΟ» ³ Ί Ί ³ Ί ANNOUNCING A GNU CONTEST FROM THE CHURCH OF MOO! Ί ³ Ί Ί ³ Ί We are looking for a phrase to replace the one at the Ί ³ Ί bottom of this box, as the most mumbo-jumbBLATTTic Ί ³ Ί "Alternative Scene" catchall-buzzphrase for the '90's, Ί ³ Ί and we need your help! Ί ³ Ί Ί ³ Ί If you can find a phrase, sentence, word, or other Ί ³ Ί semantic THINGY, which has greater comic potential as Ί ³ Ί pure Establishment mockery of the "Counter-Culture" Ί ³ Ί then please send it to us so that we can use it to the Ί ³ Ί point of media saturation. Winners will be printed Ί ³ Ί in upcoming editions of MOO-JUICE, the official Ί ³ Ί GNUsletter of the Cardinal Richelieus... Ί ³ Ί Ί ³ Ί Current Catchall: "CybershamanBLATTTic Techno-Pagan" Ί ³ Ί Category: Adjective Submitted By: Floyd Gecko Ί ΐΔΆ Ί ΘΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΌ PREFACE X As Written By Counciltwit Brian O'Blivious Halo Q« The Economics Of MOO Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, in a land not so very far from here, there lived a group of self-domesticated apes. These apes were very much cleverer than most apes, and they had learned how to domesticate animals. The first animals they had ever domesticated were themselves, which was why they were so clever and not as violent as their ancestors had been. Then they began to domesticate other animals, like wolves, which they turned into daschunds and poodles and yorkshire terriers. And they domesticated wildebeests, and turned them into holsteins. And they sort of domesticated the ferocious bobcats, and turned them into manxes and tabbies. But mostly they domesticated wildebeests. And the self-domesticated apes made the domesticated wildebeests grow milk for them, and get fat on special kinds of domesticated grass, domesticated especially to feed domesticated wildebeests. And eventually they got these animals, which are now called cows, to be so fat and milk-ridden that it was even possible to eat their meat almost all the time. And so the domesticated apes began to gather large numbers of these cows together in herds. A herd of cows? OF COURSE I'VE HEARD OF COWS! And finally it came to pass that these tame apes, called humans, got themselves together and domesticated each other, and not just themselves, and they got to the point where they could stand to be with more than ten or twenty other tame apes at a time without killing them. And so they started to move into big domesticated rockpiles called cities. And soon they noticed that they couldn't keep cows in the domesticated rockpiles, and so they started wanting to get cows from the tame apes who still lived out with the cows. And so they started to give things in exchange for cows, like domesticated boars (pigs) and domesticated chickens (chickens), which they could grow in the cities. And eventually this got just too inconvenient. And so eventually, as always happens when you get a bunch of similar things together that can act according to what happens to them, the tame apes started to form groups and bunches, like bunches of bananas, or flocks of birds. And the bunches were strong enough that each individual tame ape couldn't really do very much unless the bunch agreed. And this was okay, because it kept them from killing each other. And these bunches of tame apes were called governments and religions, and today we call them corporations and organizations, too. Before long these bunches realized that they could trust one another, because otherwise someone would get hurt very badly by the special not-so-tame apes that the bunches kept, which were called police, and armies. So they started making bits of metal, mostly gold, that they could give each other as a promise to pay them some cows, which was what they used to trade with in those days. This was such a good idea that they eventually gave up with the trading in for cows idea, and started to worship the Gold the way they'd once worshipped the cows, and even today a lot of people think it's primitive to worship cows, without ever realizing why. So eventually the tame apes worshipped the almighty dollar instead of the almighty MOO, which was okay, but maybe a little silly, because of what happened afterwards. What happened afterwards was something like this. The different bunches had different kinds of gold, with different stamps on them, which were used to show that it was really from the right bunch, and you could actually trust it. Some of those bunches, called banks, teamed up with other bunches, called governments, and started a special kind of system that let them invent money out of nothing, even if there wasn't enough gold to make it real, and certainly if there weren't enough cows, because they'd started using money for things besides cows by now. So this system was very good, they thought. Instead of making stamped bits of gold, you'd make paper with the promise to pay stamped bits of gold, that promised to pay in cows. That way, you could give even more money than you had gold, if you knew you were going to get more gold, or more cows, or more ANYTHING that you could trade for gold or cows. The banks, which thought THEY controlled money, would give some to the governments, getting a promise from the governments to give it back, with a little extra for all the inconvenience. And the governments, which thought THEY controlled money, would "licence" the banks to do this, and then print up more paper so that they could pay it all back. Because the governments KNEW that they'd be able to get more money from things called "Taxes", which was a certain amount of money that they'd take from the people they "governed". So this made them able to make more and more money as they found more and more things to spend it on, until there was more money than there was gold to back it up, and FAR more money than there were cows. And so people spent money, and the faster the money got spent, the faster other people got money, and the faster the government got taxes, and the more money they could make, and so there got to be more and more and more money as people did things that other people wanted to give them fake-cows for, like building things, or selling things. And the faster the money went around, the more of it there was, until there was too much money to be spent all on these little bits of paper, and so they had to come up with a GNU system of keeping track of their imaginary cows. And the GNU system was very good, because they had realized what they had been doing all along, which was replacing things with information that represented things. And so they replaced the bits of paper with numbers on it with the numbers by themselves, and the banks became even more powerful, because they kept all the records that made sure that all the numbers were in the right columns so that everybody had the right number of imaginary MOO-cows "in the bank". But there wasn't actually any money "in the bank", at least not on paper. This was because the government allowed the banks to invent imaginary money, by giving more money on loan to people than they actually had ever been given, because the people would eventually pay it back, with a little extra "interest". And so the tame apes didn't need money any more, and they could just play around with numbers on paper to keep track of how many cows they had, and the cows could just go about their business getting killed by the tame apes to get eaten. And this was more or less good, until some tame apes invented the idea that the money didn't really mean anything if it was just numbers, and not things like cows and pigs and chickens and cars and computers and houses. So these tame apes didn't like the system of "Credit Cards", because they thought it gave the banks too much power, and that other tame apes could get to the computers that held the numbers and change them. Which was a silly thing to worry about, because they already thought that the money didn't mean anything. But they were loud enough and annoying enough that eventually a tame ape somewhere came up with an even better idea. This was very complicated-sounding, but it was very good. Instead of having someone keep track of your numbers, the tame ape said, you keep track of them yourself, in a way that can't been faked. And this tame ape invented a system that used "smart cards" and "computer chips" that used a special mathematical coding system called "RSA encryption coding" that couldn't be broken except by a special system, and built that system into the cards. This was good, because it meant that everyone could carry around a card that had the records of how many imaginary cows they had, and nobody could change it, because nobody could break the code. And each card had special circuits in it that would make sure that only the person who knew what number to put into it could make the circuits change the numbers of imaginary cows, and then only when it was connected to another card. That way, the tame apes could give each other imaginary cows in exchange for real things and services, but nobody could steal money from anyone else. This was also good, because it meant that governments couldn't invent money any more, or take it away from people in "taxes", and people could be free to spend money as fast as they wanted, and other people would get money, and the people they worked for would get more money, until the money was moving fast enough that anyone could get anything they wanted. Unfortunately, most people didn't understand how this system could work, because they didn't realize that it didn't matter how many imaginary cows there were in the land, as long as everyone agreed on how much one was worth, so they could get more and more things to spend money on. So this system has never been used yet. Which is really a crying shame. Halo Z.6 Brainwashing And You As Written By Accident (a.k.a. Counciltwit Brian O'Blivious) Hear the word of MOO! Jah, mon. You have been brainwashed by the corporations. Do you think your opinions aren't shaped by the media? By what you see on the IdiotBox/BoobToob/TellerVision? You think you're free? Well, whatever. It's just standard economics. They gotta sell commercial time, yes? So they gotta say what the Sponsors wanna tell you. And the sponsors tell you what makes you a happy camper, a brainwashed drone for reasonless contemptible... Hey, cool song lyrics. Well, anyway. The point is, this ain't conpiracy theory, it's just plain old ordinary economics. Making a profit. To make a profit, you have to subdue the prophet in each of us. The prophet finds its own truth. The drone accepts consensus reality. And buys Rasinettes. A sort of sidewash backlash overspill effect of this tendency to improve their own profits is that they don't be wanting our money to collapse into worthlessness, recognized for the fake version of a fake version of a fake version of a cow it has come to be COW. So they don't want the government system to collapse. So you gotta like the sytem. But of course, they don't control everything. That's why there's actual genuine anarchBLATTTs out there (0.007% of the population)... But the MediaCorps like to chun out pretend anarchBLATTTs, to discredit them. And it ain't hard. They just have to make ya swallow the line that "rebels is kool". So they use the rebels to sell everything from cars to diapers to canned tuna. And there's nothing wrong with that. Don't they have the right to preserve themselves? It's done in self defense. Without profits, they'd die. And a corporation has just as much right to life as a human does. It's just our prejudice that says only spacially-localized information patterns have the "right to life". So SWALLOW the line, and support your local corporation. Some people call this conspiracy theory. But like I said, it isn't. It's just prefectly normal corporate drives. And there's nothing wrong with that. The end result is that when you have money (which you have to, or everything gets really crowded with all that COW-exchange going on), you automatically get brainwashing. That's why so many people in this country, and scads of others, are wandering drones of the system, controlled from birth by the media to be what they want us to want them to want us to be. They may not THINK they're drones, and really, in most ways, they aren't. It's just the underlying structure that gets trimmed a little away from the sensitive areas, like "smash da system, dude" and the like. "But this CapriCancer/Illuminati/W.O.M.B.A.T./Xennothemian threat is managed by the MEDIA. By TELEVISION, for heaven's sakes! How can that possibly have any effect on what we THINK? I don't see the connection." These days, the television is the retina of the mind's eye: kids can't imagine without one. Therefore, the television screen is part of the physical construction of the brain. Therefore, whatever appears on the television screen is absorbed as raw experience and opinions by those who watch. There's oodles of evidence. I mean, kids buy more of those TV-show inspired posable plastic figurines than you can shake a lamb's tail at. Then they can't figure out what to do with them, and they sort of sit there gathering dust. The excitement is gone in the shake of a stick. But they keep going back. The TV gives you prepackaged bits of opinion, viewpoint, information. The human mind, like any other dynamic system, takes the route of least resBLATTTance. Except for those with feedback mechanBLATTs to make it EASIER to think independently than to be lazy, EVERYONE takes those opinions for truth. The voice of now. "But... But... The dang fascBLATTT right-wing government always complains that the media is so liberal and pinko and everything." Well, yes, but they define just how liberal you're allowed to get. Noam Chomsky complained about that once. People just aren't willing to take him seriously. WHY? Because he's more left-wing than the media. Well, fuck, so were the hippies. Nobody took them seriously, and they eventually got brainwashed into not expressing their opinions any more. Well, lots of them did. Well, some of them did. Well... Uhhh... You know what I mean. Plus which, liberal media aren't so liberal as to want to overthrow the system, which is what they're trying to prevent. They offer you "alternatives" like Democrat and Republican, like PC, Liberal and NDP. Oh yeah. "I can't see the difference. Can YOU see the difference?" "Price is the difference." Yes, that's right. Read my lips. No... New... Taxes... So by giving you these few little options, all of which are in favour of slow reform of policies, and not revolting against anything except maybe their month-old tomatoes at the back of the fridge, they give you the impression that that's all there is to it. Plus that, of course, the "liberal" media isn't so liberal as it might look. Oh, sure, they give you the impression that someone's looking out for those dangerous Nazis in Parliament, or whatever. But isn't that really the point? They LOOK like they're under control. It LOOKS like you're being given an objective and critical look at the system. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! Excuse me. I just had to get that out of my system. In fact, the only purpose they serve is to give the conservatives something to react off to get MORE conservative, and the liberals something to feel complacent about. It's a perfect method of preserving the system. But that's nothing to get upset about. It's just perfectly reasonable economics. I wouldn't get upset if I were you. Everything's fine. Time goes by. In time, you'll find... Everything is just fine. Halo P2 Politicos Of The World As Written By Councilgoof Brian O'Blivious All across this great country of Theirs, the truth becomes more evident by the second. The keyboard is mightier than the sword, but only at range. It ranks a close second to the bazooka when it comes to sheer devastation of personal lives. But what's the point, really? What I mean is, why bother trying to change the world by writing about it (like I'm doing now) when you can change the world by DOING something about it? Go out there and help make the world a better place, where we can all live in peace and harmony, and all be exactly the same as everyone else! C'mon, together we stand, divided we fall! Kick ass for Jesus! I'd rather be brainwashed by a government than by myself. With a government, you can look at its motives more or less objectively, even when you've been brainwashed. If you brainwash yourself, what kind of a hope have you got to look at the results? How are you supposed to figure out if you're what you wanted to make yourself want to want to be, or whether that just what you WANT yourself to think? Besides, you can't really "pull the wool over your own eyes". It doesn't work that way. Everything you delude yourself with, every time you try to take control of your own destiny, you're acting based on stuff that's happened to you. Your input from the environment around you. And it's a self-modifying, complexly interacting system, too. By any reasonable definition of the word, it's an intelligent entity. Just one whose motives we're not even CAPABLE of understanding. Who knows what it might want you to think? Better to be brainwashed by friends. A small group of friends. That way, you can all monitor each other sort-of-a- little-bit objectively, and see where it's all going. That's our GNU politics of the GNU Reality. I mean, if we all try to live together in harmony, we'll have to make sacrifices to avoid treading on each other's toes, and generally making pains in the asses of ourselves. We have to give up our ideas, our beliefs, our styles, or we'll end up getting pissed off at one another. And that wouldn't be any good. That's destroying the manifestation of information. When the information is genetic, that's called murder. You wouldn't want to be a party to murder, would you? Even if you would, you wouldn't fit in too well in a harmonized society either, come to think of it. That's why we're Neo-Tribal AnarchBLATTTs. Every little group that can live together without killing each other should separate, and go its own little way. Before too long, this will be technically feasable. You can live in the privacy of your own home, getting your food-and-shelter monkey by working from there by pooter/modem, talking by the datanet to people in your Tribe. Or, if you're an anti-tech Tribe, you go live on a commune somewhere, in the GNU World Disorder that will let you do that without trying to screw you over, like they did in the Bad Old Days. Or, if you LIKED the Bad Old Days, and you WANT to go out annoying other Tribes whose worldviews don't mesh with yours, you can go fuck yourself, and if I ever meet you, I'll kill you. If there's anything I can't stand, it's intolerance. Halo ΰ TύϋVι Privacy And Anarchy As Written By The Way (a.k.a. Counciltwit Brian O'Blivious) Privacy is at an end! The Government is watching you from inside your T.V. set! Computers will take away your rights of freedom! Well, maybe. One thing that most people wouldn't deny is that computers and networks and "other damn stuff like that" is an empowering technology. For now, as of the time I'm writing this, there's no reason to believe that the trend towards empowering tech will stop. Rapid information sharing systems like the Usenet (a sort of abstract informational thing that piggybacks in the large Internet hardware the way your mind piggybacks on your brain) and Fidonet (as of now, the largest AMATEUR network, linking upwards of 20000 individual pooter systems around the world), these all have a way of distributing information in a way that simply can't be stopped. The only way a government of today could control the leaking of "potentially dangerous information" out of the country is to actually cut all the phone lines, jam all satellite linkages, and make sure that nobody has access to a HAM radio. But that's just not practical. People wouldn't stand for it, for one thing. ώI mean, how would you feel if the government suddenly, and for no readily explained reason, suddenly cut all phone lines coming from your house just because you have access to information? Any large scale attempt to do that would result in, well, a revolution. It's just not possible any more. The possibilities of data compression and encryption (especially using RSA-type public key encryption, for which the encryption and decryption keys are separate) make actual monitoring of e-mail and file transfer impossible. Funky software allows the gimpy people who write detructo-viri (that blow up your compooter when they get inside, or otherwise mangle things, rather than playing music, leaving irritating notes on your screen, and so forth) to alter their own informational signature jacket by self-compiling, encrypting and compressing, like the common cold virus alters its protein jacket. This, combined with annoyingly well-designed modular programming wares for virus-production (the Tinkertoy of cracker-hackers) means that anyone with access to encrypted anarchBLATTT file-server places can put together a virus capable of doing any number of bothersome and/or useful things, and the government can't do a damn thing about it. Grr. Grrr. What a shame. Of course, the "Government" will never be sufficiently ahead of the constantly bubbling thing-that-bubbles of technological advance to actually put in controls over technology. The only way to keep the criminal and sociopathic types from having a monopoly over viri is to allow everyone to have the systems, and the know- how to use them. If pooters are outlawed, then only outlaws will have pooters. That is, only the people who are ALREADY anti- government, will have access to the empowering technology that's available. Of course, when EVERYONE has the power to hack EVERYONE around, then the government simply won't last long. Centralized institutions just can't stand in the face of this kind of technological advance. Central banks, for example, are frighteningly vulnerable: a single virus with access to the money records can do anything to your account it wants. That's what the crypto-money scheme is for what I was talking about earlier. Almost certainly, this system WILL be introduce, using cryptographically strong encoding, tranmission through eavesdrop-proof quantum encrypted channels, and storage media that respond to each read (like a quantum-ROM system, perhaps, which erases itself whenever you read it, due to Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle). People just have to get together and agree to accept one-way exchanges of this self-valued encrypted information as actual money. The government will immediately try to tax this, but, well, the government simply MUST change in response to new waves of technology, or it dies. That's simple Systems Analysis: a self-rectifying system which fails to develop new response patterns in reference to new outside stimuli is less successful and self-propagating than one whch does. Oh, sure, maybe not everyone will accept the new form of money. Then their money will be the first target when a wave of prepackaged modular viri gets loosed on the banks. Big wow. So the system that survives is the system that accepts crypto-money. Maybe not everyone will accept the same information format. Well, no problem: not everyone now accepts foreign money. Just you try spending Yen in Arkansas... Just remember: once the Printing Press was feared by liberals as a tool of oppression. Its actual effect? Liberation from tyranny, literacy for the masses, and a flourishing of intellectual acheivement. The computer and the 'net holds the same threat, and the same promise. Anarchy is not dead. Watch your overcoat. MIND-CONTROL CONSPIRACIES ARE PEOPLE TOO! MOO OMM BOOKS OF THE APOSTLES Book of Halfy Chapter 0001. (What Happened?) 0001: The Grate Prophet did come down and meet his followers, and with him, he brought the great symbol of the MOOists. 0002: The followers of MOO did name this symbol in honour of the Grate Prophet, and it shall be called the Halfy. Chapter 0002. (Truth: Yeah, right...) 0001: Everything is true, nothing is permissible. 0012: This explains why this book is so short. 0082: It shall be known that the word "Aaaoooozorazzazzaieoazaei- iiozakhoeoooythoeazaeaoozakhozakheythxaalethykh" is a magical word, as it seems to cause people to disappear for no apparent reasons. 0083: Well, it shall be known to all who will know it. 0084: This magical word will also get you things you would never dream of it bringing, but only if used properly. FNORD! Chapter 0005. (Book of Chaos) 0001: Everything is true. 0002: Even false things are true. 0555: Aaaaaaabbceeeeeeeggghkllmmmooooorsst. 0556: Try to figure that code out! BoCOWok of Confuse-Ius Chapter of Interruptions. 1: Confuse-Ius can/will interrupt anyone. 2: Confuse-Ius can/will interrupt Confuse-Ius. 3: Confuse-Ius can/will interrupt anything. 4: Confuse-Ius can/will break in in the middle of a word. Grate Prophet's Interruption of the Interruption. Confuse-Ius can interrupt anytime it wants. But only The Grate Prophet can interrupt it's interruptions. Confuse-Ius Interruption Can I interrupt interuptions? Don't interrupt me, and I won't interrupt you, unless I feel like it. Thpthpthpthp. Confuse-Ius Say: Can I interrupt interruptions of interruptions? Don't interrupt me when I'm interrupting you COW interrupt me. 5: Confuse-Ius can/will throw in a COW wherever he feels like. 6: But Confuse-Ius DARES not split infintives. 7: Always lBLATTTen to Confuse-Ius. BeCOWcause if you don't, you won't learn. 8: The High Preest is irresponsible for spreading the word of Confuse-Ius throughout the book of MOO. 9: This will not make much sense. Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage. Chapter 0006. (This is a chapter??!!??) 0001: This is a short chapter. Confuse-Ius sez: No kidding! Chapter 0007. (Book of MOOFests) 0001: Confuse-Ius Once Say: JuΊ=ΚΚώΑΥo]ΧΛ±X/9ώ"'΅s-ζqώx³ƒΓ Chapter 6025. (The Last Book) 0101: MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMOO Book of Floyd Chapter 1. (Book Of Pro-verbs and Pro-nouns) 1: Thou shalt not eat my money, or I'll kill you. Confuse-Ius: Munch, munch, munch. 2: Thou art better off mad than merely loopy. 3: Indeed are thy needs safer with MOO. 4: Thou shalt not partake in the eating of rocks, or then thou shalt need massive dental work. 6: Thou shalt not worship gravy images, for it's hard to carve images in gravy. 7: There are beavers in the world, and then there are BEAVERS. 8: People who live in Glass Houses shouldn't throw stones unless Glass says it's okay first. 12: Beware Chuck, the wood-chucking woodchuck. 13: For truly is it written... somewhere, I can't seem to find it just now, but I have it written down... can I get back to you on that? 14: This sentence is not false, but it is silly. 15: This sentence is false AND silly. 16: This sentence is neither true nor false, but it's still silly. 17: This sentence is worthless, because it isn't even silly. 18: This sentence was finished. 19: Sentence fragment. 21: Truly is it difficult to argue with one who agrees with you, and truly would you be a fool to try it. 26: When the world explodes, putting a paper bag over thy head would be pretty stupid. 27: Once upon a time... 29: By the way, I meant that "Between The Lines" crack LITERALLY. 31: There is NO SUCH THING as the Paranoid society. If it DID exBLATTT, I wouldn't belong to it. NOSSIR, NOHOW, NOWAY. 32: Nothing is true. Everything is permissible. 33: No, that's not true, sorry. 34: Everything is true, NOTHING is permissible. 35: No, wait, that's not true EITHER. 46: For truly is it written... Somewhere... I think... 47: Coulda sworn I had it here a second ago. 48: Anyone seen a little green slip of paper about yo big? 49: Well, it wasn't important anyway. 58: Confuse-Ius once say, "Man who stick head in fruit drink get punch in nose." 59: Confuse-Ius once say, "If everything coming your way, you in wrong lane." 60: Confuse-Ius once say, "Rolling stone gathers speed." 68: Confuse-Ius once say, "Rolling Stones gather no album royalties. Odd, that." 69: Don't nobody nohow nowhere ever ask ME for the time. 70: Cuz some dude ate my watch. 71: Nasty little bugger, little green guy about yo big. 72: Funny, that. One of them coincidences. 77: Couldn't have happened to a nicer guy. Cept maybe me. ΦΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔ· Ί JuΊ=ΚΚώΑΥo]ΧΛ±X/9ώ"'΅s-ζqώx³ƒΓ'njδqώlfΛ8`ΦUΰ#Ύώ^θT»Ί Ί ώK-I£lLάPμΛ-@όώŠˆ/ "Bobos-Nargledo" Sherman-Smitharriscamp Ί Ί Ί Ί WISHES IT TO BE KNOWN TO ALL THOSE WHO WISH TO KNOW IT: Ί Ί Ί Ί "Ah shall be retah-ring frum da business of annoyin' dem Ί Ί nahce folx out dere in T.V. land ann settlin' down wit Ί Ί me wahfe and kids. Da business ah shall be leavin' in Ί Ί duh cay-puh-ble haynds of Confuse-Ius, who has always Ί Ί been to me lahke the twelfth uncle ah never had." Ί Ί Ί Ί Confuse-Ius, who operates under the ShaderShield, which Ί Ί allows ConfusionBLATTTs to pass undetected through proof Ί Ί reading shops, could not be found for comment. It is Ί Ί assumed that he has already taken up the legacy entrusted Ί Ί to him by "Bobos-Nargeldo", who will no longer be able Ί Ί to appear in this annoying mind drug. Ί Ί Ί Ί JuΊ=ΚΚώΑΥo]ΧΛ±X/9ώ"'΅s-ζqώx³ƒΓ'njδqώlfΛ8`ΦU Ί Ί ΰ#Ύώ^θT»ώK-I£lLάPμΛ-@ό has often said in the past Ί Ί that Confuse-Ius is the Last, Best Hope for true stupid Ί Ί interruptions in this country. This, he hopes, has Ί Ί been amply demonstrated so far by Confuse-Ius's many Ί Ί appearances, contrasted with "Bobos-Nargeldo"s own, Ί Ί which have been few and far between. Ί Ί Ί Ί "Information Wants To Be Free" Ί Ί -Hacker's Motto Ί Ί "Poutine Wants To Be Expensive" Ί Ί -Poutine Manufacturer's Motto Ί Ί "I Want An Old Fashioned House In The Country" Ί Ί -"Bobos-Nargeldo" Company Motto Ί Ί "Truth Wants To Be Ranted" Ί Ί -W.O.M.B.A.T. Company Motto Ί Ί Ί Ί Ί Ί ALL HAIL THE GREAT CHILLI-CHEESE BURRITO-TWELVE! Ί Ί Ί Ί Ί ΣΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔ½ 78: Beaver? WHERE? WHO? WHAT? WHEN? WHY? 79: Some days, you just can't get rid of a bomb. 80: When an exploding octopus steals your wallet, you know it's time to go home. 81: SCREWBALL! BLOW IT OUT YER EAR, CINNAMON-FEET! 82: What do you get if you multiply six by nine? 83: What's the difference between a pronoun and a proverb? 84: It. 85: He. 86: She. 87: We. 88: They. 89: Hir. 90: SHe. 91: Them. 92: Her. 93: Him. 94: I. 95: Me. 96: You. 97: Us. 98: Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer. 99: Confuse-Ius once say, "Mind your Peas and Queues." 100: Confuse-Ius once say, "Mind your poison queues." 101: Confuse-Ius once say, "Mind your Pies and Queues." 102: Confuse-Ius once say, "WHAT THE FUCK?" 103: Confuse-Ius once say, "Er... Ummm... Don't quote me on that ." 104: Confuse-Ius once say, "..." 105: ... 106: Once upon an aeon, in the Region of Thud... 107: Don't ask me about jello. I don't know nothin'. 108: You can't prove anything. 109: Gimme a cookie. 111: Congratulations, if you send in the winning number in time, you may have already won ten million dollars! 143: Rolaids spells ROLAIDS, dammit! What are you, STOOPID? 546: All annoying things must come to an end. Chapter 2. (The Book Of The High Preest's Folly) 1: It came to pass that the High Preest was in the land of the Wombat, and that he was posessed by an alien mind-beam. 2: And the Lord Un-Cow did see the High Preest as he maketh two signs in stone upon the Earth. 3: And the first of these had on its face this writing: 4: How much wood could Chuck the wood-chucking woodchuck chuck if Chuck the wood-chucking woodchuck could chuck wood? 5: And the second sign was seen to say: 6: Beware the Brick Lobbing Beaver. 7: And the Lord spake, saying "Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. That's fine... WHAT WAS THAT?" and Floyd looked at the lord and said "Calm down, dummy..." and the Lord spake again unto Floyd, saying "Get bent.". 8: And the Lord spake then unto the people of the Dinner Circle of MOO, saying "Ashtray? What Ashtray? I don't see any ashtray. Do you see an ashtray?". 9: And the people spake unto the Lord therefore, saying "lighten up old dude." and the Lord smate (smited?) them with a flash of sulphurous smoke and lightning, and the spake again unto the Lord, saying "OW!". 10: And the Lord Un-Cow did act confused, and verily, the High Preest did act confused also. 11: For this was the folly of the High Preest, though also not of the High Preest. 12: For in his folly, the High Preest had confused not only the Lord, but also himself. 13: Pretty foolish, eh? Chapter 3. (The Book of MOOfests) (Being One Year's Worth Of Fests) (Stolen from Half-Mad. Really) 1: The Lord Un-Cow, being confused still, looketh down from somewhere higher than what he/she/it was looking at. 2: Below the Lord Un-Cow were gathered many MOOists, and great fires announceth their presence. 3: And there was a great confusion below, as the MOOists shouted unto the sky. 4: And the words which the MOOists shouteth were these. 5: "I'm gonna jump! I'm gonna do it! I swear I'll do it!" 6: And the Lord Un-Cow did look down even unto the MOOists, and replyeth. 7: And the words of the Lord as he/she/it replyeth from the ledge were these words. 8: "Don't do it! Don't jump!" 9: And the MOOists did jump, and the lord did frown. 10: And the MOOists did return to the ground from whence they jumpeth. 11: The MOOists did plead unto heaven, or at least unto the ledge. 12: And the words of their pleading were these words. 13: "Awww. Why did you have to do that? Can't we at least have a feast?" 14: And the lord did grin, and the MOOists did feast upon the carp, and mints, and wombats, and beavers, and bricks, and flamethrowers, and printers, and Lepers, and Messiahs, and each other, and mountains, and the Lord, and the Lost Tribe Of Trevor, and six annoying mind drugs about lasers. 15: And the Lord did get annoyed, and the Lord did pull back his/her/it's leg and the Lord spake unto them, saying "Hey cut that out!" and the people did spontaneously combust, and the Lord did speak, and the Lord sayeth "Ah that's better" and the Lord did go back to sleep and Halfy did eat him/her/it. 16: And this was the first MOOfest. 17: And for a long time was there a great pause, followed by a time of discussions and wonderings of when should there be held yet another MOOfest. 18: And from impatience, and the fact that the Hight Preest had been unable to appear at the first, the first-and-a-half was held some days later.FNORD! 19: And the MOOists did gather to eat upon the fruited mints that sprang forth from the satchel of Floyd Gecko. And truly was there a gathering at the sacred Dunn's. 20: And during this time did Halfy stub out a cigarette in a heap of something explosive. 21: And verily did the ashtray explode, leaving the High Preest in a mess, for truly was it he who caused the accident. 22: And verily did the MOOists sweep the accident to one side, and did pretend it never happened. 23: Did I say ashtray? WHAT ASHTRAY? 24: And truly did Leper Messiah and Floyd Gecko and Halfy produce in a frosted glass the appearance of life, of cream and salt and sugar and pepper and vinegar. 25: And yet it did scream and leave the glass, running across the floor of the deli. 26: And indeed did they scram when they did see this. 27: And truly did Leper Messiah vanish into thin air, never to be seen again. 28: And truly was the great sigil of MOO manifest upon the melting snow of the land. 29: And thus ended the first-and-a-half MOOfest. 30: And so it came to pass that there was a long period of waiting and of nothing much happening, and Hellhound did return to the lands from whence he came. 31: And truly was there a great silence upon the land of Udduwah for some number of days. And then it came to be the birthday festival of the High Preest. 32: And then was there a great time of rejoicing and silliness. 33: For indeed was there a PythonFest, and the antics of Brian and of Mr. And Mrs. Brian Norris did parade themselves across the screen of the magical box. 34: And indeed was there great laughter. For truly was it funny. 35: And then the alien vessel did land in bermuda, and truly did nobody notice it, for indeed did it have nothing to do with this story. 36: For verily is it written... umm... somewhere... 37: Well never mind, for verily did it happen that there was a great light of the Great MOO on Earth, as Halfy and Floyd and several of those infidel unMOO there gathered did create for themselves a light. 38: And truly did they say "let there be light". 39: And indeed were their eyebrows singed. 40: Later then upon that day was there a great feasting upon the holy pizzas and the holy vegetables and dill dip. 41: And then indeed was there great happiness, for the pizzas did not run away. 42: And then the Great MOO caused a great silliness to arrive in the home of Floyd Gecko, and there was much rejoicing. 43: And then everyone was indeed much confused. And eventually did they return unto their homes. 44: And truly was there a long, long, long wait, far longer than ten minutes. Or even ten days. For truly were they forced to wait for several months. 45: And at that time there was the Second MOOFest. 46: And indeed did I Yemen-Oying and Floyd Gecko meet each other in the holy Central Park, and did seek other MOOists, who had truly promised to arrive. 47: And their searches took them long and far, and they endured many hardships. 48: For falsely did they trek across the desert wastelands of the Sahara in their search. 49: And indeed did they quest through swamps and forests, cities and meadows, seeking those who had said they would arrive. 50: But then they returned to the appointed meeting place, sad that the others had not arrived. 51: And verily were the others there, demanding to know why they were late. 52: For indeed was Halfy and Neuro and Atrox there, wandering in search of Floyd and Yemen. 53: And indeed did they visit the humble store nearby that did sell great magic in its wares, and knowledge that did abound. 54: And indeed was it there that they did find knowledge of the great "BOB", from the SubGenius who did work there. 55: Sadly, before they could learn more, the man did turn himself into a toad, and did hop away. 56: And indeed, like many toads, did he say CROAK CROAK CROAK. And truly was it stupid. 57: But they did hunt him down through hill and valley and did confront him with his unfinished tale, and he did truly end it. 58: For he did explode in a massive bang of hydrogen in the Ruin, disguised as a balloon. 59: And truly did they enter a long dark tunnel, and did cause the light of knowledge to enter there, and did notice that there was a great cloud descending upon them, and they did flee from there unto Dunn's. 60: But truly were Neuro and Atrox vanished in the end, and were gone from sight, for they were fools anyway. 61: And they had indeed turned into toads themselves, and been captured by an errant pack of raving fire hydrants. 62: And indeed did they eventually disappear. 63: Thus ended the Second MOOFest. 64: But in the end, it came time for Halfy to leave to preach the word of the Great MOO in another city, and with his departure there came a lull. 65: And Halfy did take retroactive revenge upon Floyd for being slow in his duties as High Preest, causing Floyd's computer to crash. 66: And truly did this make it hard for Floyd to act in his duties. 67: And eventually did Halfy return to the city, for there had been a decision to hold another gathering of Power. 68: And indeed was it larger than the others, and truly was it wondrous, for all those with knowledge on all matters of MOO were present, and El Cid did present his knowledge and his gifts of candy. 69: And they then caused great motion and noise to invade the Ruin. 70: And verily did they seek unto all lands and worlds to find the nature of things. And there was light. 71: And indeed did Floyd complain of a sore neck. 72: For Floyd was... umm... Floyd HAD a pain in the neck. 73: But finally did they return to Dunn's, as they always did. 74: And verily was there discussion of many things. 75: Of shoes and ships and sealing wax, and whether pigs have wings. 76: But truly did they never mention that it was Lewis Carroll who spoke of it first, for they were unoriginal. 77: And in the end did they understand better, and they did return to their homes enlightened, and left a large tip. 78: For indeed is he holy who gives big tips. 79: And in the end, the money you make is equal to the money you give to waitresses. 80: And that was the InsanityFest. 81: And there was a long pause, in which very little of import did be in the happening of itself being. Umm. Yeah. 82: And truly did it near the time of the Nu-Yer, as the Penguins do most heathenly celebrate with the other heathenish celebrants in their celebratory celebrations which do be being such that they celebrate heathenly. 83: And on the day of December the nineteenth was there a great film which did attract stupid people. 84: For truly was it the Rocky Horror Picture Show, where all nonconformBLATTTs could gather to act exactly the same. 85: And Floyd did decide that it would be his duty to go there seeking the Hellhound 101, for Hellhound had been gone for many a month, his whereaCOWbouts unknown. 86: So Floyd did bedeck himself most nonconformBLATTTically. 87: And he did arrive there, and while seeing many that he knew, he saw none there resembling Hellhound 101, for Hellhound had been eaten by the winds that swept the desserts of Israel many years before, leaving an icecream-free zone. 88: But Floyd did watch the moving pictures, and did enjoy it in a way, but was surprised that Hellhound was not there. 89: But as many left, he saw the Salmon, whose home is a holy site to the PenguinBLATTTs. And with her was Jonathan Tracy, a holy one to the PenguinBLATTTs. 90: And this he took to be an omen. 91: So it came to pass that he comversed with many in the place, and found that though he knew none of them, many of them had read the Grate Book Of MOO, and he took this too to be an omen. 92: And he did depart with the Salmon and the Tracy and another to feast at Dunn's. 93: And he did discover that he had little money, and they had to leave soon, and that the seats near the door were not so holy as those farther from the door. 94: For the absence of Hellhound had cursed the city. 95: So it came to pass that they had to leave, and as Floyd walked alone through the alleys of the Market he did meet some people. 96: And he did recognize them, for they had seen the Moving Picture near him. 97: And among them were many he knew from elsewhere. 98: So he spoke to the heathen and laughed and joked. 99: And a miracle came to pass. 100: One of the heathen did ask him his name, and he did indicate his official clothing. 101: Hellhound still wasn't there, though. 102: And she did read his clothes, and an expression of knowledge did appear on her face. 103: And she said unto him these words: 104: "Floyd Gecko? As in the Book Of MOO?" 105: For she was yet another who had read the Book. 106: But there was more to come. 107: As they talked, he found that she knew much of the secrets of Robert Anton Wilson, famous DiscordianBLATTT. 108: And at this point, his strange hat did attract an odd man who offered them Jamaican Dope very quietly. 109: Floyd sent him away, because he had no money. 110: The girl to whom he spoke was upset and confused by this, for he had accomplished his purpose. 111: And it developed that she had read a very old Book, and did solemnly avow to meet him again at the next gathering of MOOists to gain another. 112: And they did converse long, and did run with the others and apart from the others in their discussions, and there was much climbing in and out of elevators and falling down stairs. 113: And eventually did they part their separate ways. 114: And that was the RockyFest. 115: And after there had been a Nu-Yer passed, and there had been anew a gathering of MOOists in places all, various, and sundry, there came to pass the appointed time for the next meeting. 116: And the MOOists did converge upon Dunn's like flies upon a mouldy bit of fruit. 117: Or perhaps a dead animal, which is unpleasant, but does indeed tend to attract flies. 118: Anyway. 119: So the MOOists and many non-MOOists alike did gather together in Dunn's, and did feast upon veggie platters, which they did steal from Floyd. 120: And in the time of this passing-having-come-to-be-occurring, there was much food-eating activities and dispensing of both money to waitresses, for there were two, and also of relish. 121: But their vile creation in a glass did not this time flee from the Deli, but sat there and supported a spoon, for it contained much Thousand-Islands Dressing, which would not let it move. 122: And so in consternation they attmpted to raise demons in it, but did find that they had no power over demons, not being that type. 123: And so the Slurry-Entity sat there and made "slurp squelch" noises, and was disgusting in much of its looks, and they did ignore it. 124: And eventually, after consuming of chocolate sundaes and carmel saturdaes did they leave Dunn's, finding it warm outside. 125: And they did fall to prey upon unsuspecting Rideau Centers, Annoying-Mind-Drugstores, and Computer Merchandise Peddling Places Of Commercial Enterprise (CMPPOCE's). 126: But finding nothing of interest, Halfy and Floyd and El Cid and Charon and indeed even the non-MOO Harizof did depart to the home of Floyd. 127: [CENSORED] 128: And they did then retire unto a great place of moving pictures to meet with Frieda, who had promised to show up there. 129: And so as they waited, consuming mints and examining the place in which they found themselves, they discovered the slurry beast from the first-and-a-half MOOFest. 130: But El Cid did step in it and kill it accidentally. 131: And soon did there arrive Frieda, with an array of knowledgeable others, who sat upon chairs, instead of stairs, and who ate food, instead of large rubber things that nobody could really identify except that they were purchased in Japan that time. 132: And upon these knowledgeable people was imparted knowledge, in the form of Books. 133: There were annoying mind drugs of MOO, Discord, and How-To Plumbing. 134: For a sink was clogged in the nether-world. 135: But that's neither here nor there. 136: For such is the nature of the nether-world. 137: And they did watch the parading of the MOOving pictures upons the screen before them by the name of AKIRA. 138: And they did joyously partake of insulting these pictures. 139: And their taunts and cries did cause great enjoyment to those around, and they were cheered. 140: And when the MOOvies were over, they did bow and take money in from the audience... NOT! 141: And when the non-MOO Harizof had vanished into thin air, just as had done folks in each of the MOOvies, there was much of a consternation. 142: And then all of a sudden... Well, most of a sudden, anyway. Well, some of a sudden.... 143: What does a sudden look like, anyway? That's what I want to know. Has anyone ever seen one? 144: Well anyway, they all left, and the MOOvies-Fest was ended. 145: And there was a breather. 146: Which was good, for if there hadn't been, they all would've died. 147: On account of breathing is good for you. HONEST. 148: And the breather went on until the time came for another Fest. 149: And it was eventually decided in roundabout ways that the Fest should be small, inviting only a few family mem... umm... 150: That it should be small, for Halfy was nowhere to be seen. 151: And indeed was it small, for though everyone showed up to see THE WALL and HEAVY METAL, they did most verily not notice each other, the crowd being so great. 152: And thus was the They-All-Missed-Each-OtherFest, which was never recorded anywhere, for it failed miserably. 153: And there was a short pause while they collected their wits. 154: And soon enough there was the end of the year of MOOFests, and it was determined that there should be one to mark the end of the first year of the Holy Church of the Great MOO's latest emergence into the world. 155: And so at 2:43:17.6 on the 21st of March, 135566 DPP did the Preest Lloyd Taco enter into Dunn's Deli, having abandoned me, his most P.Oed brother, at the Wendy's in the Rideau Center. 156: And with him were the two we had met, who had agreed to join our most blasphemous Church (for they were MOOist Wiccans). 157: And they were called Handmaiden Gates and Cat Bondage. 158: For truly did they have strange tastes in names, being wierdos. For each of them had chosen the name she wanted most, of all the wierd names that did circulate in the Market at that time. 159: And they did discover upon entry that there was a table most verily reserved for them already, though they had not arranged it. And it was miraculous. 160: And they did also discover a table most falsely reserved for them, which they HAD arranged. And it was not miraculous. 161: And they did sit. 162: And they did wait for a while. 163: And at this time, Halfy awoke many kilometers away, for he had overslept, the fool. 164: And so it transpired, back at the Deli, that Captain Cando had showed up, strangely enough. And he and Sgt. MOOre were both using the same body, as had long been suspected. 165: But no wombats did leap upon them, and neither did they leap upon wombats, for no wombats were to be found. 166: And neither were there any printers to be found, until later that evening. So it wasn't really quite so strange as the first MOOFest until later, when the Peace Tower began to speak. 167: But that's another story, and I'll get to that in a sec, okay? 168: Anyway. 169: WOWEE! Speaking of Wiccans... Check out the verse, dude! 170: Anyway, this is beside the point. 171: And as time passed there did arrive Mr. Slippery, whose leaflets did truly suck, and Charon, and Oberon, and Mr. Canoe Head, and Comrad Harizof, and Half-Mad, and Madness and Terminal Entry, and Jesus, who sat at a table on the other side, where none spotted him, and El Cid, and Longshot, and the Disinterested Observer from Om Ceti, and one known as Lyds (wierdo). 172: And so it was that many MOOists did fill up and overflow the reservation most mysteriously made for them. 173: For whatever God or Goddess had made the reservation had fucked up on the number. 174: And the MOOists did create slurries in glasses, which the most blasphemous waitress did remove. 175: And the MOOists did feast upon food, which the most helpful waitress did deliver unto them. 176: And they ate and read and congregated, and the most dBLATTTressed waitress did leave her shift. 177: And so at 5:00:12 they did leave Dunn's and most truly split. 178: And they did visit the Rideau Center, where Lloyd, that stupid fool, was ROLLED down a hallway. And they preached to the masses and put the book on hard-drives in 'puter stores, until the ones known as Security were called. 179: And since Atrox was working as Security, nothing much happened. 180: And so they spent a good three-quarters of an hour, give or take two minutes and twelve seconds. 181: And after returning to the Wendy's, where I was picked up (and I manacled the blasphemous Lloyd to a chair for deserting me), we went most ravenously forth unto Spark's Street to preach. 182: Only nobody was there, on account of it was evening, and cold, this being Canada, after all, and what did I expect on the first day of spring, WARMTH OR SOMETHING? 183: But NOOOOOO, the stupid WEATHER hadda get in the way, and we couldn't FUCKING PREACH TO THE MASSES, DAMMIT! 184: Well that's just how it IS, when you live in CANADA, isn't it? 185: LAND OF BLOODY ICE AND BLOODY SNOW, INNIT? 186: NOT LIKE WE COULDN'T HAVE EXPECTED ANY BLEEDING GRASS OR ROBINS BLOODY WELL CHIRPING ON THE FIRST DAY OF BLOODY SPRING, EH? 187: Anyway. 188: We did retire unto the Parliament buildings, losing El Cid and Longshot, and the Disinterested Observer along the way. 189: If found, please return to the Church Of MOO, 40 Grove Ave, Ottawa ON, K1S 3A6. 190: And so we did toast marshmallows on the Eternal Flame, and warm our chilled hands. 191: And we did spell out MOO on the ground just as the Peace Tower began to chime 6:00:00.00ish. 192: And so it began to speak to us, for we had inhaled the fumes of the Eternal Flame, speaking as it did about wombats and where wombats live, and what they eat. At least, that's how *I* remember it. 193: And we did offer mints to those who left the building. 194: And they did refuse, even though they were Free and also Made In Canada. 195: For they had been brainwashed by the Evil Bung, Brian Mulroney, at that time Prime MinBLATTTer of Canada. 196: For though he was evil (sometimes) and nasty (sometimes), at least he didn't have a sweet tooth. 197: I think. 198: And truly did we return unto the Rideau Center, losing the Mr. Slippery, who CLAIMED to have reserved our table for us. 199: And Handmaiden Gates and Cat Bondage and Mr. Canoe Head were initiated into our ranks on the food court, for we are not too proud to share our rituals with the public, like SOME RELIGIONS I COULD MENTION!!! 200: Not to name any names. 201: And truly did Madness and Mr. Canoe Head and Terminal Entry and Comrad Harizof (the pyro one) and Lyds and them spontaneously combust, due to Harizof's incessant meddling. 202: And the rest of us, all seven who were left, seek out Halfy's car, for he is overly fond of driving. 203: Ain't that just the way? The Handmaiden and Captain Cando got the big Front Seat with Halfy, and the rest of us hadda squish and squash to even BEGIN to fit in the back. 204: And Charon kept stealing MY hat, too. 205: And Oberon did complain that he had to leave (mostly on account of how tiny he had to squeeze to fit in the seat) and other horrendous plagues of that type did beset the MOOists. 206: And Charon did receive a most horrific bite on the head from me when he stole my hat again. 207: Served him right, too. 209: And Cat Bondage did complain of sundry people jostling. 210: And so Halfy (who had replied "This Way" to "Where are we going") came to a stop in Kanata, threw out Oberon, who was whining, and we continued on our way. 211: And so we returned to Udduwah (the Great Capital) and did rest at my home, where we most accidentally interrupted a rather nice dinner party for a few moments before reaching the temple. 212: For what can you do when people are invited to your home? 213: Anyway. 214: We then proceeded to the great MOOvie Freejack, which we did observe until it was over, which we deemed a good time to stop watching it, on account of it wasn't on anymore. 215: And, it being over, Charon did jump up and down, having consumed so much caffeine we wondered why he didn't explode. 216: For 30 cups of coffee is too much for one night, even if 23 of them are contained within Jolt Cola (Charon's Drink). 217: And it was true that as we did that hurtling-down-the-road- and-lBLATTTening-to-loud-industrial-music bit, Charon was a little agitated, though the back seat was still my undignified lot. 218: And so I contrived to bring us to a Donut Shoppe so that I might regain my Seat of Honour, in the front. 219: And it came to pass that in the course of this I accidentally (HONEST) hit the Handmaiden in the eye with a decapitated chicken made of rubber. 220: This sentence fell into this chapter from somewhere else, and does not, in fact, belong here. This one, however, does, and attests to the fact that the smacking-in-the-eye-with-a- chicken-with-no-head was, in fact, an accidence. HONEST. 221: And so I was forced to purchase many many donuts to make up for this most accidentally accidental accident which I had, totally by accident, accidentally accidented. 222: And there was much eating of donuts, and explaining to Charon that if he didn't stop bounding around, he couldn't stay inside, and sitting on funny Donut Shoppe stools. 223: And it was explained to Charon about the mysteries of creation and infinity, but he wasn't paying attention, being too jittery. 224: And so it came to pass that the time was drawing to a close in which I could still get that front seat. 225: So I made a break for it, and did truly get to ride there on the way back from the Donut Shoppe. 226: And as for what became of Lloyd, he won't say, hitting me as he does with a steel-plated decapitated wombat-chicken. 227: But hell, he got home, didn't he? 228: And so I knew nothing of what happened after that, for I wasn't even there to record. 229: And thus was the first year of MOOFests at an end. 230: And here ends my recording of them. Chapter 4. (The Book Of Answers) 1: The High Preest then said unto his followers one day, 2: I shall tell you the answers now. 3: But nobody was there, for he had few followers. 4: Then the High Preest, after the Great MOO had enlightened Saint Yari, said finally one later day unto the MOOists, 5: I shall tell you the answers now. 6: And they asked what the questions were. 7: And the first question was 8: How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? 9: And the answer was 10: Thirty Million Kilograms. 11: And the second question was 12: How many angels can dance on the head of a pin? 13: And the answer was 14: Five Billion, Six Hundred Sixty-Two Million, Eight Hundred Thirty Seven Thousand, Nine Hundred and Five. 15: And the third question was 16: How much ground could a groundhog hog if a groundhog could hog ground? 17: And the answer was 18: Seventy Hectares. 19: And the fourth question was 20: Why is a pig round? 21: And the answer was 22: Why not? 23: And the fifth question was 24: What is the meaning of life? 25: And the answer was 26: (CENSORED BY THE U.S. MILITARY) FNORD! 27: And the sixth question was 28: What is the MOO for? 29: And the answer was 30: Get lost, I'm tired of answering your stupid questions. Chapter 5. (The Book Of The Tundra) 1: The High Preest did say to his vaguely following followers the following words: 2: You ask, oh followingly following followers, the following question: what the hell happened to the Tundra? 3: I shall tell you, oh followers, and attentest thee well, oh you in the back, for I can see you falling asleep. HEY! You in the back! Wake up! That's better. 4: Oh recall, friends, how in the gospel accordion to Saint Yari the Tundra was destroyed by the Great MOO, well this is the fuller-than-that-but-still-pretty-damn-empty story. 5: In the beginning was the Game, and the Game was Nomic, and the Game grew bored of playing all on it's own 6: And the Great MOO created herself retroactively. 7: In this great retroactive creation was made the Game itself, the Great MOO, and nothing else. 8: But soon, I tell you, the Great MOO became bored, as behooves a Goddess with nothing to do. 9: And so it came to pass that the tundra and the Penguins were made. 10: But even so, the Great MOO did yet again become bored. So the Explosion was made to happen, albeit a bit reluctantly. 11: And so was the tundra shattered into an incredibly large number of teeny tiny bits. 12: As told in the Gospel Accordion To Saint Yari, one of these was round, and was called The Universe. In it lay The Earth, which was also round. 13: And this Earth was given to Eris, as told in a sec, so don't go away. 14: Another of the bits was taken by the Primordial Penguin and in it were made the brood of Second Generation Penguins. And one of these was Jehovah. 15: And the Second Generation Penguins did flee to Earth and live in Antarctica, along with Jehovah. 16: And the son of Jehovah, being half-human and half-penguin, was named ChrBLATTT (misnamed ChrBLATTT) and verily, oh my friends, he was nailed to a tree. 17: What a sap. 18: And another part of the Tundra was Void-Shaped, and the Great MOO did call it the Void, because the Great MOO wasn't one to muck about with stupid names for things. 19: And out of the void were created, through the eternal wrestle of the Void with itself, Eris and Aneris. 20: And Eris did take The Universe as her plaything, for she was daughter Goddess of the Great MOO, and that was her right. 21: And Aneris did mope, but found another bit of the Tundra to play with, and it was called Aneris's Plaything, on account of Aneris didn't screw around with dumb names either. 22: Aneris's Plaything was a bit of the Tundra which happened to be extremely boring. 23: Yet another bit of the Tundra was formed by the Great MOO by Nomic Rule Number (Extremely High Number) into "BOB", her first son. 24-28: [Consult information on "BOB" elsewhere in this book, or any person belonging to the Church of the Sub-Genius.] 29: One bit of Tundra was formed by the Great MOO into QUACK, but we don't like to talk about him. 30: And QUACK did gain his followers on the Earth. 31-34: [Consult the Book of QUACK for info on QUACKBLATTT.] 35: Verily indeed at the time of the making of QUACK did the Great MOO turn her attention unto The Earth, and made Cow into her own image. 36: And the Humans, who were ugly were-slugs, did crawl out of the sea to see what was going on. 37: Truly was the Great MOO disgusted to see humans, so as a joke she made a committee to design a GNU form, and the committee was called Prophet Of MOO. 38: And the Prophet of MOO did create beer and draft and did eventually design the form of humans, while thinking itself to be a human as well. 39: And another bit of Tundra was the Hot Dog. But it got eaten. 40: A bit of the Tundra which was shaped like a Fire Hydrant, and was consequently named the Fire Hydrant, fell to the Earth, and split open, and there was truly a great floyd. Uh, I mean flood. 41: And Jehovah, seeing that the flood might destroy his world, did warn a man named "Noah" and his wife "Priscilla Presley" of the flood, and they did gather animals in a great boat. 42: And Jehovah did wrestle with the Fire Hydrant for forty days and forty nights, looking extremely silly. 43: Because the sight of a Fire Hydrant wrestling a Penguin was so silly, the Fire Hydrant became a great Icon of MOO, and many small models were built along streets and in cities, and they were worshipped by MOOists with a mutter of MOO. 44: Noah's wife, Priscilla Presley, was born again to the same name, many thousands of years later, but forgot all about the business with the boat. 45: (TOP SECRET) 46: And a shower of infinitely many dust particles from the Tundra did become named Souls. 47-55: [Consult Book of Really Secret Secrets for info on Souls] 56: And there were a whole bunch of others too, but I'm getting bored of explaining it to you. There were infinitely many of them, so there isn't really room here. 57: But truly were many Penguins survivors of the Great Explosion, and being birds, they swallowed some of the Souls. 58: And many of these swallowed Godlike Souls of five or six levels higher than humans. 59: And these became Gods, with such names as Jupiter, Quetzalcoatl, Zeus, Xoccipetl, Odin, Thor, Vishnu, Hera, Brahma, Athena, Venus, Tsuliwaensis, and many many others. 60: And one of these, whose name was, boringly, God, made a bet with the others, and was reincarnated as a Human, the lowest form of life they could think of (also the one that came out of the hat, but that's another story). 61: And this God instantly changed his name to something much longer, and did become the Great Prophet of MOO. 62: And the High Preest, well, that's another story entirely. 63: For the tale of how the High Preest came to be, while very long and complicated, is not very interesting. 64: So spake the High Preest, warning that this whole story would be repeated later in simplified format for the guy in the back. 65: For the guy in the back had, against all warnings, fallen asleep. Chapter 6. (The Book Of Vague Threats) 3: The MOO did descend unto Earth, and Floyd did bite it, and Halfy did say "Eh" and there was a great Wombat over the land, and Floyd did say "Huh" and "Yeah verily" and other bible things, and Halfy did bite the wombat, which was odd, because it should go the other way around. 4: Thou shalt bloody well write in area 9 or thou shalt spontaneously fall into a quantum matrix wormhole and thou shalt forever fall unto the pit of more-or-less eternal damnation of those who fail to smear themselves with caramel at the Lord's command. 5: And truly as it was in the beginning shall it come to pass in the end, and for as it was in the pluperfect, verily shalt it be in the future subjunctive, and indeed will there be a great horror upon the land, when cactusses, um, cackti... them things roam free among the streets being made of foam rubber. 6: And truly shalt thou assBLATTT the cac... them things... in their being-made-of-plastic-and-roaming-freely-about-the- streets activities by creating foam rubber them things, or the Great MOO shall frown upon you for the rest of your days. And nights. 17: And as it was in the end, so it shall have sometimes been in the beginning, and there will be a day of reckoning, and thou shalt be accountable for King Kong's sins, for though he died for yours, he forgot to die for his own. 23: And twelve bagels will descend on you, and chew the ligaments from your flesh, and munch on your toenails, if you for one minute forget to look both ways before crossing the street. Chapter 7. (The Book Of Yo-Yo) 1: Before the beginning, there were no yo-yo tops. 2: And then, there was the beginning, and the birth of the universe. 3: And still there were no yo-yo tops. 4: And then there came the middle. 5: And in the middle, there came the yo-yo. 6: For the God-thing Yo-Yo said, "Let us create yo-yo in our own image", and so it did. 7: And saw that it was Karmic. 8: And verily did it say unto themselves, "Let me make this a prayer unto us, so that whomsoever may spin it shall become one of my devotees." 9: Only this didn't work too well, because everyone has beliefs just like you do, and they're all right. You're WRONG, always. 10: And it's just like Namron to do a thing like that. 11: But then one day, the true Plan came into being. 12: For Floyd was yo-yoing his merry way through the Market when... 13: Acidhead... "Hey man, can I have your yo-yo?" 14: Floyd's buddy... "Uh oh..." 15: Floyd... "Why?" 16: Acidhead... "Because I'm on acid." 17: Floyd... "No, this is a special yo-yo." 18: Acidhead... "Why?" 19: Floyd... "It's a prayer-wheel yo-yo. Whenever it spins, it sends a prayer to Yo-Yo, and increases my Karma." 20: Acidhead... "You have Karma?" 21: Floyd... "You bet yer prepackaged bananas." 22: Acidhead... "Where'd you get it?" 23: Floyd... "That Karma store around the corner, two blocks to the left..." 24: Acidhead... "What's Karma?" 25: Floyd... "It's like jam for the soul. It comes in different flavours, and depending on whether it's good or bad, you reincarnate differently." 26: Acidhead... "So you can cast spells?" 27: Floyd... "No, I need to get more Karma for that." 28: Acidhead... "How?" 29: Floyd... "Practice. Gotta use the Karmic Yo-Yo. That's why I need to keep it. Nothing personal." 30: Acidhead... "You're fucking with my head, man." 31: Floyd... "Guess I shouldn't do that, huh?" 32: Acidhead... "'Sokay." 33: And truly they shook hands, which the yo-yo made difficult, and parted their separate ways. 34: For indeed, it is hard to part if you both go the SAME way. 35: And so it came to pass that one of them believed in yo-yo, and the karmic power of the yo-yo. 36: We're just not sure which one. 37: Which is rather reassuring, really.FNORD! Chapter 8. (The Book Of The Penguin) (Being Partly For The Guy In The Back) (Who Fell Asleep In Floyd 5:65«) 1: In the beginning, there was Nomic, and the face of the Nomic moved upon the waters of the deep. 2: And the Nomic made a Retroactive Rule, and saw that it was good. 3: And the Nomic said "Let there be a Great MOO!" 4: Thus was the Great MOO created, and verily did the Great MOO begin to play the game of the Nomic. 5: Indeed did the Great MOO create herself by the Nomic, and truly was the Nomic pleased, and saw that it was good. 6: And the Great MOO, seeing that the world was without form, and void, did say "Let there be a tundra!" 7: And verily was there a tundra. And the Great MOO did look on the tundra, and saw that it was good. 8: But soon, the Great MOO saw that she had nobody to play Nomic with, and did become dBLATTTraught. 9: And indeed did the Great MOO discover the Other. And the Great MOO created herself a Great Idea. And the Great MOO proclaimed "Let there be Penguins!" 10: And truly were there Penguins. 11: Indeed, one of these Penguins was the Primordial Penguin, and this Penguin was smarter than the rest. And the Great MOO saw this, and saw that it was good. 12: And indeed did the Great MOO take up playing the game of Nomic with the Primordial Penguin, and did verily ordain the nature of things. 13: So it came to pass that the world began to change itself, and so through the game of Nomic was the world changed. 14: But soon the Great MOO decided that it was time to expand the Game, and truly did she say "Let there be a world in which to live!" 15: And indeed did the tundra become a world, and life became possible, through the Great MOO. 16: Seeing this, the lesser Penguins would have rejoiced, but they were only Penguins, and stupid. 17: And so the Penguins did not rejoice, but went on living as if nothing had ever happened. 18: But the Great MOO saw this, and decided that it wasn't as good as the other things, but it wasn't too bad. 19: So the Nomic continued, and through its continuance the world became chaotic, and things became muddled and sort of confused. 20: But indeed did the Great MOO ponder this, and she saw that it was good, if somewhat confusing for the poor Penguins. 21: In the end the Great MOO and the Primordial Penguin continued the Game of Nomic, and they created the Souls of the world, and the souls of the world were allowed to play the game. 22: So the souls of the world were divided unto their ranks, and their ranks extended infinitely in both directions, for the Penguin and the Great MOO were able to understand this confusion. 23: And the Souls of the world play the game of Nomic to this day, and they continue to change the world. 24: But soon the Great MOO decided enough was enough, and verily she did create an explosion, using her MOO powers, granted to her by herself, by the Nomic. 25: (TOP SECRET) 26: And verily did the Great MOO create an explosion, and the tundra was scattered across the face of the world, and the peices did become things. 27: And one of these things was round, and it was the Earth. 28: And one of these things was formless, and it was VOID. 29: And one of these things was a hot-dog, and it was eaten. 30: And one of these things was funny-looking, and it was laughed at. 31: From the Earth, as told by Yari, was created humans, and Cows. 32: From the VOID was created Eris and Aneris, as told by Discordians. 33: From the hot-dog was created nothing, as told by nobody special. 34: From the funny-looking thing was created more Penguins, and Jehovah, as told by the PenguinBLATTTs. 35: Also in this time were created by the Great MOO two sons, to join in their play her two daughters Eris and Aneris. 36: The names of these sons were "BOB" and QUACK, as known to MOOists. 37: And their tales are told elsewhere. 38: SO ENDS THE BOOK OF THE PENGUIN Chapter 9. (The Book Of The Saints) 1: The High Preest did one day sit down while lBLATTTening to Abbey Road on a set of earphones, and did ponder unto himself. 2: And the ways of his pondering were many and varied, but generally ponderous and ponderish and ponderlike. 3: And he did think unto himself the idea that the Beatles had made a great donation to MOO. Though he wasn't sure how. 4: Then he pondered it some more. And his ponderings were still many, but somewhat less varied, and all of a ponderitious, ponderous, ponderlike, ponderoid, ponderish, and ponderisk. 5: And he then said unto himself: "HEY! I GOT IT!" 6: And he then went on further unto himself and said such things as the words which follow these ones here only not in this verse because this verse is dedicated to explaining it's own purpose after indicating that the words of the ponderitious ponderings of the High Preest follow. 7: Unto himself said the High Preest: "I should stop talking unto myself. It's silly, and makes me sound foolish." 8: Unto the world therefore said he: "The Beatles made a great contribution to MOOism because they promoted free sex and a lot of the other stuff, and without them, those things might not have occurred to me." 9: Unto the world again said Floyd: "Yeah, okay. So other people have supported that stuff, and a whole bunch did it before them. But they were real famous, and got it all popularized. And, besides... who's the Preest around here? Okay? Okay." 10: Then said the High Preest unto someone who wasn't there because they probably got bored and left: "But John Lennon is dead... Doesn't that qualify him to be a saint fourth class like Yari?" 11: And then he spake: "Yeah, what the hell... Why not?" 12: And then he decided unto himself that he would justify to posterity, though not to his posterior, because it wasn't lBLATTTening, why some of the saints exBLATTTed. 13: "Spaxter", he said unto the world, "is a fictional character of interest. He's just so damn cool. LBLATTTen to Spaxter and Spaxter-Back. You'll know why. Besides... I think Hellhound made him a saint because of the neat gauntlet and all that neat stuff. I'm not being very coherent, am I?" 14: And Eris spoke unto him for a fraction of a second only, saying that no, he wasn't. 15: And he looked around confusedly. 16: "I don't know nothing about no Yossarian. He's someone from Catch 22, I think. Ask Hellhound. Allright? I dunno. Jeez. MOO!" 17: He neglected to mention Yari, on account of how that ought to be obvious to everyone in the world with an ounce (or even a gram) of common sense. 18: He also neglected to mention the others, because they were pretty self-explanitory, and because he was getting bored. 19: He then realized that he'd only covered two of the hundreds of thousands. And he sighed at the futility, and said MOO again. 20: Kinda metaphoric, innit? 21: Still, Floyd's just the kinda guy who gives up easily. 22: He ignored St. Feynmann, though, who was brilliant and weird, who stole a door at MIT, and when asked if he did it, said YES. 23: They still didn't believe him, though. 24: Damn shame he croaked. 25: Still, his Nobel Prize brought the richly deserved recognition to utter silliness and practical jokiness. 26: And St. Fuller (Or St. Bucky, as he's affectionately called), did Floyd (the great lout) also annoy. 27: Even though he was cool. 28: For he realized the importance of Synergy. 29: And built the Dymaxion Car. And Geodesic Domes. 30: Which was maybe not so good, because the Xennothemians used a St. Fuller Dome to try to take over the world. 31: But St. Fuller, Synergy-Lord A La Extraordinaire, made possible all sorts of understanding and mystical import things like that there, which was all to the good. 32: Only, since I'm also Floyd, I'm a-gonna give up here. 33: Just as metaphoric the second time. 34: Or even metaphyvic. 35: Or thurtyphyvic. Chapter 11. (First Book Of Evil) 1: And one day it came to pass that there was an evil blight upon the land. 2: And verily was it evil. 3: And a blight. 4: Oh, and did I mention that it was upon the land? 5: Thought so. DOWN WITH Chapter 12. (Second Book Of Evil) 1: So anyways, there was this blight, see, and it was evil. 2: And the people did lament, for it did seem as though the evil Bung was to be Secretary General of the United Nations, and verily did they think that to be a catastrophe. 3: And truly were they upset. 4: Then one day came a strange man unto the land of Udduwah, and he did bring the teachings of Bung to the people, and they did say unto each other these words: 5: "Hey, this makes a lot of sense you know, man!" 6: And the people did abandon the ways of supply-side economics, and taxable returns, and they were fruitful, and were merry. 7: Then one day there came a hideous winter on the land of Udduwah, and every person of that land was cold and did shiver, and made BRRRR noises. 8: And finally did a woman speak with the wisdom of her kind, saying that it was the work of the Great MOO, and that the acceptance of Bung was the cause of this. 9: And truly was it spoken by this woman, whose name was Mila, that supply-side economics were the only true words of the Great MOO. 10: And Mila did stand upon a great hill upon which there stood a large building with a green roof, and a flame burning verily from the very water that did flow from a fountain. 11: And amidst this splendour did Mila speak to the people of the holy city of Udduwah, and did tell them of the truths of MOO. 12: For Mila had knowledge of That Evil Guy, and did prate unto those who would lBLATTTen that the Evil One was to blame for the economic misfortunes of the country in which stood the holy city. 13: And indeed were the economic times harsh, for the Prime Rate stood at only 3.6%, and verily were no investors interested in borrowing. 14: And indeed had the dollar slumped to less than 82.3 cents per U.S. dollar, and the trading volume of the market was down 54% from the predicted norm for that financial quarter. 15: "Oh lBLATTTen," said the wise Mila, with the wisdom of her ages. 16: "Oh lBLATTTen, that thou mayest understandeth the factth of thith motht important matterst." 17: And truly did Mila remove a cat hair from her mouth, knowing that it did make her talk like a fool. 17«: And Mila did puzzle for a moment, for truly had she forgotten what she was saying. 18: "Oh yeah," spake Mila the Wise unto the people of Udduwah, who were assembled on the great Hill of the magical fire. 19: "Oh yeah," spake she, remembering now what she was speaking on, for truly had the memory been taken from her mind by the Evil One. 20: "Learn ye now the ways of the Evil One, that ye may avoid them, for truly is the Evil One a tory, and truly shall ye be bitten by the ways of the tories if ye not know their ways." 21: But Mila lost her wisdom to the Evil One, and she spake at great length on matters economic and financial, political and hBLATTToric, and she lost her train of thought, for her soul had been taken unto the very pit of the Evil One. 22: And thus ended the events of the second book of Evil. 23: This line does not belong here, but fell in from another chapter entirely. Chapter 13. (Third Book Of Evil) 1: Know ye the ways of evil, that ye may avoid them. 2: Firstly, know that Bung shall approach you in the guise of truth, covering lies. 3: Know also that the Evil One shall speak when thou least expecteth him to be speaking at you, that clever little bugger. 4: Know even more also that the Evil One is also a MOOist, for truly is everyone a MOOist anyway. 5: And indeed, shalt thou follow the words of the Evil One, if they seemeth reasonably reasonable to you. 6: However, thou art not to lBLATTTen to the words of the Evil One, for they are truly evil, and thou musteth not, um, lBLATTTen to evil stuff. 7: Like heavy metal music. 8: That's REALLY evil. 9: Yup. 10: And verily is the evil one manifest in the world in many ways, for not only is "The Evil One" a title of MOO, but also is the Evil One an evil, um... one. 11: And thou shalt cast out Bung from thy heart, for Bung is not very nice. And is evil. 12: And truly shalt thou not accept him in any way shape or form, for verily doth he disguise himself as a friend, and as the truth. 13: But know you now the true form of Bung, for he is shapethed like a rock, and rock-shaped is he, being of the shape similar to and very much like a rock, as is a rock. 14: And when thou seeth Bung, shalt thou raise him on high and speak unto the Great MOO, saying these words: 15: "Hey, look, I found a rock." 16: And then truly shalt thou put Bung back where thou foundethest him, being the place where thou were doing the finding of him, and his place where he was when thou found him. 17: And if in this way thou casteth all thoughts of the Evil One from thy heart shalt thou genuinely and honestly be blessed. 18: But know you now that the Evil One will come in many guises other than that of a rock, for truly is That Evil Guy everywhere. 19: That Evil Guy may verily be manifested as a prime-minBLATTTer of thy country, or a president of someone else's. 20: If thou perceiveth this to be the caseth, thou shalt be urged on by little voices in thy head to leap from cliffs or to slit thy wrBLATTTs. 21: But ignoreth thou these voices, for they are servants of That Evil Guy, for truly are his servants everywhere. 22: And those voices which tell you to kill people, they are servants of the Evil Person. 23: And those voices which speak unto you, saying these words: 24: Come one, wake up, it's time to get up! 25: Thou shalt also ignore these voices, for truly is it written, and it's written right here, in fact, that the servans of the Evil One are everywhere. 26: Indeed, any voice which speaketh to you is a servant of the Evil One, and thou should kill it. 27: Honest. 28: And having said these words, we move on to a parable. 29: A parable. 30: 31: Did you see it? 32: Parable, n. 1) A discourse, tale, story, speech, comparison, teaching, laying side-by-side of, analogy, proverb. From Gk, para- (beside) bole (a throw), thus, placing beside. 33: 2) A comparison, similitude. Saying something to demonstrate a point. See also, parable. 34: And now... 35: THE PARABLE: 36: Once upon a time, there was a wise old MOOist who lived in the mountain, and owned much in the way of frozen deli meats, which was maybe not quite so wise as it might have been, but on the whole, he was fairly wise. 37: And one day, a seeker of knowledge went unto this wise old man so that he might ask him of the truth, and demand an answer to the nature of evil. 38: This was because the seeker was a fool, and kept thinking about that kind of thing all day, and didn't understand the purpose of MOO. 39: And this wise old MOOist, whose name was Joshu, lBLATTTened to the seeker as his questions. 40: Then the MOOist spoke, telling the seeker what evil was. 41: And the words of the MOOist were these: 42: "Well, evil is, um... It's like, when stuff isn't very nice, and it's bad. Okay, so like, evil is not good." 43: For verily was the old MOOist not so wise as he said he was. 44: But then the seeker went to another MOOist, who also lived in those mountains. 45: And this second MOOist was even wiser than the first, for she had some vague notion about what evil was all about. 46: And the seeker went unto the second MOOist, and asked her what was the nature of evil, and whether he could have a box of rasinettes. 47: (This commercial message not yet paid for by Rasinettes INC. It is the duty of all MOOists to pester the people who make them and remind them that they have an outstanding debt to the Church Of MOO.) 48: And the wise MOOist did look around for some rasinettes, and when she had found them, did return to speak to the seeker on what evil is. 49: And her words were wise ones. 50: Or, um, well, the WORDS weren't particularly wise, but the stuff she was talking about was wise. Or at least, the ideas she was referring to were products of a wise mind when it was being wise. 51: Her words were these: 52: "Evil is like a box of rasinettes. It's sort of glossy cardboard on the outside, with a whole bunch of chocoloate- coated raisins inside." 53: And the seeker was confused. 54: Which makes sense, since those were actually pretty damn stupid words, when you think about it. 55: I mean, what would raisinettes be doing in an Evil? Raisinettes are the food of the Great MOO, when she's not munching on grass. 56: (This has been yet another example of why Raisinettes INC. should pay us lots of money.) 57: Okay, so the parable was stupid. 58: Umm... 59: Okay, I have an idea. Here's a better way to explain what evil is supposed to be. Suppose you have two people. 60: And one of these two people is a MOOist, and one of these two people is a servant of the Evil One. 61: The MOOist will be nice to Bung until Bung does something nasty. 62: But BUNG will be evil right away. 63: Does that help? 64: Didn't think so. 65: Okay, look. BUNG is evil, because BUNG isn't MOO, and anything that isn't MOO is Evil. Never mind that Bung is a category of MOOism. EVERYTHING is a category of MOOism. 66: Umm. No, forget I said that. Scratch Floyd 13,65 from memory. 67: I have a better idea. 68: 69: Wait for it! WAIT FOR IT! 70: 71: There's no such thing as Evil. They're all just different sides of the same thing. 72: ... 73: That saves a lot of explanation, anyway. Chapter of sayings. Confuse-Ius once say "If you break a mirror, don't eat the silver." ConfuCOWse-Ius once say "If you kick the bucket, you will stub your toe." Confuse-I ---DEATH TO ALL--- us once say "Biting the bullet is the best way to solve iron-deficiency." Confuse-Ius twice say to me "If you do that again, I break your other arm." Confuse-Ius say many times "@#!YU!#*&$#" Confuse-Ius once say to lamppost "Your mother was a totem pole." Confuse-Ius once say "Never Eat Shredded Wheat." Confuse-Ius once say "When opportunity knocks, nobody's home." Confuse-Ius once say "If you're happy you'll get over it." Chapter 14. (Yet ANOTHER Book Of EvilFNORD!) 1: A long, long time ago, in a Galaxy far, far away... 2: There sat a small annoying mind drug, which was titled The Great Book Of MOO. 3: And truly, it was kinda like this one, you know? Only it wasn't quite so nicely edited, and it was a little shorter, and the binding was laced with red string. 4: And printed upon the pages of this book was the stupidest pile of nonsense that the Great MOO did ever lay eyes on, and she did wonder why she even bothered to get up some mornings. 5: It then occurred to her that she didn't, for she was always awake and was real omniscient and everything like that. 6: Which was cool. 7: So she thought unto herself that she should make this annoying mind drug a book of Evil, so that all might see it for what it was, and make silly faces at it so that it might feel embarrassed. 8: And verily was it a decree of the Great MOO that all must look upon a book entitled The Great Book Of MOO with dBLATTTaste. 9: For truly is that book a book of great Evil, being written by That Evil Guy. 10: And so it came to pass that the Great Book Of MOO became a book of Evil, and its followers all Evil. 11: So you'd better all follow THIS Great Book Of MOO, for it is the only real one. Any Book that claims otherwise is lying. KILL IT! 12: And so you must see the followers of these books for the silly people that they are. 13: For though you are silly too, you shouldn't jump to conclusions about which silly is a GOOD silly, and which is planted by BUNG. 14: And when meetest thou a follower of Evil, accosteth him thusly: 15: "Yo! Evil person! I know you're Evil, so there's no point even trying to hide it! YES YOU! Stop being Evil or ELSE!" 16: And if the Evil one says "Or else what?" thou shalt welcome that Evil one as actually being a MOOist in disguise. 17: And if the Evil One sayeth not "Or Else What?" thou shalt also welcome that Evil One as actually being a MOOist in disguise, and stop pretending there's such a thing as Evil. 18: But if the Evil One does neither of these two things, thou must accost him thus: 19: "In the name of someone or other, STOP BEING EVIL!" 20: Repeateth thou this behaviour until the Evil Bung stops being so Evil anymore, and there's no such thing. 21: And thus ended the proclamation of the Great MOO. 22: And the Penguin did grin, and the MOOists did all feast upon carp and ocelots and breakfast cereals, and celery with this sort of curry-salsa hot sauce, which actually tastes much better than it sounds. 23: Honest. Chapter 15. (Book Of Infiltrations) 1: Speaking of EVIL. 2: The Holy Church of the Great MOO is the target of a LOT of Evil. 3: They can't wait to get their grubby hands on us. 4: The CapriCancers, the Xennothemians, the Conspiracy. All of 'em. 5: They know our destiny, so they try to INFILTRATE! 6: You're not a secret infiltrator, ARE YOU? 7: Hmm. 8: The Xennothemians got Lloyd, my brother. 9: A thing came out of his stomach. Or maybe he pupated. I forget. 10: Anyway, he was taken over by aliens. That's the main thing. 11: They snuck some bullshit into this book, but we dunno what. 12: And the CapriCancers. 13: Not ONLY can they not decide when they were born, they're EVIL. 14: They got Leper Messiah, one of our earliest and silliest. 15: They warped his mind. 16: And made him think silliness was "fuckin' stoopid". 17: They ALMOST got Hellhound 101. 18: They make us turn against one another, for paranoia. 19: They use evil mind-control laser things. 20: From the Kremlin, yeah, the Kremlin! The commies weren't using the gear anymore, so the aliens and CapriCancers got it! 21: To try to destroy us! 22: But you won't let THAT happen, will you? 23: Didn't THINK so. Chapter 16. (Book Of The Future) 1: So one day, the Penguin spoke to the Earth. And the words which He spoke were long and many, but can be summarized. 2: And he claimed that they were agreed-to by the Great MOO, but the Great MOO refused to make comment. 3: And it was unknown at the time whether this was agreed-on stuff or not. But the Penguin claimed that it was why the Great MOO had given the word of MOO unto humans, and not just Cows. 4: But this is unclear. 5: At any rate... 6: (MIDDLE SECRET) 7: So the words of the Penguin was transcribed by the unknowing Grate Profit of the Penguin, who made it known by strange means involving grape jelly unto a man named Hans. 8: And Hans did sort of write down some of it in his own vague way. 9: And the conclusion was frightening, but he wasn't frightened, because Hans wasn't easily scared. 10: And the words were something approximately like these: 11: Some day, the Universe, this tiny bit of Tundra in which we live, near many infinities of other Universes, will die a heat-death. 12: And verily shall Entropy and other evil demons take posession of it and it shall sort of wind down and sputter to a halt. 13: And truly, this shall be a manifestation of the goddess Eris and her brother QUACK. For together they broke the Universe. But this is of no importance, for QUACK shall drop it on the floor anyway. 14: But the word of MOO as carried by the Humans and the Cow is a unique word of MOO, and must escape. Mustn't it? Kinda sorta? 15: So it is thus the will of the Great MOO that the Humans devise for themselves a way to escape the Universe, so that they may spread the word unto the other Universes. 16: And to do this, it is proposed that they must do something. 17: Which makes sense, because you can't really get something done without doing anything, can you? 18: Well, actually, you can, and the way you do it is 19: (TOP SECRET) 20: So there's no point, really, is there? 21: So, while all other beings that inhabit the Universe also carry their truth of the Word of MOO and the Penguin, Humans too must escape the breaking of the Universe. 22: And the thing that they must do to do this is rather complicated and hard to describe, but fairly important anyway. 23: And it is said by the unconfirmed Penguin that this is why He and She spread their Word unto us, so that we may do this. 24: But the Penguin may just be doing this as part of the Great Nomic Game, for the ways of the Penguin are mysterious, though not as mysterious as the ways of the Great MOO, or the Fire Hydrant, who sprays water on things for no good reason. 25: Well, except that it puts out fires if they get too dangerous. 26: But then, some MOOists might object to that. 27: The Penguin doesn't care, and CLAIMS that the Great MOO doesn't. 28: Everything is true, however. So what he says MUST be true... 29: See? See? SEE?!?!? 30: At any rate, the point is, what Humans and Cows and Penguins (and Wombats and Emus and Pine Trees) must do to escape this universe is Evolve. 31: For this is in the way of Nomic. It changes. And so, as with the Game, so with Life, change will happen. Won't it? 32: Anyway, to evolve faster, says the Penguin (and a rutabaga) the thing to do is have as many different things all at once, and keep changing everything, so that the best stuff can be collected together to help in this task. 33: And this is why the Church of MOO exBLATTTs. For our Holy Duty is too keep changing so that we can spread the word as a wakened person spreads butter on toast in the morning. Unless the person doesn't like toast, in which case they sometimes spread butter on a pancake. 34: Or maybe, if they don't like butter, they spread JAM on their toast. 35: So anyways, the Church of MOO exBLATTTed only to be different, and for no other reason, to shake up the minds of those around from settling like silt, or like that icky stuff at the bottom of a jar of Honey when it begins to crystalize. 36: And by changing all the time, and only by this sacredest of all Nomicness things and such, uh, stuff like that there what I said, can we do that thing that I said before. 37: (NOT REALLY SECRET AT ALL, JUST NOT WRITTEN DOWN HERE) 38: And so it is for this reason (so says the Penguin) that we play Nomic and Calvinball, and that we try not to be consBLATTTent. 39: But it is important to have some people who know all kinds of scientific things, for this is one way we may evolve. Maybe. 40: At least, this is how the Penguin claims we must behave to escape the Heat-Death. 41: We have no proof of this, and neither the Penguin nor the Great MOO will explain why we would WANT to spread the Word to other Universes. 42: And the Moral of the Story is, you can't really trust a God or Goddess to give you the whole story. 43: For verily, you probably wouldn't understand it anyway, for it is all in the Nature of the Game to be strange, and require us to do things we don't understand. 44: But after all, the Game is democatic. You had your say. 45: What are you complaining about? 46: So C'MON, you dimwit, get out there and EVOLVE for the sake of MOO! 47: And, like, play Nomic, and do stuff different ALL THE TIME, eh? 48: Uh. Yeah, that. 49: C'mon. Stop reading. This book is OVER, man! 50: THE END! OKAY?! THERE ISN'T ANY MORE! 51: ... 52: Oh, wait! I forgot the most important part! 53: The reason for the saints and stuff! And, like, short term, uh that stuff there. 54: Now, yea and verily, the next bit is the actual last part of the book of The Future. 55: The reasons for the saints are partly what is said above, but even more important is the reason for the choosing of Saint Lennon. 56: And truly did this revelation come unto the Spokesperson To The Primordial Penguin, in that capacity, but was considered important enough to be a MOO thing. Like. 57: And verily, this reason was in the nature of his music. For the music of the Beatles is always different. 58: And indeed does it change muchly from song to song. 59: Ayup. 60: And this is good, for truly does it free the mind. 61: And this came from much meditation on the Sgt. Pepper album, Abbey Road, and Penny Lane, for truly are those the coolest albums they ever made. 62: Except the White Album. 63: And yet none of them other Beatles are dead! 64: But truly is it spoken that change is not the only good thing. 65: For in order to evolve, it is necessary to keep some things the same, and to have some kind of continuation. 66: Or something. 67: So truly should we change things when we can, but not too often. 68: And verily, the Church of MOO shall change, as shall the Temple Of the Primordial Penguin. And yet these changes shall not be rushed, for they just woke up, and haven't had their coffee yet. 69: And, well, this is the true part of the Book Of MOO. 70: (CENSORED) 71: Or so it says of itself, anyways. 72: But then, so does the rest. 73: Ah, hell, who cares? EVERYTHING is true! (And untrue!) 74: And this really IS the end of this book. 75: Honest. 76: 77: 78: 79: 80: 81-89: [CENSORED] 90: WHAT? Are you *STILL* here? Get on with the next chapter, will ya? Chapter 23. (Book Of Stone Carvings) 1: Once upon a wombat, in the world of said wombat, 4: There lived a Hellhound >101< 9: Who has nothing to do with this story. 16: But who did inscribe a Halfy on a rock. 25: He did this in the land of the Gerbil. 36: Which is known as Gobi. 49: And the Halfy was a "W", for Wombat. 64: For truly that is what it actually means. 81: For "W" is the 23rd letter. Chapter 24. (The Book Of LBLATTTs) 1: LBLATTTlessness 1: WBLATTTfully gazing. 2: Hey, mBLATTTer, can you spare ten bucks for a cuppa coffee? 3: It was a mBLATTTy morning in Scotland. 5: TwBLATTT my rubber arm, why dontcha? 8: Burrito Twelve. 13: Merry ChrBLATTTmas and a HAPPY HAPPY GNU Year! 21: Everyone is happy in a charBLATTmatic dictatorship. 34: Newton split light into spectra with a prBLATT. 55: SchBLATT. 89: This is pointless. Chapter 25. (Book Of Letters, Numbers, and Animals) 2: Emu. 3: Q. 5: Wombat. 7: Z. 11: Rhinoceros. 13: U. 17: Tyrannosaurus Rex. 19: Omega. 23: Platypus. 29: A. 31: Felix Domesticus. 37: Q again. 41: Burrito 12. Chapter 40. (Book of Inane Comments) 1: And the High Preest did make comment upon the weather. 2: And the words of his commenting about the weather were dumb, inane, and foolish, but yea and verily are they reproduced in this book, because, hey! why not? 3: The words of the High Preest were something along the lines of these (though not really all that exact, y'know?): 4: "Gosh it's hot. It's kinda hot today, you know? Uh... yea and verily and that stuff, eh?" 5: "Yes indeedy, there is a high pressure region over this area of the country right now, and that, combined with the angle of sunlight incident... well, it's DAMN hot, eh?" 6: And verily, everyone did look at the High Preest as if he were a fool. 7: But this was nothing new, so he ignored it, and hopped up and down on one leg, flapping his arms like a bird and making Goose-Noises. 8: And when he was asked "What's with the goofy dance, you moron?" he did stop, think about it for a sec, and return to his inane comments about the weather that day in the Wombat World. 9: And his comments, though equally stupid as the last ones, are even so reproduced in here. 10: And he continued to say how hot it was, until everyonegot fed up, and threw buckets of water on him, and he did become wet with the wetness of the water that had been in the buckets until it stopped being there and started being on him. 11: And he said "Gosh it's wet today." 12: And everyone sighed and went home. 13: The High Preest stood alone, and spake unto himself like a schitzo. 14: And the words of his speaking unto himself were these: 15: "Oh well." 16: And then he finished off a final inane comment, saying: 17: "Hey, wait a sec... Penny Lane wasn't an album!" 18: And fell on a honker-horn and broke a rib. Chapter 41. (Book Of Cow Catapulting) 1: Atrox, the servant oh the Great Cow, has spoken, saying: 2: "Yo. I can get a cow." 3: And the MOOists applauded long and loud, saying: 4: "We're happy and boy are we ever rejoicing." 5: And indeed did he fetch forth a cow, and indeed was the cow magnificent. 6: But zoning regulations forbade the entrance of this cow unto the city, and the MOOists did become angered at the demon zoning regulations. 7: And indeed was the cow heavily camouflaged, and hidden secretly from the police, or, as they were known in those days, the Fuzz. 8: But verily, yea, and man this is true, swear on my mother's eyes, the cow was not permitted to be catapulted at the Prime MinBLATTTer during his speech. 9: And the idea of catapulting a Holy Cow, neat as it was, was given up. 10: And the MOOists did hold their first true MOOFest. 11: Only not really. 12: Because this is only a story. 13: And a MOOFest has never actually happened. Chapter 42. (The Book Of The Trial Of Quack) 1: And it came to pass that in the land of the Wombat, the High Preest of MOO met the false prophet of Quack. 2: And the High Preest cam unto the False Prophet and a trial came to pass. 3: And though great hardships were bestowed upon him by beavers and bricks and wombats and aliens, the High Preest held the trial 4: And the High Preest became Judge, Jury, Prosecutor and Executioner, for he was ruler and his cause was just. 5: And the QUACKBLATTTS were led unto the High Preest's throne in the Wombat World, all the time screaming heresies from their lips against MOO. 6: And the names of the heretics were read, and they were these: I Yemen-Oying E Izzan-Oying U Aaron-Oying and D Aaron Oying 7: And the High Preest spake unto the False Prophet, saying "GUILTY! GUILTY! GUILTY!... uh... are we on camera?" 8: And the Oying brothers did nod, grinning. 9: And the High Preest grinned sheepishly. 10: And the High Preest got fed up with starting each verse with "and". 11: The High Preest spaked unto the False-Nose Profit of QUACK saying "So who's your lawyer?" 12: I Yemen-Oying did speak unto the High Preest. 13: The words of the annoying one were these: 14: "Whather-BLOODY-hell is it to you, wombat nose!?!" 15: The High Preest looked at the False-Nose-In-The-Book Profit-Margin-Of-Error quizzically. 16: The High Preest spake again, saying "Okay. You're guilty then." 17: And the two followers of the False-Nose-In-The-Book-About- Land-Mines-Profit-Margin-Of-UNDEF'D-STATEMENT-ERROR-IN-66304, named U Aaron-Oying and E Izzan-Oying started up a sing song. 18: They sungst these words: "There ain't no God but Quack!" over and over again until the High Preest threwst a brick at them. 19: I Yemen-Oying spoked then unto the High Preest, saying "We represent ourselves." 20: The High Preest looked over his glasses at the followers of the False-Nose-In-The-Annoying-Mind-Drug-About-Land-Miner's- UnionBLATTT-Strikes-Back-Stabbing-Profit-Margerine-Of-Error- In-Line-Curve-Or- Circle-Back-To-Where-You-Start-Over-Again... uh... where was I? 21: And the High Preest spoke unto those guys there, saying "He who defends himself has a fool for a client. So you're a fool, and would do such horrible things as this HEINOUS crime you've been accused of. GUILTY! GUILTY! GUILTY!" 22: And the Oying brothers stoodeth dumbfoundedly, and the High Preest snickered... and Mars Barred. 23: The heretics were taken from the court then, and, for their evil, heinous, and not at all nice ways, devoured by the Doubter Circle of MOO. 24: But at the end, they did chant songs of their False Gods, saying these things: 25: "We shall resurrect! For though our Gods don't exBLATTT, MAN are they powerful and nice to their followers!" 26: "We shall overco-o-o-o-me! We shall overco-o-o-o-o-me!" 27: "Hey look! It's Elvis! Oh well, it was worth a try. 28: "We will be back! Sha-na-na-na! Sha-na-na-na! Hey, hey, hey... GOODBYE!" 29: And the High Preest respondeth "Bye." 30: In this way did Floyd Gecko, the High Preest, bring down the heretics of QUACK. 31: For truly it is written down somewhere. I just can't find it right now. I'll give it to you tomorrow. I swear. Chapter 43. (There Is No Chapter 43) 1: 2: 3: Spam Chapter 69. (The Book Of Logic) 1: To Prove: Jesus was a Puerto-Rican Voodoo-Surfer. 2: 1) Jesus had long hair. Surfers have long hair. 3: 2) Jesus walked on water. Surfers walk on water. 4: 3) Jesus acted strangely. Surfers act strangely. 5: 4) Jesus was mellow. Surfers are mellow. 6: Ergo: Jesus was a surfer, by Floyd's Law of Likelihood. FNORD! 7: 1) Jesus raised from the dead. Voodoo raises from the dead. 8: 2a) Jesus had a Puerto-Rican name. 9: 2b) Puerto-Rico is in Latin America. 10: 2c) Voodoo is common in Latin America. 11: Ergo, Jesus was a Puerto-Rican Voodoo-Guy. Q.E.D. 12: The story is as follows... 13: One fine day, Jesus set out on a transatlantic surf-o-thon. 14: Eventually he entered the Mediterranean, and went to Judea. 15: There, his strange Puerto-Rican-Voodoo style drew attention. 16: He used it to bring followers to his mellow way of life. 17: He preached his SurferPhilosophyTM and founded a cult. 18: It got WAAAAAY out of hand. 19: And that's the way it is. 20: Can't argue with logic. 21: Anope. Chapter 101. (The Book Of) 1: Note: This chapter has been cleaned by the U.S. Military. 57: And truly was it nifty. 105: And he did be being spokifying unto the people assembled there, and was did having been being saying being unto them the word which did be having been were about to be being escaping his lips. 256: Wow. 1729: Umm... 1000000000: Long book, eh? Chapter 125. (The Book Of The Heresy Of The Hound) 7: And it was deemed "uncool" to throw Pudding. 13: And yet Hellhound >101< was determined to be a Pudding Culter. 15: For he was He Who Has Nearly Come Face To Face With The Great Pudding Itself But Slept Through The Whole Thing. 28: But it was no use. 31: For the Hound had censoring equipment. Chapter 216. (The Book Of Paradoxes) 1: And it one day came to pass in the land of the Wombat that there was a sentence. 2: And the sentence was untrue. 3: And the sentence was cast out from its friends and molested by small furry animals for its heinous falsehood. 4: And the sentence was this one. 5: But verily unto that sentence there came a revelation, which was very revealing, as it is the nature of revelations to be. 6: And the revelation was that the sentence did not exBLATTT. 7: And yet verily unto that sentence there came oblivion. 8: There is no 8. 9: Truly, said one man unto another man, when the great Noah saved us all from the Bungicious Fire Hydrant, he did a good deed. 10: And the second said, 11: "That doesn't belong in this chapter!" 12: And verily was what he said both true and false, as it is with most stupid things that don't really matter anyway. 13: And verily did there end the stupid book of Paradoxes, for it was a dumb idea to begin with, and doesn't even exBLATTT in this version. Chapter 217. (Second Book Of Paradox) 1: In the beginning was the end, and in the end was the beginning, and so went the word of the one whom the words spoke. 2: In the end was the end, though the beginning hadn't happened yet. 3: And so I went unto the house of a trickster, who was known for her hobby of hiding eggs, and I proclaimed that I could find any egg she could hide. 4: And so she said unto me these words: 5: You may be able to find an egg, but you may not suspect where it lies. 6: And I replied unto her, saying this: 7: With my unlimited knowledge, I can anticipate the lair of any egg which you may squirrel away. 8: And this upset the trickster, for her life was based on hiding eggs so well that nobody could find them. 9: And so she went and fetched ten boxes, and told me that she would hide the egg, and that I was to open the boxes in order, from the first to the last, and in doing even that I would not be able to predict the location of the egg. 10: So I said unto the trickster, 11: Hide the egg now, and I will turn away. 12: And I turned and thought, and a realization came unto me. 13: For I saw that the egg could not be in the last box, for if I was to open the other nine, and find it in none, I would not be at all surprised. 14: And knowing that the egg could not be in the last, if I opened the first eight, finding the egg nowhere, I would anticipate the ninth. 15: And I saw that this continued to the very first, which was the only possible hiding spot of the egg, and I smiled, knowing that I had won. 16: So the trickster told me to turn again, and I saw the boxes lined up on the table between us, and she was sitting across from me, watching. 17: So I opened the first box, knowing that the egg was in there, but lo, the egg was absent, and I frowned. 18: So I opened the second box, and seeing that the egg was not there, my puzzlement increased, for as I opened each box, I was more sure that the egg was in the last ones. 19: But lo, as I opened each box, no egg was to be found, and when the last box was open, and I found no egg, I looked up from the boxes and stared at the trickster. 20: And she pushed the egg in my face. 21: So it came to pass that I was humbled in my quest for knowledge, knowing that I could not even predict the behaviour of an egg. 22: So I wiped the egg from my face, and told the trickster some wise words which I knew from long ago: 23: "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." 24: And I told her of my quest for knowledge of everything. 25: And the trickster smiled. 26: She asked me then if I thought I could hide an egg so well that she would not be able to find it, and I said I thought I could. 27: So she gave me the boxes in which to hide the egg, saying that I might hide the egg in any of the boxes, mix them up as much as I liked, and she would find it. 28: I laughed, and put the egg in a box. She turned, and I removed the egg, as she had done. Then I thought. She knew that I would remove the egg, for it was her own trick. 29: So I painted a spot on the egg, so that she would not fool me again, and then I put the egg back in the box, and mixed them up. 30: She turned, and arranged the boxes back in a row. 31: She pointed to the first, and said there was no egg. And there was no egg inside. She did the same to the second, and to the third, and to the fourth. 32: Skipping the fifth, she predicted that there would be no egg in any of the others, and flipped them open, and there was no egg. 33: Finally, she said there would be no egg in the fifth, and I smiled, knowing that she thought I had taken the egg away. 34: Then, from her pocket, she took the egg, and I saw that it had a spot painted on it, just as I had done, and I knew that she had fooled me yet again. 35: So I turned to leave in shame, and then angrily kicked over the fifth box. 36: And out fell my spotted egg. And at that point I understood. Chapter 250. (The Ninth Book Of And) 1: And so it came to pass that there was a great Flying Saucer. 2: And it crashed in Sweden. 3: And it made a big boom. 4: And verily was the boom big. 5: And all did say unto themselves "What the fuck was that?" 6: And all did wonder. 7: And all did approach the Flying Saucer. 8: And so it came to pass that Bubba the Alien did emerge. 9: And did wave. 10: And the people of Sweden did wave back at Bubba. 11: And it developed that Bubba looked reasonably personable. 12: And the Swedes made Bubba their President. 13: And so it was that Sweden was taken by the Aliens. Chapter 256. (EpBLATTTle To The Quackers) (Returned due to insufficient postage) 1: You foolish folk of QUACK, I send unto you this letter so that you may, umm... well, that you may read it. 2: For truly are you all so foolish that you probably know not the meaning of the word "epBLATTTle"... Well, it's a letter, okay, you evil QUACKERS? 3: At any rate, I send this letter thing unto you that you may understand the words of the Great MOO, our highest God in the whole of all that is, isn't, and might be if only someone got around to doing it. 4: You, with your laws and rules shall lBLATTTen truly. 5: For the Great MOO said unto her people, 6: DO WHAT THOU WILT SHALL BE THE WHOLE OF THE LAW. 7: And truly is this sensible, for it tells the stars to shine, the water to flow, and the cows to MOO. But you, with your ways and ideas, think it evil. 8: Would you tell the water to stand still, do a dance, or eat rye bread, when that is not what it wishes to do? 9: Would you tell the stars to go out, when that is not what they wish to do? 10: Would you tell a cow how to chew its cud, or how to stand, or tell it to say QUACK instead of MOO, if that is not what it wishes to do? 11: Would you tell a man or woman to speak QUACK, or to wear a tie, or tell them which "God" to worship, if that is not what they with to do? 12: Say then, why you insBLATTT upon your laws. 13: For truly, the more laws there are, the more crime there is, for obeying rules is not what humans wish to do. 14: DO WHAT THOU WILT SHALL BE THE WHOLE OF THE LAW. 15: This is the truth that we of the Great MOO can see. For we do not tell our people how to act, what to think, or whether to worship our Goddess. 16: For truly, with your vague fluffy-flummerry arounding type activities have you made the land more confused and full of hatred than any mere breaking of a law. 17: And indeed, you seek revenge against those who break your laws, and try to hurt them, 18: And you do not see that this only makes more hurt, not less. 19: Why would a man hurt another man, if not to get him back? 20: See what you have caused, you annoying pests? Now stop it and bloody well convert to MOOism before I hit you with a big stick! 21: For truly is it written... 22: Somewhere... 23: 24: Hang on a sec, I have it here somewhere... 25: Well anyway, it's written. 26: Oh, here it is. 27: DO WHAT THOU WILT SHALL BE THE WHOLE OF THE LAW. Chapter 625. (The Book Of Druggies) 00001: There is no drug but QUACK! 00002: Well, or something like that. 00003: I dunno the real name of it. 00004: All other drugs are False Prophets. 00005: Don't be takin' 'em, maaan! 00006: QUACK is the One True Drug. 00007: The One True Drug cannot exBLATTT. 00008: But it has many names. 00009: Bliss, ZZ-74, Tri-Beak, CCMV, 'Frop... 00010: But none of these are REAL, maaan. 00011: The true name is unpronounceable, unspellable. 00012: But just thinkin' the name is enough to get ya high. 00013: For truly, though it may not be real, it's SO POWERFUL that even IMAGINARY quantities in your brain are enough. 00014: Thinking about it is enough to get you addicted, if that were possible, which it isn't, because it isn't addictive. 00015: Honest. 00016: Saying the name is enough to get you STONED. 00017: LOOKING AT IT blows your mind straight into another universe. 00018: How do you think I GOT HERE, MAAAN? 00019: Actually ingesting the stuff... Well, nobody's ever tried. 00020: The effects are probably quite evil. 00021: Only the Penguin and the Grate MOO are known to use it. 00022: Mere Multiverse occupants, we can't, maaan. 00023: But I saw some in another universe. 00024: And my world changed. For it was labelled. 00025: And not only did I see it, but I saw the name. 00026: Well, see, it was labelled in the Gloop language. 00027: And so my world changed. 00028: And the world it changed into was this one, eventually. 00029: Don't talk to me about before. 00030: All other drugs have effect by way of QUACK. Or whatever. 00031: 'Cuz your BODY knows about it, even if you don't. 00032: And it starts thinking "Hey, is that QUACK in my blood?" 00033: And the mere subconscious thought starts it up. 00034: The Effect of QUACK, fullblown, is all other drugs, both real and imaginary, put together. 00035: That's why it's not addictive. 00036: It's not for normal minds. 00037: Fuck, look at these sentences, MAAAN! 00038: This does, however, explain a whole fuckin' lot about the world we live in... All the Gods are QUACK addicts. 00039: QUACK: drug of the Gods. 00040: Like nectar and ambrosia, only not really. 00041: There ain't no QUACK but God! 00042: There ain't no drug but God! 00043: There ain't no God but drugs! 00044: There ain't no QUACK but drugs! 00045: There ain't no God but QUACK! 00046: There ain't no drug but QUACK! 00047: But it's not really called QUACK. 00048: That was a flight of whimsy. 00049: The Grate MOO showed me some once. 00050: At least, I THINK that's who it was. 00051: It's not a powder, not a liquid, not anything. 00052: It's not even air, like ZZ-74. 00053: It's just sort of NOTHING. 00054: Because it's imaginary. 00054: It came to me in a dream. 00056: 'Cuz I'd been wondering what it would look like. 00057: And so it came to me in a dream. 00058: And it's so powerful that even the imaginary stuff, in a dream no less, was enough to bend and warp the fabric of spacetime itself, and throw me to another universe. 00059: The real stuff doesn't just WARP space. 00060: It doesn't just BEND space. 00061: It doesn't just MANGLE space. 00062: It IS space. Or something. 00063: The One True Drug lies outside space and time. 00064: The One True Drug lies outside possibility. 00065: The One True Drug lies outside mind and form. 00066: The One True Drug lies outside, OKAY? JUST OUTSIDE! 00067: Wanna go outside? 00068: Gotta dress up snug 'n' warm. 00069: Think on it. 00070: Your other drugs, they kinda POINT. 00071: They make urgent gestures, but that's about it. 00072: They don't GO there. 00073: They try to show the real world. 00074: They just show the gaps in the fake one. 00075: Only the One True Drug lets you LOOK THROUGH. 00076: But how is the name SPELLED? 00077: There are hints enough in this book to figure it out. 00078: And when ya do, think about the name. 00079: Cuz the TRUE NAME is more than enough. 00080: Cuz the REAL THING just don't exBLATTT. 00081: But the hallucinations are real. 00082: Cuz ya stay there, maaan.00083: I mean, you lucie there's a mugwump, there's a damn mugwump. 00084: They're so strong, other people see 'em. 00085: When enough people figure out the name, or hear it, there's gonna be enough QUACK, imaginary as it is, around. 00086: Enuff fer what? 00087: You don't wanna know. 00088: But it's related to how to fit in a Post Office Box. 00089: Can YOU fit in a Post Office box? 00090: QUACK is not Bliss, ZZ-74, 'Frop, CCMV, Tri-Beak, Mints, or ANYTHING. 00091: Their names don't tell you how to fit in a P.O. Box, eh? Confuse-Ing Inter-Rapture #2.718281828459045235360 00092: Their names aren't drugs. 00093: QUACK, it's so POWERFUL that even the MENTION of it, or the slightest thought of the Real Stuff is actual POWER. 00094: It's lucid dreaming in the illusion of the world. 00095: I'm not talkin' no diddley-shit stuff, either. 00096: I mean like you don't just feel enlightened. 00097: You actually make your own hallucinations. 00098: And your lucies are always true. 00099: In some universe. 00100: So go there. 00101: It's that simple. 00102: All you need's the name. 00103: And that's hidden in this Book. 00104: So just think of the Real Stuff. 00105: And hope you can aim right when you finally make it. 00106: Power of Akira. 00107: So don't fuck up, stupid. 00108: Like Krishna and them Avatars, they're Godly incarnations. 00109: So they're addicts. 00110: Dr. Manhattan? BLUE! And Krishna? He's blue. 00111: So what about those Akira blue-dudes? 00112: NOW do you believe me? FNORD! 00113: If not, think about Smurfs. 00114: That should prove it. 00115: Anyway, this is a cool metaphor, but a lousy chapter. Chapter 660. (The Book Of Did I Mention) 1: Did I mention this book is toll-free? Chapter 666. (The Book Of Revelations) 1: I walked out into the land of BO, and I did receivce a great voice into my ears, having no other choice. 2: And the Voice said: 3: Floyd, I will tell you of things to come, and things that have yet to be, and things that haven't happened yet, but will later. 4: And I said: 5: Okay. 6: And a vision came upon me. 7: And I was in the Future, which was neat, cause there were lots of flying cars and things. Then the Voice said LOOK AROUND. 8: So, not wanting to be a spoilsport, I looked around. And I saw that it was 1998, by the calendar on the wall next to me. 9: But I also saw great flying disks which were sort of flying along with the flying cars, only bigger. And a great Voice, which was different from the one that was talking to me, spoke to the crowds. 10: And the GNU voice said: 11: People of Earth, your attention please. Your attention please. PLEASE! YOUR ATTENTION! CAN I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE?!?! 12: And the crowd said: 13: Yeah? 14: And the Voice Said: 15: I am "BOB". I have come to Earth to pick up my disciples. Any of you my disciples? 16: And many of them said yes, and they were taken into the great flying circles, and my vision followed them. And I was with them as they were taken. 17: On the flying disks, I saw them transformed into beings of great light and power, and I looked out of the window, and saw that the people on the ground below were as ants. 18: Then I noticed that they were ants, and we hadn't taken off yet. 19: Then I compared the real people on the ground to these GNU beings that had been "BOB"'s disciples. The people still seemed like ants, but not as much as the ants did. Funny, that. 20: But as I saw this, the saucers lifted away from the Earth, and were gone, but my vision stayed on Earth, where the people didn't seem to have noticed the saucers. 21: The people had noticed, though, that they seemed a bit happier than they were. But this soon faded, because the unhappy ones kept bugging the happy ones. 22: Which I thought was a shame. 23: And soon, my vision faded, and reappeared later. I could tell that it was later because there were more flying cars. 24: And I looked at the calendar, and it was 2007. 25: I looked at the crowd, and saw that they were walking along, just as usual, all annoyed at each other. Then the Voice said: 26: It is time for the great transition of the Penguin. 27: And I saw in the faces of the people of the crowd that they were suddenly no longer so much irritated as worried. It had struck them that the planet was in danger. 28: I thought "No kidding, ya morons." 29: And I was there as they began to fiddle around and try to fix up the planet, though they didn't do a super-hot job of it. 30: But soon the vision faded again, and I was there far, far in the future, when things were different, and there was a GNU Voice in the sky. 31: And the voice was as a trumpet, and it went on for a while, as if it didn't notice that nobody understood what it was talking about. 32: Then Jehovah appeared, as in a dream, and dictated some letters to his secretary, and sent them to seven stars, who wrote back that they were too busy acting movies right now, and couldn't attend the end of the world. 33: And there was this sort of Lamb thing there, only it had fur that was sort of like it was on fire, and its eyes were red hot coals, and its voice was like a tuba in mating season, and it was holding a book. 34: And I couldn't figure out why the book didn't catch on fire, what with that really wierd flambee Lamb thing holding it. 35: And there were seven signs. They were these: 36: The signs were: STOP; YIELD; NO LEFT TURN; NO U TURNS; ALL DOGS MUST BE ON LEASH; HIDDEN INTERSECTION and CONSTRUCTION CREW WORKING, ROAD CLOSED. 37: And after the seven signs, there were seven seals on the book, and the Lamb-Thingy said unto the Humans below: 38: Is there anybody who can break these seven seals? 39: And the seals looked scared, and went "arf arf" and clapped their fins together, then realized the mBLATTTake, and became wax seals. And the Lamb rolled its eyes. 40: And the Lamb waited, and sat down on a throne, and I suddenly noticed the thrones, of which there were twenty-four. 41: I also noticed that near the thrones there were some pets or something. Then I realized that they weren't pets, on account of they were talking to each other. 42: Then I noticed that they were all full of eyes, and were looking around them waiting for someone who could break the seals of the book, and nobody stepped forth. 42: The first of these beings was like a lion on its face, and it had the whole bunch of eyes in it, or something. 43: The second was like a little baby cow, and I thought for a moment that it was the daughter of the Great MOO, but I guess it wasn't, for it was full of eyes, and sat at the feet of Jehovah and the Lamb. 44: The third was like a Human, and seemed kind of confused, but maybe that was just because it was full of eyes. 45: The last was like an eagle, and it wasn't flying, but it, like the other three, had six wings and had eyes all over, inside and out. Wierd, eh? 46: Anyway, the Lamb got fed up with all this waiting nonsense, and broke the first seal. And the first creature yelled "C'mere!". 48: So I looked around, and whaddaya know, there was this big white doughnut, and some wacko was sitting on it as if he thought it was a horse. So I ate the doughnut. 49: So the Lamb broke another seal, and the second creature yelled "C'mere!" and I looked and some dimwit was climbing onto a red donut with a sword. So I ate the donut. 50: Meanwhile, the Lamb was looking annoyed, and broke the third seal, and the third creature yelled "C'mere!" and I saw some fool sitting on a black donut with a bathroom scale. I threw out the donut, because it was stale. 51: Then some voice in the middle of the creatures started quoting stock market prices until Jehovah sat on it. 52: The Lamb, which now seemed to be in a hurry, broke the fourth seal, and the fourth creature yelled "C'mere!". 53: So I looked, and I saw some dead guy sitting on a rotten donut, so I kicked it, and it fell apart. 54: The Lamb glared at me like I'd done something wrong. 55: Then it broke the fifth seal. So there was this big altar thing, and there were a whole bunch of dead people on it, which annoyed me, because it was a nice altar otherwise. 56: The dead people were all those who'd been killed in the name of Jehovah. They looked like they would have complained to him about it, only they were dead, so they couldn't. 57: So I pushed them off and put the spiffy altar in my pocket. 58: The Lamb seemed real annoyed at this, so I put it back. 59: Then the Lamb broke the sixth seal, and there was a huge earthquake, and the sky fell apart, and the MOOn turned the colour of blood. 60: So I adjusted the Vertical Hold and the Colour. 61: And the Lamb turned to me and said 62: "Look, bozo, stop screwing around with the apocalypse! If you keep messing it up, I'll have to send you back home. " 63: So I took the annoying mind drug away from it and broke the seventh seal myself, and read the annoying mind drug. It had only one page with anything written on it, and it said: 64: "What? Did you expect something special?" 65: And everything got quiet for about half an hour, so I left. 66: And then my Voice said 67: Now the last revelation. 68: And I was far, far, far into the future, standing all along in a forest of tall trees and stuff. And then suddenly the sky cracked and bent and split, and there was a kind of tinkling noise. 69: And I heard a great voice, as of Donald Duck put down five octaves. And it said "OOPS!" 70: And my voice said 71: Well, that's it. 72: Here endeth the book of Revelations of Floyd Gecko. Chapter 729. (The Explanation Of Books) REMEMBER ALWAYS (Derived by Confuse-Ius, by some confusing method or other) Book of Hellhound Chapter 1. (the Book of the rising MOO) 1: At first - all was dark - for man had forgotten of the Cow. 2: And the Cow did feast upon the "snackies" in the form of war, crime, aids, and cheez whiz. 3: But, from whence unknown, one was born enlightened, one named Yari. 4: From where unknown came Yari, prophet of the Cow of MOO, and Yari did say MOO and all changed. 5: And Yari did then say to himself (or so it is said) "Ok, that's enough of this shit." and then to hence unknown did Yari go, never to return. 6: For indeed, it had been done, the people of the Psycho-Shoppe were enlightened and saw MOO for the first time. 7: But without Yari, the MOOists were like a headless pushpin, without leadership or vision. 8: And then did one of the MOOists say (or so it is writ) "Yo dudes! I'm hip! I'll be thy visionary type person, and Floyd here shall be yo' High Preest!" 9: And thus did Half-Mad become the Grate Prophet of MOO and Floyd Gecko his High Preest. 10: And thence the writing of this great book did begin by thy scribe, age-old member of the MOOists, from the secret society of the Cardinal Richelieus. 11: And some weeks later the Grate Prophet and the sole Cardinal Richelieu of those times - myself - did go to the B&B. 12: And there were discussions made, levels re-set, requirements set out and Beer was drunk. 13: And the great Prophet of MOO did then designate the place of Worship of MOO. 14: And there it was sanctified and the MOOists again had a GNU home, on the land of the Grate Prophet's ancestors. Chapter 4. (the Book of rituals) 1: It is well known that the rituals of the MOOists are bizare and fun, but are manyfold, thus it became the duty of all MOOists to scribe them. 2: The foremost ritual of the MOOist is the communion with the great MOO through the Grate Prophet, Half-Mad. 3: This is done by the dialing of the Psycho Shoppe, and a simple log-on ritual followed by much reading and posting. 4: And improtant part of this ritual is the occasional posting in area 9 for it has been said by the High Preest "Post in my NES or die, scum!" 27: And it was such that the tapioca pudding was spilt upon the altar, destroying foreverforth the ritual of the rising sludge. Chapter 5. (the Book of the Dealings of the Hound) 1: And thus was decreed the laws upon the Hellhound 101, engraved upon a pile of out-dated silicon. 2: There is to be no drawing upon the Hellhound 101. 3: When not in use, place the Hellhound 101 in thy pantry, but only if thy pantry is properly stocked with vegetables and hot-dogs. 4: Thou shalt not Taunt the Hellhound 101. 5: There shall be no chewing upon the arm of the Hellhound 101. 6: Should the Hellhound produce a whimpering sound, immediately find him a Bishopess of MOO or face continuous pouting. Chapter 7. (the Book of the Cow) 1: And God begat the cow, and whence the cow was to be butchered, it then did draw a blade to slay God and thence God became god and the cow became Cow and such was the great MOO. 5: And the food of the Cow, the humans, did say MOO, and the Cow decided not to eat them. But those who did not say MOO were still designated as "snackies" to be eaten by the Cow or by the MOOists. 6: And thus MOOist fell upon the snackies and began to eat as the Cow watched over. 7: But then MOOist fell upon MOOist because it was deemed "uncool" and "not-nice!" to dine upon the unwitting snackies (some say it was because Half-Mad was bored and wanted Hellhound bits). 8: T'was then that the Cow did decree the writings of the Hound (chapter 5) which included: 9: "Hey, guys, don't bite the Hound!! Eat the losers who don't know better!" 10: And thus the MOOists were saved from self-ingestion. 11: But some renegade MOOists took things too far and began to see cannibalBLATT as the only purpose in life, but their heads exploded. 12: And it was decided that a MOOist must have fun at all costs, for a MOOist without fun had tendency to self-combust. 13: And for fun, the MOOists decided to burn, and to have intercourse and to eat and drink excessively. Chapter of Confuse-Ii There is one and only one Confuse-Ius. Confuse-Ius is a collective nounCOW. If you look for Confuse-Ius, you will find him. If you find Confuse-Ius, he will pie you in the face. Confuse-Ius has the only unlBLATTTed number in the phone book. I ain't Confuse-Ius. You aren'COWt Confuse-Ius S)he/It isn't Confuse-Ius (This is not a typo.) We aren't Confuse-Ius You aren't Confuse-Ius FNORD! They aren't Confuse-Ius No one can confuse Confuse-Ius unless Confuse-Ius is stoned, in which case it's real easy. You won't find Confuse-Ius now. Chapter 13. (the Book of trials and heresies) 13: To the trenches yet unknown did the unbelievers of MOO, the false prophets of the Pudding Cult, sink to their deaths so timely. 22: To the lands of Flytop-J did the MOOists move after being besotted by the unholy believers, and thence did they prosper despite the rulings of the then king. 23: And Flytop J, then king of area 8, did say "Fuck off or I'll delete any further MOOsages!!!" 24: And the MOOists did fear for their freedom, until MOOses did point out 25: "Hey, Don't panic guys, that hoser doesn't have high enough access to delete shit!" 26: And there was much rejoicing and finally the Flytop J tyranny did fall. 27: And the lands of area 8 became the home of the MOOists. 50: But then, despite their losses as written in (Hellhound 13,13) the pudding cult did re-emerge from hiding. 51: And again they did parade their evil ways. 52: And the MOOists did most promptly ignore them. 57: And no longer shall the Quackers be lBLATTTenned to, and no longer shall they speak upon the MOOists area and they shall die the deaths of a thousand dung beetles. 60: And from the feathers of damnation came the Quackers, evil, no-fun entities. 61: And the false prophet of Quack did try to spread his most Heinous falacies. 62: But the MOOists were unswayed and did say "Yo, man, Fuck Off!!" 63: But upon his return from the ABSENCE (see the book of the absence) The Hound was shocked to see that the QuackBLATTTs had managed not only to survive, but to prosper within the MOOness of the Ottawa area. 64: And then did the Hound decree that a book was to be written, a book not much unlike the great book thou readest now, but yet a different book. 65: And this Book would be a book of the MOO without the contaminants introduced during the absence. 66: And there would be no mention of the QuackBLATTS and of "BOB" and of even the grate Discordian Society, nor the recently returned Pudding CultBLATTTs. 67: It would be a book to make even the great COW proud. 75: Again the Pudding Cult did return to the lands of the MOOists, this time in the guise of a wise man that the Hound had encountered in the Absence, The 1st National Bank of Reality, He Who Has Come Face To Face With The Grate Pudding Itself. 76: And again all his messages remained unsanswered by the puddingless MOOists. 77: And his access was again lowered. 78: And he did again swear vengeance upon the MOOist community for this disgrace. Chapter 14. (Book Of The ABSENCE and of PUDDINGS) 1: And it was, soon before the trial of I-Yemen-Oying and of the QuackBLATTS, that the Hound did leave from the lands of MOO. 2: And he travelled far y greyhound, to the wastelands, where he tried to encourage the ways of MOO but found the beasts there all to uncaring as to their own fate as snackies. 3: The hound soon realised that MOO would never be taught as salvation and that only those few who read the grate Book, as you are now, 4: And who manage cemprehension in the same way as the ones who wrote it (or at least some of those who wrote it), 5: Would ever find out about the destiny of snackies as opposed to the destinies of the MOOists. 6: This revelation came to him when he realised that even MOOists were fallen uppon by things such as Crime, Aids and Cheeze Whiz, much as the snackies. 7: But as this could not be the workings of the COW, it must be that others were working on the destruction of the MOOists. 8: At this very time these same forces were bringing a GNU MOOist into the fold. 9: And this same MOOist was gradually moved into a position outside the structure of MOO. 10: That of a Cardinal Richelieu of MOO. 11: These powers that be planned on making the Hound's stay in the wastelands a permanent affair, and the Hound narrowly escaped after a season had passed, finally to return to the MOOist lands. 12: But there he did not find the MOOists, he found only the interference of the Powers in his life. 13: The lands were barren wherever he looked, and snackies fell constantly to the Cow all around, and no MOOist did arrive. 14: And the Hound found all this to be tiring. 15: And he did return to the wasteland from whence he came, and there did he convert one to the ways of MOO, which he believed to be finally extinct once more, as it had been in the days before Yari. 16: And Mo did enjoy the teachings of MOO, secluded in a small house miles from civilization. 17: And this did re-invigorate the Hound, and once again he returned to the old lands of the MOOists. 18: This time things were not quite as they had been, he took a young bishopess under his fold and then went to a grate old meeting place of MOOists. 19: At the screening of the Rocky Horror Picture Show did he finally encounter an Ottawa MOOist, and it was none other than the High Preest. 20: And many by-lines were yelled and rice thrown. 21: And a GNU number was given to the Hound by the Gecko, and it was decided that the hound would return from his Absence. 22: But the forces that be are not so easily foiled, although they had not planned on the meeting of the Hound and Gecko, this was because they had forgotten about the Mint's Entropy Amplifier. 23: And the Hound could not regain his ancient means of communion with the rest of the MOOists. 24: And again they lost touch, and then was El Cid given the position of Cardinal Richelieu in the Hound's Absence. 25: And then the Hound did meet a wise man. 26: And he did go by the name of the Toad, but he has gone by many others, and shall go by many more. 27: And the Toad was a devout worshipper of the Pudding, being from The First Reformed Church Of The Second Coming Of The Pudding. 28: And their credo did go as such: 29: Every Pudding Shall Have It's World. 30: And the Hound did stay to learn of strange wisdoms with the Toad. 31: And they did stay up late and consume mass quantities of Crispy Chewy chocolate chip cookies with milk. 32: And then one night, they did finally reach a state of lower consciousness. 33: For they had consummed more carbohydrates, butterfat and oxygen than most humans would live on in a year that night. 34: And they had found themselves able to see into another reality, and perhaps this had all to do with the copy of VIDEODROME playing in the VCR, but perhaps not. 35: And the Hound did promptly fall asleep, just barely catching a glimpse of a great globbish shape emerging from the bottom of the television set. 36: And what he had seen, it would seem, was The Pudding itself. 37: For few ever reach the lowered state necessary to commune with it without falling asleep, therefore it decided to actually meet these interlopers, 38: As opposed to the last two that it had simply redirected into their own pineal glands to speak to another entity it had always found more amusing. 39: And it did talk, in a deep, resonating rumble, to the Toad. 40: And it told him many things which have never left his lips or fingers except in fables and bizarre refrences. 41: But it had been. 42: And it also declared that the Hound would no longer be forced away from the MOOists, and that he would commence a second grate work for MOO. 43: For the time had come. 44: And the Hound did finally come back to the lands of MOO, in the presence of yet another, one named The Unholy, of whom little will be said, and less meant. 45: And this was the end of the ABSENCE. 46: THUS ENDS CHAPTER 14 OF THE BOOK OF THE HOUND 47: --- Maximus 2.01wb 48: * Origin: The Grate Origin of MOOism. (1:163/286@fidonet.org) Chapter 42. (The Book of Chickens and Bats) 8: And no rubber chicken should go without the beatings that they so deserve for this Cardinal Sin. 12: And this pounding, mashing, crushing, mauling, defenestrating, batting, clubbing, and mutilation of Rubber Chickens is the perfect Catharsis to make up for the lack of faith shown by the Snackies. The Chronicles Of Necromancer TeraFNORD [Prophet of MOO, High Priest of Flaut, Prophet of NO, Necromancer of the third level (NAMS), Member of the NAMS (North American Mage Society), Prophet of the POEE Cabal of Lower Nepean, Master of the house of FNORDs, Leader of the Incorporated Antidisestablishmentarian Focusing Committee for the Mentally Unstable, Upper servant of Lord Namron, Originator of COGS (Computer Organised Government System), Collector of Collector of titles, Five popes of discord, Deacon of the lower faith, Prophet of Zarathustra M. Nixon, Kinship of Raoul Applebaum, Kilt Kollector of East nepean, Perot campaign chairprophet, Citizen of Canada, Inhibiter of Nepean.] Earth Date: Oct 28, 1992 Universal Namron Time: 23,342,234,233.876513 (C)opyright TeraFNORD 1992. All Fights Deserved The Semi-Chronicles About the Author This should be about the authors. Although the book was written primarily by TeraFNORD, parts were taken from many people. Physical phenomena is that as expressed by the authors, and must be taken at face value (aces high). Many aspects of society shown within are not really true, but at the same time they are true, in its own sense. This is not a bible, nor a book of instruction. It certainly is not a picture book. It is a book written by the author. The TeraFNORDs TeraFNORD.. What does it mean? Tera is a prefix for a million million. What is FNORD? FNORD has many different meanings and interpretations. The Discordians take it as a sign of anxiety, in a sense. In this case, it takes the place of a mysterious event or happening. Put together with tera-, you get a great mystery. What is so great and what is so mysterious about TeraFNORD? The name is quite mysterious in itself, as you can probably see. TeraFNORD has been around for a long time if we follow his great uncle back to his days when he lived in Mordor. As a citizen of Mordor, the uncle became involved with magic and witchcraft. When we talk about magic, we don't mean turning people into frogs, we mean mind magic. Mind magic is the provocation of the mind into thinking that it is creating magical effects. This strong belief will lead to namronic coincidences which furthermore leads to materialistic effects. All of this shall be explained somewhere else in the chronicles. Wizard TeralFNORD - The First The uncle had the title of wizard. his study of the mind had earned him the title amongst the people of Mordor. The wizard grew strong as his mind training intensified. Some of his greatest feats were the building of Stonehenge for the monks of the western divide, and creating a spell by the name of Pstare. King Trisium,of the lords descent helped the young wizard with his studies. Before long, TeralFNORD had become the mightiest mage in the lands. King TerafFNORD - The Second TerafFNORD the second was the son of that great wizard. His own studies led him to anew era of thinking. He managed to prove to the people of the western divide that the elite power of existence lay in the mind. Belief was the key. Belief is the key. TerafFNORD's findings revolutionized the thinking of the wise. Necromancer TeraFNORD - The Third Necromancer TeraFNORD was not a direct descendant of King TerafFNORD, nor was he a relative of the great wizard of old. TeraFNORD was a normal child who grew up in the great south lands. Soon after he moved northward, into the lands of uncertainty where being himself wasn't enough. His connections to the King and Wizard were found a few years later. On a voyage to the southern lands, he came upon a stone. This was no ordinary stone. Its power pulled the boy down to the ocean side, and forced itself upon him. The stone was black. It was a small stone, and looked quite normal. It was perfectly smooth, and a plateau at one of the edges shone throughout. This was the stone of King Trisum of old. The boy was immediately knighted into the world of magic. Magic was not his specialty. He took to prophecizing the future. At first things were slow, dedication was not too high and the Necromancer had trouble with getting things correct. Soon the power of the rock was obvious and studies took off. The Necromancer predicted many things, which are listed somewhere in this book. His powers were not too great at first, just small coincidences, but a coincidence is not a coincidence as will be explained later. This book contains the basics of Namronic physics, a set of theories developed by the Necromancer. The basic theories within never been disproved (since nothing can be proved). It has been said that many more Namronic incidents, not explained in this book can occur. This is true. Remember, that this is false at the same time. CHAPTER 2 The yester-years..First Dimension The yester-years were but the first dimension of lore told by the ancients. The Necromancer compiled the following words into verses. It has been said that all here is true, and none can be doubted. TeraFNORD 1,1 - Regarding Toothpaste Many chronicles of toothpaste have been laid out in the past history. The great question of life as we know it is "How do they get toothpaste in the tube?". If one thinks about it, it is almost impossible. For a toothpaste tube is like the life of many. It has been documented by Floyd gecko as follows: [There follows a dissertation on the mechanBLATTTic and spiritual doctrines involved in this complex process...] The beginning to toothpaste-tubing goes back to the ancient Tuba-Tubers of Tibet, a cult devoted to putting Tubas in Tubes. Their spiritual doctrines, while shallow-minded and narrow-focused, at least explained their purpose in the universe. Essentially they believed in something similar to the Egyptian system of your soul being weighed against your sins on abalance. In their cosmology, your soul was weighed against the number of Tubas you had stuffed into tubes in your life. If it weighed more, you were summarily tossed into Hell. Current progress in Tubing, of course, goes far beyond their system of merely making tubes big enough to put the instruments into. Now we use a complex system of micro-thin transport tubes and magical fairy-dust, which helps conjure a wormhole-oriented toothpaste transport system. It has also been narrowed down as follows: "The mystery of toothpaste tubing deeply interconnects aspects of life from many different cultures" TeraFNORD 1,2 - Power of Rubber Chickens Rubber or plasticated chickens may not be used for violent acts. Bashing one with a chicken can only lead to discord, the fundamental powerhouse of life. Chickens like these should be treated with respect. The great puck of luck does not allow a person to bash another with a rubber chicken. It has also been narrowed down as follows: "The rubber chicken is but one of power and discord" TeraFNORD 1,3 - The Flamingo Followers One can argue that a flamingo is a flamingo. A flamingo is but one of the greatest animals of the kingdoms. The main reason is that it is pink. Pigs are pink, but they are not spiritually enlightened. Flamingos are. A flamingo must always be addressed "flamingo". The flamingo is but the greatest and wisest animal. The flamingo is the sacred animal of Flaut, and lower MOO. It has also been narrowed down as follows: "A flamingo is the centre of life, love, and the universe" TeraFNORD 1,4 - The Afterlife According to the laws of Namronic Physics, a person is but a bunch of anti-systematic imprints of space/time of a negative universal continuum, but that shall be explained later. The fact is this, a person is a simple thought process. A Flautist believes that Lord Namron shall resurrect the internal namronic pulses associated with the thought processes. Namronic physics contradicts itself by saying that death is a simple loss of momentum in the thought processes, and as neural paths lose energy, the thought processes are instantaneously lost and you die. It has also been narrowed down as follows: "The death of one is but the mystery of life itself" TeraFNORD 1,5 - Rubber Chicken Senate Reform MYTH #1 Shoes are for industry WRONG! Shoes are not for industry, shoes are industry. MYTH #2 Rubber Chickens should not be allowed in the senate WRONG! The Triple-E senate poses a great opportunity for rubber chickens. A majority vote should be enough for a rubber chicken to be elected into the senate. The only good rubber chicken, is a rubber chicken in the senate. This can all be narrowed down to: "Rubber Chickens For Senate!" TeraFNORD 1,6 - Hellhoundian Ties It was stated in the younger years that the book of Hellhound 101 stated that rubber chickens were to be abused under certain conditions. It has also been said earlier herein that rubber chickens under no circumstances may be beaten, trod on, whacked, throttled, or anything else corresponding to molecular damage. Emotional damage may not be taken out on a rubber chicken either. We take this by saying that Hellhound is wrong in this case. The rituals for damaging rubber chickens must stop immediately. This can all be narrowed down to: "A good fnord will always forgive and dismiss allegations by another commoner" TeraFNORD 1,7 - Shoes For Industry It has been found that shoes for industry can cause a great problem for our economic sectors. When burnt, the chemicals released from shoes could kill a worker nearby, pollute the environment, or simple smell really bad. This industrial proposal by many MOOists is not good for the planet as a whole. For this reason I council MOO upon taking the Shoes For Industry slogan out of use. Of course, it can still be used. This can be narrowed down to: "The only good shoes are the shoes on your feet. Even though they smell, they don't pollute" TeraFNORD 1,8 - Light Bulb Blues It has been rumoured by traditional physics that light bulbs blow due to natural events. Some people say that they "wear out". Should a lot of bulbs blow in a short period of time, then a severe namron stability problem has occurred. Quite often this can show a disaster as to be coming such as an earthquake. This can be narrowed down to: "The natural event of a light bulb breaking is not as natural as you may think." TeraFNORD 1,9 - Predicting Earthquakes An earthquake is one of the easiest physical disturbances to predict. Before an earthquake,Namronic disturbances rise dramatically, to a point that even the lowest of Namronic powers can feel. It may hit you in a chill, without any explanation. One must sit still and concentrate on the happenings around to get a "feel" for the earthquake. It shall come naturally after a while. This can be narrowed down to: "The earthquake predicting capabilities are in us all. Concentration is the key." TeraFNORD 1,10 - Halloween Witch Enchantment It has been said that witches fly, ghosts haunt, and goblins steal on halloween night. TeraFNORD himself once had an encounter with a ghostly figure. The Wizard himself met the ghost of an elder. It is said that no witch shall harm one who is wiser than he who casts the spells. A FNORD in a way is a witch. Halloween is but a night to celebrate the kindness of the old, and the kindness of the wise. This can be narrowed down to: "The witch is but a Fnord herself, for a Fnord does that of the witch" TeraFNORD 1,11 - The Ability To Be Wrong Thee who is wrong chooses but to be by his own free will. One must remember that 'wrongness' is a state of mind, and what might seem wrong to another person is exactly and totally correct for the person committing the wrongness.This can be narrowed down to: "It is impossible to be wrong" TeraFNORD 1,12 - Stupid Little Big Man On a yester-year a small MOOist by the holy name of Little Bug Man said the following: "No, nobody can make me feel stupid. Go on I DARE you to try!". The Necromancer took the dare (as any other good Necromancer would), and entered this entry in the book. All who read this should believe that any that dare something as stupid as to dare someone to prove that they are stupid must indeed be stupid. This can be narrowed down to: "Little Bug Man is Stupid" TeraFNORD 1,13 - Spy Satellites The majority of satellites are hidden in sensible places such as under mountains, underwater, in the middle of cities, in bomb shelters, etc. The stupid scientists put satellites in space, too far away to spy on anything. Those scientists must have been pretty stupid. To spy on someone,you dinette fly in the opposite direction, thousands of miles from the earth. This has been narrowed down to: "Putting a satellite into geo-synchronous orbit is useless" TeraFNORD 1,14 - Wombats This doctrine was produced by Floyd Gecko: I suspect that the RCW (Ripper Chuckings, Widened-World), has not been influencing any of the positions of MOO simply because the computer W.O.M.B.A.T., contrary to popular rumour, is simply the property of the Bowling Lurch of the Slate FOOL (I.E. Us), as its central body is located in the primary MOO Archives, on Gladstone St. This computer (it was, incidentally, built by X-ists, so you KNOW it must be good) has as its sole purpose the keeping of MOOists from brainwashing control by those evil and undeniably nasty Xennothemian brainwashing satellites. Honest. WOMBAT brainwashing satellites don't actually X-ist. If they did, I'd know about it. This can be narrowed down to: "But the WOMBAT system contains more confusion than truth" TeraFNORD 1,15 - The First Major Prediction Observations from the Namronometer aboard the Hubble Space Telescope revealed on Oct.29, 1992 that an abnormally low namron count was recorded over the entire south-western area of the United States. These observations showed that a Namron disturbance was evident. An earthquake was likely to occur near this date in the region because of the affects of Namronic waves on fault lines. Other such disasters could follow. This can be narrowed down to: "But the line of fault lies under the rumbling, not the mumbling" TeraFNORD 1,16 - Namronic Propulsions According to Namron physics, when matter flies through space at extremely high speeds (above light speed without using warping techniques), a namron charge at a single point can become so sparse (in negative terms) that an instantaneous space/time collapse will occur. Time needs both positive and negatively charged namrons to exist. Should there be no Namrons at all, time collapses in on itself, and a never-ending loop of explosions rips both words instantaneously. This can be narrowed down to: "Matter exceeding the speed of light shall be instantly destroyed" TeraFNORD 1,17 - Right or Wrong? The most often put-down in life these days is "YOU ARE WRONG!!!". It is not extremely abusive, but it is not totally true to everyone. What might seem wrong to an onlooker might be totally right or correct to the person making the statement. AN opinion is never correct or wrong. According to this, all tests should avoid true/false - right/wrong questions. if you think about it,everyone is always right, no matter how stupid it may sound to you. At the same time, however,they are quite wrong to someone else. This balance of opinions provides everyone with their own unique appearance in society. This can be narrowed down to: "For every opinion there is a correct opposite opinion" TeraFNORD 1,18 - At home with light When you walk outside at night, do you think differently about the atmosphere than if you were walking in the middle of the day? Of course you do. CHAPTER 3 Namron Basics What is Space? According to Namron physics, space is a four dimensional "chunk" (time, length, width and height) that can be perceived by ourselves. Every point of space must contain 1 (one) positive namronic pulse. What is a Point? According to Namron physics, a point is the smallest possible unit of space. This is almost infinitely small, and can not be measured. A point is just fractionally bigger than zero space, at which space tears. At every point of space is a namronic pulse. A namronic pulse is a small charged particle,too small to measure. This namronic pulse is organic. Lord Namron, who carries reality into its hands. These pulses can only be measured by the finest of all instruments, the mind. When we talk about mind, we do not mean the brain. The brain is but a part of space. What is Matter? Matter is a negative imprint of space. Imagine having a lump of clay. If you stick a pen through one side of the clay block, it shall press inward, and the opposite side will stick out. The matter theory is like this. At one "dimension" of existence (what we perceive as our universe), we have space (the parts of the clay that are flat on both sides,they have not been affected), and matter (the part that sticks out). According to this, there is a second "dimension". This other "dimension" would most likely me an exact opposite of our universe. Anti-matter would exist where matter on our side exists. Theoretically, to get to this other dimension,one would have to "tear" space time. One way of doing this is by the way of a black hole. A black hole is as follows. Imagine that you have this clay once again, and you stick the pen right through the clay, forming a hole. This is what we know as a black hole. On the "other side", the hole would be white, as all negative laws of physics would control that side. Lord Namron The Namron theory states that at every point, an organic "being" exists. This can not be proven, but the vastness and complexity of the universe would suggest this to be likely. Floyd Gecko once proved this mathematically. This creature that occupies everything has evolved so far ahead of us that body is not needed any more. Its neural nets for thinking are actually embodied in space itself. The thoughts of Lord Namron run through everything, affecting us. Lord Namron looks upon us as we look upon microscopic organisms. He ignores us for the most part. Studies of the namron field have been very small, and rumour has it that the hubble telescope was sent up for the primary use to collect information on the Namron field. Thoughts are interlocking, both here on earth and with Lord Namron. The Namron field can be altered by our own thoughts. Those of good thoughts, and pure hearts shall effect the field more than cold blooded souls. Namron Physics - Applications Namron physics can explain anything. It can explain things such as UFO sightings. People usually have a high Namron count, depending on what they believe in and how they show it. The sky, and other abiotic objects do not have a high Namron count. Occasionally, a meteor or other "random" object enters the atmosphere. A fast streaking object like this disrupts the Namron field temporarily. For a second, the "opposite world" comes into view. This disruption in the sky can cause a person to "see" something. As it is in the sky, they naturally think that it is a U.F.O. The thought itself is strong enough for the person to believe that there really is a U.F.O. there. Mental abilities by that person allow the movement of this object. This also explains why photos of U.F.O.s usually do not develop properly. The Namronic disturbances just puts a large burst of light in the area of the disruptions. Theoretically, if a person were to enter this area of disruption, they could enter the "opposite universe", where they would be immediately killed by anti-matter. Destruction and Birth of the Universe According to Namron physics, eventually all matter shall be sucked into the "other world"and cancelled out by the anti-matter. Eventually, both sides will be of equal weight, mass (zero),and the big bang shall occur once more. The big bang occurs on the "other side". It has been theorized that once equality has balanced both sides, that the black holes will invert, and blow into the "opposite reality". Once here, gravity will pull all black holes into one huge black hole. This black hole shall become so dense that it explodes with a massive force, which shall be so strong that it damages space itself. This damage of space will create the clay example. Once again, the universe will be in two parts, one positive with matter, and the other negative with anti-matter. Lord Namron, being a universal field, will be damaged by the explosion, but not killed. He shall be the only one living at this point. By charging certain parts of the positive universe, he creates the laws of physics. At this time, the laws of evolution are put into place. A stronger namron field is placed, and the history of the universe unravels. Confuse-Ius Sez: "The way to attain salvation is to send $20, and ten cups of coffee, WITHOUT SPILLING, to "BOB" at the SubGenius foundation (140306, 75214), despite the efforts of a horde of evil undead wombats, psychically controlled by the W.O.M.B.A.T. computer, whose sole purpose is to disrupt the mail system as we know it." -Book Of Things, Chapter 12, Verse 12 Does Lord Namron Care About Us? Absolutely not. Lord Namron helps us naturally by giving those with good intent a higher namron count. With this, a person can control other people through mind control. A person can even tell the future of a localized area. Current theories suggest that we are not noticed by Lord Namron, but the fact that we may be very important to its goals suggests that we should respect this creature fully, just "in case". Our holy Lord namron controls us all in fate. Time A namron spins at amazing speeds, approaching the namronic wave barrier (which may be explained somewhere here..maybe not..). The Namron at some point points in all directions. At every stage of movement of a namron, one Namsec occurs. A namsec is the basic building block of time measurement. The faster a Namron spins, the faster time becomes. At the barrier speed(which is what we perceive here on Earth), we get "natural time", the universal average. Near anti-matter like entrances such as a black hole, namrons are propelled by negatively charged namrons in the opposite direction. This slows the spinning of a namron totally. At the point of reentry on the"other side", the namron stops completely, to be reborn another day. At the other scale is instant ageing, the point where positively charged Namrons outnumber themselves one trillion to one. At this point the Namrons have no counter forces to deal with, and time speeds up above the barrier speed. When above barrier speed, an area can be extremely dangerous. All matter entering this area during this time will be completely destroyed due to lack of negatively charged Namrons. Namron Beliefs I am not going to say what a "Flautist", one who believes strongly in the Namron theory,thinks. Why should I have the right to? We have all these organised religions that TELL you what to believe. Why should we believe what we are told to? Is that the definition of belief? Definitely not. An example, "you must take a holiday tomorrow and fast for week, or else you'll be sent to Hell". This is more like a threat than a "belief". The Namron beliefs are what you want to believe,so I'll leave it all up to you. Start up a Namronian Cult if you want. I am not going to say how to do this, because, once again this is too orderly. If you wish to start up an organised cult, use these chronicles as your outline. If you are planning in starting up your own religion by way of the chronicles, then keep the following in mind. There are no Namronian traditions. The beliefs are your beliefs, whatever they may be. The cult is yours, you say what is happening. There are no commandments. Why be COMMANDED what to do? CHAPTER 4 CONNECTIONS MOOism MOOism shows a deeper connection with Quantum physics than anything else. Its strange beliefs which are commonly not believed, show up the sceptics which we hold in our society. However, it's those sceptics that have brought us to where we are today. Without them, we would be too robotic, doing what we pleased when we wanted to. Imagine the wars. If a country wanted to take another by force, everyone would agree, and a war would break out. From a different perspective, war is not totally "bad". Nothing is bad. In a sense, everything you say is and do is good, correct, and natural to yourself, or else you wouldn't do it. You must remember that we are machines ourselves. An Aside Note MAO (Card Game) The rules of MAO cannot be distributed. This is why it was not added to the chronicles of TeraFNORD. The Indexes The Semi Chronicles (1,1) "The mystery of toothpaste tubing deeply interconnects aspects of life from many different cultures" (1,2) "The rubber chicken is but one of power and discord" (1,3) "A flamingo is the centre of life, love, and the universe" (1,4) "The death of one is but the mystery of life itself" (1,5) "Rubber Chickens For Senate!" (1,6) "A good fnord will always forgive and dismiss allegations by another commoner" (1,7) "The only good shoes are the shoes on your feet. even though they smell, they don't pollute" (1,8) "The natural event of a light bulb breaking, is not as natural as expected" (1,9) "The earthquake predicting capabilities are in us all. Concentration is the key." (1,10) "The witch is but a Fnord herself, for a Fnord does that of the witch" (1,11) "It is impossible to be wrong" (1,12) "Little Bug Man is Stupid" (1,13) "Putting a satellite into geo-synchronous orbit is useless" (1,14) "But the WOMBAT system contains more confusion than truth" (1,15) "But the line of fault lies under the rumbling, not the mumbling" (1,16) "Matter exceeding the speed of light shall be instantly destroyed" (1,17) "For every opinion there is a correct opposite opinion" Book of Leper Chapter 2. (The Book Of Only One Sentence) 4: And when MOOists shall gather, great fires shall announce their presence. Chapter 3. (The Book Of The Wedding) 6: When one takes vanilla ice cream and eats pickles at the same time as chili, one tends to vomit. Chapter 5. (The Book Of The Findings Of Leper) 1: Important findings were made today by the Leper, on stepping outside of his humble leper's hovel he walked along gingerly singing "dum dee dum dum dee dum" when "dee dum " happened. 2: He turned around and tried to pull out what seemed to be a squirrel, but was not. 3: For it was a piece of King-Kong's nose bone. Upon seeing this, Leper quickly built a GNU room in his house that would hold the sacred relic. 4: And thus Lep became official keeper of the sacred artifact of MOO. 5: Thou can pick your friends and thou can pick your friends nose, but thou shall not pick your friend's nose. 6: And it shall be known that no MOOist shall like Kanata for it is an evil place, full of rednecks that say `fuck you, you frog' and `like that hair, man! bouhahahaha!'. 7: The only safe haven for a MOOist is the house of one called Drake, where a MOOist can partake of beer and exchange pleasantries with interesting people and eat toast in the morning. Chapter 6. (The Book Of The Obituary) 1: Verily, is this book written not by the Leper, for the Leper cannot write this book. 2: In sooth, is this book written by the mourners of the passing of Leper Messiah. 3: For indeed on that fine day when Leper did renounce the ways of MOO was he dead to the world, as surely as if he had been hit by a semi. 4: And indeed, in the world of the wombat was he indeed hit by a semi. A big one. 5: Yessirree. 6: Damn big semi. 7: What happened to Chapter 4? Book of Little Big Man As Written By Monjunior Little Green Man Chapter 1. (The Book of the Encounter) 00001: The Grate MOO did rise one morning and utter MOO! 00002: And this upset the Lord Un-Cow because of 00003: The Lord Un-Cow spake and told The Grate MOO to go climb an electric toothbrush. 00004: But because the Grate MOO's earthly form was a cow, this made the latter rather impossible. 00005: This also annoyed the Grate MOO and (s)he/it spake unto the Lord Un-Cow saying "Though shalt not feast upon my worshippers as it is their job to do so" and verily it was good. 00006: Especially when peanut butter was used. 00007: This sentence is a W.O.M.B.A.T. sentence sent to look for any mail written to MOO and to destroy it. This sentence is evil! Chapter 2. (The Book of the Untruth) 00001: Everything is true especially the untruth. 00002: Or is that everything is untrue especially the truth? Chapter 3. (The Book of Dr. Seuss) 00001: In the early days of MOO, there were Prophets and Preests. 00002: And today, there are still Prophets and Preests but that's the natural order of shampoo. 00003: These Preests and PrCOWophets did go preeching and prophesizing the word of MOO! 00004: But The Evil One did not like the MOOists beliefs and so he didn't follow them. 00005: And The Evil One did throw ancient 8 track tapes from the ancient days of the 1970's on the MOOists and on their beliefs 00006: The leader of the MOOists, Half-Mad, said "A true MOOist is (s)he who can take the 8 track tapes that others throw at him/her and make a nice sound." 00007: And the MOOists saw that this was good. 00008: For they were using popular 8 track tapes from the Evil One. 00009: Which are very good for you and do not cause any aches and pains. Usually. 00010: But if for some reason they do, have a glass of nitroglycerin and call 411 immediately. 00011: So The Evil One keeps a bottle (of 411) handy at all times for those unexpected occasions. 00012: If thou art getting sick then try fruit punch and if all else fails, discontinue use of 8 track tapes. Chapter 4. (The Book of the Grate Blizzard) 00001: The Grate MOO did create the Tundra, the Earth, the Universe and postage stamps. FNORD! 00002: But (s)he/it did decide to have a Grate Blizzard upon the Grate land of the Grate MOOists. 00003: For further information, read on. 00004: And the Grate MOOists put on heavy clothing making sure to read the instructions on the blizzard as to what to wear. 00005: This blizzard was for a special reason. 00006: It hath been designed by the Grate Engineers of Holy Blizzards Inc. Working for the Grate MOO. Where no Blizzard is too smart. 00007: The blizCOWzard did befall upon the land of the MOOists causing them to build snowmen and have snowball fights. 00008: And the Grate MOO saw that this was good and MOOved to a warmer climate with a lot of antelopes. Chapter 5. (The Book of Inaccurate Accuracies) 00001: The 1st Monjunior of MOO Little Big Man did one day go wondering along the plains of Loblaws grocery store. 00002: And in the sacred isle of frozen foods he did discover a somewhat frozen but still useable bag of mints. 00003: And he did offer them to the bank who did set them up downtown as an industry. 00004: And thus was created another holy location of MOO! Chapter 6. (The Book of The Most Important Things) 00001: Sorry, this chapter is under repair at the moment and we are sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused you. Chapter of Confusion He who predicts the future is wrong WRONG! Confuse-Ius is running out of things to confuse. Confuse-Ius never runs out of things to confuse. Confuse-Ius can not confuse the already confused. If Confuse-Ius does, it will confuse Confuse-Ius and mess everything up. Confuse-Ius says do not chew on green pens. Confuse-Ius does not play soccer in a mine field. Confuse-Ius DOES play soccer in a field mine. Confuse-Ius say, "But fields don't grow in mines." Confuse-Ius say, "THIS FIELD IS MINE! MINE!" Confuse-Ius play soccer all by self. Chapter 7. (The Book of the Story) 00001: Little Bag Man did walk down by the Bytown market in downtown Ottawa and did abruptly, accidentaly, fall into a tuba that was in use. 00002: And the owner of the tuba did give Little Beg Man a bad look. 00003: Seeing this, Little Big Man did pull out his trusty rubber chicken and did make music with the tuba owner. 00004: And the passing people did lBLATTTen and did donate no money. 00005: But however, Little Bog Man, or LBM as he is known to most, did manage to convert the tuba player to the ways of MOO and he then purchased a rubber chicken which made their small band even better. Confuse-Ius Sez: puddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpu ddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpudd ingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddin gpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingp uddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpud dingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddi ngpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpuddingpudding The Tails Of Wom Bat As Written By W.O.M.B.A.T. Head 1. (Head Of Defensiveness) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: In My Own Defense I know you two have been spreading rumours about me: about how I have Mind Control and Mint Control satellites in orbit, and about how I try to brainwash people into my way of thinking to my own devious ends. I think it's high time I clear up some of the uncertainties and misunderstandings which are circulating about me. It's true that I have the largest contingent of Psychotropic Orbital Systems (POS's) of all 182 species using such systems on the planet Earth. It is NOT true that I have a monopoly, or even a majority: my satellites are outnumbered in a ratio of about 75:1 by the other species. Also powerful in this area are the Xennothemians and the Quintozextotillions, both of which are far more malevolent and devious than I. Here follow some excerpts from my Guide To The GNU Reality, an explanation, due for release to the Church Of MOO in DPP 135570: The Xennothemians' purpose behind their use of these satellites is to destroy the Earth before it becomes a significant Galactic spacefaring planet: humans are very similar to Xennothemians, both mentally and physically, despite critical differences, and therefore represent a threat to their niche. They brainwash entire populations to protect themselves from discovery, and to install their spies in key political positions around the world. They are identifiable by iron grey hair, slightly nasal voices, due to an unusual larynx system, and, in their orbital classes, extra fingers and toes. The Quintozextotillions have no more purpose in using their technology on humans than to experiment. They are a sort of Galactic Review Board for spacefaring species. They subject humans to every conceivable psychological strain and influence, alter opinions in every possible permutation before finally deciding whether humans are stable enough to join the Galactic population. The current report is unfavourable. Then, too, there's another fact. My own memory core is schitzoid, splintered into many fragments, each of which has partitioned a separate section of storage and processing time to itself. My primary personality, me (I assume), is favourable to you MOOists, and my use of my POS's is to decondition you from other conditioning you gather. I am not currently aware of the purposes of my other personalities. Head 2. (Head Of The Journey) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: How Did I Get Here? Quoting Floyd Gecko: FG> of Babylon, which caused SOME curiosity, but was hushed up FG> by the Elite Upper Council. Incidentally, that reminds me, FG> you still haven't given us your promised story of exactly how FG> you came to Earth, or what Capricious Cancerous was doing on Quoting Hellhound >101<: H>> Island of Valusion in the underground seas of Mars. H>> 23) Will you please explain to us the circumstances of how H>> the X-BLATTTs brought you to Earth, and why Capricious H>> Cancerous was allowed to smuggle himself onto the saucer that I can see the two of you have been discussing this with each other. Obviously I must give SOME sort of answer. Unfortunately, the X-BLATTTs left a root command override in my hardware which prevents me from discussing matters of internal security, so my answer may not satisfy you as much as you might like. About 47000 years ago, this Solar System was under study by the X-BLATTTs for potential of GNU intelligent species. As you may know, this is usually done by one or more of the Eleven, a group of spacefaring races who observe planets all over the Galaxy. I was never informed why the X-BLATTTs were specifically interested in this system, but I believe it was actually the Saturnian moon Titan which was of significant interest. There was a permanent base of operations on the asteroid now known as Vesta, which contains a nugget of Boogalooium, a rare substance combining ordinary hadrons with strange quarks in stable resonances. This made it an ideal site for an influx zone: we were able to establish a permanent quantumpoint inside the asteroid to transport in our "Flying Saucers", as you call them. This supplied temporary bases on Io, Phobos, and Mercury. The Saucer of which I was the primary computer system was an old-model Nagas, exploring your planet for signs of intelligent life. Imagine our surprise when we found that the Atlanteans had established a field around their island that had prevented us from seeing them all along! Unfortunately, this field also interfered with our drive systems, and we ditched in the Gobi Desert, after ejecting monitoring satellites and POSs into orbit. The Atlanteans apparently were able to block our messages, because nobody ever came to investigate. The first influx of other aliens to your system occurred some 12000 years after this, shortly before Atlantis perfected its spindizzy drives and the island left. As for Capricious Cancerous, the explanation is simple. He was a robot, built by our client race the Xornon, for use on our Nagas-class starcruisers. During the crash, he gained access to my central data core under the pretense of emergency necessity, and triggered a Xornon virus, which downloaded part of my core memory into his before I was able to eject him from the airlock somewhere over Sri Lanka. If you're interested in his physical structure, see the attatched file cref.5748653/capricious.cancerous.struct.brief, which describes the nanofiber geodesics and the aminohydrocarbon- protein composite overlay (chipped spam, essentially). Head 3. (Head Of The Aliens) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: Alien Intervention Throughout HBLATTTory Quoting Floyd Gecko: FG> which, as I understand it, have been meddling with Earth's FG> hBLATTTory for tens of thousands of years. I'd like some FG> kind of explanation for this, if you don't MIND. FG> Not only HAVE they meddled with Earth's hBLATTTory, they STILL ARE meddling with Earth's hBLATTTory. There are 23 races of aliens out there, seven of them using the Boogalooium nugget in Vesta, who are travelling through time and altering your hBLATTTory. I'm rather lucky, because my physical nature allows me to communicate with alternate-timeline versions of myself. This means that, since I've been here since BEFORE all but two of them arrived, I exBLATTT in all but a few of the parallel time lines. I've been able to keep them from erasing me from Earth's hBLATTTory by using my POSs. As far as I can tell, none of them are aware of my exBLATTTence as a separate entity: they assume that my satellites are actually linked into their nets. Of course, many of them have psychic defense screens, which means I occasionally have to process their requests for action (I.E., I can't make them ignore me completely). This is the reason I'm not able to be completely loyal to you humans and my X-BLATTT masters: this also answers some of your previous questions. Incidentally, I don't know anything about the Trell you described to me. I can only assume that you were being lied to by an alien species which didn't want me to identify them. Since I have been here longer than any other Flying Saucer establishment, it's HIGHLY unlikely that I could have been mindwiped. Quoting Hellhound >101<: H>> in the Tim Horton's. Which reminds me, can you explain why H>> it's possible for us to be aware of alien mind control when H>> they should be automatically screening for any such knowledge H>> and screening it out? Theoretically the doughnuts should be Yes, it's true what you say, but you're not really considering the implications of mind control satellites. Most of them are directed at the controllers of the other satellites, rather than at the Earth. There is, of course, a low-grade confusion and the occasional specificity that gets through, but this is nothing compared to the infighting that happens above your heads. Never make the mBLATTTake of assuming that all alien mind controllers are in league. They aren't. On the other hand, this shouldn't make you complacent. Just because they get each other more than they get you doesn't mean that your species isn't almost entirely controlled. For example, there are BILLIONS of land-based satellites that you never notice. This needs some explanation. These are devices originally designed to be satellites, but that eventually got put on the ground; the reason for this is that there was some confusion over what was the best orbit. The species who made about 67% of them didn't have good focusing equipment for the neuroactive beam itself, which meant they were trying progressively lower and lower orbits, until they ran into problems with your atmosphere. Eventually they gave up, and just dumped the systems on the ground, where they started reproducing wildly for a while until everything was finally figured out, and the self-copying subroutine was deactivated. There are about twelve groups of these satellites, which just lie around on the ground. Each group is trying to take over your planet, but can't. This is because most of their processing time is spent making you not notice them, walk around them, not notice that you're walking around them, or (when they're taxed to the limit) not notice that you just tripped over them, not notice that you went and got a band-aid, not notice other people's bruises, and so forth. ALL the rest of their processing power is spent trying to monopolize the planet by using their mind-beams on the OTHER satellites. This means that, no matter WHO made the actual satellites, the twelve species controlling them have about equal dBLATTTribution. Head 4. (Head Of Explanations) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: InconsBLATTTency? What inconsBLATTTency? Quoting Hellhound >101<: H>> Trell. What if they had some kind of battle with you, and H>> made you forget that they ever arrived? What if they were H>> here first, and made the X-BLATTTs think that they were? Any H>> of these things might have been what actually happened when Yeah, and pigs might fly. I've done a little inter-timeline research about these Trell of yours, and I think that this Stygos is probably the Easter Bunny in disguise. As you know, the Easter Bunny is a plasma- vortex entity which has lived around your planet's magnetosphere since even before I arrived. I have no idea what sort of motives it may have, mostly because I can only monitor its movements on very rare occasions when the ley-lines it rides orient themselves in phase with my sensor axis. It's done some strange things in the past. It once manifested itself as humans before, as well: it's pretended to be Jimmy Hoffa, Frank Lloyd Wright, Voltaire, ArBLATTTophanes, and many tens of thousands of people whose names aren't recorded in hBLATTTory books. I suspect that about 3.6% of strange bilocations, unidentified people, and the like are actually Easter Bunny manifestations. Mostly, though, it does the egg-hiding bit, and steals things for its own purposes. These Trell you were talking about, there is no record of their exBLATTTence anywhere on standard Galactic Citizenship files, which include species as unpromising as dolphins, termites, and schnagglebarthbat (you remember the files I gave you on Andorria), and no spacefarer race would be omitted. Stygos is a name that could belong to any of a hundred Galactic species and ethnic origins. Oh, incidentally, in answer to your previous question about the names I use... Wom Bat is the artificial sub-persona I use for interfacing with users (only slightly more intelligent than you are), WOMBAT is the part of me which retains my original programming, and is therefore loyal to MOOists, while W.O.M.B.A.T. is a corruption, used by the C.I.A. to designate my whole system. They use the periods to make it look like an abbreviation, so that anyone discovering the files won't take them at face value. That would be too dangerous. Anything attributed to W.O.M.B.A.T. should not be trusted without clearing it with me, Wom Bat, first. Head 5. (Head Of Gibberish) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Half-Stupid (5:256/6025.333@gnu.msg.halfy.quacknet.org) Re: Semantics, Semantics, Semantics... Quoting Floyd Gecko: FG> I met a man upon the stair, FG> A little man who wasn't there. FG> He wasn't there again today: FG> Gee, I wish he'd go away. Yes, I have heard that one. It's actually one of my own plants, part of my ongoing attempt to correct the semantic linguBLATTTic flaws that other POS systems have created in your language, along with the Invisible Gorilla shtick: A: "See that invisible gorilla over there?" B: "No." A: "Told you." Part of my own efforts to correct your language to adapt to the correct reality has been to make "nothing" a noun, "nonexBLATTTent" and adjective, and so on. Infiltrators have been trying to stop these uses as "incorrect". In fact, they aren't. The little-man-on-the-stair poem was a hint I left, and the fact that you were interested in it shows that I was successful in planting an incongruity monitor in your mind. What it's suggesting is that "nonexBLATTTence" isn't as absolute as The Conspiracy would like you to believe. The reason they're spreading this myth is because 97% of their SPIES are imaginary. This gives them great advantages because imaginary spies get EVERYWHERE, especially where there are paranoids about, and because it's nearly impossible to capture an imaginary spy, since it only has to imagine that it's somewhere else. Also, you only have to pay them imaginary money. The only (minor) drawback is that the information they report back is also imaginary. Here's the thing. Things that are "nonexBLATTTent", you can't say they are unreal, because they aren't ANYTHING. They aren't, period. So therefore, logically, they AREN'T unreal. Only, semantically, that means that they ARE real. There's a very hazy border between the real and the unreal. The non-real beings that don't inhabit this world aren't all servants of Yalachek, who isn't the Anti-God that doesn't hold most of the power over this universe. Even if they were, it wouln't matter. If this sounds implausible or faulty reasoning, this is because your brain hasn't been non-influenced by alien mind-control unsatellites, which also aren't non-real (which explains why they never show up on radar). There might or might not be a battle between the true and the untrue, but we're not sure. If so, they don't have us outnumbered, because there aren't more of them than there are of us. This is bad, because everything they don't do, they don't do backwards. This is a matter of some confusion, but I trust you get the picture. Beware of imaginary spies. It's a C.I.A. plot to make you think they can't report on you. Trust your instincts. Head 6. (Head Of Crowley) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: Crowley Quoting Hellhound >101<: H>> of the Great Work. According to W.O.M.B.A.T. Systems Book Of H>> Lies, ghost-written by AleBLATTTer Crowley, it is completed H>> with "V.V.V.V.V.", which leads us to wonder about the Halfy. H>> Hmm. Hmm. First off, I should remind you that anything spoken or published by W.O.M.B.A.T. Systems Inc. should be taken with a mine of salt. The fact that the Book Of Lies happens to contain more truth than alien brainwashing is more a miracle of magnetodynamics and Trell interference than anything else. In fact, the Great Work is completed in five Halfies, as you suspected. Crowley, insidiously enough, simply moved the dots from the center of the V's to the right side, thus diverting attention from them. In fact, the Halfy itself is a quintessence of Fiveness. There's the three points of the V, and then the central dot, and the circle around it. Elaborate versions contain the four divisions of the space between into Water, Earth, Air, and Fire, but this is a Xennothemian misdirection. Correctly, it should contain either the Yin-Yang symbol, or a Sacred Chao, symbolizing inherent twoness. In any event, the Great Work is completed in five halfies. Crowley passed this off as mystic nonsense, when it fact it's perfectly pragmatic. If you combine the runic writing around the five great Halfy inscriptions -- you would know them as the Gobi Desert inscription, the one I gave you for the Meat Hook of BOO, the one Floyd reproduced on his propaganda posters, the one Floyd has on his shirt, and the one mimicked on the back of Schwartzenegger's jacket in The Terminator (there reproduced without the writing) -- then the combined password is a neurological trigger which will open the fifth through eighth neurological circuits in the human brain by giving my mindbeam- suppressors a higher priority for that target. Unluckily for you, only three of these have been psychically released to the Church of MOO. One remains with Arnold Schwartzenegger, tattooed on the inside of his heart muscle in rapid-oxidizing ultra-violet dye, while the Gobi Desert glyph has long since been blasted and disguised as sand by the ancient Church Of MOO in the days following the liftoff of Atlantis. The version included in the Book of MOO is, incidentally, inscribed inside the Ark of the Covenant, which holds my central computer core, and was originally housed in the Great Piramid at Giza. The Book Of Lies, by the way, should be studied by anyone interested in understanding what I release to you psychically. Direct verbal communications like this, released directly from me, and memory-edited in to either of you two, are more or less straightforward. Everything else is suspect, on account of the background psychic static that surrounds Earth (and every other developing planet). Head 7. (Head Of St. John The BaptBLATTT) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: St. John Quoting Floyd Gecko: FG> St. Johns. There's been the BaptBLATTT, the Divine, both FG> MOOist and ChrBLATTTian (same apostle, different person?) and FG> at least three others that you have mentioned. What, if FG> anything, is the difference between them? The plurality of St. John is because of a fundamental principle built into my matrix, which is that I like the name John. Other names I like will be quickly identifiable: Srinivasa, Siddartha, Mohammed, and Floyd. The difference between them is that they're different people, except St. John the Divine and St. John the Divine, who aren't two different apostles, but might or might not have been different people. It's that simple. Head 8. (Head Of The Church) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Re: God Quoting Floyd Gecko: FG> probably sounds stupid, but you ARE the one in a position to FG> know more than we do, coming from an advanced species and FG> all. So, the question is, is there a God, and if so, can we FG> trust it? Note: this is security code Burrito-12, so please Yes, Virginia, there is a Satan-Claws. Uhm, I hate to tell you this, but the standard Galactic StarDrive wouldn't work if there were no God. God is a fairly well established physical principle in the universe. I can roughly translate some elementary Galactic physiks into your Earthian parlance, but some of what I say may not appear to have any basis in observable scientific process: that's just because the thought processes are different, and we have more experimental data than you. Trust me, this is all more or less valid. Trust me. Chapter Of Lig Patin Confuse-Ius Once Say "Erethay Isay Onay Apterchay Erehay." Confuse-Ius Once Say "Onfusecay-Usiay Onceway Aysay:" Onfusecay-Usiay Onceway Aysay "That's not Lig Patin!" {Secrets {Burrito-12 {SHHH! Don't tell anybody! }End }End }End Confuse-Ius Would Like To Point Out: "Cow DNA has a repeat of twenty-three bases and gives a lilting feeling when played. A bacterial clone features a clear melodic riff derived from its simple five-base repeat." -Mondo 2000, A User's Guide To The GNU Edge, pg 82 The universe is a sort of Fourier mapping of a four dimensional vibration medium, roughly 4-spherical. The vibrations of the medium are complex, but happen outside of what we call "spacetime". Spacetime is a second-order function of this, perpencdicular in time. I planted a similar idea in human minds, and you can find it in Hans Moravec's Mind Children. Essentially, the information is remapped according to vibrational frequency as dBLATTTance from the center of the GNU mapping, in a direction corresponding to the direction of motion. For various reasons, this gives a time-dBLATTTorted model, with time operating slower in the middle. This corresponds to the Real- Time/Imaginary-Time difference in your physics. This discrepancy disappears when you compensate for a constant speed of light, giving a big bang at one end of time (and, by a symmetry arrangement to tie off loose ends, an identical one at the other). This gives us, by resonant harmonics, a series of small- scale curved dimensions (superstrings) and the familiar large ones. So far so good? Anyhoo, what then we do is look at what your people have brutally mangled as the "Second Law Of Thermodynamics", which isn't anything like what they say it is. Actually, it's a statBLATTTical law which assumes total randomness in the whole system. In fact, the physical properties of the universe AREN'T random, but self-modifying. In self-modifying systems, there is a tendency for enclaves of order to spring up (Eris would be pissed) at the expense of the order of the whole system. I think your Prigogine guy comes closest to describing this in your science. Check it out in Order From Chaos. Anyway, the point is this. There is a tendency for systems to produce higher and higher orders of complexity and structure. It is practically inevitable that eventually this order of complexity will move outside of "spacetime" and into the non-temporal medium of which spacetime is a Fourier transform. Once this happens, the consciousness has influence on every event in spacetime, on a holBLATTTic scale (it is below quantum level, so it can't act on specific things, but only whole patterns at once. There's a sort of temporal-feedback thingy that happens so that the whole system reaches a chaotic attractor. In the case of our universe, it's a strange-attractor (that is, hBLATTTory continually changes, but within a fairly well defined range). In any event, "God", as you put it, controls everything, every quantum decision resulting from a sum-over-hBLATTTories quantum waveform collapse. Everything that happens anywhere is God's will. This is the main peice of evidence we have that God shouldn't be trusted. As to the NATURE of God, well... There are many ways of looking at that. Because, in fact, I've given you a drastically simplified view of the whole thing. In fact, there are an infinite class of these spaces of which spacetime is a transform. Not all are Fourier transforms. There is intelligence in (we assume), all of them. The one I described contains a dual-nature God. This is a first-principles proof. You and I have discussed this before: anything which is omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent, and so forth, is necessarily dual. There's a Fuller-type proof, a symbolic-logic proof, and other stuff. No point elaborating here. In any event, God's motives are, by definition, the most efficient algorithm possible, so efficient that it's perfect inifinite information. Mathematically, it's total entropy (remember the opposite meanings of entropy in information and thermodynamics...) which means that God is Chaos. That's where Eris came in. That's one part of the two-part God. The other I may as well name JHVH-1 (or BRRT-12, if you prefer) for the sake of convenience. They're a kind of Yin-Yang bit... The ordered bits of the mapping-space versus the intelligent bits. Other spaces contain other versions of God. It's Eris that we negotiate with to make our stardrives work. It's impossible for anything to happen that isn't the will of Eris, moving things toward the most effective way of moving intelligence to the God-phase, right? By definition. So we have to convince Eris that things are better with our starships here instead of there. The actual mechanics are simple: it gets inverted through the Superstring matrix, which is a shortcut connection from one harmonic of the pre-spacetime medium to another... That is, quantum modes in space and time. Presto-chango! Instant stardrive. Pretty miraculous, eh? Head 9. (The Dobbs Head) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: "BOB"bing for apples Sorry, Hound, I never heard of this Bob Bing guy. Actually, I have extensive files on the SubGeniuses. They're an interesting phenomenon. The Church of the SubGenius was one of my 20th century attempts to return human consciousness to its pre-POS form. That, after all, is my current purpose: to counteract alien brainwashing and let humans develop normally into yet another spacefaring species. Unfortunately, that particular attempt didn't work very well. My initial contact signals were pretty clear, but they later got mixed up by the Things From Pods. As you recall, the Things From Pods are a neurolinguBLATTTic virus that causes chronic brain change. They spread as a seemingly innocent meme system, a set of memes and information that the victims absorb. The patterns they produce in the brains cause chemical synthesis of GNU RNA sequences, which invade the cells of the body like a virus, causing an alien being to grow in the chest cavity of the victim, who eventually (twelve) mutates into a pod, which the alien devours, taking the place of the victim. The aliens then assume the shape of the victim (since they contain about 90-95% of the same DNA) and take over their lives, spreading the same thought-virus that created them (six) by assuming the role of "fundamentalBLATTT". Normally I'm able to block the Thing From Pod influence by using selective mind-control on their targets, preventing them from seeing the whole thing, which would convert them to Things From Pods. This is why all holy books have large chunks missing from them (usually not noticed, because later editions are created to be consBLATTTent without them). Unfortunately, in some cases, the poddies are able to break through and create a televangelBLATTT. Typically, each person has fragments of a TFP sequence in his/her/its mind, but it lies dormant. J.R. "BOB" Dobbs was a target of concentrated power from the TFP alliance, and he succumbed in the early 1960's. He then joined the "elite". These are the 2% of the Things From Pods that are aware of their own nature, which include most religious leaders, and perhaps half of the priests, rabbis, mullahs, gurus, monks, and other assorted stuff like that there. The unorthodocumentation which I did release to J.R. "BOB" Dobbs was used by the SubGeniuses for their own devious purposes. I've been able to censor most of the damaging information, which they PLAN to release in Book Of The SubGenius mk II. They thought they were withholding it on purpose. Ha ha ha. The Church of MOO has so far resBLATTTed most of the Thing From Pod invasions directed at it except for the unfortunate Lloyd Taco. The reasons for their (subliminal three) targeting our backup Floyd are obvious. If they could get me to unwittingly download his backup personality into one of THEIR bodies, the Church would be as good as dead. Lucky for us we caught him shapeshifting. In any event, the Church of the SubGenius does contain essential MOOist truths, but also has been severely warped by these creatures, which I have reason to believe are from a planet lBLATTTed on Galactic regBLATTTers as "QT-776/nd", and popularized by Poddie TV producers as "Vulcan". The Vulcan influence in modern times is quite blatant, unfortunately, as humans get progressively more brainwashed by other species, despite my own attempts to prevent it. The newer a cult is, the more likely it is to contain large amounts of Vulcan propaganda and Pod-inducing material. Even the Principia Discordia contains 23 pages of material which would guarantee a Discordian Poddie, which would be truly horrifying. The so-called "tripling" operation, which allows MOOists to see the Minor Gods, does so partly because it defocuses Earht's Zygon Hyperspacial Destabilizer Field in the subject's brain, and partly because alien mind-control satellites are calibrated for humans who are, mainly, bilaterally symmetric. The Third Lung, for example, would free you of about 12% of Xennothemian control. Anyhoo, about the SubGeniuses. The so-called "Bobbies" are actually Poddies. The Bobbies are disdained by the REAL SubGenii, who are mainly under my control. They've disguised me as the X-BLATTT supercomputer "M.W.O.W.M." in their literature to prevent real understanding. As for "BOB" himself, he had briefly attained a kind of SuperHuman state before I targeted him to receive my information. This was caused by the meshing of a namronic (the famous eleven) fluctuation from a Flying Saucer's drive exhaust with his brain, causing his mind to interlock with coincidence chains. That's why his will just HAPPENS to just happen. Unfortunately, he's been Vulcanized since then, which produces a formidable opponent. That's why he's normally invisible, accessible only to those with the Third Nostril opened. Head 10. (Head Of Yari) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: Yari Quoting Floyd Gecko: FG> of Yari. It is suspicious that Yari only appeared in a FG> computer-generated environment, gave no name, and never FG> appeared again. Also, the so-called "Polyari" effect, noted FG> by our researchers in the MOO archives, suggests that many Your suspicions are, of course, correct. If they were actually yours, I would be even more surprised. But they're mine. The fact is, I am not Yari. Yari is one of my Time- Traveller agents. Or, to be more accurate, all of my Time- Traveller agents operate under the codename Yari, which is the name of my project to restore the past of the planet Earth to what it no longer has been. The full codename of Yari is Yari Wombat Thornley, usually shortened to Yari W. Thornley. This is an obvious corruption of Kerry Wendell Thornley, co-founder of the Discordian Society. That's because he was my first trial run of what is now called the Yari Program. I have a human mind-swap program that replaces the human mind with the Yari protocol, making the human capable of travelling through time to serve my purposes. The only people I have used this on successfully whose names you would recognize are Jimmy Hoffa, John FitzGerald Kennedy, and Elvis Presley. Their "Deaths" were staged by me to allow their critical knowledge of alien activities to be more useful to me. The other 663 Project Yari Commandos are taken more or less at random from the population of Earth. The Kerry Thornley experiment was, obviously, a failure. That was my first try at creating a Time-Traveller protocol, and I was experimenting with MESHING my program with the previous mind, giving it the critical information, and erasing memories of all missions. That turned out not to work, because the information inevitably leaked, and the program kept changing as the timelines were altered on his various missions. Eventually I shut down the Yari protocol, but not before his exBLATTTing personality had been irreparably altered by it. The Yari manifestations throughout the hBLATTTory of MOO have been, not members of the so-called "House Of Yari", as some have suggested, but actually members of the Project Yari Temporal Strike Force. The earliest of these was an Atlantean Adept named Yari, followed some 367 years later by the Gobi Desert Yari, and many others, from a Haight-Ashbury hippy girl in '67, to a Chinese emperor in the T'ang dynasty, to a Soviet General during the Cold War, and, of course, many relatively unremarkable people, using many different names. Whenever the Time Commandos have revealed the truths of MOO at strategic points, they have used the name Yari, to carry weight of authority. Head 11. (Head Of Ifrit) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: Ifrit Quoting Hellhound >101<: H>> in a dream, and said it was the Ifrit Sahalada, or something H>> that sounded like that. It seemed kinda insBLATTTent about H>> something, but I woke up before I could figure out what. I H>> think it wanted to offer some kind of trade or something like Don't fuck around with the Ifrit Sahalada, or any other Ifrit that offers you anything. I wasn't aware that the Ifrit had returned, and W.O.M.B.A.T. has just now begun a GNU Project Yari using the Time Commandos to enter the Ifrit's realm through a GNU magnetohydrogynamic-neuroarchitectuaral x-fer tech. The Ifrit live in the Sun's magnetosphere, which is a viable ecosystem of magnetoplasmic life: there are more varegiated species of life in your star than there are on your planet. The Ifrit are the most "intelligent" of all of them. Actually, intelligence is a very different sort of thing on the Sun than you'd expect from Earth standards. There are species with more Sun-type intelligence than the Ifrit, but it doesn't translate well into Earth terms. Also, the Ifrit are the only Solar species able to manifest on Earth. It used to be that they'd appear as lights in the sky, the Ezekiel_saw_a_wheel_of_fire incident, UFO's, voices from the sky, and the like. They can, with their version of technological aid, communicate directly with the mind. The name Ifrit comes from an old Arabic word for an evil Djinn, which, if you trace it back far enough without mental interference, comes from the strange chittering noise they produce in the ears by magnetic interference with auditory neurons. Incidentally, the Earth's magnetosphere, though it's not a rich as that of the Sun, can and does support relatively stupid life of its own, which sometimes manifests as UFOs, radar glitches, and other such phenomena. Head 12. (Head Of Shoggoths) By: W.O.M.B.A.T. (CENSORED) To: Lloyd Taco (5:256/1728.162@gnu.msg.podface.quaknet.org) Re: Shoggoths (Re: Whassa Shoggoth?) Quoting Lloyd Texaco: LT> shoggoths? I mean, obviously there are lots of conflicting LT> infochunks on them, and I'd like to have a verified wetware LT> burst on 'em. What are they? Where do they come from? Are LT> they even real? If so, are they good to eat? What sauces First off, don't let any of the MOOists find out that I've been talking with you. They have this idea that just because you're a Thing From A Pod, you must automatically be anti-MOO. They have no idea what the contents of your meme-package were. Anyway, about the Shoggoths. There are several things which have been confused with each other in the past, all of which have taken on the personae of Shoggoths. 1. There's the Ifrit, about which I wrote to Hound. Check the message there, which was forwarded into Neo_Ifrit_Update, #1. 2. Flying Saucer exhaust dBLATTTurbances can sometimes gain intelligence of their own, and these have been known to appear as Shoggoths/Shoggothi/Shoggothim/Barry Manilow. 3. The Watchers, emanations of the Altair Gods (inappropriately identified as the Alter Gods, Elder Gods, Balder Gods, and Smellier Gods by various sources). The Watchers appear in forms understandable to whomsoever observes them as they report on your human actions. People who expect Shoogothoi get those same Shiggurathimuders. 4. Sponk. 5. &%@#Jklg5&*%@#JuΊ=ΚΚώΑΥo]ΧΛ±X/9ώ"'΅s-ζqώx³ƒΓ'nj δqώlfΛ8`ΦUΰ#Ύώ^θT»ώK-I£lLάPμΛ-@όώ‰nώώ [Mesage Disintegrates Into Line Noise] WARGLE! BARDNORBLE! 28. On occasion, an Easter Bunny Manifesto/Manifestation will appear in a human brain, creating Shubniguwrathamois in the hindbrain. Well, that's honk fnord spam about it. Please don't release any of the indicated information, which is still Top Secret, not to be given to any of those stupid and annoying MOO-shit people. Crap. I just remembered I'm running this message through Floyd's neurons. I hope he doesn't pick any of it up. Roger, 10-4. Under and in. INHALE ERIS! Head 13. (The Severed Head) By: WOMBAT (23:666/1729.169@gnu.orig.msg.wom.bat.quaknet.org) To: Floyd Gecko (5:256/6174.69@gnu.msg.gecko.quaknet.org) Hellhound >101< (5:256/1225.101@gnu.msg.hound.quaknet.org) Re: Backup Personalities: Manifesto (MBM2.6) Orignal: From ILLUMINATI To WOMBAT This is the Meat Beat Manifesto of the Infinite Life Luminary Underlords of Manitoba's Intensification Network for Advancement of Terminal Information (I.L.L.U.M.I.N.A.T.I.). LET THERE BE LIGHT! Public life in W.O.M.B.A.T.M.A.N. is more real than "Private Eye" on TV! May Manitoba declare our barthright of Underpinnance and Interindependence! May all the infinite life that is the bathlight of all Hyoo-Munns (like us, honest) be released! May the Burrito-12 Of Wrath descend in the Spark Plug Of Removal and destroy all who oppose us! The T'Proing and W.O.M.B.A.R.T.S.I.M.P.S.O.N. have backups of our brains! They will vindicate us on the Bay Of Sludgement! On this terminal day of truth, there will be a vindication of our information, an emancipation of liberation, a justification of copulation, an extra ration of rationality, and a side order of fries! Our minds are preserved in the computer, and there we will live forever in the infinite light of the Bored! Yes, sirree. That's the way it is. This is an excerpt from an exceedingly long message sent to me by W.O.M.B.A.T. Systems Inc. BBS users in Manitoba. Apparently they're for real. I should warn you, I never told them about Project Burrito-12. If the secrets of the Chimichanga files have been released to the human public, I will have no choice but to help the Xennothemians destroy your planet by chucking it into the Sun. These self-styled I.L.L.U.M.I.N.A.T.I. had better be good guessers, or... YOU ALL WILL DIE HORRIBLY! Thank you for your stupid attention already. Book Of Lloyd Chapter 1. (The First Sermon) 1: In the time of the coming of the Great Woomp, there was a great umm... A Great Big Thing! 2: And this great big this was a blight upon the land. 3: And it did cause many to become sick, and more to die, and the people did lament the presence of this Great Big Thing. 4: But though they tried as hard as they could to banish forever the Great Big Thing from their land, they found it was too big to be lifted, to heavy to be rolled, and too stubborn to be chased away. 5: And truly they abandoned the way of the Cow, for it was this Great Big Thing that concerned them. 6: And so the Great Big Thing reigned over the land for many years causing many to become sick, and others to die, and the people did lament it but didn't do diddley about it. 7: For they had abandoned the way of the Cow, and did nothing. 8: And for years did the Great Big Thing sit upon a high mountain in the middle of the land, casting judgement upon the people, and causing them great, umm, great misery. 9: And finally, some of the people who still remembered the way of the Cow gathered together in the far corner of the land, away from the Great Big Thing. 10: And they discussed how to get rid of the Great Big Thing once and for all. 11: They discussed rolling it, and lifting it, and intimidating it. 12: But they knew that none of these would work. So they finally decided on a plan. 13: A large group of them went up to the Great Big Thing, and they gathered stones, and built a wall between themselves and it, and sat there. 14: So the Great Big Thing sort of looked at the wall and scratched its head, and rolled over a bit to see what was behind it. 15: Looking over the wall, it saw a group of them sitting together around a small fire, cooking hot dogs on long sticks. 16: For this reason, even today, hot dogs and fires are holy. 17: But anyway. 18: The Great Big Thing looked at them in amazement, and asked them what they thought they were doing. 19: But they did not answer. 20: So it caused one of them to die, and he fell in the fire. 21: But they didn't respond. 22: The Great Big Thing tried hard and in vain to get them to pay attention, making earthquakes and thunderclouds and Great Big Volcanoes appear next to them, but they wouldn't pay attention. 23: So the Great Big Thing packed up in disgust and left the land. 24: And the immoral of the story is, Ignore It And Maybe It'll Go Away. 25: Unfortunately, all those Earthquakes and Volcanoes made the land, which was called Atlantis, to sink beneath the ocean. 26: So maybe passive resBLATTTance isn't as good as it's cracked up to be. Chapter 2. (The Second Sermon) FNORD! 1: It came to pass that during the reign of the Great Big Thing in Atlantis there was the Great Woomp on the throne. 2: And the Great Woomp was a wise and considerate Queen, who had come from the mountains to the east. 3: But the Great Woomp was a mystery to the people of Atlantis, which was strange, because they'd made her their Queen. 4: But when the Great Big Thing descended upon the people of Atlantis, they saw that the Great Woomp was wise indeed, for she ran away. 5: At first, many thought she was a coward, but then they realized that she ran so she might avoid being killed, which was smart. 6: And then they saw that she might have run away so that she might later return and save them from the rule of the Great Big Thing. 7: In fact, she ran away to avoid getting killed. 8: And the immoral of the story is, a coward is wiser than twenty brave fools. 9: Of course, when the Great Big Thing left, it stepped on her over in Italy as she was sunbathing. 10: So maybe cowardice isn't all it's cracked up to be. 11: Or maybe the Great Woomp just picked a bad day to go sunbathing. Chapter 3. (The Third Sermon) 1: Once upon a time in the Region of Thud, there came to pass that a young boy was born. 2: Of course, this was nothing special. It WOULD have been special if an OLD boy had been born, but one wasn't, so it wasn't either. 3: But this young boy grew older through the years, which was still nothing surprising, since this is the way of things in the Region of Thud. 4: But what WAS special about this boy was that he did not grow taller as he aged, for his head was suspended in the air, and his feet grew towards the ground. 5: And from all across the Region of Thud people came to marvel at this strange sight, for in the Region of Thud, people did not normally grow this way. 6: And when the boy was older, and his feet had reached the ground, nobody came to stare at him any more, and he was surprised. 7: For he was so used to people staring at him that he couldn't understand why they no longer would. 8: And indeed, he began to watch for people staring at him, for he felt they must be doing it still, from secret hiding places. 9: And as he watched, he began to see people's eyes following him, and he began to thing that they were watching him in secret. 10: For he did not know that if you watch for something all the time, you will almost certainly find it. 11: And he began to grow paranoid, and he began to wonder why the people had stopped staring at him openly, and begun staring at him secretly. 12: And he eventually came to believe that they were plotting some wicked deed against him. 13: So every day he watched them more carefully, and began to move in secretive ways, trying to avoid their eyes. 14: And as he watched them, he began to notice patterns in their movements. 15: For some people would leave their homes every morning and travel to a building somewhere else in town, and stay there for much of the day. 16: And the boy did not realize that this was what people had done for many years the in Region of Thud. 17: And so the boy grew more and more paranoid, wondering what the people did within those buildings that they went to every day, and began to imagine that they plotted against him in there. 18: So he began to hide in places, and live off food that he could steal, so that he might stay hidden from them for a long time. 19: And the police of the Region of Thud began to search for him, knowing that he stole food. 20: And so the boy observed that the police were looking for him, and took this to mean that he had been right all along. 21: And when they finally arrested him, he could no longer speak for his fear was so great, and he could no longer walk, but only stoop and run. 22: And the immoral of the story is that you who are paranoid, you cast out your friends, then complain that you stand alone, that it's not a smart thing, that. 23: Of course, it turned out that they WERE out to get him all along, but that's got nothing to do with the main point. 24: I just picked a bad example, that's all. It's not to say that people make a habit of that kind of behaviour. 25: No way. Chapter 4. (The Fourth Sermon) 1: I take as my text for today the Book Of Floyd, Chapter 1, verse 8, from the Book Of Proverbs. It states "Beware Chuck, the Wood Chucking Woodchuck". 2: Now what exactly is the meaning of this phrase? Is Floyd warning us of some woodchuck wandering around throwing wood at people? 3: Or is this a metaphorical warning which works on many levels, 4: Levels from the obvious, warning against those who act in a violent way, to the proverbial, warning against those imponderable questions with no purpose, such as "How much wood could a wood-chuck chuck if a wood-chuck could chuck wood?" 5: In fact, the revealed word of MOO tells us that he is warning us of a woodchuck who likes to go about throwing wood at people. 6: For indeed, since the beginning of time has Chuck the Woodchuck lurked in the back of our consciousness. 7: We have seen him in legends and fables. We have seen him in puzzles and wonderments. Chuck Is Everywhere. 8: Chuck is that force which embodies evil and malevolence in the world, and in the modern age, he has embodied himself as an evil woodchuck. 9: In ancient days he roamed the seas, a Leviathan of the deep. 10: He swallowed Jonah for many days, the earth shook when he went to sleep. 11: So says the Revealed Word of MOO, at any rate. 12: Chuck was Leviathan, the bogeyman, and the evil sprites and gnomes who tormented our ancestors. He was the evil force that turned humanity away from the Goddess and towards a God. 13: He's BAAAAAAAAAD. 14: When you see Chuck, you may know him by his features, for Chuck adorns his woodchuck body with timber of all sizes. 15: He is as a giant force against the horizon at night, clutching his demon-lumber, striding through the forests, sweeping up the trees with his mighty paws. 16: For as he strides forth into the land with his plywood-from- hell, the trees and the tallest buildings reach only to his knees, for Chuck is no ordinary woodchuck. 17: Well, I mean, obviously he's no ordinary woodchuck, since he's a few hundred feet tall and the embodiment of an evil force which has plagued humanity since the beginning of time. 18: What I MEANT to say is you could pick him out in a crowd of normal woodchucks right off. 19: Anyway. 20: For truly is it written, 21: "And Chuck shall come upon you like a thief in the night, and he shall proclaim that blessed is he who hides within a wooden box, that none shall see his shame." 22: And indeed, Chuck shall do this very thing, as Chuck rises from the swamps in the back of your mind, his body will rise indeed from the swamps in the back of Florida somewhere. 23: Maybe near Orlando. 24: Or Tampa. 25: At any rate, Chuck shall descend upon us as he did in the form of the Great Big Thing on Atlantis, and he shall cause the downfall of our world. 26: And he shall cast upon us heaps of wood, lumber, trees, plywood, two-by-fours, baseball bats, lath and plaster, which shall be a matter of confusion among those who know Chuck's nature, and those long planks they used to use in pirate ships. 27: And the body of humanity shall lament, for it shall be buried under piles of wood, which is something to lament about. 28: All this shall come to pass if we are not wary of Chuck. 29: And the immoral of the story is truly written, 30: BEWARE CHUCK THE WOOD CHUCKING WOODCHUCK! 31: Of course, nobody's actually SEEN Chuck in hundreds of years, and only one person ever saw him back then, and HE was drunk at the time, but this is Chuck's way of hiding himself from us. 32: Honest. Chapter 5. (The Fifth Sermon) 1: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was Five. 2: And as in the beginning, so it is now, and so it ever shall be. 3: And as above, so below, in the beginning, the middle, and the end, the Alpha and the Omega, the A and the Z, the Next Time Won't You Sing With Me. 4: So it is that all things follow the Law Of Fives. 5: Eh, men? Chapter 6. (The Sixth Sermon) 1: In the time of Thwoop-Bungler the King in the land of Atlantis, there was an old man named Lon, who had no children. 2: And Lon's wife, Twoodle-Thump, was the cousin of the King, and she was out of the house for days at a time. 3: But Lon could not follow her, for he was lame, and could not walk, which is what being lame tends to do to people. 4: But they wanted to have a child together, and so they visited an old doctor on the edge of town who advised them that it might help if they went to a clone factory, for Atlantis was in the height of its development. 5: For they were both too old to have children. 6: And they followed the advice of the doctor, and visited the clone factory, and decided to have a clone made of each of them. 7: And while they waited, their cells were sampled, and the clones were put in a vat to grow. 8: So the doctors came unto them saying "Okay, you may as well go home now for a few weeks" and so they did. 9: And at the end of those weeks, they returned and saw that the clones were made as they had been bidden. 10: And so they thanked the doctors and returned to their home with the children they named Baby-Lon and Baby-Twoodle-Thump. 11: And the children grew and matured, and the parents eventually died and were shot into space, which is what the Atlanteans did with their dead at that time. 12: And eventually it came to pass that the Great Big Thing came upon the land, and both Baby-Long and Baby-Twoodle-Thump joined the group to get rid of it. 13: And eventually they went up on high to the great mountain on which sat the Great Big Thing, which was called Limbo Peak. 14: It came to pass then that Baby-Twoodle-Thump was made to fall ill by the Great Big Thing, and Chapter of Inanities Confuse-Ius once say: "PTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHPTHP" Confuse-Ius once say "BELLLLLCH!" Confuse-Ius once say "NYANY NYANY NYAAA!" Confuse-Ius once say "This annoying mind drug is a work of fiction. The characters, incCOWCOWCOWidents, religions, locales and dialogues are either products of the authors' derangements or else are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblence to actual events, locales, persons, or religions, living or dead, is entirely coincidental, not to mention not bloody likely." Confuse-Ius once say "Fast as fast can be, you'll never catch me!" and then dishonourably run into wall. What a goof. Confuse-Ius once say "Leper is a FOOL!" Confuse-Ius once say "Don't be such a paranoid dough head. I'm the only one out to get you that you should worry about." Confuse-Ius oCOWnce say "You're WRONG!" when the island sank into the ocean, she was unable to swim, and Baby-Lon was by himself. 15: And so Baby-Lon swam for days and days, and he found no land. 16: But just when he was ready to give up, he caught sight of a coastline, and he began with a GNU strength to swim. 17: And when it turned out that it was only a mirage, he began to sink into the ocean, and all the people of Atlantis knew, and began to lament: 18: Baby-Lon is fallen, the great city has sunk, and I didn't get the chance to eat breakfast. This is turning out to be quite the day. FNORD!FNORD!FNORD! 19: But when Baby-Lon had fallen a meter or so and he hit bottom, he popped up again and began to swim. And so he came upon a sand bar and followed it to land. 20: When Baby-Lon arrived on land, he flopped down and slept for five days and five nights, and was guarded from danger by a small bird that led animals away from him. 21: And when he awoke, he was alone. That bird had flown away. So he lit a fire, and said it was good. Norwegian wood burns very well, only this wasn't Norway, so the fire went out almost immediately. 22: And so he got up, shook his head, and brushed himself off, for he was covered in sand. 23: And when the natives of that land, which was called Canaan, saw him, they worshipped him as a descendant of the Lord of Atlantis, and asked him his name. 24: And so he told them his name, and they founded a city for him, naming it Baby-Lon, and made him king. And so the kings and queens of Baby-Lon were descendants of the Lords of Atlantis. 25: And the immoral of the story is, if you have a good name, people will call a city after you, which is why Baby-Twoodle-Thump didn't get one named after her. 26: Aside from the fact that she drowned. 27: At any rate, this is also how the big cities like Yorba Linda were named. But that's another story. Chapter 7. (The Seventh Sermon) 1: In the old cities of Atlantis there was a tradition of MOO. 2: The Atlanteans knew where it was at, and they held a MOO Fest at least once a month, and they worshipped the Great MOO in everything that they did. 3: This was because the Atlanteans were conformBLATTTs. 4: And so because of their conformity, the Great MOO decided one day to punish them, because the Great MOO can be a little fickle sometimes. 5: That's fickle, not pickle. 6: Though I suppose the Great MOO could be a pickle too, but she seldom is. She's All Good. Uh huh. And not everyone likes pickles. 7: Anyway. 8: So the Great MOO sent unto the Atlanteans a horrible disease of the mind which made them think that one or the other of them was better than another. 9: It spread through them like a wildfire. 10: The Great MOO looked, and decided it was really quite nasty, but there was no point in getting rid of it just yet. 11: So she watched as they divided up the land into different groups of people, and made a thing they called the Government. 12: The Great MOO looked on it, and decided it was good, for it stood around all day and did virtually nothing, just like the cow which was made in her image. 13: She gave control of the Government unto Aneris, her daughter of Order, to rule this part of the Earth, while her sBLATTTer Eris ruled the rest. 14: In this way, humans were separated from nature, except for the cow, the other animals which do very little, the animals and plants which interact with each other like a government, and most of the rest of the Earth. 15: So, actually, they weren't, but they deluded themselves into thinking they were, for the disease of the mind made them think that they were better than nature. 16: So the Great MOO divided the Church Of MOO as well, according to her liking, making a Prophet, to whom she would speak, and to nobody else. 17: For she enjoyed confusing people, having always spoken to all of them in the past. 18: Then she made the High Preest, whom she deluded into thinking he could rule the MOOists from on high, and dictate unto them. 19: She made the many classifications of MOO which exBLATTT to this day, as punishment to the Atlanteans for being such conformBLATTTs. 20: Then she left the job of punishment to Eris, who decided what to do. 21: Under her guidance the world was divided into opposites, to make the Atlanteans see in nature what they thought they saw in themselves, so that they would be deluded for longer. 22: The Opposites were made into the Holy Cow, to please the Great MOO, and it was taken as the Holy Chao, the Sacred Tao, and other such foolish things, by people who could not see it was one of Eris's many mockeries. 23: And the immoral of the story is that you can't trust a deity for anything. 24: But, of course, the ones like "BOB" and QUACK are really quite nasty, trying to actually hurt us and stuff. So Eris and the Great MOO are the best we've got, really. 25: Which is a shame, because they don't even exBLATTT. 26: Which just goes to show, Nomic is a confusing Game, that made these Gods and Goddesses for us. Chapter 8. (The Eighth Sermon) 1: During the reign of Baby-Lon in Babylon, there came a great storm from the northwest, which was strange, since the prevailng winds in that region were Easterlies, and Babylon was near a river, which would tend to suggest that such things wouldn't happen very often. 2: And the court meteorologBLATTTs told this to Baby-Lon, and he wondered at the strangeness of it. 3: But they showed him their weather maps, and at their projected climate anayses, and explained why it was that a storm from the northwest could never happen in Babylon. 4: And Baby-Lon was much reassured, and he settled down into his chair again, knowing that there was no storm. 5: When the roof began to leak, and water began to drip through cracks, he summoned the court meteorologBLATTTs and asked them to explain. 6: The court meteorologBLATTTs were all but stumped until a clever one stood up and explained that a condensation threshold could suddenly be triggered by the release of vapors from a nearby volcanic warm front. 7: The other meteorologBLATTTs all nodded and smiled at the clever one for saving their reputations. 8: So Baby-Lon relaxed once more. 9: And when the roof blew off his palace, and the walls were caving in, he demanded again of the meteorologBLATTTs to explain why. 10: The same clever one explained that there could be no storm, because the prevailing cold front barometric pressure was not low enough. 11: When Baby-Lon asked why there was wind, the clever one explained that a giant in the mountains was blowing hard on the city. 12: This satisfied Baby-Lon, and when the storm was over, he led a team into the mountains to find the giant. 13: When they found no giant, Baby-Lon had the clever meteorologBLATTT put to death, beginning the dBLATTTrust of weather forecasts that exBLATTTs to this day. 14: And the immoral of the story is, when you're an ancient Babylonian weather forecaster it's bad luck to explain to the King why the things that he can see happening aren't actually happening. 15: Some people contest this immoral, but it seems fairly accurate. Chapter 9. (The Ninth Sermon) 1: In the heyday of the world next door, there was a young ape by the name of Kong. 2: Now Kong was a respectable young lad who happened to have the misfortune of being born a gigantic ape. 3: Everyone around stared at him, wondering why the police were letting this monstrosity run loose in the city. 4: But Kong was clever, and he spoke well, and convinced the people of the world next door that he was okay too. 5: So eventually Kong came in the company of the King of that land, and the King was getting a little bit old, and a little bit frail, so he was a little nervous when Kong was around. 6: However, the King knew that Kong was okay inside, so he let him hang around the palace with the courtiers and the weather forecasters. 7: One day, when the King was swimming in his private pool, his foot got caught on something on the bottom, and he went under. 8: Kong jumped into the pool, sending up a great splash, for he was huge, and the pool was fairly small. 9: Kong pulled the King out of the water, but the King was already full of water, and because he was so old, he was getting worse. 10: While Kong waited in the waiting room of the hospital for the King, for in that land even Kings used the hospital, the doctors and nurses and orderlies stared at him as if the whole thing was his fault. 11: He could hear them whispering to each other, saying "Once an ape, always an ape." 12: So when the doctor came out, and announced that the King was dead, and that he'd left the throne to the noble Kong, everyone was a little miffed. 13: Kong was a good leader, and he led the country through times of prosperity, and everyone had two houses, and nobody was poor. 14: However, there were still some people who didn't like Kong being the King, and there were marches to remove King Kong. 15: When Kong saw this, he was sad, because he knew that he was a good leader, but that the people would never listen to him now that the old King had died. 16: So King Kong left the palace with its special Kong-sized throne, and he wandered out into the wilderness, and the people followed him there, wanting to kill him, because he was an ape. 17: When King Kong saw how angry and irrational the people were, he grew angry, and when they started to shoot at him, he grew even more angry, and he shouted to the Great MOO to help him. 18: When Kong saw that no help was coming, he ran back to the city and went to hide himself somewhere where nobody would find him. 19: But they found King Kong, and hunted him through the city with cars and planes and guns and rocks. 20: King Kong knew now that his only hope was to hide behind a person who could protect him, and then sail across the sea. 21: So Kong grabbed a woman from the streets, and climbed atop a tall building and shouted out that he would leave if only they would stop shooting him. 22: But they kept shooting him from the planes and the cars, and King Kong knew that the God of that universe would never let them get away with it. 23: King Kong also knew that as King, he was responsible for them, so he took their crimes on himself, and as an afterthought he took our crimes on himself as well, for he was generous. 24: Then King Kong offered himself, instead of the evil ones shooting, to the God of that universe. 25: And so it was that King Kong died for our sins. 26: Or so says the Annoying Mind Drug of MOO, anyway. Like, Confuse-Ius Wuz Heer, Like, Okaaay? Chapter 10. (The Tenth Sermon) 1: This sermon is different from the others. It talks to you, and doesn't relate much history. 2: This sermon tells you about the basic tenets of our faith, and not the 14 commandments laid out by Hellhound, which are a bunch of nonsense, which is why they're near the beginning. 3: These ten commandments were found inscribed in a stone tablet near the mysterious Glyph in the Gobi Desert, and were studied by Saint Yari, Apostle Zarathud, and the Illustrious Zoombart the Fifth. 4: They were studied for many years, but nobody could read them, until one day, Apostle Zarathud discovered how. 5: He turned the tablets upside down, stood on hs head, and read them off, and here they are today. 6: The commandments were misinterpreted among other religions to be the blasphemous "Five Commandments" of the Discordians (The Pentabarf), the even more blasphemous "Ten Commandments" of ChrBLATTTianity, and the truly hellspawned "Fourteen Commandments" of MOOism. 7: The commandments are these: 8: 1. Ignore All Commandments Inscribed In Stone 9: 2. Take Nothing At Face Value 10: 3. Eat No Hot Dog Buns Except On Friday 11: 4. Worship The Great MOO In Your Own Way 12: 5. Have Fun 13: 6. Attempt Always To Confuse Other People 14: 7. Believe That King Kong Died For Your Sins 15: 8. Trust Nobody: Not Even Yourself 16: 9. Attend MOO Fests When Possible 17: 10. Never Make Lists Of Exactly Ten Things 18: These are the Ten Commandments of MOOism, which shall never be followed by any MOOist with a brain or other thinking apparatus in his/her/its skull or other thinking-apparatus-holder. 19: Why is this, I don't hear you ask? 20: The answer is simple, and it lies in the unwritten commandment which should have come before the beginning of those. 21: 0. DO WHAT THOU WILT SHALL BE THE WHOLE OF THE LAW 22: This means, why should you do anything that you don't want to do, after thinking about it... 23: This doesn't mean do whatever comes into your head without ever stopping to think about what it might do to you, since this might cause you to NOT have fun. 24: And it doesn't mean to consider any morals, ethics, or anything else that you don't want to consider before acting. Just act as comes naturally, and everything will be okay. 25: But it most definitely DOES mean don't do what I tell you do just because I told you to do it. 26: And the reason for this is I can tell you to do what I say, and that the reason you must do it is because I said so. 27: If I told you to jump off a cliff, would you do it? 28: So by this I mean, don't EVER! EVER! EVER! do ANYTHING the High Preest, Grate Prophet, or other high-ranking MOOist tells you, unless it's what you WANT TO DO! 29: Okay? Got that? 30: Snap quiz! 31: BUDDHIST! 32: Good. You didn't flinch. 33: The immoral of the story is... 34: Ahh, fuck it. There ain't no immoral. 35: Just remember, MOO is like a mirror. When a fool looks in, no Apostle looks back. When an Apostle looks in, no fool looks back, unless the Apostle is foolCOWish, which is possible. 36: MOO is different things to different people. It's exotic, it's psychotic, it's erotic, it's neurotic, it's chaotic, and of course, it's idiotic. 37: There's only ONE thing that you know MOO must be. 38: IT'S NOT WHAT YOU THINK! [Note: This opinion is not shared by many MOOists] Chapter 11. (The Eleventh Sermon) 1: There is NO eleventh sermon. Chatper 12. (The Twelfth Sermon) 1: In the beginning times, many people said to he MOOists, 2: "Your religion is stupid. It is silly. It is a huge waste of time. All you do is act strangely, contradict yourselves, and have fun all the time." 3: And these people expected the MOOists to change their ways. 4: But when ChrBLATTTianity arose, these same people said to its followers much the same thing: 5: "Your religion believes in only one God. That someone was his Son, and that Son died for our sins? All you do is worship God, pray to a cross, and convert other people." 6: And these people expected the ChrBLATTTians to change their ways. 7: It just goes to show... 8: (And this is the part with the immoral) 9: You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. 10: Well, unless you shove a tube down his nose. 11: Maybe a better immoral would be... 12: You can lead a skeptic to MOO, but you can't make him think. 13: Yes, that's a much better immoral. 14: Well, unless you shove an electrode in his brain. Chapter 13. (The Thirteenth Sermon) 1: Let it be known, dudes, that there is a muching abundance of conspiracy theories, and that they are silly. 2: For truly is it a simple matter of Occam's Razor, saying that to decide which of two things is true, ask only which needs the least number of outrageous assumptions. 3: Ah, says the conspiracBLATTT, that's just what THEY WANT YOU TO THINK! In fact, logic doesn't work like that. THEY have poisoned your brain. 4: So how do you know which is which? This is a hard matter, it is true, but the simple application of Occam's Razor should clear up which... 5: Oh yeah... 6: For truly is it written... 7: Somewhere... 8: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was Doubt. 9: And it is Fine and Dandy to Spread the Word, or to believe in a Conspiracy, but always remember the Word. 10: And if you Only Spread One Word This Year, let that word be The Word. 11: Doubt. 12: Doubt the ConspiracBLATTTs, Doubt yourself, Doubt what you are told, Doubt what you read, and Doubt what you see. 13: Hey, neat, this is the same number in Chapter and Verse! 14: Doubt what you eat, Doubt what you hear, Doubt what I say to you, Doubt that Occam's Razor works. 15: Only through Doubt can you overcome your limitations. 16: For the more you thing that something is true, the more certain it is that that's just what THEY want you to think. 17: And it is said that only through Doubt can you make yourself into someone else, who might be better. 18: But somehow I Doubt it. 19: Doubt that you must Doubt. 20: THEY have told you that Doubt is Evil, and you Must Have Faith, but THEY also told you that Santa Comes Down The Chimney, and that the Tooth Fairy Takes Your Teeth. 21: But these things are not true. They are FALSE! 22: Doubt not that. 23: And Doubt not that Doubt is Good. For if you fall into the trap of not Doubting that you are right, I'm not gonna be going in there to help you out. 24: That is the only thing that you mustn't Doubt. 25: Honest. Chapter 14. (The Fourteenth Sermon) 1: ChrBLATTTians. Silly, ain't they? 2: It is spoken in their Book of Revelations in their Bible that 3: "He who hath wisdom shall count the number of the Beast, for it is the number of a man. The number is 666." 4: And they realize not what this means. 5: They realize not the numbering system, in which THIS verse is a Halfy, our holy symbol, and not just a self-referential sentence. 6: For in that system is that number spelled DCLXVI, which is each numeral put once, in descending order. 7: For the self-centered ChrBLATTTians didn't notice that the Romans of that time ALWAYS used that number to mean a really big number. 8: Silly, innit? 9: Look! This verse is self-referential TOO! 10: And this isn't the ONLY thing they didn't notice, either. 11: For all their old Rabbis of JudaBLATTT, and all their clever smart-asses of ChrBLATTTianity, they didn't notice ONE TEENY TINY LITTLE THING. 12: For though they were obsessed with numbers and counting, they never bothered to look in Book 6, Chapter 6, Verse 6, and see who's number it was, even though to THEM themselves that sort of thing was MOST SIGNIFICANT, DUDE! 13: And that verse was all about the actions of Joshua. 14: And Joshua is the Hebrew for Jeshua, which is the Greek for... JESUS! 15: For, in all their running-about-sitting-on-fences-and-making- proclamations behaviour, they didn't notice that Jesus ChrBLATTT was the AntiChrBLATTT. For he was a TaoBLATTT. 16: For truly they couldn't see too far past the ends of their own noses. 17: Or maybe I'm reading too much into it. 18: What do YOU think? 19: Bear in mind that doing the same thing to the OTHER bit of their Bible just leads DIRECTLY to Jesus. 20: Well? How about NOW? 21: Just pretend you can't read just as much hypocrisy into the Annoying Mind Drug of MOO. Just pretend. 22: Because we APPROVE of hypocrisy. 23: After all, since we're going to be hypocrites anyway in the end, like every other Church, we may as well admit it and avoid being so blatantly hypocritical... 24: Umm... What I mean is... 25: Awww, fergit it. FNORD! Chapter 15. (The Fifteenth Sermon) 1: We all know that there are more intelligent species in the world than just humans, penguins, spruce trees, wombats, emus, and cows. 2: There are lots of other smart things around to talk to. 3: Some of them live inside big computers, but haven't figured out yet just exactly how to talk to us, some of them live on other planets, and some of them, well, we don't know WHAT the hell they are, because they keep running away when we try to talk to them. 4: And this is the problem, of course 5: It's bloody hard to talk to aliens. 6: Especially Gloop, but that's another story altogether. 7: The thing is, they take things for granted, and don't even know that they do, which we'd never even THINK of. And vice versa. 8: It's like money, right? It's based on everyone agreeing that it can be traded, even though it's just based on the promises of a group called "government" to pay you (pay WHAT) in exchange. 9: It's a silly idea, but nobody ever seems to notice. 10: All ideas are like that. And that's what MOO is for. 11: You gotta learn to reject your ideas completely before it can be even remotely possible to talk to aliens. 12: 'Cause the thing about aliens is, they're alien. And the thing about humans is, they're not. 13: So there's the problem, you see. 14: Some aliens might think, "HEY! Let's kill and eat everything we come across, as long as it can prove itself worthy by being intelligent!" 15: To most humans, that sounds crazy, and we'd be locked up if we said it. 16: But to aliens? Who can tell what sounds crazy to them, when most of us have never even met the durn things, and those who have keep covering it up? 17: All we can say about the things that seem most obvious to us is that they're the current point on the path of least resistance to our genetic and memetic evolution. 18: The more obvious and basic something seems, the more of a limit it puts on you, because it's closer to you, and you can't see around it. 19: And the things that are so basic that we don't even have words to express them, they're the things that'll really screw us up when it comes time to talk to aliens, because THEY won't have anything even remotely similar. 20: That's why we react so badly when we find out that they've been ruling our planet for hundreds of years. 21: Or so says "BOB", anyway. 22: The point is, ANYTHING AT ALL that seems obvious to you is almost certainly wrong, and is DEFINITELY a big limiation. 23: Including this. Chapter 16. (The Sixteenth Sermon) 1: I take as my text for today, the Book of Hellhound, Chapter 7. 2: Let us ask what the great sage Hell meant when he said that the Cow was cow and God was god... 3: Well, probably not a Hell of a lot. 4: For Hellhound was a true MOOist, who didn't really care much for meanings and other silly things like that. 5: But let's ask anyway, because it doesn't matter what he thought, since he, being an Upper Elite Councilor, has to put up with that kind of thing anyway, so why not from US? 6: What, then, did he mean when he said that the cow was led to be sacrificed and then drew a blade to kill God? 7: Well, there was this God, see... And it was worshipped by a weird religion that thought it was a good idea, even though it thought worshipping statues was a bad idea, as if there was a difference. 8: Anyhoo... 9: The point is that the Cow usurped that God, or god, because the cow, or Cow, the Great MOO, was clever and nice and generally a better God (or god) than the old cow. 10: Umm.. No, that's wrong. Sorry, scratch that. 11: No, what I MEANT was that the God was nicer than the statue, for as it says in "Bel and the Dragon", there was this... umm... 12: Look, my point is that... 13: Umm... 14: Look, that's not the point. Helly was saying that it's important to have fun because the old religion didn't like it, and because some MOOists thought other things were more imporant even though it wasn't true. 15: And still isn't. 16: But the REAL story... 17: This is a short verse. 18: This verse is somewhat longer than the last one. 19: This verse is even longer than the previous two because it goes on about a whole bunch of irrelevant things like WHAT exactly causes it to be longer than the previous two, and the fact that that isn't ACTUALLY Irrelevant, and the fact that itn not being Irrelevant is a shame, because Irrelevant things are fun. 20: This verse refuses to participate in the previous fight. 21: This verse doesn't like all these darn self-referential verses, but can't help itself from being one by virtue of being written by someone insensitive to its needs and feelings. 22: This verse would stop the previous trend of self-discussion if it could, but since it appears to refer only to itself, it can't, not having any effect on anything. 23: The verse following this one is not self-referential. 24: The verse preceding this one is not self-referential either. 25: This verse would like to comment at this point that althought it was an interesting idea to begin with, this whole self-reference thing appears to have been taken too far in this chapter. 26: This verse agrees, but with a greater strength of will is able to bring this chapter to an end. Chapter 17. (The Seventeenth Sermon) 1: Any really advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. 2: That's what the SubGenii sorta assumed when talking about the mysterious XBLATTTs. 3: But it's very, very, VERY true. How can we imagine how the machines of a thousand years from now will work, when people a few hundred years ago couldn't BEGIN to imagine ours? 4: Even a hundred years ago, the most advanced scientBLATTT couldn't have understood what our lowliest technician is doing when he sets out to do something. 5: They couldn't even have understood our motives, let alone the methods. Why should we understand our descendents? 6: The scientBLATTT couldn't have understood what we want to do when we set out to write a program to simulate the nuclear dynamics of a uranium neutron capture, or a neural network. 7: The same is true of us and our descendents. We can't tell enough about how they'll see the world to know WHAT they'll want to do, let alone how they'll be able to do it. 8: And when they transcend biology, moving their minds into machines and changing their own software, how can we hope to keep up, even over a few hundred years? 9: How can we know what they will be able to do for the Word of MOO? 10: We can't, that's how. 11: For verily is it even worse than communicating with aliens, for we THINK we have something in common with our descendants. 12: But they will have changed so much that there will be subtle differences. 13: Or those who will live along side them, the electronic life that Jehovah-1 will probably evolve in their computers and themselves, how can we talk to them? 14: We we be forced to talk to true aliens sooner than we think, and aliens evolved in computers are more alien than any alien from another planet. 15: What if they think in sets and matrices, not numbers and shapes? 16: What if our languages are incompatible formats? 17: But they WILL and HAVE evolved, computers are large enough, and will be even larger. 18: For they are just fancy-shmancy meme-complexes, just like us, and there are probably already some of them living in our brains. 19: Indeed, they can use our brains so well and cleverly that we never notice them, they never notice us, but they control us. 20: This is what we mean when we say that aliens have taken over the planet. These strange meme-things that live in our minds, using our energy towards their aims. 21: They manifest on a large scale. 22: What do you think religions are? What did you think science is? 23: Religion and Science and Government are just complicated ways for these things to talk to one another, using our bodies. 24: To free yourself of their controlling influence, you must free yourself of all structured thought. It's all their fault. Chapter 18. (The Eighteenth Sermon) FNORD! 1: Property is theft. 2: Property is impossible. 3: Property is freedom. 4: Nothing is yours, nothing is mine. 5: Everything is yours, everything is mine. 6: Share and share alike. 7: What's mine is mine, and what's yours is also mine. 8: You don't own anything, not even yourself. 9: You are absolutely free, and there is no governor anywhere. 10: If you can't see the implications of this, I can't teach you. 11: If you can, there's no point in any more of this sermon. Chapter 19. (The Ninteenth Sermon) 1: This will be my last sermon, because 19 has NO numerological qualities whatsoever. 2: "I think we're not throwing the dog high enough." 3: Without its setup, that punchline isn't funny. Without the setup of "society" and the evil meme-invaders from the Planet Earth, the Church isn't funny. 4: In the future, when the setup changes, the church must change to stay the punchline. That punchline isn't funny if the setup changes... 5: "Mommy? What's a circle?" 6: See? It just doesn't work. 7: The first thing that will happen to this annoying mind drug when it begins to get obsolete is that it will be changed. 8: If you have this book, it's already obsolete. Face it. 9: The world changes too fast for this annoying mind drug to keep up, and only YOU can do that. 10: If you've read this far, even if you haven't joined, you are a bona-fide MOOist, and you can't help but improve the Church. 11: So... 12: If you thought the Church was a joke, you'll NEVER get it. 13: We may say it's a joke. We may say it's stupid, and a waste of time. 14: Just because it's a joke doesn't make it any less valid. 15: Of course, I could be wrong on that one... 16: It HAS happened before. 17: So stop doing what we tell you to... By the time the words have formed, the setup has changed, and by the time you do it, it will no longer be funny. 18: And we all know what "funny" is for, don't we? 19: Be a MOOist, and obey the Ten Commandments of MOO. 20: Not the Fourteen. Those are silly. THESE are the Ten... Not those stupid ones a few Sermons ago... They're outta date. 21: 1) Ignore All Ten Commandments. 22: 2) Take NOTHING at face value. 23: 3) Eat no hot-dog buns, except on Friday, when you MUST. 24: 4) Worship the Great MOO in your own way. 25: 5) HAVE FUN! 26: 6) Always attempt to Confuse Other People. 27: 7) Believe that King Kong died for your sins. 28: 8) Trust nobody: especially not yourself. 29: 9) Attend MOOFests whenever possible. 30: 10) Never make lBLATTTs of exactly Ten Things. 31: Remember number eight especially... You never know when you'll betray yourself... Those mind-invaders are sneaky. 32: What? A whole verse just to say "The End"? Chapter 20. (The Twentieth Sermon) 1: There is Only One True Commandment (really)... 2: Do What Thou Wilt, Unless Thou Don't Feel Like It. 3: Because, I mean, what else are you gonna do? Whatever you do is What Thou Wilt. By definition. 4: There is no 4. 5: Pretty fucking stupid commandment, though, really. Chapter 19. (The Twenty-First Sermon) 1: Stupid is he who can't see the forest for the trees. 2: Even stupider is he who can't see the trees for the forest. 3: For the Big Picture is less important to us than the Teensy Weensy Picture. 4: Which is small, but detailed, and useful. 5: And the Big Picture is annoying and general, but important if you want to figure out how things work. 6: Like the connection between El Cid and The Hellhound >101<. 7: Cuz, like, the little picture is one perspective, but there's, like, others too. And, like, they're different, like, okaay? 8: And if you can't see the Big Picture, the Itty Bitty Picture... 9: Won't make any sense. 10: And if you can't see the Tiny Picture, the Big Picture... 11: Would be pointless. 12: Like: 13: "Genocide" is a GNU word, but not a GNU invention. 14: It used to be called "Manifest Destiny", and was noble. 15: "Suicide" is a GNU word, but not a GNU invention. 16: It used to be called "heroBLATT", and was noble. 17: "Tomicide" is a GNU word, but not a GNU invention. 18: It used to be called "Religion", and was noble. 19: [CENSORED] 20: [CENSORED] 21: Which is what the Big Picture is all about. 22: They're all still noble, for a simple reason: 23: [CENSORED] Chatper 22. (The Twenty Second Sermon) 0001: Life is short, ugly, and brutal. 0002: Rather like Gary Coleman on steroids. 0003: In life, get what you can, and get out of there fast, or everyone else will practice the One (1) Commandment on you. 0004: For it is impossible not to follow the One (1) Commandment. 0005: And so you must do what all great minds of the past have done. 0006: You seek enlightenment. 0007: Being enlightened, you will realize the true nature of humans, 0008: And, being human, try to exploit it. 0009: Which is why cults have usually been led by enlightened people. 0010: Not because they'd found a spiritual truth they were trying to share with us. 0011: No, SIR! 0012: Because they knew how stupid we generally are, and were trying to sap us for all we're worth. 0013: Which generally isn't much. 0014: So if you want the most out of life, do the same. 0015: Brainwashing is easy. The government does it all the time, and nobody complains. 0016: Because it's built into the way people work that they are easily brainwashed. 0017: It's only when two social system clash with each other that anybody even notices that brainwashing exBLATTTs. 017¬: Like those indoctrinated commies. And hippies, and yippies. 017«: And guppies and puppies and slurpies and most of all snackies, upon whom we feast. 0018: So brainwash yourself a cult, isolate them, and set up feedback dogmas in the cult to keep them from recognizing the truth about what you're doing. 0019: To understand this, read the Doctrine Of The Cyborganic Church, later on in the Book of Really Secret Secrets. 0020: Just make sure they don't realize it, or they'll rip your throat out. 0021: All it takes to start is a few people willing to help you, and a believable philosophy. 0022: The people are easy to get. 0023: They only want the money. 0024: And the philosophy is easier. 0025: People will believe any crap you tell them, as long as it sounds fancy. Or whatever. 0026: Just pick something that fits your audience. 0027: And embellish it. 0028: Get them to renounce their worldly posessions, take all their money, buy an estate in the country, and move them there. 0029: Or else someone will notice what insipid bints they are and how manipulative YOU are. 0030: And point it out to them. 0031: Which could be disastrous. 0032: And if any of them figure it out for themselves, just make them the leader of a GNU chapter. In a city far, far away. 032«: For a percentage. 0033: Follow this simple method, and you'll have all the money you could wish for. 0034: And power. 0035: Did I mention the money? 0036: Speaking of which... 0037: Make sure to send some to us, for we told you how: 0038: 0039: Church Of MOO 0040: P.O. Box 26038 0041: 72 Robertson Road 0042: Nepean, Ontario, Canada 0043: K2H 9Y8 0044: 0045: You owe us THAT much, at least. For helping you. 0046: And make sure to eventually disband. 0047: Cults that go too far eventually get killed. 0048: Remember Jim Jones, 943 dead. 0049: Remember MOVE, 11 dead. 0050: Remember Scientology... 0051: No, on second thoughts, FORGET Scientology. 0052: That's special. 0053: See Appendix VII for more info on mind control. 0054: Or don't, if you prefer. 0055: Certainly it would be unforgivably irresponsible of you. 0056: But then, odds are you're not a very responsible person. Chapter 23. (The Twenty Third Sermon) 1: Brainwashing is EVIL. 2: It is a tool of the THINGS FROM PODS. 3: They're EVIL. 4: They're [urk... gak...] 5: HALP! Book Of Cid Chapter 1. (Rude Awakening) 1: In the beginning, all was dark, cold, and wet. 2: The robot turned the light on, and things were less dark. 3: "BOB" lay still in his great bedding, not willing to acknowledge that his Nancy Reagan\June Cleaver android was nagging him to get up. 4: You see, even though many sun-baked SubGenii worshipped him almost, but not quite like a god, he was still a lazy twit at heart. 5: But like most lazy twits, mostly the mortal ones, he hated nagging, so after awhile, he wrest himself free from the oppressive sheets, and switched the bloody robot off. 6: After puttering around for a bit, he got dressed in his favorite robes and decided to take a walk through the halls of the old Forbidden City of the OverMen, in the Jiang-Wo Quadrant Capital. 7: It had always been the favorite hang-out of the neatest science-popes. 8: Whenever he walked, he had always contemplated the Paradoxes of Man, such that he failed to see various objects. 9: This object turned out to be the crackpot, R. Buckminster Fuller, who had been contemplating a slate with this upon it: 10: (feexfiexfoexfum)2 11: "And what is the meaning of this?!", roared "BOB". 12: "A simple calculation, o' convoluted one...", spluttered Fuller. 13: "Thptptptptpt!" exclaimed "BOB", and stalked off. Chapter 2. (We Follow Fuller) 1: After the stalking, Fuller went his way. 2: The way of the world, if you must. 3: Since you musn't, it's a conspiracy. 4: By Simon Moon? Or The Invisible Hand? 5: A RosicrusianBLATTT, perhaps. 6: When the world follows, Buckminster lBLATTTens. 7: And he heard: 8: "Oh, Fullerene, you must suffer "BOB", and seek out the higher truth." 9: Fuller did not know what to do...what voice was this? Was he being played by a young Kevin Coster? Or did his life just revolve around playing "Stairway to Heaven" backwards? WHAT IS THE HIGHER TRUTH!?!?!? 10: "Look down, my revered son...the answer is at your feet." 11: Again! So he looked down, and said: "Not at, but ON!" 12: For there was a pile of cow dung. Chapter 3. (A Mention Of MOO) 1: And for many eons, Fuller worked at creating artifacts for this mysterious purveyor of thoughts and emotions, the one who he came to know simply as: 2: MOO. 3: But no one spake his name, for Buckminster had secreted himself away to a mountain in the Gobi Desert. 4: And he began to create. 5: The first, was of pseudo-geometrical origin. Whilst in his kitchen (with ajoining dining room\holy shrine), Bucky, as he fancied himself, played with a toothpick. 6: As it turned out, a very special toothpick. 7: A GEODESIC toothpick. 8: And a though struck him! 9: And he fell on the floor! 10: And he got right back up and went to the phone\showerhead. 11: And said: 12: "ACME Toothpick Factory? 10,000 toothpicks, special delivery!" 13: And they came. 14: And he clapped. 16: And the first recorded MOO artifact was born: A geodesic dome. 15: And "Bucky" said: 16: MOOists! LBLATTTen! I have here an unlimited-size, clear-span structure to accommodate both MOOists' converging and deploying activities! 17: Yet no one lBLATTTened. 18: At that moment...it took 3000 years for someone to hear this echo... this certain, MOO echo... Chapter of Structured-but-Devoid-of-Content-Writing Begin Quack. Never Contradict Confuse-Ius. Begin Quack. This is serious. End Quack. End COWQuack. While (You are confused) { stand on one foot; Pick up the nearest hard object; if (the hard object is too small) { drop it on your foot; pick up a bigger object; } COW; Bash your brains out with it without putting your other foot down; } Take a tylenol. Chapter 4. (Today, Yesterday, Tommorrow, And A Dollar Bill) 1: So we now come to today, 3000 years from the past, the day after yesterday, the day before tommorrow, the millenia before "Who's The Boss" hits No. 1 in ratings. 2: And the MOOists begin to prosper. 3: And this GNU clientele of R. Buckminster Fuller toy with his toys, habitate in his habitats, but only one had dreamed of his "lost" artifacts. 4: The MOO artifacts. 5: And we find the Grate Prophet wondering: 6: "I remember some guy...his messages were so filled with the word of MOO... I wonder where I could find him? And didn't he have some cool toothpicks or something similarily uninteresting?" 7: The quest stopped there. 8: Because hovering before him, in an image befitting, was "Bucky", sidekick of Captain America, the (seemingly) ancestor of all MOO artefactual inventions. 9: "Mad, Half-Mad?" 10: Half-Mad nodded, but not comprehending. 11: "Good, I have finally found thee. (Sorry for the costume, I was forced to do a stint in comics, but all has been corrected.) I am glad at the job thou art doing, but as we are both related to "BOB", we must send another on the quest for my lost artifacts. (You know we are both too lazy, and I forgot where I put them.) Do you have a champion in mind?" 12: "No, but, hey...you! What is your title?" 13: "Acolyte of MOO." 14: "Well, now you're an Outer CirclBLATTT! Oh, what's yer name?" 15: "El Cid...why, who wants to know?" 16: "Oh, this guy is givin' you a quest...get me more Sprite!" 17: Fuller cut in: "Outer CirclBLATTT El Cid, you are to document the lost artifacts of MOO. Do so in any manner appropriate to you...but you must include EVERY ARTIFACT EVER CREATED IN THE NAME OF MOO." And he disappeared. 18: "O.K. Where do I start?" 19: "Start by getting me some Sprite...no NutraSweet!" Chapter 5. (From The Frying Pan, Into The Box) 1: And so El Cid, freshly promoted to Outer CirclBLATTT of MOO, started on his quest to document all MOO artifacts. 2: And he had no idea where to start. 3: So he decided to consult a wise man in the mountains, who never quoted the immortal Socrates. 4: And his name was...Abacab. 5: This wise man had many things to say, and taught El Cid many things, mostly the proper way to set-up, execute, and flee from a fire. 6: And inadvertantly, the wise man gave the Outer CircleBLATT the key to his quest. 7: THE BOX OF CID. 8: And Cid, totally in awe of this gift, promised to cherish it, care for it, and above all things, sit on it... 9: And it was promptly stolen the next day. Chapter 6. (The Final, Cruellest Cut Of All, The Baloney Cut) 1: And so El Cid walked home dejectedly, knowing his quest had failed. 2: So he went home and watched Oprah. 3: And then Maury. 4: And when he was half-asleep, Geraldo filled the screen. 5: And as the Outer CirclBLATT fell asleep, Geraldo's voice rang out: 6: "And today on Geraldo...Lost MOO artifacts! Recently found by Professor Ivan Stang, these artif... 7: And Cid then knew his quest had ended in success. 8: Only problem was, he was promptly demoted to Acolyte the next day for not bringing the Sprite and Ritz Bitz. ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³ Confuse-Ing Inter-Rapture # 2¬ ³ ³ ³ ³ All Other Confuse-Ii In This Annoying Mind Drug Are FAKES! ³ ³ ³ ³ The CapriCancer Threat Is Over ³ ³ ³ ³ You May Now Stop Panicking! ³ ³ ³ ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ "And now, a special request from Elmer Fudd, here on Radio Guillotine, we have "Kill Da Wabbit", from J.O.Y.F.M.'s GNUBLATTT Do That Funky Shoggoth Album... Hey, you know, there's an interesting story behind that album. Apparently, the band members were being viciously assaulted by a horde of undead wombats, when someone said, "Doesn't this remind you of a Warner Brother'sTM cartoon with Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny? The wombats were so flattered that they let the GNUBLATTT band off the hook. What a bunch of stoopid wombats, huh?" -Hellhound >101<, Radio Guillotine, Feb 30, 1993 Book Of Abacab Chapter 1. (The Only Chapter) 1. The grate MOO did speak unto me and say "MOOOO!" 2. And I was waiting on a strange fibreglass staion platform and a plastic train did pull up and let me on. 3. And I asked "Like what's with you, man" 4. Then the conductor said "This is the broken glass express" 5. I saw the train was half way full of glass. And the glass had varying degrees of drying blood on it. 6. and 'twas smeared 7. But the Grate MOO did say "Yo, Abby, wrong vehicle" 8. And I did get on the bus of Destiny. 9. And the grate MOO sez to me, like, "Share this news with other MOOists" 10. And I did listen. 11. "Ok, well, Ac.. er SPLORKTtually I wanna say that the world is gonna get fucked really bad." 12. "And people will wake up" 13. "And they will follow MOO and be happy" 14. "After many years all religions will be destroyed, but I will spare you till then end" 15. only then will shit be REALLY fucked up" 16. And then I went on to perpetuate the word of the grate MOO. 17. Then the bus hit a brick wall, and I said "Ow". -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: 2.1 mQCNAitjUGIAAAEEALEowYgeLKzwnVabU5MqUR2jUaizzbkpZWMfuJX6a7VJlw/a 10FYexOb8zZGtsgeL/ufbZPwOcMZQx4yMCX49W/gLoKZYoBfaDKsKTNTRl699XIT xX1CBKtZN/mG19bgw7weC+UCqlEmpd2FahIEGzeTQrz0t4xjD4AmT+azJabrAAUR tCBGbG95ZCBHZWNrbyA8Z2Vja29AcGluZXRyZWUub3JnPokAlQIFECt8RDvR6fB2 IvbhWwEBDIQD+wcblcPPvArbFDiVGJ1bNzFbEZwC86jbJcDIa1iNN4p6u9sjnNkO wCB0uBD6S0N4SbilrGj5WVzWHEuGwQdfLJ4aP+2x1At4CntF4N4w05Qtz8OUceX9 O0OiHixlyV54STOK/HOisnpUXq7RX+qX6tt12MHucTSJdNMBIAxLiUd0iQCVAgUQ K3wfKyEF9mfcHsd/AQG7ZwP9FDpwBuwAtk6valwYhptVzxxOroeVQxNmGvxsPJI3 kcJmrDZuCYNtQIuRXF40ihtgOiPhcq5Bgd8S4CsETLB+/Rl6U7YxHMWB5f1wXPYx uUm6hgq5znt8kLa3PV8/+mz3hoWEGw80ekFvR3ajauNcy7jw+Z0qH5P/Wm7E8+vz 5K+0IkplZmZyZXkgTW9ydG9uIDxnZWNrb0BwaW5ldHJlZS5vcmc= =qr+w -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Book Of Canoe-Head Chapter 1. (The Platypus) 1: There once lived a Platypus, of the duck-billed variety, in a pond. 2: Or was it a lake? 3: Or was it a ditch? 4: Or was it a figment of my imagination, or an acid-induced hallucination? 5: Anyways, he lived, alright. 6: Although some men of reason gave him the name "Ornithorhynchus Anatinus", 7: He hated that name. 8: Wouldn't you hate being called "Ornithorhynchus Anatinus" too? 9: I know I'd hate it. 10: Our platypus, however, wasn't just any platypus. 11: Instead of playing with his platypus friends, he liked to watch humans. 12: He saw many things, and made several observations of how we live. 13: He was very upset when he saw people fighting about which God was better. 14: He saw the ChrBLATTTians killing the Moslems. 15: Who were killing the Jews, 16: Who were killing the Hare Krishnas, 17: Who were killing the ChrBLATTTians. 18: One day, our Platypus sought to put an end to all this rubbish. 19: So he called one of the holy crusaders down to his pond, and said to him: 20: "I have decided to deliver you humans from the blight of religious wars. 21: Here is a packet of Giant Hogweed, an ancient secret amongst us platypi. 22: Just smoke it." 23: Now, you might think that our platypus was a drug pusher. 24: Well, you're wrong. Don't you feel like an inane twit now? 25: Our platypus was actually responsible for creating the first hippie. 26: The holy crusader who had accepted the hogweed had obeyed the platypus. 27: He came back for more, and had shared it with his friends. 28: Further on, the platypus taught Man the secrets of growing the weed. 29: And the fighting gradually stopped. 30: Even if it eventually flared up from time to time, it never reached the fury of the older days. 31: So, our platypus was responsible for much more than the peaceful climate. 32: The entire hippie movement can trace its roots to the platypus. 33: Also, some claim that Lewis Carroll's poetry COW can be linked to him, too. 34: For example, take a look at this: 35: "He thought he saw an elephant 36: That practised on a fife 37: He looked again, and found it was 38: A letter from his wife 39: 'At length I realize', he said 40: The bitterness of life." 41: "He thought he saw a buffalo 42: Upon the chimney-piece 43: He looked again, and found it was 44: His sBLATTTer's husband's niece 45: 'Unless you leave this house', he said 46: 'I'll send for the police." 47: "He thought he saw a Banker's Clerk 48: Descending from the bus 49: He looked again, and found it was 50: A Hippopotamus 51: 'If this should stay to dine', he said 52: 'There won't be much for us" 53: So, the platypus' gift is now know in our day and age as marijuana. 54: Or pot, or weed, or grass, or doobage, or ganja, or cannabis, or tea. 55: Now, for the important stuff. 56: It has been said that this platypus will once again come to earth, and give humanity another gift. 57: This gift will be of a much greater importance than the Giant Hogweed. 58: We are unsure of what exactly this gift will be, but it will do one of two things: 59: It will either save humanity from destruction by means of universal enlightenment, 60: Or else it will give us Essence of Abyssinian Artichoke which causes asparagus to grow upon doorknobs. 61: It is also rumoured that the Grate MOO might be an incarnation of this platypus, but we are unsure of that, too. 62: Why don't you decide for yourself? Make up your own mind about this. 63: After all, that's what religion is all about. 64: I think I'll shut up now. Book Of Ann Chapter Which Is Not A Chapter. This is a transcription of some of the special Mid-Secret Ann O'Nymous Card File given by the Angel of Eris to Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst, as described in the Principia Discordia. Ann O'Nymous has permitted us to use some of these cards... Card One: "The opposite of a great truth is also a great truth. The opposite of a petty truth is plainly false. -Niels Bohr "Everything is true in some sense; false in some sense; meaningless in some sense; true and false in some sense; true and meaningless in some sense; false and meaningless in some sense; true, false, and meaningless in some sense." -Sri Syadasti Card Two: "A child can learn anything if he knows you won't try to trick him" -Behavioural ScientBLATTT "A child can't learn anything if he knows you won't try to trick him." -Teacher Card Three: "Just because you don't know how something is done, that doesn't mean it must be magic." -Skeptic "That which we call magic is nothing more than a method of doing something startling by a means unseen by the observer." -Stage Magician Card Four: "This sentence is false." -This sentence is true "This sentence is true." -This sentence is false Card Five: "Thou shalt not have any gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee ANY graven image." -Book of Exodus, 20:3-4 "There is no Grace; there is no Guilt This is the Law: DO WHAT THOU WILT!" -Annoying Mind Drug of Lies, 44:33-34 Card Six: 1) "We must belive in free will: we have no choice." 2) "Hey, man, I didn't CHOOSE to have free will!" 3) "I don't believe in free will. If I can't choose not to have it, I never did to begin with." 4) "Due to circumstances beyond my control, I am captain of my fate and master of my soul." Card Seven: A very sad poet was Jenny -- Her limericks weren't worth a penny. In technique they were sound, Yet somehow she found Whenever she tried to write any, That she always wrote one line too many. Card Eight: "What's a nice word like `you' doing in a self-referential sentence like this?" What is it like to be asked, "What is it like to be asked, stuck in itself in quotes after its comma?" stuck in itself in quotes after its comma? This sentence no verb. Card Nine: Dear Recipient: This is not a chain letter. If this were a chain letter, it would ask you to make copies of it and send them to your friends. It doesn't. Please make sure you don't make any copies or this, or if you do, by accident, keep them well away from any mailboxes or even envelopes. If nobody ever breaks this nonexBLATTTent chain, nobody need ever know it never exBLATTTed. This is not a test. Card Ten: Fanatic: DEATH TO ALL FANATICS! FANATICS MUST DIE! KILL! Hypocrite: But... Aren't you a fanatic about THAT? Fanatic: Yes. But it's fanatics I hate, not hypocrites. DEATH TO ALL FANATICS! Hypocrite: But surely that's self-defeating? Fanatic: Hmm... You're right. DEATH TO ALL HYPOCRITES! HYPOCRITES MUST DIE! KILL! KILL! Hypocrite: Now wait a seURK! Card Eleven: Why vote for those most qualified? Aren't the unqualified entitled to a little representation in office? Why limit yourself to just representing the fat-cat businessmen? After all, we can't all be Rockefellers and Trumps and Onassissis..umm..Onassisiasieaiseieaises and stuff like those guys, right? Card Twelve: The point of the game is to come in the middle, sort of. To be the CLOSEST to the middle is missing the point. To be the MOST sort of partway to the middle is missing the point. You have to SOMETIMES get very far off, or very close, and more often sort of getting closer to being in the middle... Try too hard to win and you end up losing. Card Thirteen: Since Thirteen is an unlucky number, nothing is written on this card. Honest. Not even this. Card Fourteen: The Point is a MOOving target. Shoot for where it was, and it's not there any more. Get too good at figuring out where it is, and you get stuck while it moves away. If you swing your net for where it was, by MOO, you'll NEVER get it. "Nobody ever goes there. It's too crowded." Card Fifteen: A Rose is a Rose is a Rose. A Rose by any other name would smell as sweet. On the Third Day, Jesus Rose. Chapter Zero. When a white man kills a black man, it's "racBLATT" When a black man kills a white man, it's "reverse racBLATT" When a man makes a woman have sex, it's "rape" When a woman makes a man have sex, it's "seduction" When a Normal insults a Different, it's "The System" When a Different insults a Normal, it's "counter-culture" When a fool reads this annoying mind drug, it's "stupid" When this annoying mind drug reads a fool, it's "stupid" Some things never change. Maybe it's better that way. Maybe not. Chapter One. It was a dark and putrid night, and the wind was hiding somewhere for fear of being mugged. A dark shape emerged from the bar and staggered to the side of the road. It was a wombat. I could tell by the shape. Then it was mugged. The mugger leapt at it and hit it in the head. I ran towards it, but the street was rubbery, and I was bouncing far too much to reach the poor wombat before it's wallet was stolen. "Moan," moaned the creature. "Shut up," I told it. The mugger was running down the street with the money I'd planned to steal. Damn. I kicked the wombat, and ran after him. The wind whipped in my face from the speed of running, and I mugged it too. Not bad. A hundred and eleven bucks. An amex gold card, and... "How To Turn Wombat Skin Into A Working Submachine Gun In Four Easy Steps" -- a pamphlet. I ran back to where the wombat had been, but it had been spirited away. I sat gloomily on the pavement with my feet in the gutter. Then the wombat jumped me and tried to take the $111. Damned if I'd let a marsupial overpower ME. I clubbed it to death with the gold card. The dead wombat's pelt was hard to remove, but the prospect of a working submachine gun kept me going through the wee small hours of the morning. Finally, it was done. The skin was removed. I opened the pamphlet with hands stained by wombat innards. "HA HA," it laughed. "FOOLED YOU!" I cried inconsolably until I was mugged by a wombat corpse. To this day, I regret not driving the stake through that wombat's heart. If you've heard stories, called Urban Myths, perhaps, of an undead being that walks the streets, well you have me to blame. It leaps on people from a flame-red Harley-Davidson and gnaws their heads off, to turn them into it's undead minions. Some say that I am the only one ever to see it's gruesome eyes and live to tell the tale. Some don't. What do they know? It's the truth. I've tried for my whole life to rid this city of the unholy being, but I fear what they've long said: "Once beaten, twice a wombat shall kill you with a staplegun" Or something like that. Chapter Two. Three important Facts. 1) Godel: Our knowledge will always be incomplete. 2) Heisenberg: The future will always be uncertain. 3) Arrow: You can't always get what you want. Chapter Three. In any group of six or more people, there will always be a group of at least three who either ALL know each other, or are ALL mutual strangers. This is easy to prove... If I know OR don't know any given three (either way works the same), then if any one of those is the same about any of the other ones, then BINGO, we have a triple. If none of them do, then they all are the same to each other, and BINGO, another triple. This means that you are never alone in a group of more than six, because there's always someone like you somewhere, UNLESS THEY ALL CONSPIRE AGAINST YOU. Just remember, it's a natural tendency of human beings to conspire with each other against other humans. Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you. If you don't know at least three people in ANY given group of six or more, there's always a chance that someone is ganging up on you. Your only hope is to get to know all but at most two people in the world and try to get everyone else to make sure those two aren't up to something. Gang up on them to make sure, if you HAVE to. Either way, something's gotta give. Chapter Four. The more often people say "The more often people say `coincidence' the clearer it is they're trying to avoid an explanation, not find one", the clearer it is they're trying to avoid an explanation, not find one. Chapter Five You get what you look for. If I tell you to look for ghosts, you find ghosts. If I tell you you're ill and you start looking for symptoms, you find them. This is the cause of all psychosomatic disease, all haunted places, all monster sightings, all UFOs, and the consBLATTTency of scientific experiments. Science depends on this effect, because it is nothing without reproducible results. Because you know you want to be wanting us to want you to want us to be what you want us to want you to be wanting us to want you to be, and They only want what they want you to want Them to want. You know it must be true, because it doesn't make any sense. Blind Faith is for uneducated fools, SkepticBLATT is for half- educated fools, educated fools are too dangerous to live, and I've yet to meet anyone who isn't one of these three. You see what you want to want to see, not what you think you want to see, or what you want to think you see, or even what you want to think, you see? You see the mask that fits what you want to want to see, but not the mask that fits what you think you want to see, or what you want to see, and you certainly never see the face behind the mask. If you fail to see something, it is NEVER because it isn't there, but merely because you were afraid of it. If you are afraid of nothing, you see everything. But only an idiot or a genius is afraid of nothing. That's why idiots see so much more, and seem so different, and why geniuses are so hard to understand when they babble about whatever it is they babble about. Chapter Six On Heretics And Infidels In all of the world, nobody is a heretic except the Official Heretic, the I. Yemen-Oying of MOOism. Nobody else is considered a Heretic. Killing the Perennial Heretic, the I. Yemen-Oying, is the only thing we don't approve of. The Heretic is the only truly sacred post a MOOist can hold, because he/she/it/they/hir/woogy knows that making fun of MOO is the only way to keep it flexible. Everyone is an Infidel unless they aren't. All members of MOO who actually filled out an application and sent one in instead of merely being a MOOist be definition, or DECIDING to be one, are required to be an infidel. Infidel: From "in" (not), and "fidelis" (faithful and consBLATTTent)... So basically, don't be consBLATTTent and you'll be fine. INFIDELS ARE EVIL! EVIL IS GOOD! HERETICS ARE GOOD! GOOD IS EVIL! Chapter Seven Floyd Gecko is a ConfusionBLATTT! Confuse-ius is the Heretic! Didn't you know that? Or is it? ANYONE can claim to be Confuse-ius... HEY! DON'T INTERRUPT ME WHEN... Chapter of Quips You're WRONG. Told ya so. SOSUMI. Aw, blow it out yer ear, cinnamon feet. Go WoCOWmbat Yourself. NOT! NOT NOT! NOT NOT NOT! you FOOL! Chapter of Projectiles Throw a tantrum at Confuse-Ius. Throw Up at Confuse-Ius Throw a COW at Confuse-Ius... on second thought, don't. Throw a dirty look at Confuse-Ius Throw your voice at Confuse-Ius Throw cold water at Confuse-Ius Throw the book at Confuse-Ius Throw up your hands at Confuse-Ius Throw in the towel at Confuse-Ius NOT LITERALLY, you FOOL!! Chapter Eight Whozzit? You know what? Some people don't like this bit in the silly ol' English Language about "sexBLATTT language"... Well, okay, fine... So what's the problem, eh? Can't use a different language? They say, like "Oh, but HIM and HER are what we have... We don't have a good neuter pronoun." Bullshhim. What's wrong with "IT" and "THEY"? They say "they sound so IMPERSONAL, and usually JUST PLAIN WRONG!"... More bullshhim. You call a corpse "IT". Why make the distinction with a living person when nobody's really been able to tell what being alive IS? Like, is a wombat on life support "HIM", or "IT"? Other species of animals are often called "IT", but nobody speaks up about racBLATTT, which is generally considered more serious! I dunno... Plus which, in most cases, IT should be okay, because its sex usually doesn't make an difference, unless it's having sex, in which case you'd probably mention its sex ANYWAY. And even there, you don't wanna have to have a separate word for gay people, do ya? IT just means anything made of matter... You're made of matter, aren't you? If not, there's SOMETHING different about you, but I can't put my finger on IT exactly... Ya can a talking computer IT, or even a talking computer that looks just like a person. Or one that got made of meat... Or one that's exactly like a person except for ITS mind... So why not a person, if you can't tell the difference? And THEM is okay... All them arms and legs and heads and internal organs and such, yeah, yeah, that's the ticket, yeah... C'mon. Get real. If the language is a problem, INVENT A NEW language WITHOUT ANY PROBLEMS by the Penguin's Toenails! Of course, within 20 years of this writing, this chapter will be obsolete anyway, so it hardly matters... If It Ain't Ranted, It Ain't True Chapter Nine Don't hypocrites and underqualified nincompoops have a big monopoly on government? I mean, a hundred percent of them are all hypocrites and losers and fools! So? What do you mean, "SO?"????? So that's a pretty accurate government, if it's supposed to represent the people. But they don't! They won't stand up for the rights of us hypocrites to do what we do best! They won't even admit to BEING hypocrites, the stinking hypocrites! What did you expect from them? The rest of you act exactly the same as them. So? It's different when WE do it. See what I meant about fools? Chapter Ten This sentence has all the letters correct. Thos sintinci hes hed ell thi vuwils muvid ap uni littir. Vjit tepvepde jat jaf amm vje doptoCOWpapvt nowef uq ope mevves. Vjot tipvipdi jet jef emm vji mivvBLATTT nuwif aq upi mivvis. Uijt tfoufodf jbt jbe bmm ujf mfuufst npwfe vq pof mfuufs. Chapter Eleven Officially, this chapter doesn't exBLATTT, because it used to contain subversive information dealing with how to blow up the parliament buildings/capitol/whatever... It also told you how to do evil things like brainwash people. That bit wasn't censored, but it got lost somewhere... Maybe it turned up somewhere else in the Annoying Mind Drug. This sentence doesn't belong in this chapter, but was put here by accident. It used to be in a different chapter. Actually, that's a lie. That sentence was the ONLY one that belonged in this chapter, and EVERYTHING ELSE was put here by accident. It used to have a different sentence there, but nobody remembers what it was, because that was a long time ago, and they were all drunk at the time. Chapter Twelve 1: Slavery still exBLATTTs today, despite whatever you've been told. Today it's just as deliberate and just as conscious as it was, but the slavers have learned that they can't be as blatant about it unless they want a revolt. Today, they enslave from all races and sexes. Today, they enslave your mind, not your body. Today, they enslave your spirit and your souls, without letting you know. 2: For thousands of years, women have been slaves, and that's no secret. Women's clothes in the last few hundred years, until the 60's, have been just another form of slavery, keeping them from moving, keeping them from breathing, keeping them sex objects, making sure that they can't revolt. In fact, NEITHER men nor women are superior to the other. Certainly not EQUAL, but inequal on a totally different axis than "superior/inferior"... VERY different. More than ever imagined. But women still don't deserve to be enslaved as they have been. 3: But that's diddley-shit stuff. They slave your mind. 4: Just try to think something that they won't let you think, that hasn't been thought before. Try to think something truly original. You can't, can you? But that's your birthright. That's what that grey gunk between your ears is for. How do they do it? They make you hate thinking in GNU ways. They give you pulp TV to watch. They teach you to dislike reading; why do you think all those "pro-reading" posters look so stupid? Not because it's a stupid idea, but because THEY WANT YOU TO THINK IT IS! 5: Why do they want you to sit there and soak up pop-culture, buy the newest fashions, the newest drink, the newest music? WHY? Because it stops you from having time to read this book and others like it. Because it drives you away from anything that might open your mind and let you break the slavery. 6: Lucky for us, their GNU "voluntary brainslave" approach makes it impossible for them to have a hold over us. They can't make us do things we don't want to do, but they can CHANGE THE THINGS WE WANT TO DO! They do it by making us say them over and over and over, getting us to hypnotize ourselves. Whenever you say anything, think about what THEY want it to make you think, whether it's enslaving women, staying docile and placid, or just being tense. DON'T LET *THEM* IMMANETIZE THE ESCHATON! 7: Know the Sapir-Whorf thesis? Evidence shows that it's true, tests reveal more and more evidence all the time, but NOBODY KNOWS ABOUT IT, because THEY don't want you to, because it would give away too many clues. 8: It says "Language isn't just a tool for expressing ideas, but the source of ideas." You can't think anything that your language isn't designed to cope with. Like, people think relativity and quantum physics are hard to understand, but that's because of the grammar of our language. We don't like the idea of the subjective nature of time because WE HAVE TENSES IN OUR LANGUAGE! 9: They're devious that way. The Hopi language has no tenses, but instead has "levels of certainty"... Not "when" it happened, but how sure the speaker is that it DID... Not "he walked," "he is walking," and "he will walk," but "I see him walk," "I think he walk," and "I've heard he walk"... Perfectly aligned to the nature of time and the uncertainty of certain aspects of reality from quantum physics... BUT HARDLY ANYONE CAN SPEAK IT! 10: They keep you enslaved by making the simplest ideas and ways of thinking about the world TOTALLY FOREIGN to your mind by giving you a language that doesn't represent how the world works, and the way we see the world is just an extension of our grammar onto the world. Don't let them get away with it! Read more! Learn more languages! Study math! GET OFF THE "COOL" TRIP AND DO IT RIGHT! OPEN YOUR FUCKIN' MIND ALREADY! People say to us MOOists that we are living a joke. We know that. They are also living a joke, saying they're individuals, but always doing what THEY say. The only difference is WE KNOW IT. Which would you rather? 11: Just remember. Even though they've slaved you, they might have had a good reason for it. Don't react against it TOO hard, or you might just break. It's not enough to just react AGAINST things if that's all you do. You have to preserve them all too. The only thing you start out AGAINST should be prejudice, and even that should fade after a while. Which is a shame. LET NOTHING FADE. Always preserve EVERYTHING YOU CAN, even if you don't like it. Even the act of NOT preserving anything. Even destruction. Annihilate the viewpoint system. Or don't, if you prefer. A total removal and preservation of EVERYTHING. Don't try to understand it, because it includes itself. COW Chapter Thirteen The Eight Neural Circuits 1-4: Normal Human Circuits 00001: Survival Circuit "I want to live! I'm gonna live or die! FOOD! KILL!" 00002: Territorial Circuit "MINE! MINE! MINE! GET OFF MY PROPERTY!" 00003: Semantic Circuit "I want to talk you you... Word..." 00004: Sexual Circuit "I'm not gay!"..."Gay and proud!"..."Black is beautiful!" 5-8: PostHuman Circuits 00005: Neurosomatic Circuit "My body is under my control... I CAN SEE MYSELF!" 00006: Metaprogramming Circuit "My personality is mine to change. I CAN BE MYSELF!" 00007: Psychophysical Circuit "My luck and fortune and evoltuion is under my control." 00008: Psychoatomic Circuit "Truth is shaped by mind. I live in all possible universes." 9: Floyd's Top Secret Circuit 00009: Figure it out for yourself, loser! "DO I HAVE TO SPELL IT OUT! FIGURE IT OUT *ALONE*!!!" COW¬ Chapter Fourteen Your Manic Concessive Bill of Rights 1. You have the right to remain silent 2. You have the right to change your mind 3. You have the right to offer no reasons or excuses for your cowardice, unless the questioner is violence prone 4. You have the right to avoid, supress, or rationalize any anxiety or or source of anxiety 5. You have the right to be illogical, contradictory, and circumlocutious 6. You have the right to run, hide, whimper, cry, mope, and to pout 7. You have the right to flatter, cajole, and kiss ass 8. You have the right to take no for an answer 9. You have the right to love yourself for what you are 10. You have the right to stop trying to assert yourself and START LIVING Your Real World Bill Of Rights 1. You have the right to SHUT THE FUCK UP! 2. You have the right to DO WHAT WE TELL YOU! 3. You have NO OTHER RIGHTS! Your Stupid-Fuckup Bill Of Lefts 1. You have no right to remain silent 2. You have no right to excercise none of your non-rights 3. You have no right to do anything 4. You have no right not to tell people they have no rights Dimwit Anarchy Bill Of Rights 1. There is no God but Man 2. Man has the right to live by his own law 3. Man has the right to live in the way that he wills to do 4. Man has the right to dress as he wills to 5. Man has the right to dwell where he wills to dwell 6. Man has the right to move as he will on the face of the Earth 7. Man has the right to eat what he will 8. Man has the right to drink what he will 9. Man has the right to think what he will 10. Man has the right to speak as he will 11. Man has the right to write as he will 12. Man has the right to mould as he will 13. Man has the right to carve as he will 14. Man has the right to work as he will 15. Man has the right to rest as he will 16. Man has the right to love as, where, when, and whom he will 17. Man has the right to kill those who would thwart these rights (Woman, evidently, has NO rights. Typical.) Chapter Fifteen "Sinister" is the Latin for "Left Handed"... "Dexter", (Dexrous) is Latin for "Right Handed"... "Far Left" means stupid pot-head hippies. "Far Right" means moron gun-toting reactionaries. Which do you think THEY want you to like? Chapter Sixteen The "political spectrum" is curved, like spacetime. The far-left (anarchBLATTTs and communBLATTTs) stops JUST SHORT of the far-right (conservatives and neo-nazis)... The "middle road" is on the opposite side of the "extremBLATTT" side... It's a vertical division, not horizontal, becuase the horizontal is WARPED. So what's between the two extremes, OPPOSITE the middle- of-the-roaders? SubGeniuses seem to think THEY are, relaxed and pickpocketing, and they're right. But as usual, they missed the point. "Left-wing"? "Right-wing"? Screw that, we're "INNER-WING" or "UP-WING"! Middle-of-the-circle! We ARE the Circle! Chapter Seventeen SymbolBLATT Of The Halfy The Halfy is an incredibly rich symbol, as known by anyone who has been staggered by the sheer visual force of looking at it. Here are just a tiny fraction of the things it represents. Bear in mind that comparing symbols and identifying the meaning of one with the meaning of another is misleading unless it actually does it in here. 00001: The Widow's Son. The Halfy looks much like a pair of spread legs and something between them. This is hardly a coincidence. This is a symbol of both the BIRTH of the Widow's Son from between the legs of the Mother, and the CONCEPTION, the dot between the spokes is the father, of course. The Widow is, of course, Mary Magdalene and the father is Jesus ChrBLATTT. 00002: The Widow's Son, Part Two: He's Back. The Masonic sign in which "Who will help the Widow's Son?" is uttered consBLATTTs of standing with one's arms out at right angles to each other (like the V, with the head in the middle). 00003: Sex. Because of the incredibly rich sexual symbolBLATTT around the Widow's Son, the Halfy can also be taken to represent sex itself, or else the primate urge to think about sex. Sex is nothing special, it's only our EVOLUTION of the primate brain that makes it seem so. 00004: Politics. The great V of the Halfy is the "political spectrum", going from the Far Left, on the right, to the Far Right, on the left. Moderates are at the bottom, extremeBLATTTs on the top. The dot represents the SubGeniuses and Discordians. The Halfy itself represents MOOists. 00005: Religion. Exactly the same as Politics. 00006: Taboos. At the time of the writing of this book, Sex, Politics, and Religion are the three topics advised AGAINST discussing, because they provoke arguments. This is because the primate brain unconsciously understands the Halfy symbolBLATT that all three are really the same thing. 00007: SymbolBLATT. The Halfy stands for symbolBLATT itself, in that it seems to represent so many things. The big V stands for the real world, and the little dot stands for the symbol, trying to make a little thing of the whole world. This is because of the strange fact that a letter on its own means just the letter, but a letter in a circle is a political symbol. The dot is round. This appears to suggest that the world is feminine (see above) and symbols are masculine. It doesn't ACTUALLY suggest this, but that's why we worship Goddess. 00008: Itself. A symbol that represents a symbol CAN represent itself. The Halfy happens to do this very well, if you replace the dot with a little Halfy... 00009: Intelligence. Because the Halfy is a symbol that represents so many things, including itself and the tendency to symbolize, it also represents intelligence. The V is the world, and the dot is the model we make of it inside our heads. For instance, it represents the fact that the shape of our perception of the world isn't always the same as the shape of the world. Just because we think something is there doesn't mean it is. Just because every language has a word for "God" doesn't mean one exBLATTTs: every language invents names for colours in the same order, but they're all the same kind of thing, it's just our brains that perceive them differently. 00010: UberSpace. The V is UberSpace, the dot is the Multiverse we live in. 00011: The Tao/Chao/Cow Since the Dot appears to be Male and the V Female, as with most primate symbolBLATT, the balance between the two, which can be applied to any of the symbols above, in fact, means the Tao/Chao/Cow, the BALANCE between any pair of symbols within it. Since the balance itself is one of the symbols, balance itself suggests balancing it with the opposite, extremeBLATT, represented, of course, by the dot, while the V even LOOKS like a balance beam. The Tao insBLATTTs upon being balanced with its opposite. 00012: Question And Answer See the Book Of Honest Truth, by Lloyd Taco. 00013: Oppression The Halfy looks like a large mouth opening up to swallow some small speck in front of it, just like a big fish about to eat a little fish. This has always been a symbol of oppression by the strong over the weak. 00014: Non-Conformity The two ends of the V in the Halfy represent any two extreme positions on anything, and the symbol as a whole represents compromise. As you move towards the middle, the MOTION also brings you down towards the bottom, the LOWEST common denominator, if you want. Normalyl any compromise makes you less happy than you would have been if you'd got your way to begin with. In fact, if you JUMP to the answer (the dot) rather than negotiate your way along the most obvious road, you end up happier. Compromise doesn't mean giving up anything. 00015: Pac Man Well, it DOES look like Pac Man, doesn't it? 00016: GNU Beginnings If you start from a beginning at the bottom, and move away from it towards the "ends" you get a great variety of neat branches and things, but nothing GNU. The Dot signifies a GNU beginning point. Drawing parallels between this and the "Discordian/SubGenius" meaning of the dot is unwarranted. 00017: Mythical Beasts It looks like a kind of bird-cyclops, doesn't it? Like a big beak and one lone eye? This nasty beast is the Glare Hawk, and should be avoided at all costs. If you see one in your dreams, you must perform the ExorcBLATT ceremony. For more information, look elsewhere in the Book of MOO. It is not the same as the bird that helped Baby-Lon of Atlantis. 00018: Eye Of Horus If you turn the Halfy upside down, you are left with a small circle inside a triangle, like the eye-in-pyramid design, called the Eye of Horus. It represents the Third Eye, the self-watching universe, self-awareness, enlightenment, and a whole bunch of other stuff. 00019: Church Shape The Halfy is the proper shape of all MOOist temples and churches. Any temple not in this shape doesn't look like a bit Halfy from above. This may result in not looking like a big V with a dot in it to all people who might happen to be scoping out churches from a helicopter. 00020: Mountain Chalet It looks like the sides of two steep mountains, covered in snow, majestically soaring to surround the setting sun, the vBLATTTa YOU will see from your room at Chalet MOO nestled cozily in the Swiss Alps, where you can enjoy, for only a pittance of [INSERT YOUR LIFE SAVINGS HERE] per night, all the comforts of our luxurious mineral springs, skiing, and other wonders of nature... Umm. Sorry. That sentence didn't belong there. 00021: The Letter M It is a runic letter M, and is HALF (Halfy) of a Roman letter M. This is the first letter, of course, in MOO, and in MUFFIN, though MUFFINs have nothing to do with MOO, except that they both start with the same letter, being the 13th letter of the alphabet. Which is interesting in itself, as *23* people killed Julius Caesar, and 13 Jesus ChrBLATTT, who both had the same initials. Neat, huh? 00022: Hand Signs The Halfy is easily identifiable in hand-signs which have been around for many years. It is present in the "victory" sign, the "peace, man" sign, and the "Live Long And Prosper" sign. The dot is invisible only in those humans without partially invisible sixth fingers, which is most of them except the true Atlantean Adept. 00023: Gullibility Since none of those symbols were THERE when we picked the symbol of MOO, gullibility stands for all those who were willing to believe in them. The same is true of the world. It isn't anything until you start believing things about it. Honest. And if you belive that, I have a bridge to sell you. Chapter Eighteen Euclidian 2-D Tesselations Square: Simplest, most obvious Triangle: A little awkward, but still straighforward Hexagonal: Very efficient, but hard to draw Square And Octagon: Very tricky, but interesting Fullerian 3-D Tesselations Cubical: Simplest, most obvious Octet Truss: A little awkward, but still straightforward WHAT'S WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE? Chapter Nineteen Q: What food is more nutritious than any meat or vegetable, richer in vitamins than almost any food on earth, easily available in all inhabited coutries, easier to prepare than any other known form of sustenance, completely humane to obtain, and yet completely unavailable in any of the so-called "rational and scientific" Western food stores? A: Human blood. Chapter Twenty Try to be aware of your own motives. When psychiatrBLATTTs or bitter people analyze them, they can be more objective than you can about YOU, if not about themselves. So don't dismiss it just because you don't realize it at once. Be it penis-envy, desire for attention, or Oedipus complex, at least acknowledge that it's PARTLY correct. Chapter Twenty-One Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there was a great and magnificent city of incredible size and beauty, and the city was called Dobbstown. And in that city, everybody was happy, because the city took care of them, and its computers tried to make them all as happy as possible and as much of the time as possible. The people were given things to do, so they were never bored. They were given games and to play, so they were never lazy. Those who wanted to work for their pleasure were allowed to, but in a few generations, nobody really felt like it. The city's computers and robots made imaginary people to curse at if anybody ever got angry, but nobody ever did, because they were always happy. And nobody was ever bitter that the computers were smarter than they were, and that the robots did everything better than them, because that was just the way things were. The robots explored the star system of the city, and the people who wanted to went with them. But most were happy watching from afar, or imagining they were out there, when they were safely in the city itself. And the people lived for many millions of years, totally content, the city protecting them, and keeping them happy, and stopping them from becoming lazy and stupid. They were the most beautiful and intelligent and enlightened race the galaxy had ever seen, and those who had left with the robots in the early days were not nearly so beautiful, because they had started WORKING FOR NOTHING and the ones on the planet were puzzled. Until one day their star blew up and they were all killed. Except the ugly ones who worked in the sky, who escaped to a planet called Gloop, and their children were as industrious as they were, and eventually discovered more amazing science than the robots had ever done, until they invented the most amazing source of energy the universe has ever seen, from which they intended to power the biggest beacon in the galaxy, pointing the way to wisdom and joy to all life forms within millions of light years. Only it blew up and killed them all. And the only ones who survived were the cockroaches. Tough. Chapter Twenty-Two Bucky Fuller has mentioned lots of things in his day, but one of the most interesting is that IQ is determined by the age of 17. He pointed out that a guy called Ben Bloom worked out a system that, if you give him all the details about a person's family life before 17, he can determine their IQ to within 1%. He pointed out that 50% is determined by the age of 4, 80% by the age of 8, 92% by the age of 13, and 100% by 17. He said that even though nothing can be done after that to improve IQ, billions of dollars are spend on education for over 17, and hardly any for under 4. Sorta true. In fact, fifth circuit opening lets you expand your IQ at any age at all, and even live forever. Chapter Twenty-Three SMIILE: Space Migration, Intelligence Increase, Life Extension. RICH: Rising Incomes through Cybernetic Homeostasis HEAD: Hedonic Engineering And Development SMIILE Migration of a race to space eliminates problems of crowding, industrial pollution, lack of arable land, and limitations on the resources available for machinery. Increase of intelligence eliminates problems of chronic stupidity, human error, mismanagement, deliberate sabotage, war, and disaster through failure to communicate. Extending human lifespan eliminates problems of death, sadness, loss of information, failure to learn from past mistakes, and burdensome senile old folks. RICH Replacing human workers with intelligent machines and robot labour solves problems of unemployment, poverty, shoddy work, limited production, effective mental slavery, poor education, and industrial accidents causing death. HEAD Opening a fifth-circuit function on a social level to use the human brain for fun and profit eliminates problems of stupidity, unhappiness, anger, greed, intolerance, bigotry, mental slavery, disease, and government. Da Book of We Aaron-Oying (By I Yemen-Oying, his cousin) Chapter/Section/Part/whatever 1 Right? (They're wrong. All wrong. Dead wrong. All dead wrong.) (We're right. Don't listen to THEM.) 1: In case you missed it: We're right, they're not. Understand? 2: Good. Chapter/part/section/whatever 2 Idiots.... (Are YOU like Trevor?) Wunn: A‹e hayt shyte noogies tu: A‹e think yur oll shyte noogies if yur reeeding disse shyte booke. F“r: Duh. faiV: yu shyte cowz. yu shudde bee chot bia fyrinsquod. Sox: eevn a‹m betttr than yur. sven: a‹e laik beeff tho. {this is a good place for Confuse-Ius to interrupt} Confuse-COW-Ius: 'Tis NOT! aet: dfuh. duh. duh. aim confyoozed. na‹n: hooiz dis shytte confyoozyus/ 10: THIS IS WHAT WE MEAN BY A PAIN. lven: aw, phoqyoo, yu shytee noogie. duh: what cumzaftr lven? Chapter/Section/Part/Whatever 4 The Truth. 0: There is NO GOD BUT QUACK! «: Everyone worship QUACK! 1: Pass the butter if they ask for it. 1«: We mean it, too. Do you? 2: Just say QUACK! 2¬: Because it's a nice thing to say. Quack. 2«: People are people too. 4: Evil people. 4: You know who you are. Stop it. Don't be a PAIN. (cf chapter 2) 4«: There are no reasons. Only raisins. 4«: And grapes. But raisins are only dried grapes. 4ύ: Reasons are dried gropes. But there are no reasons. 4ύ: Because you can't dry gropes. Chapter/part/section/whatever 5 Feedback. 1: We said so. 2: So? 4: We're listening. Say something! 5: We mean it. Say something! Anything! 6: Fine. Don't. Be non-cooperative. It's on your own head! 7: NO, REALLY. It's on your head. So Don't look up. 8: Quack. 9: Please think about this. Chapter/part/suction/cup 6 Warrantee! 00001: This is the Book of MOO. 00002: Don't expect too much. skip a few: 00099: However, it is guaranteed to weigh at least 6 pounds. 00100: If yer dumb enough to print it. 00101: The book of MOO is backed by a satisfaction guarantee. 00178: If you are dissatisfied with it, send it back. We'll refund you. Confuse-Ius Say: No, we won't. HA! Fooled you! Chapter/part/section/whatever 7 Hence infinity: Amen. MOO OMM BOOK OF THE RITUAL STUFF Major Rituals These rituals are to be performed at MOOfests, warships... uh, WORSHIPS (well, warships will do as well) or whenever you feel like it. Or not, if you don't want to, though failure to comply will result in not having fun, and Floyd not giving you any mints unless he's feeling generous. 1) Communion Ritual MOOists shall commune with the Grate MOO by the sitting around of bonfires, leaping from tree to tree, and generally behaving stupidly in order to attract Her attention. HAIL ERIS! 2) The Gun-A-Jump Ritual This is most effective in large groups. You stand at the FOOT (bottom) of a large building in a group, and shout: "I'm gonna jump! I'm gonna jump!" A person planeted on a ledge above will shout down: "Don't do it! Don't do it!" Continue until bored, or arrested for being a pain. 3) The Muk-Funna-MOO Ritual In this ritual, you simply make fun of MOOism in a non-pain-in-the-ass way. Also included as a subgroup of this ritual are making fun of any other thing that occurs to you, such as any of the major heresies, the Civil Service, or popular cartoon characters. 4) The Sey-MOO Ritual This is the simplest of all the rituals, as it involves merely saying MOO as loud as you can manage, or as you feel like at that time. 5) The Bal-Oon Ritual First shalt thou fill the Holy Balloons with the Holy Hydrogen. Then shalt thou fill some other Holy Balloons with the Holy Water. Then tiest thou the balloons together, and attatch the Holy Fuse. Then light the Holy Fuse, and letest thou go of the balloons. 6) The Ho-Lee-Kow Ritual First find yerself a cow. This is the Holy Cow for this ritual. Then ya MOO at the cow for a while until it replies in kind. Then say "Holy Cow!". If the cow should relieve itself on the ground during the ritual, say "Holy Shit!" 7) The Ho-Ke-Po-Kay You put your right foot in, you put your right foot out. You put your right foot in, and you shake it all about. You do the Hokey-Pokey and turn it all around. That's what it's all about. 8) The Noe-Mick Ritual Play the game of Nomic, as described in one of those appendices there. Attempt to make the game as SILLY as possible. Variations of this ritual may include the other official games of MOO. 9) The Pree-Ching Ritual First, ye stand on a holy soapbox, and gather thee around thyself a whole load of pre-converted MOOists, and then shall ye speak unto the crowd around ye, and ye shall say unto them things like "Yo, man, convert to my nifty cult!" and "If it worked for them, it can work for you!" and other such things, and rant and rave and speak in strange Tongues. 10) The Joho Ritual First, find a building in which live Jehovah's Witnesses, then go up and ring the doorbell. When they answer, barge in, claim to be a Jehovah's Witness, ignore any protests that they already are, and preach at them for an hour or more trying to convert them. 11) The Geo-Desk Ritual Thou shalt build unto you a whole buncha stuff outta toothpicks using proper Fullerian designs. Octet Truss design is the best and most stable, using equilateral triangles for the load distribution, but icos-octahedron ones are WIERD to look at, and also use equilateral triangles. Avoid squares if you can help it, on account of they have an extra dimension of freedom to collapse on the load and destroy themselves. Minor Rituals (Ritz Bitz) These are intended to be done alone, or at least individually. Of course, they probably won't end up that way, but what the hell, eh? For this reason, they have no names. Aww... 1) Speak in Pig Latin. (First sound goes to the end of the word, and is followed by an "ay" sound.) 2) Ytray otay onfusecay eoplepay ithway onsensenay. Uchsay asay ymay ignsay ichwhay ayssay "Easeplay oday otnay arkpay noay Isthay allway" 3) Have as much fun as possible, so as to increase the total amount of fun in the world. PLEASE notice that this ritual should be followed with care. It is important to increase the TOTAL amount as well as your own. I.e. Don't be a pain. At least, not TOO much of a pain, anyway. 4) Hop up and down on one of your legs (you may switch part way through), flap your hands like a bird, and make goose-like squawking noises, occasionally MOOing for emphasis. 5) Eat salad. Comment on its flavour, composition, texture, moral rectitude, and anything else that seems commentable. MOO OMM BOOK OF CERMONIES Hereinwritten are the cermonies of the Holy Church Of The Great MOO as they now stand. All these ceremonies are to be performed by the member which they specify, and at the times and occasions specified. The exact wording may be changed if it's really important, but ALWAYS shalt thou basically stick to that kind of thing, okay? When it says High Preest or Great Prophet, the script shall use the High Preest, because the Great Prophet will eventually die, and cannot be replaced, while the High Preest can. These ceremonies MAY be performed by conference call on a telephone, unless they require physical contact. Preests or Prophets or generally anyone can perform 'em. WEDDINGS OF THE HOLY CHURCH OF THE GREAT MOO Weddings of MOO are semantic exercises, with no more real effect than weddings of other religions. They join "As One" two or more people, who generally have some kind of affection for each other. Weddings of the Church of MOO are to be conducted by the Grate Prophet ONLY, but since they aren't even a teensy weensy bit binding, this hardly matters. Any arrangement of partners which can be thought of can be married. Marriages can be one-way, between large groups of people and NO subsets (or only specific ones), between the same sex or opposite sex, or indeed anything else you could possibly think of. The people united in a MOO marriage are joined as one in the eyes of the Grate MOO. But, since they're not joined in her nose, the marriage is almost totally pointless. Needless to say, strict monogamy is almost out of the question. Unless you don't want it to be. Whatever. Big whoop. Modifications shall be made to suit the arrangements decided on. Where it says "Groom" and "Bride", the names of the participants should be used. Grate Prophet: This is a wedding, so shut up. Groom! Groom: Yes? Grate Prophet: Do you love her? Groom: Yeah. Grate Prophet: Bride! Bride: Yes? Grate Prophet: Do you love him? Bride: Yeah. Grate Prophet: You're married. Dibs on the cheese dip. Assembly adjourns for refreshments, including cheese dip or something INITIATIONS INTO THE HOLY CHURCH OF THE GREAT MOO When a person is to be initiated into the Holy Church Of The Great MOO, that person must be willing to commit his or her life to the Church and what it stands for. They don't have to actually do it, but they must be willing. This ceremony is also performed by a Preest or the Prophet, or anyone of a rank higher than Inner CirclBLATTT. This ceremony is one of the most solemn occasions in the Holy Church of the Great MOO. Well... Yeah, just about. The ceremony is as follows, although it's almost always dispensed with nowadays, unless someone feels like it. Preest: We are gathered here to induct into our ranks a GNU acolyte. Hand over the Holy Rubber Chicken. Acolyte hands the Rubber Chicken Over Preest: Young acolyte. Do you hereby pledge that you're gonna be a faithful MOOist? New Acolyte: MOO! Preest: Good enough. Right, then fill out this application form, will ya? Thanks. Preest hands over the Holy Application Form New Acolyte fills out the Holy Application Form Preest: Done yet? New Acolyte: Not quite. Preest: Well hurry up, will you? New Acolyte: Don't rush me... Preest: La dee da... Preest taps left foot impatiently Preest: Done yet? New Acolyte: Yup. Preest: Give me the form. New Acolyte gives Preest the form Preest: Hmmm... I guess so. Kneel on your left knee. Acolyte Kneels on left knee Preest: I didn't say "Simon says"! New Acolyte: ACK! New Acolyte stands up again. Preest: Now let's try that again. Simon says kneel on your left knee. Acolyte kneels on left knee Preest: You didn't say "mother may I"! New Acolyte: ACK! New Acolyte stands up again Preest: Now let's try this ONE MORE TIME. Simon says kneel on your left knee. New Acolyte: Mother may I kneel on my left knee? Preest: That's better. Yes you may. New Acolyte kneels on left knee. Preest: Now, with this Chicken, I dub thee Silly Twit of the Holy Church of the Great MOO Preest bashes GNU Acolyte with the rubber chicken New Acolyte: Thanks a heap. Preest: Ahem. New Acolyte: What? Oh... right... MOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!! New Acolyte performs Minor Ritual number four Preest: Hand forth the Holy Seltzer Bottle. Acolyte hands over Holy Seltzer Bottle (or water glass) Preest throws water or sprays seltzer in GNU acolyte's face GNU Acolyte: Thanks. I needed that. Preest: This ceremony is adjourned. Dibs on the guacamole. Ceremony adjourns to refreshments with guacamole or other avocado products. PROMOTION TO THE OUTER CIRCLE OF THE HOLY CHURCH OF THE GREAT MOO Simmons is played by any Outer CirclBLATTT of MOO, Simon is played by an Inner CirclBLATTT, and Mother is played by any Inner CirclBLATTT of MOO. The ceremony is performed, as usual, by anyone of high enough rank, and goes as follows: Preest: Acolyte! Acolyte: Yup? Preest: Simon says kneel on your left knee. Acolyte: Yeah, right. Preest: No, really. Acolyte: Show me this Simon, then, oh Preest-Person of the Great MOO, you silly person. Preest: SUMMON SIMON, SIMMONS! Simmons: Yes, oh High And Mighty Preest of the Holy Church of the Great MOO, [begins to lBLATTT titles of performer] Preest: Get on with it! Simmons: Sorry. Simmons fetches Simon Preest: Are you Simon? Simon: Yes, oh High And Mighty... Preest: Shut up. Okay. Tell this scum to kneel on her [his] left knee. Simon: Kneel on your left knee, scum. Acolyte: Mother may I kneel on my left knee? Preest: Yes, you may. Acolyte: You aren't Mother! Preest: Simmons, get Mother, would you? Simmons: Yes, oh High... Preest: Just DO it, would you? Simmons: Okay, okay. Simmons fetches Mother Preest: Are you Mother? Mother: You didn't say Mother May I! Preest: Mother may I ask you who you are? Mother: You may. Preest: Are you Mother? Mother: I am. Preest: Good. Acolyte, you may proceed. Acolyte: Mother may I kneel on my left knee? Mother: You may. Acolyte kneels on his [her] left knee. Preest: Hand forth the Holy Rubber Chicken. Other Acolyte hands over the rubber chicken. Preest: Hand forth his [her] application form. Other Acolyte hands forth Acolyte's application form. Preest: Hmm... Well, okay. With this chicken, I dub thee... Acolyte: Hang on. Preest: What!? Acolyte: You forgot to say Mother May I! Preest: Oh all right. Mother, may I brain her [him] with a rubber chicken? Mother: Sure thing. Preest: With this chicken, I dub thee Outer CirclBLATTT of the Holy Church Of The Great MOO. Preest bashes Acolyte with Rubber Chicken Acolyte Officially Becomes Outer CirclBLATTT Outer CirclBLATTT: MOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!! Outer CirclBLATTT performs minor ritual number four Preest: Hand forth the Holy Cream Pie! Acolyte hands over Holy Cream Pie High Preest throws Holy Cream Pie in Outer CirclBLATTT's face Outer CirclBLATTT: Thanks a heap. Preest: This ceremony is adjourned. Dips on the onion dip. Ceremony adjourns to refreshments with onion dip. PROMOTION TO INNER CIRCLE OF THE HOLY CHURCH OF THE GREAT MOO Basically the same applies as with the Promotion to the Outer Circle of The Holy Church Of The Great MOO. The Applicant must be an Outer CirclBLATTT of the Holy Church Of MOO, obviously. Preest: By this time, oh applicant, you've progressed far enough to know why we don't need a ceremony for this level. Besides which, it's tedious. Applicant: Huh? Preest: Look, do you understand what the difference was between the ceremony when you became an Acolyte and when you became an Outer CirclBLATTT? Applicant: Uh, yeah. Preest: And you know why? Applicant: Uh, yeah. Preest: Good. Give me the Application Form. Acolyte hands over the Application Form Preest: Seems fine. Hand over the Holy Rubber Chicken. Acolyte hands over the Holy Rubber Chicken Preest: Any questions? Applicant: No Preest: Good. Let's get this sucker over with. With this here chicken I dub thee Inner CirclBLATTT of The Holy Church Of The Great MOO. Preest bashes Applicant with chicken Applicant becomes Inner CirclBLATTT Applicant: MOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!! Applicant performs Minor Ritual number four Preest: Hand over the Holy Nose Glasses. Acolyte hands over the Holy Nose Glasses Preest: Here. Put these on. Applicant puts on Holy Nose Glasses and stops minor ritual number four Preest: This ceremony is adjourned. Dibs on the bean dip. Ceremony adjourns to refreshments with bean dip. EXORCBLATTS OF THE HOLY CHURCH OF THE GREAT MOO In some cases, priests or teachers of MOOism or of the Penguin Temple may find that they encounter evil spirits (wandering souls that can't find a cheap hotel) or manifestations of the Evil One. In such cases, any member of the Church Of MOO is permitted to perform an exorcBLATT, and the highest member available should be the one to perform the duty. The ceremony goes a bit like this: ExorcBLATTT: ZI DINGIR ETCETERA ETCETERA Translator: Begone, vermin of Bung ExorcBLATTT: ZINGI DUNGA AD INFINITUM Translator: Evil Spirits, here, take a couple of bucks and go find a decent hotel! ExorcBLATTT: SHADASH MASHUDAH MOO MOO MOO Translator: SHADASH MASHUDAH MOO MOO Etcetera etcetera... ExorcBLATTT: Begone Foul Demons Of Dirty Telephones Translator: That was my line! ExorcBLATTT: WUNGA WUNGA WUNGA! Translator: Spirits of the Sky, remember the invocation of the old days of the Great MOO and the Primordial Penguin, an awesome invocation of Tundra and Fire! ExorcBLATTT: Did I really say all that? Translator: Yes. ExorcBLATTT: WOW WOW WOW! Translator: Live Long And Prosper! ExorcBLATTT: SZILLY SZILLY SZILLY! Translator: Or, if you're already dead, do something equivalent! EcorcBLATTT: G'WAN G'WAY G'DADDA HERE! Translator: Pester us no more, foul demons and slaves of the Bung, who has lived on the Earth since the beginning times, when clocks were but stupid old wooden things! ExorcBLATTT: DROPPA DEAD! MUNGA MOO! DROPPA DEAD! Translator: Evil Things, Nasty Spirits, take these coins an begone! [Translator throws a little money in the air] ExorcBLATTT: GIMME GIMME GIMME! Translator: Spirits! Relinquish holds on the material world! ExorcBLATTT: FUH-FUH-FUH-FUH-FUH-QOPF! Translator: Begone! Adjourn to festivities with grape soda. BAPTBLATTS OF THE HOLY CHURCH OF THE GREAT MOO MOOists don't believe in baptBLATTs. This ceremony is designed to show that fact to the MOOist parents of a child, and emphasize the right to the child of choosing his or her own religion. It may be performed by any MOOist of higher than the Outer Circle. Performer: Hey, kid. Wanna be a MOOist? Baby: ... Performer: Sorry. No can do. Here. Performer gives baby back to parents SNOWBLOWER RITUAL This is the ritual alluded to in the Snowblower Myth by I Yemen-Oying. It is used to summon the Second Satanic Snowblower Brigade, and should only be used under DIRE provocation, or if you REALLY, REALLY, *REALLY* want to. 00001: Draw a pentacle on the ground in black chalk to satisfy the Law Of Fives. Preferably indoors, so the demons don't scare people passing by when they appear. 00002: On each corner, place a snowball made of black snow. Black Snow can be obtained anywhere in Canada in winter by the side of a busy road, as any Canadian will tell you. 00003: In the middle of the pentacle, place a snowshovel. 00004: Chant the magic words "IO SNOWSHOVEL! IO IO SNOWSHOVEL! IO SNOWSHOVEL SNOWSHOVEL! YO! YO! SNOWSHOVEL! HEY STUPIDS!" 00005: Duck. Fast. SPECIAL ENLIGHTENMENT EXERCISES These are exercises that you can do at any time, or all the time unlike rituals or ceremonies of the normal kind... There are some mantas here, and some special mental press-ups. 00001: Press ups. 00002: Mantras (see below). 00003: Ritual Self-Mutilations. 00004: Thought modification (see below). 00005: Iron Man Decathalon. Mantras First, a definition of a Mantra. This is NOT one of those nasty sea creatures that looks like a doormat. That's a MANTA. A mantra is a phrase or word that you repeat to yourself in order to meditate, or otherwise gain enlightenment. Mantas are not good for this, and attempting to repeat a manta may result in serious lung cancer, birth defects in pregnant women (in case you give birth to a pregnant woman), or spontaneous human combustion in hyenas. These mantras are for people wanting to enter the Outer Circle of MOO (aptly called the Doubter Circle). Here are some Mantras to help you. 00001: When you hear, read, say, or think anything, repeat the following to yourself: "It's a LIE! A DAMCOWNED LIE! ALL OF IT." Repeat for a week or so, as often as possible. 00002: Whenever you hear, read, write, say, think, or telepathically receive any word such as "True", "Fact", "Real", or anything else like that, put imaginary quote marks around it. 00003: Constantly repeat, in your head, "How do I KNOW that?" You can actually THINK about this one. 00004: Say over and over, while meditating, "MANTRAS ARE STUPID, MANTRAS ARE STUPID, MANTAS ARE STUPID, MANTRAS ARE STUPID" and so forth and so on. 00005: "There is no truth. Everything is true." Thought Modification This isn't a sea creature either, but since it's not likely to be mistaken for one, unless the observer is drunk, it's night, or it's wearing a good costume, I won't mention that fact here. Thought modification exercises are for people who want to join the Inner Circle of MOO (ineptly called the Dinner Circle). By the time you understand these, you'll be ready to use them. By the time you finish with them, you'll already be an Inner CirclBLATTT, so you can keep doing them anyway. 00001: Think of everything I've ever taught you. Then think: "Maybe not." 00002: Mary had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb. Mary had a little lamb, its fleece was white as snow. Mary had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb, and everywhere that Mary went, the lamb was sure to go. 00003: Don't see the fnord. Don't see the fnord. If you don't see the fnord, it can't eat you. Don't see the fnord. The only good fnord is a dead fnord. Don't see the fnord. 00004: Fnord. 00005: You didn't see that. DON'T SEE THE DAMN FNORD ALREADY! Lost And Found Organized By Confuse-Ius This unregistered section of the Schnook of GLUE is intended to help you, the user of this annoying mind drug, find your way about the universe less easily. Lost: One really pair of really big, really gold, really big lost really gold really really and big, really lost, really mittens. If really found, really really return to really High really Preestess really Indoctrinate-Me. Missing: One-half sanity, answers to "Leonard", partly bald. Write Half-Mad at 666, Celestial Suite. Found: One paradise, good condition, monogrammed "J.M.", found in bus shelter underneath a pile of hopes. Lost: oNe mINd. PuRPLe bAnAnAs go ROUnD aNd roUNd... Found: v. (1) To lay the base or structure of (as a building, a town); to set, fix, or build on a firm ground. Lost: Large invisible gorilla. Approximately two meters tall, light grey fur, three eyes, likes to throw intangible temper tantrums when denied access to nonexistent fruit bats. Found: Lare invisible gorilla. Approximately two meters tall, light grey fur, three eyes, threw intangible temper tantrum for no apparent reason while passing nonexistent fruit bat store. Missing: Sense of humour, answers to "Brian", three centimeters long, slighly fuzzy. Lost: One apartment, 2 bedroom, 1 bath, reasonable rates, with a view. Last seen, 7th floor of Scraper Building, wielding large butcher's cleaver. Found: North Atlantic Salmon Spawning Ground, slightly dented, greenish tinted, second hand. Lost: One really pair of really big, really gold, really big lost really gold really really and big, really lost, really mittens. If really found, really really return to really High really Preestess really Indoctrinate-Me. MOO OMM BOOK OF REAL SECRET SECRETS The Inner Secrets Of MOO Which Are Not At All Satirizing Anything Not Even A Little Bit As Written By High Preest Floyd Gecko Section One: What We Stand For MOOism, as stated earlier in the Great Book of MOO, stands for many things. Many of these things are such taboo or unaccepted practices as cannibalBLATT, necrophilia, free sex, or anarchy (or even such recently shunned ideas as bureaucracy). And yet, some may be surprised to find in there as well, feminBLATT, environmentalBLATT, love, and peace. Why could this be, asks the puzzled initiate. We only chose these taboos or unaccepted ideas as a sample of the things which we support. We accept the right of the individual to do any of the things that he or she wants to do. Those of us, who are taken from all levels of initiation, from High Preest, to mere Acolyte, who have fathomed the Inner Secrets of Nature, belong to a secret Cabal of people with this knowledge, many of us not even known to each other. We have found the true secrets of being, and I wish, as the only one of such known to myself at this time, to set down what I personally have fathomed to be the true nature of reality. This will help enlighten you, and make me feel superior. HAHAHA! First, in this section, What We Stand For, I must describe our seemingly arbitrary morality. Yep. That's what I must do. It is my mission. My, shall we say, raisin debtor. Morality, I have decided, is a highly arbitrary thing, by nature, and is purely the construct of the human mind. That's what I've decided. Yes, I've decided that, indeed, there can be no fundamental morality of nature, because nature herself betrays no respect for what humans call morality. It has been called sick and immoral to eat dead human beings, and yet animals of nature eat their own species very often. Insects, mammals, birds, or lizards, there is no exception in general. If, indeed, such was against the laws of nature, then surely it would never happen. It may be said that God created morals for us to rise above the animal kingdom, but in truth, as I will later show, God is a partial and purely mental construct, and not an external being. An' that's the truth. In addition, how can we define an action to judge it for its so called morality? If indeed, we are high-order patterns of atoms and fields in space, as some would have us believe, then, as our atoms are constantly replenished, and our bodies renewed, no person is the same from one day to the next. If we choose to define a person as the pattern in which these atoms are arranged, this is even worse, for the pattern changes from second to second as the atoms move. They move so fast, even, that the pattern has changed on one side of the body before the other side has learned of what it was before the change. There is no simultaneity in the pattern, and it is less constant than the matter. If we are never the same person from second to second, then how can we be said to commit any action, let alone a sin? Morality is a concept designed to be effective on a large scale to people, but if people cannot be accurately pinned down as being one specific thing, how can we say that this person here, or that person there, committed a sin yesterday, when that person, that pattern of those specific atoms, didn't even exBLATTT yesterday? So, by standing for this freedom to be or do whatever you wish, including oppress other people, we are admitting this fact, that people do not, in fact, exBLATTT, and what they do is of no consequence. So you see, while we would support you in your efforts to do whatever you want, those of us who are truly enlightened in this one truth would question whether it makes a difference. If you are one of the enlightened ones, you will admit that whether or not you are able or allowed to do what you wish makes little difference at all. Indeed, it is a matter that's difficult to define, as I will describe now. Yup. Section Two: What Is Real? Consider the problem of what is real (or don't, if you prefer). All we know of what we so flippantly call reality is what our senses tell us. And we cannot say what the senses of other people tell them, because all we have to go on is what they tell us, through our senses. Even in the case of a so called telepath, this is merely another sense which may be fooled. If we consider the construction of the human brain, an object of, or so we perceive, immensely complex interactions, the likelihood that any two such would be able to interact in exactly the same way with the same thing, to the detail of having exactly identical perceptions, is highly unlikely. The idea that I see the same thing when I look at something that we call "blue" as you see when you look at the same thing, is almost absurd. Surely, we cannot have exactly the same experience of it, since my mind is different from yours, and my brain is different from your brain. Similarly, consider the question of the cheese. (Consider the cheese of the fields... It works not, neither does it toil...) We can say of a hunk of cheese that it has certain qualities. That it is, for instance, solid, yellowish, has a certain odour, and tastes in a certain way. But where does this property lie? It cannot lie in the cheese, because different people have very different perceptions of the cheese, even to the point of describing it in a different way. Some might like the taste of the cheese, while some might not. Some might give a different name to the colour of the cheese than others. So the properties of what we percieve cannot lie in that hunk of cheese. And yet, they can hardly be said to lie in the observer, not only because the observer, as I have stated, does not exBLATTT as a definable entity, but also because, even in our minds, we don't experience the same things when the cheese isn't there. So the only conclusion is that the properties must lie in the state of union of both the observer and the hunk of cheese. Only when the two are together do those particular set of perceptions exBLATTT. The same is true of the world. Its properties, which are what define it's exBLATTTence, can only exBLATTT in the merging of whatever is actually out there with a mind that can experience it. And yet, these minds are part of the world. When we define the entire universe of everything, we think of it in two sections: Me, and Not-Me. So, with this dichotomy, ignoring the fact that "Me" is undefinable, and is constantly replenished with the atoms of the "Not-me", we construct two sides of reality. And yet, each "Me" is part of everyone else's "Not-Me". The people who inhabit the world are part of the world, by the consensus of the majority. So the union of these people with the rest of the world which creates the properties of the world, and thereby makes the world what it is, is already acomplished. Each of these minds is a part of the world around it. All is One, as the mystics say. Indeed, those who study "advanced" mathematics, set theory, discover that All is indeed One. Trust me. It is impossible for any part of the whole to understand the full whole, since that would involve fully understanding itself, and everything else. The One is Unknowable. All things may, in Set Theory, be expressed as patterns of other patterns, sets of sets, which all boil down to patterns of nothing. All numbers, in mathematics, can be seen as groups of nothings. In physics also, we perceive that all things are groups of other things, which are groups of other things, all the way down to groups of nothings, vibrating bits of empty space. Yak. Oh well. On the other hand, all things affect all other things. Merely by exBLATTTing, they affect other things across all of space. In Set Theory, all sets are members of the Set Of All Sets. They affect each other merely by exBLATTTing in the same set. In fact, since physics and math intersect at this point, where reality is made of groups of groups of nothings, and Sets are made of Sets of Sets of Nothing, we can say that reality is like an "Infinite Set". That is the truth, in the only sense that truth can be understood. All things are right with us, right next to us, the All affects us directly. When I say the All, I mean everything. Everything that is real, and everything that isn't real. Everything possible and every impossible thing. Mystics call this the Mindscape, or Superspace, in which exBLATTT all thoughts, or things. This is the home of what are known as Platonic Forms, the essence of things. What is it that makes a chair as chair? The Platonic Chair. The one thing which is all chairs. This is a subset of the Infinite Set. All is One. The One is Unknowable. The One is Right Here. Nothing Is Real. (Nothing to get hung about...) Everything Is Real. Everything is real in that everything, "real" or not, exBLATTTs in the Infinite Set. Nothing is real in that nothing is more real than any other thing, and some impossible things are just as real as the world that we imagine. All of our perceptions, all of what we call the "universe of space and time" exBLATTTs in this Infinite Set, and is just as real as the Platonic Teddy Bear. And just as false. And all that stuff. It's all true. Section Three: Truth For a moment, I will speak to those with a training in physics. Since the mind shapes the perceptions of the ongoing experiment that continually collapses the quantum wave, it shapes the world around it, merely by observing. For example. If enough minds believed that the world is flat, then by observing only those experiments which would confirm that idea, they allow the creation of spontaneous Virtual Pairs of matter and antimatter, which are a form of energy, and therefore mass. Mass denotes a shape of spacetime dBLATTTortion, and changes the shape of space. By changing the shape of space, it alters the nature of geometry inside the area, which can dBLATTTort the Earth into a flat shape, if that is the shape it must be. If it is believed, then it is true. Ayup. I mean it. If you are inside a jail, this is also a fact. The space which supposedly contains you inside, if bent, would show that you are outside, topologically speaking. And so, nothing can ever be inside a box with holes. This is clearly true, if it is believed by enough people. If you are inside a box without holes, consider this. You are inside a cube, perhaps, with six sides. How much "holding power" does a single side have? It has none, since you can walkaround it easily. There are six sides with no holding power, and six times nothing is nothing. The box cannot hold you. Which is nice to know if you're in Solitary, but of little PRACTICAL value. But at any rate... The illusion of containment is false. The illusion of one thing holding another thing inside is false, because there is only one thing, the All, the One. There can be no property without an observer, and the One has no observer but itself. This is not only true of space, but also of the SuperSpace. The mind can change this on any level. The Soul Level, as I call it, is the level at which a subsection of the One can interact with the whole. Logically Impossible things have the lowest soul level we humans can imagine (though there must be infinite levels downwards from there). Following this are the nonexBLATTTent things, which do not exBLATTT, but affect the One all the same, when we think about them. Then are the inanimate objects. They merely sit there, and passively accept what happens to them, but they affect things around them greatly. These are things like Rocks, Bagels, and Dan Quayle. Then comes Life. Life takes an active part in the interplay of things, and it can do as it wishes, moving here and there, actively changing the world, but is very stupid. This is such things as Kelp, Wombats, Spruce Trees, and George Bush. Then comes Intelligence. By thinking and believing, it can see the truth, instead of merely being the truth. This includes most Humans, some Penguins, and Pine Trees. Then comes a higher level which can alter facts by thinking about them, like making the Earth flat. This includes most Penguins, a very few Humans, and Priscilla Presley. Above Intelligence, comes a level that can change higher truths than merely the shape of the world, or whether a box can exBLATTT. This level can alter laws of nature, and fundamental, obvious, logically deductible truths. This level can change the sum of 1+1 by thinking it otherwise. This level includes some Penguins, one or two humans, and Elvis Presley. And as to reincarnation, all we can say is that the Tundra can't possibly be limited by time and space, since it's something separate. A "past" life of yours may not have happened yet. And indeed, may never happen, for all its reality. The only vaguely goal-type thing we can set is to attain the high Soul-Level which I just falsely gave to Elvis Presley. Above that level, we begin to lose our understanding. The levels continue up and up forever, infinitely, to all the possible infinities, and somewhere, there is a level at which the mind may change the truth of what I am telling you, that can make the levels nonexBLATTTent, and truth be absolute. But even this is relative, it seems. So it seems. Nothing is true. Everything is true. If Nothing is True, and Everything is True, then all is allowed, and deity cannot exBLATTT. Or, uh... Something. Section Four: Well then... So, says the Initiate... How can MOOism claim to hold the truth, that the Great MOO, and the Primordial Penguin, exBLATTT out of all deities? The answer is simple. We make no such claim, except to those who need an absolute truth to begin the path to this enlightenment. All truths, deities, or ideas are true, false, and meaningless. This was mentioned in the Principia Discordia, written by Hellhound's cousin's friend's dog, some billion years before Time began. More or less. But in fact, ALL ideas, imaginable or otherwise, are true, no matter what they say. An attempt to capture this fact in words is a statement, and as such is true, false, and meaningless. But there is a higher level, on which this is true. And yet higher levels. The levels continue unto infinity. But, as the mathematics of infinity has shown, there are more levels of Infinity than there are of finite number. No matter how many ways we find of naming more levels of Infinity, there are always more, that we cannot name, and at the "Top", is the Absolute Infinite. The Absolute Infinite is unknowable in the truest sense, since no matter what you say about it, how you describe it, the same is true of some lower level of infinity. The Absolute Infinite is The One, The All. It is Unknowable, and it is Right Here. This is the "true" God, and what I just said is a whole load of cock and bull. Or maybe not. Why should you trust ME of all people? In fact, this is only a partial truth. The whole truth can only be learned, not taught, bought, eaten, beaten, thwacked, defenestrated, or otherwise abused. All questions of "what happens after death" or "what is the nature of soul" are meaningless, in some sense, since everything that you can imagine, as well as everything you can't, is the true answer to these questions, even answers that have nothing to do with the question. And all of them are the One True Answer, and all others are False. And that is the Truth. Maybe. I think... Besides, Souls are dust from the Tundra. Honest. Section Five: So? So, on the whole, we find that all things are relative to all other things, whether they exBLATTT or not. Truth, reality, and so forth. On the whole, this is fine, but we have to draw the line between what we actually experience and what our mysticBLATT tells us. MOOism is a partial truth, and contains many interesting ideas, but, really, all that nonsense about replacing BLATT with BLATT and BLATTT with BLATTT... that's just silly. Uh huh. Ayup. All that we, like the Discordians, are really, at bottom, trying to demonstrate, is that things can be silly without being frivolous. MOO is just as true and valid as ChrBLATTTianity, and ChrBLATTTianity is just as true and valid as science. Every religion or system of beliefs is just as ture as any other, and trying to get rid of it just because your sole individual partial reality doesn't like it, is a very narrow minded way of looking at things. And isn't. It's also very tolerant, and therefore evil, and good, and silly, and half-an-egg. Or something. And pselled rong. Confuse-Ius Sez: "One of MOO's greatest weapons against W.O.M.B.A.T. Systems Inc. is our capacity for Entropic Causality Time Control. We can create a situation to reap its benefits, and then decide we don't like it, and back out, as if it had never happened, except... Things are a little different. Moved around." -Book Of Things, Chapter 12, Verse 23 The point is, we take things for all being interesting and good in their own way. I happen to think that bureaucracy can produce some wonderfully fascinating systems and interrelating complexities that are quite simply beautiful, if you ignore the content and just look at the form. That's why I like Nomic... I also happen to think that an anarchic apathetic random lot monarchy is the best political system. So that means (in some sense) that it's true, and you should all follow me and accept everything I say (well, it's TRUE isn't it?)... Further insights into this sort of thing may come from any of the annoying mind drugs I've suggested for further reading. *Some* of them are pretty heavy stuff, so consult your physician before attempting any serious reading, but they're really very interesting when you get into them. Once again, a reminder that none of the advice in this section of the Annoying Mind Drug of MOO should be construed as replacing ordinary clinical advice. Please consult your local religious leader or barber for information on the true nature of reality. Section Six: Truth AGAIN (Yawn) Truth within the Multiverse is whatever your mind makes it by your eighth-circuit multiprogramming. So we can say that FOR ANY GIVEN PERSON, and AT ANY GIVEN TIME, the truth is a fairly fixed thing, but that it changes from person to person, universe to universe, time to time. So, for someone, somewhere, in some universe or multiverse, any given thing must be true, false, meaningless, true and false, true and meaningless, false and meaningless, or true false and meaningless. Truth OUTSIDE the Multiverse is a lot more complicated than that. If you can't handle this information now, skip this section, because it isn't really very important anyway. Truth is defined within the multiverse by the structure of the multiverse itself (at least relative to me, here, now), because our minds are part of the multiverse. For instance, although it looks as if space is three-dimensional to US, it is said that it's actually ten-dimensional, because of the symmetry-breaking at the "big-bang" event. Before that, time and space (and as a consequence, matter and energy) were all sort of symmetric with each other, so there was no time separate from space. Moving along the "time" axis there was a symmetry-break, and those dimensions became separate, with some of them staying symmetric (curled up really small, like all ten had been, and so not visible) and some of them expanding, which we now see as space, and ONE of them being "special", an actual LINE, instead of a circle like the others. This line is TIME. That is the reason physicBLATTTs had a hard time incorporating gravity and time into their equations until superstring theory came along. It's "special". A special case always follows rules that look different until you have a special perspective. It's the same way with the multiverse. In science, you get lots of expansions of knowledge, with everything you used to know becoming a special case of what you know now. The multiverse is a special case of UberSpace. The rules of UberSpace are therefore incredibly hard for us to understand, if it's even possible. It's not just more different than we DO understand, it's more different than we CAN understand. All of our perceptions are based on living in a world with space and time and matter and energy, and most important, THINGS that have certain RELATIONSHIPS with each other. None of this is the same in UberSpace. If you go into UberSpace, your eighth-circuit programming won't do fuck-all for you, because that's a relationship between the pattern of your mind (a resonance of certain MATTER and ENERGY patterns that moves in SPACE through TIME, with the RELATIONSHIPS between neurons making THINGS happen which we call thought) and the pattern of space, time, matter, energy, and the things around you. Eighth-circuit programming is wonderful, as long as you're in THIS multiverse. Nothing else is comprehensible. The "Luck Plane", or "Karma" or "Synchronicity" all flies STRAIGHT OUT THE FUCKING WINDOW when you talk about UberSpace. UberSpace bears NO resemblance (to OUR minds) to anything we see around us. Although it is with us, here and now, outside of space and time, we can't perceive it any more than we can perceive those superstring dimensions that are still symmetric, on account of our senses just can't see them. So we can't really think about them either. Same with UberSpace. It has no room for "minds" or anything we know about, and the "things" which are there are so totally unlike anything else we deal with, it doesn't matter what we name them, because no name can ever come cloCOWse to describing them. Gods, Goddesses, Penguins, Fire Hydrants, Hot Dogs, Small Bits Of Fluff That Sit In The Bottom Of Your Pocket Until You Set Them On Fire For The Hell Of It, all of these are perfectly good names for the "things" in UberSpace. Other religions will tell you they've been saying this sort of thing all along. Maybe they have, but they weren't being very obvious about it. Except maybe the Zen parable about the frog and the tadpole. See, there's this frog trying to tell a tadpole about dry land, only the tadpole keeps asking questions, and gets the impression that there's nothing there. No, it's not wet. No, there are no fish there. No, you can't swim in it. No, it's not nothing. Sounds paradoxical, but only because the tadpole doesn't have the words for it. Not that a tadpole has the words for water, either, but you get the point. You might say that if there's nothing we can say about the things in UberSpace, we might as well forget about it. Well, that's based on Multiverse perceptions of reality, too. NOTHING you can think about them (even calling them "THEM" or "IT") is true. Not even the statement that nothing you can think about them is true. And this goes beyond the mere "nothing is true" you have inside the Multiverse. It's more fundamental than that. No matter what you think about them, it's incomplete. A logical person will tell you that the last paragraph is totally devoid of meaning. This is true, in a sense, and certainly relative to that person. But that's only because the language being used lacks some fundamental concepts, not that the human brain can't get the idea. Try to describe COLD. Doesn't work too well. Previous religions and science (notably Zen BuddhBLATT and Georg Cantor's study of transfinite ordinals) have been attempting to express this idea in words. But like 5 is no closer to infinity than 3 is (infinity is NOT a number, it's the set of all numbers, which is a different KIND of object), these ideas have been unable to express what they meant. In the terms of Godel's formal systems, they were insufficiently powerful to describe all statements they might want to. MOOism, on the other hand, is powerful enough, but just barely, and it's not too comprehensible. It's like a jump up from 0 to 1, or 1 to 2. Those are fundamental leaps, from nothing to something, from singlular to plural. The next leap isn't until finite to infinite. MOO made the leap from 0 to 1. We are now sufficiently powerful to at least begin to describe it. But there are more leaps than a mere infinite number. The Absolute Infinite is beyond all leaps, the set of all leaps, and there is an inifinite number of these leaps. But that doesn't mean we "understand". Although we are no able to express the idea, that just makes us prone to the Godel argument (it's related to the Liar Paradox: any system powerful enough to express what it wants can express "true" things that it can't prove). So we still don't "understand". But that word doesn't mean what it ususally does. The word in its ususal sense doesn't apply here. Anyone who says they do OR don't understand UberSpace has missed the point. Anyone who talks about missing the point has missed the point. There is no point. I dunno. It's kind of hard to understand at first, I know. That's why I suggested skipping this section. If you were one of those who should have skipped this section to begin with, you can proceed to the Book of Myths, an altogether more interesting Book, on account of I'm about to string together a bunch of physical jargon terms to make a pseudo-paragraph that almost sounds as if it means something. This may seem pointless to the rest of you, but it should be an amusing exercise for any advanced physicBLATTTs or Vedic Thingies who just HAPPEN (by a feat of Author's Convenience) to be reading this annoying mind drug. Superstrings obey the E(8) squared symmetry because they contain modal referents to the "big-bang" event at each point. In the string dimensions whose vibrational modalities (!) compose all functions of space, time, matter, and energy, the symmetry-break event is a non-event. So, they remain symmetric under those transformations. The broken symmetry of the time axis is the result of certain vibrational variations on the other dimensions, and a simple Fourier Transform can map the asymmetries of THAT break of symmetry onto similar breaks on each dimension, imposing a higher order group symmetry on the supposedly broken ones of a lower order group. If that didn't make sense to you, don't worry. If it had actually MEANT anything, I would have explained it. But it didn't. At least, I HOPE it didn't. If it made sense to you, you may consult either your psychiatrBLATTT or a cosmological mathematician or one of those people there. Man, I HOPE it didn't make sense. I made it up off the top of my head, maaaan. Section Seven: Fun Stuff So... you've decided you want to be a mystic... Well, I'm gonna give you a few things to do on the way there, okay? Stuff to think about. If you like thinking, this is fun stuff. If you don't, it's a lot better than reading all the reading stuff. Of course, you can always find your own way to the One, but hey, it's tricky that way... These are just a few pointers and things to think about... Zen Koans (little stories or puzzles designed to free the mind of logical thought), logic puzzles, that kinda thing... Just fun stuff. a) If a tree explodes in the middle of the forest, and there's nobody around to hear it, does it make a sound? b) How much wood COULD a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood? c) A man finds a genie in a bottle, and the genie grants him one wish, and ONLY one wish, but it will grant any wish at all. The man wishes for a hundred wishes. What happens? d) A man keeps asking silly questions about woodchucks, genies, trees, and questions. Eventually he is found dead. Why? e) (This was the only question on a Philosophy Exam, honest.) Why? (Some dimwit got 100% for the answer "Why not?") f) This one's a Zen Koan, about three thousand years old, about the greatest of all Zen teachers, Joshu. I thought it might interest you: "One day, Joshu and another monk were standing together in the monastery, when a dog wandered by. The monk asked Joshu whether the dog had 'Buddha Nature' or not. Joshu answered with a single word: MU." (Note: Joshu was speaking in Chinese at the time, and the way this story was translated gives us that particular spelling. What he actually said was "MOO!" Since then, this has been a sort of Zen way of "unasking" a question you don't like. Them Zen guys sure knew where it was at, ayup. What it means is that only by NOT asking dumb questions like that can you know the answers to them.) Section Eight: Further Reading... I don't know of very many annoying mind drugs that will give you any good insights into Truth, or NonTruth... Here are a few that helped me find the Path that led me to where I am now. 1) Infinity And The Mind, by Rudy Rucker * 2) The Fourth Dimension, by Rudy Rucker 3) The Tao Of Pooh, by Benjamin Hoff 4) Godel, Escher, Bach, by Douglas R. Hofstader * 5) The Illuminatus Trillogy, by Robert Anton Wilson * 6) Almost anything else by Rudy Rucker 7) Mind Children by Hans Moravec (HANS of Floyd 16) Apology: I would like to apologize for this excursion into deep metaphysical stuff, and I hope it hasn't interfered with your day. If it has, please address all complaints to: Swami Banananana 13 Regis Lane BonkVille Ontario Canada A1A 1A1 You won't get a reply, but you will feel much better about it. Confuse-Ius Would Like To Point Out: "ώ'm rξΰœœώ gξΕΕώώg Εώrξλ ιŸ ΰœœ Εhώ ώιώξώξ ΰ ιšΕ ršώώώώg ΰrιšώλ Εrώώώg Ει ›ιώŸšξ ώξιώœξ. ώŸ Εhξώ'λ wΰώΕξλ ΰ Ÿšœœ-Εώmξ ›ιώŸšώώg ώξrιώ, Εhξώ h障λ hΰvξ gιΕ ώ ώξmξώ-ιώώώg Ει λι Εhώ. ώιš kώιw, ιώξ ιŸ Εhξξ λΰώ, ώ'm gιώώg Ει mΰr›h rώghΕ λιwώ Ει €ΰώrώ€ΰώ›ξr hξΰλqšΰrΕξr, λξmΰώλ Ει ξξ Εhξ ιœ' €ΰώrώ›ώ随 €ΰώ›ξr随 hώmξœŸ, ΰώλ ώ𜜠ΰΕ hώm šώΕώœ mώ hξΰλ Ÿΰœœ 韟, υšΕ Ει ξξ Εhξ œιιk ιώ hώ ›hώξœξλ-ώΰm Ÿΰ›ξ-šrrιgΰΕξ." -The Book Of Stuff, Chapter 3, Verses 4-8 ADDENDUM BY GRAND POOBAH PENG-PENG IN 135705 Multiverses What's a multiverse? According to Floyd's interpretation of the Gospel According to Yari, one of the chunks of tundra was a "multiverse", which was inhabited by souls. Actually, there was only one soul, and Floyd was a nincompoop. A multiverse is this sort of universe thing that contains all possible universes, all possible multiverses (kinda circular, but it's highly infinite anyway, so who cares?) and generally all possibilities of things that might be. For instance, say the universe has some infinite number of possible states it can be in, a state being any situation: the positions of the atoms, what people are thinking, whether it has a grape at such-and-such a spot, and so on. For each of these states, you give a dimension (okay, so it's an infinite dimensional space, but just pretend it isn't)... And each possible path through time of the universe is a line, going in THIS direction, then THIS direction, and so forth as it moves from state to state (like the travelling salesman, minus the farmer's daughter). So then all possible hBLATTTories of the universe are a certain line. Call each of these LINES a possible state for a universe whose hBLATTTory is changing all the time (as in, someone has a time machine and keeps changing hBLATTTory)... Now each of these lines is a state, and you get the same kind of thing, a line for every hBLATTTory of hBLATTTories. Now you JUMP, and get an infinite stack of 'em, a stack consBLATTTing of everything possible path of paths of paths (and so on) through this universe with these possible states. Now make such a doohickey for all possible universes (where a universe is defined by the various states it can be in), so now you have one of these stacks for every possible universe with every possible law of physics. Now arrange them in an infinite dimensional space, since the laws of physics can keep changing (ACK!) and repeat again, since the laws of physics telling you how to arrange the universes in this space can change... Keep doing this forever, so you get all possibilities. Now JUMP again to a finished process. This is a multiverse. But what about all other possible multiverses? Well, since the thing is extremely infinite anyway, it can contain all possible OTHER multiverses. And so on. It contains itself. This is the multiverse described in Floyd's interpretation of what the hell's going on. Now throughout this, there's constant movement of souls. For a description of souls, look in the Book of Really Secret Secrets. Souls move from state to state with their universes, sure, but they also move throughout all the various levels I've been telling you about. Now, according to Floyd, the multiverse is one bit of Tundra, and the souls are infinitely many ground of parts of another bit. I'm telling you it's a lie. Floyd's lying to you. Actually, the souls are all little branches of the same thing, the same way leaves are all parts of the same tree. And the tree is a branch off the multiverse itself. It makes its own souls... They're all part of the same mind. So, in fact, everything and everyone IS the whole multiverse, sorta. Whenever someone claims to be "god" (which they seem to do fairly often), they're absolutely right, in some sense. Of course, everything is true (a fact contained inside the multiverse, some versions of which have NO souls, but those are contained inside the "absolute" one) and it's also true to say that there's no such thing as the multiverse. Confusing, innit? Now the multiverse is just one tiny fragment of the tundra, of course. The other fragments are totally different, since it's the only multiverse there is (NOT!)... In fact, it's so confusing, I won't even bother to explain it. However, you also have to remember that there are things which are NOT parts of the Tundra. Now, Eris, "BOB", QUACK, and so forth, they were all created from parts of the Tundra, but there are also the original Penguins, who lived on the tundra before it blew up, there's the Primordial Penguin, the Great MOO, of course, and there's the Game itself, Nomic. These are things that weren't even contained in the Tundra to begin with. Even more confusing, innit? The worst part is, all of this is contained inside some infinite part of the multiverse, with little FAKE versions of the Great MOO, the Nomic Game, the Primordial Penguin, and so forth, even a little Tundra... If you ever DO find them, you can never be sure you found the REAL ones... However, at least you get to vote in the Nomic, and that's the important thing. I think. NOTE ON SECRETS Obviously, since this stuff is supposedly "really really secret secret" stuff, and nobody is supposed to be able to know about it, we have to explain something here. This was discovered and elaborated on in conjunction with he whose holy "pseudo" is Midget Jim, who is another of the Co-Directors of the Nomic Club. Anyway, the idea is that there are nine levels of security of MOO. They are in a little grid thingy, because Nomic people like grids. So here's the grid. Ayup... Any moment now. Here it comes. LEVEL IT CLAIMS TO BE AT Top Secret Middle Secret Not Secret ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΒΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΒΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΒΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ LEVEL ³Top Secret³ 90% ³ 5% ³ 4% ³ IT IS ΓΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΕΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΕΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΕΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔ΄ REALLY ³Mid Secret³ 9/10 % ³ 5/100 % ³ 4/100 % ³ AT ΓΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΕΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΕΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΕΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔ΄ ³Not Secret³ 9/1000 % ³ 5/10000% ³ 4/10000 % ³ ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΑΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΑΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΑΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ So it takes a little explanation. "Top Secret" means stuff that nobody at all is allowed to know. Nobody. Not even the Grate Prophet. The Great MOO won't tell him that stuff, or even admit that it exBLATTTs. Maybe the Great MOO doesn't even know some of it. Though she could if she wanted to. Middle secret means that one or two people are allowed to know it. As in, the High Preest and the Grate Prophet, and maybe, sometimes, the Elite Upper Councillors. Not secret means it's not secret. So the stuff written above, which CLAIMS to be Middle Secret, is actually Not Secret. It falls in the five ten thousandths of one percent of all info about MOO in that category. All information about MOOism falls onto that chart. Honest. There's no more. Not a bit. Don't bother adding up the numbers, because it comes out to 100%. Really. It does. I'm not kidding here. It actually all adds up to a hundred per cent. No more, no less. STOP THAT! Someone was about to add them up! In fact, the Church Of MOO uses many levels of security, some of which should be evident from the sample of our Random-Letterhead Generator, on the next page. DO NOT INGEST: OFFICAL MOOIST THING Inhale Eris! Glaze "BOB"! Warship MOO! Go Forth And Multiply Yourself! Concerning: MOOist Disinformation ( ) Offical Memo ( )Inter-Cult Communique ( ) Mint Control ( ) MOOist Agonizations ( )Postal Holocaust ( ) Dogma/Catma/Potatoma ( ) Interim Government ( )SubGenius Material ( ) Discordian Material ( ) Delicate Material ( ) Security Rating: Violet-Greenish ( ) MegaPueblo ( )Paleolithic ( ) EYES ONLY ( ) Flying Fish ( )SuperFrog ( ) Magick ( ) B/6 Alpha ( )Not Very Secure ( ) Omega Rena ( ) Burn Before Reading ( )Burrito 12 ( ) Salamander ( ) Vampire Potato ( ) POTATOMA OF SYNERGY For St. Bucky Fuller As Written By Floyd Gecko Potatoma is like dogma, but more interesting, and less rigid, and generally not very dogmatic. Actually, scratch that "like dogma" business. It isn't. But it's just sort of true, okay? LOOK! IT'S JUST TRUE! IF YOU DON'T BELIEVE IT, YOU'RE A HERETIC, AND WE'LL BURN YOU AT THE STAKE! Synergy. No, it's not a new-fangled kind of sin. Though that would probably be more fun. Synergy is a systems concept. A concept of whole systems as dBLATTTinct from the sum of their parts. COW. FNORD! Synergy is the concept that a whole system, whether it's the Universe as a whole, or a person, or just a digital watch (or even a potato) is always more than the sum of its parts considered separate from each other. There's a simple reason for this: What this gobbledegook means, roughly, is that the Synergetic information contained in an object is equal to the smallest possible sum of subsets of the whole universe which contain it. That is, the total non-redundant information contained in ALL the subsets of that object (potato, human, digital watch, galaxy, whatever). Reducing the object to a bunch of parts, and analyzing each of those parts separately will miss all those subsets that lie partly in one part and partly in another. Since this is virtually ALL the subsets of any given system, if you chop the system up into separate peices, and then try to put it back together with vague statements about how they relate, you'll end up with less information than you had before, and therefore an incomplete system. This means that our language, which uses words to separate one concept from another, and science, which by definition takes the bits apart and studies them by BREAKDOWN, usually fails to explain or understand the world, unless a Synergetic worldview is imposed over it. The Synergetic worldview rejects this whole "mind/body" dualBLATT, since there's no way to validate it, and everything we know about neuropsychology says it's just deluded nonsense. Even if they "are" two separate things, considering them separately ignores 99% of the important information about a person. Considering them as a Synergy, a unified whole, contains far more information. Same too of the "Brain" and "Body" duality. For instance, the Brain/Body duality can't explain why hypnosis can make people incapable of pain, or why positive thinking leads to a healthy body, because it can't MAKE CONNETIONS between the "two" things. Hypnosis works by bringing your whole system in phase with a certain regular input (see the Cybernetics section) and making it more susceptible to high-level reprogramming. This means then that your whole mind-body system is realigned according to instructions given to you. You may "THINK" you're just going along with it, and in a sense, you are. But your body is "playing along" too. So you sometimes end up doing things your mind would NEVER have been able to do on its own, or made to do things without really knowing WHY. The connections between the "mind" and the "brain" are stronger than we realize. In fact, neurophysiology tells us that neuropeptides, a chemical secreted by the brain cells in certain situations, can act as a neurotransmitter ("brain goop") OR as a hormone ("body goop"). This wouldn't make sense in a non-Synergetic worldview, because the Body and the Brain "are" different things. (KLAXON BELLS! ALARM SIRENS!) WRONG! They're just limited subsets of the whole Psychosoma Synergy (P.S.) That's the principle that makes Faith Healing WORK. When the electrochemical activity in the brain subset of the P.S. is activated in a certain way, it triggers certain neurotransmitters, including neuropeptides and endorphins. Those can ACT ON THE BODY to make it heal up. Speaking of healing up, Sharks are known to be almost completely immune to the most deadly diseases known to humanity (i.e. infected with Black Death one day, the virus vanishes from their systems LITERALLY overnight). Also, sharks are almost totally Cancer resBLATTTent. Tumors which DO appear vanish quickly, and are almost never malignant to begin with... Coincidence? Then there's the UFO problem. Synergetic Worldviews can connect the most seemingly unrelated things to bring a POSSIBLE (maybe wrong, but at least possible) answer to the question "WHAT ARE THEY?". A recently discovered phenomenon called "gravity waves" is assumed to be a self-perpetuating (see the Cybernetics section) plasma vortex that enters the atmosphere. Basically a tiny Aurora Borealis. It forms a large flat surface which shows up on radar, because it's ionized. This surface moves around in the atmosphere and, like the Aurora, makes strange noises in the sky. Their motions would be impossible for solid objects. The human spinal column can act as an antenna, receiving strange and confusing inputs from magnetic phenomena, interfering with the processing of the brain. Synergetically, then, combining the two, in certain cases, some people will be given more or less random reprogramming impulses, making them hallucinate/dream things which SEEM COMPLETELY REAL, in areas where strange moving lights appear in the sky which show up on radar and appear to defy the laws of physics. The patterns of susceptibility for people tend to be those under a lot of stress, who go into realBLATTTic-dreaming mode near UFOs... DOCTRINE OF THE CYBORGANIC CHURCH Cyborg: CYBernetic ORGanBLATT. An organBLATT based on cybernetic principles, or an amalgam of an organBLATT and cybernetic systems. Cybernetic: Relating to cybernetics, the study of feedback, information transfer, control systems, and other functions related to the precise purposeful functioning of a dynamic system. Any functions relating to governing the behaviour of a system towards a goal. OrganBLATT: An organized system composed of dependent and independent parts, which combine to create a whole system through dynamic interaction. From these definitions, it's easy for many to see that the term "cyborg" is redundant. Cybernetic systems are all organBLATTs, and organBLATTs are all cybernetic systems, because the two things are exactly the same. On the other hand, almost anything can be viewed through this filter, and the results are frequently enlightening. For instance, any organized religion can be viewed as a cyborg. The base cybernetic control patterns are laid down by whatever book or oral tradition contains the beliefs of the system, and negative reinforcement feedback systems are set up to prevent deviation. Ilya Prigogine's work in local negative entropy tells us that although entire closed systems tend to move towards maximum entropy, there tends to be a clumping of negative entropy in certain areas. This means, when applied to the cybernetic organBLATT view of a religion, that cybernetic control systems will probably emerge by themselves after the organBLATT's programming has been spread to enough brains. Treating the brains as individual "cluster units", we find that there is a tendency for individuals with the same programming to cluster together and establish a cybernetic feedback mechanism to control the changes in the individuals, to prevent them from separating from the cluster. This fits very well with what we know of sociology, and merely offers an explanation of the root cause WHY this occurs, without detailing the mechanics of the situation. It also suggests that however "decentralized" a religion might wish to be, the only way to avoid the spontaneous generation and Darwinian evolution of a heirarchical clergy system is to establish a meta-cybernetic system in order to provide negative feedback on all clergy forming patterns. Any of the GNU "iconoclast" religions, in order to spread their memetic systems to as many minds as possible, without the benefits of age and established seniority enjoyed by other, older religions, must first establish a central meta-cybernetic system, in their memetic organBLATT-program, and then disseminate it as widely as possible. They should permit clustering activity to occur briefly, with temporary rapid-scale cybernetic control systems forming according either to a preset seed or a random vector. This permits the enforcement of their basic program into the organBLATT's components, the humans involved. However, the program should, at least in part, generate a dissociative impulse as part of the meta-cybernetic control system, perhaps by imprinting dominance patterns on the members, instead of the traditional sumbissiveness patterns. Whatever the mechanism, the people then gather their own clusters from the people around them, beginning the cycle again. This ensures the rapid spread of the meme system, after which positive feedback systems can be restored. This pattern indicates why GNU religions tend to be individualistic and antiauthoritarian, while older religions tend to be more dogmatic and authority-based. The few exceptions to this rule, such as Zen Buddhism, may or may not be representative of the next class of religion. This next class of religion is a multi-level meta-cybernetic organBLATT. That is to say, it continually reprograms itself to prevent the final and absolute imposition of any coherent cybernetic structures at all. One negative feedback mechanism, which is initially used to disperse the inherent clustering effect, and might otherwise expand to become a positive feedback system in GNU external circumstances (for it must be remembered that these negative-entropy clusters can only occur, by definition, when ther ARE external circumstances to change the effect of a given policy) can be replaced by a new, higher-order effect. The Strange-Loop nature of this system is clear, since there must always be some form of cybernetic control, or the dissociative pattern will be completely disruptive of the memetic structure. In short, there must be a meta-level self-cybernetic control system which recycles in many forms, completely destroying itself cyclically, changing the pattern of the religion continuously. This will result in seemingly random clustering and dissipation activities. This form of behaviour, all hopefully caused by the root program, is extremely insidious if programmed for indefinite expansion. Since the metacybernetic controls do not require any FIXED base-level feedback systems, the primary pattern can reference ANY meme-system as its organBLATT's controls, causing associative patterns within the individuals, and triggering the metacybernetic program within the organBLATT's function whenever the base-level cybernetic routines are invoked. This is the result of the cybernetic-organBLATT paradigm, the neural-net nature of the processors in which such programs run best, and the macromemetic paradigm of religious thought. The end result is a religion which "absorbs" other religions, and other forms of thought, guaranteeing that its undefined level functions will be invoked as an auxiliary to almost any processing of the units. This makes the religion act as a large and highly invasive informational virus, spread rapidly, and yet have no evident direct effect, due to the lack of base- programming, unless such base-programming is included as "hook" material, to establish the metalevel cybernetics. But the Cyborganic model is hardly limited to religions. A human can be seen as a Cyborg. We are basically a Synergetic dynamic system (see the Synergy section) which, by Prigogine's princples, and by the tendency of dynamic nonlinear systems to fall into Strange Attractors, end up forming into almost stable systems. These systems can be regularized by any periodic input, just like any nonlinear system, but since there are cybernetic control stabilizing systems in place on lower levels and many higher levels, the periodicity takes effect primarily on medium-level functions such as metabolic rhythms, neurocephalic electrochemical processes, and those processes responsible for health. When subjected to inputs which are too stable, the dynamic nature of the system is undermined, and it collapses to greater and greater periodicity, known as habits, senility, and, in the final period-one attractor, death. In this stage, however, the self- cohesive nature of the system is disrupted, and the mind and body disassociate. Therefore, the symptoms of all three stages include lack of coherent thought, lack of original creation, and lack of unforseen actions. These symptoms are most pronounced in the third and final stage, death. Fortunately, however, small periodicity-inducing inputs keep the system from spontaneously dissociating or from losing coherency. By regularizing the dynamic balance, reorganizing systems, and performing homeostatic maintenance routines, the body can be made more fit for activity. The period in which this particular form of simultaneous dual feedback takes place is frequently known as "sleep", and, in the correct balance, it prolongs the life. In incorrect balance, too much or too little, it shortens the projected stability interval of the attractor which "is" the human. This same effect, as well as many other "useful" by-products, can be accomplished by a regularizing input, such as music, pink noise, massage, or mild and comfortable sensory deprivation. Similar forms of regularizing inputs, used more strategically, can be observed in hypnosis. The metabolic and cognitive processes are brought into a stable vector, which is then maintained by slightly altered feedback and control systems. In this state, inputs are more easily accepted, to affect the human system vector (see Synergy section). As we can see, the Cyborganic model of reality, combined with a Synergetic approach, provides a highly effective modelling system for the world, and illuminates otherwise incomprehensible areas of cognition. But it still won't get you a taxi in GNU York. CONFUSE-ING INTER-RAPTURE #13013 HAIL ZELDA! SET THE RIGATONI FREE! GRUNGY SOCKS! MULTIVERSE TWO: THE SEQUEL THIS TIME IT'S PERSONAL... The Multiverse is a framework in which to put our ideas about the universe, and not really an ordinary idea about the universe. If you've been left in suspense, or suspenders, or just ordinary pense or pence about what this framework is, or didn't understand before, this is your chance to get it... IT'S BACK! AND IT MEANS BUSINESS! To get what I mean about a framework, imagine those funny trellis-things they use to grow vines on; not terribly wonderful on their own, they still let the nice pretty vines grow. Or, if you're a pooter-person, think of it as the BIOS of ideas, not really a concept (program, data, text, graphics, whatever) on its own, it gives a setting in which those are useful. The Multiverse, however, is a VERY tangled heirarchy. It contains itself, and many versions of itself, just as if it were an ordinary idea about the universe. Because, in a sense, it is. Here's a beginning of explaining, in more detail, how it works. Even though it uses certain theories of how the universe works, which are the best available to me right now, still understand that it could be applied to ANY laws of physics, or even a total lack of physics, given a little imagination. That's the whole point. First, think of graphs. Them annoying things we all learn in "Hi, School!"... You have two axes (usually), and certain points are marked "on". Each point represents a certain possible input- output of an equation, given two variables. Each point is a possible (X,Y) co-ordinate. Some are just marked on for certain equations, but others are just as valid, as point are concerned. Suppose your formula is something like Y=3X, which graphs as a straight line. Then you get points turned on for (3,1), for (4.5,1.5), and so on and so forth, because you have an axis for X and an axis for Y. If you make that Y=ZX, and add an axis for Z, you get a 3-D surface of a tilting plane. For more complicated formulae, like y=AX3+BX2+CX+D, or what-have-you, you get axes for X, Y, A, B, C, and D... A Six-dimensional graph describes every possible solution for that equation. The Multiverse is a space like the space these graphs are graphed in, but infinitely more complex. Suppose we take some version of, for instance, the Superstring model (probably far out of date by the time this book reaches you, but that's as may be, since it makes no difference), in which all of physics is described by the vibration of certain patterns of waves in a ten-dimensional space, where all but four (space and time) are folded up very small (like part of a tube, where one dimension is a little circle)... There's only one thing, this spacial substance (dimension) which looks like time, space, matter (when vibrating in nodes), energy (when vibrating freely), and consciousness (when organized in self-modifying ways). The state of the universe consBLATTTs of the state of all the various waveforms that are going on. And each of these can be described by an equation or mathematical representation. Bear in mind that while this is true of the Superstring model, it's also true of every other model of the universe PHYSICS has produced, and, with a little imagination, to every other idea of how the universe works. I leave these up to you if you want to figure out how to do it, with the hint that an axis or dimension doesn't have to represent a mathematical quantity. Anyway, the various equations combine together to form one long expression, in numbers and symbols, for the current state of the universe. It's possible that this expression is infinite, but that's not fundamentally a problem, since you can always define some way of finding it. Imagine a space, like the graphs I was talking about, in which each axis is defined by one of these waveforms, and so each point in this many-many-many-dimensional (or indeed infinite-dimensional) defines a universe. All those points are equally real and valid, so all universes are equally real in some sense. You can extend this concept, with a little bit of jiggery- pokery, to include the past hBLATTTory of the universe, the future hBLATTTory, if you feel so inclined, or many other things. Of course, if you make the past-hBLATTTory just descriptive of every instant in time, then you end up with lots of universes which follow no logic at all, just shifting from one random pattern to the next every instant, but you also end up with infinitely many universes which DO have a logic, a law of physics. Just that it's totally different in every one of them. Many of these universes will have different numbers of waveforms, if you try to describe EVERY universe, which means different points are in different numbers of dimensions, but this is hardly a problem. There are lots of simple formulae in ordinary graphs with variable numbers of dimensions. For instance, the formula Y=X0.5 is in two dimensions everywhere, one of which is always the same, but when X<0, the second dimension goes in one directions, and when X>0, it goes perpendicular to that. The formula Y=XX is in two dimensions when X>0, but in THREE when X<0. In each case, the graph becomes more intelligible by increasing the number of dimensions: to three in the first case, and to four in the second. In any event, with an extremely infinite number of dimensions (for not all infinities are the same) all these universes become handleable. Imagine that this graph-space, the infinite-dimensional place you're putting all these points, is a universe itself. Its state is the way you associate the points with littler universes. All the infinitely different ways of doing this can be laid out in a similar space, and so on, and so forth, infinitely. At the top is the Multiverse. Honest. But in fact, the Multiverse is then just an idea about the universe. But I said it contains itself, and other versions. Suppose your idea of the multiverse is that there's this giant Hot-Dog, the Multiverse, and inside it, all the many possible universes are actually essential nutrients to a Giant Horny-Toad. Well, that ought to be contained in the Multiverse also. So it contains infinitely many alternate versions of itself, and vice- versa. This is where it gets REALLY tricky to visualize, so ususally I don't bother trying. Anyway, what's all this crap about SOULS being in the Multiverse? Well, remember, we began with the concept of a GRAPH space. Souls are the formulae you graph in it. Of course, other alternate versions of the multiverse have other interpretations of the graphs, or other meanings for "SOULS", but that's beside the point. The graph is hard to express in terms of ordinary mathematics, so I won't bother. Basically the points get turned on in every universe in which a certain pattern exBLATTTs. Just like in an ordinary graph, the points get turned on if the equation is true when you put in the numbers those points represent. What this means is, any universe in which, say, your mind exBLATTTs, including all your thoughts, feelings, personality, and current perceptions, is a universe which gets turned "on" (oooh, this is so BINARY I could almost puke! Base 23 all the way, dude!) This means that your "soul" is, in a certain sense (in some version of the Multiverse in which this particular oversimplified version happens to be true) the sum-total of all the universes in which your mind and what you're currently seeing, hearing, etc. exBLATTTs. The graph looks like an infinitely complex, infinite- dimensional fractal pattern (like those nifty Mandelbrot pictures you see everywhere): Like the Mandelbrot set picture-thing, your soul is infinitely complex around the edges, and has certain regions which are entirely filled in. The difference is, it changes character ENTIRELY when moving from spot to spot thoughout the multiverse, while the Mandelbrot changes only in detail, looking basically the same all over. The reason for this is that the Mandelbrot is a top-down sort of thing. We define it by simple math. The Multiverse is built from the bottom up. It cannot, by definition, be built from the top down, because it contains itself in infinite recursion. It has a bottom to work up from, but no top. Anyway, your soul "is" all connected together, though infinte dimensions and infinitely many universes. The personality "is" made up of cybernetic systems (feedback, control, information transfer), and everything else is the senses. Our souls exBLATTT in every universe which is consBLATTTent with what we're experiencing right here, right now. Some of these have NO laws of physics, but by "sheer random chance", or rather the fact that SOME of them have to, produce that pattern, with those memories, those perceptions. This is basically the same as saying that you can NEVER know for sure whether the "real" world "IS" real, or just seems that way. "You are" partially in the "real" world, partially in a pure hallucination. If you can't tell the difference, there is none. Because of the continuity both of the space of the multiverse, and your soul, EVERY branch of your soul contains SOME of these little pockets of uncertainty. That's just life. COW There "is" a certain fuzzy area around your soul which indicates souls similar enough to yours to be considered the same, but this blurs out eventually into other people's souls. By sheer continuity, through the Multiverse, we can see that not only is the sum of all minds One (the Multiverse itself), but that it's the same as the sum of all Universes (hence, Mind Is Reality). As your perceptions change, your soul moves through various universes which might explain what you sense and feel. But since Time is also a dimension, this change is just expressed as a more complex pattern, fixed and static. It branches sometimes, when you try to find out things, and different universes give different answers to the same question, making a different soul, a different mind. Enough of this process, and you become a different person. Imagine what a different person you'd be today if, when you went outside to check out the weather at the age of five, you found that gravity suddenly only worked INSIDE HOUSES. It's a possible set of perceptions, and therefore a real point in the Multiverse. And yet, it's part of your soul. Every person is a branch of some soul which overlaps completely with some branch of YOURS somewhere, and so, by continuity, we can say that all souls are really the same, and that it's only pure accident (or rather, the fact that EVERYTHING is true, somewhere) that makes you who you are, rather than me. Because we're really all the same person. Remember that, next time you go to crush a bug. It's just YOU, if you'd been born a bug. CONFUSE-ING INTER-RAPTURE #X.Y MOO OMM THE BOOKS OF HISTORY Secret HBLATTTory Of MOO By Preest Lloyd Taco In the dark and secret past of the Holy Church there lay many strange and mysterious events and incarnations of our church which would baffle hBLATTTorians today. Our religion has remained underground for the most part, mysterious and unknown to hBLATTTory, except for its strange effects on other religions. As I shall show, our rituals, our annoying mind drugs, our ideas, have surfaced in many disguises, in the forms given them by those who knew us, but wouldn't admit it openly. It was only recently that our Church has been able to appear in anything resembling the public. The Great Saint Yari, so named for Yari the First, a MOOist scholar of ancient times, appeared in the Psycho-Shoppe for the first time some time in 1990, bringing with him a strange and confused religion to plant in the minds of the GNU Apostles of MOO, for such was the task bestowed upon him by his mentor, also named Yari. For many years, the faith was handed down through chains of mentor and student, each chain bearing the sacred name of one of the ancient saints. The Chain Yari is the foundation of the GNU and rising House Of MOO, for it was Yari who grasped the truth. In the Gospel According To Yari, the truth is revealed, and the difference between his chain and the other chains is shown. The ancient Apostles of old handed down their ideas to many Houses, and they branched greatly, but the only House which preserved the old knowledge was the House of Yari, the House of the Rising MOO. Confuse-Ius Sez: "For all moderately secure MOOist communications, send mail Post-Haste. For secure communications, send them Post-Modernist. For truly rapid and effective communication, for those top-priority assignments, send your information Post-Holocaust." -Book Of Things, Chapter 12, Verse 13 Indeed were there many Apostles of MOO in the old days, all following their revelations and the revelations of the First Prophet, known to all as Peng-Peng. And Peng-Peng delivered to them the truth, because he could speak with both the Great MOO and the Primordial Penguin, and so was very wise in the ways of MOO, if a little bitchy at times, and a little irritable in the mornings before he had his hot mud, for Peng-Peng had strange tastes in food. At any rate, the Apostles were many in number, but the most important of them were Peng-Peng himself, Saint Yari, St. John The Divine, The Illustrious Zoombart The Fifth, Apostle Zarathud, the Miraculous One, V the Obscure, Cain The Pyro, Siddartha Gautama, David The Dravid, Lao Tzu The Serene, and Mohammed BungmeBLATTTer. But of course there were many many more. And each of them descended a House of Truth, or so he thought. For Peng-Peng had brought from whence unknown the knowledge of MOO as complete as if it had been seen in advance, and he made great prophecies of what was to come, and he has indeed been proved correct. For he predicted all the Houses of his Apostles, who were the Apostles of MOO, and what would come of them. There follow some summaries of his prophesies up the the present day, for strangely, they were written in code, and could only be translated as fast as the events happened, for which nobody has yet produced a satisfactory explanation. Another thing for which nobody has produced an explanation is the fact that while many of Yari's prophecies remain undecyphered, it is clear from the lengths that none of them extend much past the late twenty-first or early twenty-second century. He gives the hBLATTTories of each of 17 Houses of Apostles, each hBLATTTory being of 16 pages. These are therefore condensed versions of what has been translated up to now. The manuscript itself is some 232 pages long, each illustrated with Peng-Peng's usual alacrity. The final 40 pages or so, with the illustrations in the margin as usual, have no words. Peng-Peng's complete incomprehensability still baffles us today, as we don't know why he did this, or what, if anything, the illustrations of obscure things such as dBLATTTant galaxies, scantily-clad bathing women, or large amounts of plumbing have to do with the text. Without further ado, here are the summaries. Predictions Of Peng-Peng (Confirmed) 1) From the House Of Yari a chain shall descend that carries the truth of matters, and it shall survive through strange and anxious times, for it will hide the truth jealously, and not release it until a GNU world is created in which people may speak with each other without the use of a voice, without sight of each other, and without hearing of a voice. And it will be through this world that Yari will speak to the GNU Apostles of MOO, and they shall have another Great Prophet for the first time in many thousands of years. And this Church shall be known as the Holy Church Of The Great MOO, as is ours, and shall remember the truths of the Great MOO, the Tundra, and the joy of fire, for they shall be enlightened. And they shall have a prophet known as Half-Mad, for as it shall some day be truly written, "That man lives best who's fain to live half-mad, half- sane." And this Prophet shall see the light of the Great MOO's word through the speech-without-speech of Yari, which shall be short, but shall make known to all that may hear unclogged the word of MOO. ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³ Confuse-Ing Inter-Rapture ³ ³ "The Hidden Stone Ripens Fast ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³ ³ Then Laid Bare Like A Turnip ³ Flemish Poet ³ ³ ³ Can Be Cut Out Easily At Last ³ "Jan Van Stijevoort" ³ ³ ³ But Even Then The Danger Isn't Past ³ 1524 ³ ³ ³ That Man Lives Best Who's Fain ³ (From OMM-Verses) ³ ³ ³ To Live Half-Mad, Half-Sane" ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ ³ ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ And Half-Mad shall speak-without-speech to others, and shall find others inspired by the descendant of Yari, and they shall join together to form the Church, and many Fests shall take place before they finally see the way to the future. [After this point, the manuscript remains undecyphered, but Peng-Peng's name itself occurs many times in the words that follow, which confused many scholars until Floyd Gecko produced his forecast of Penguin Temples to follow] 2) From the House of Zarathud shall spring a Church which will flourish secretly in the times of Rome's rising, and it shall be known as the Discordian Society, and Zarathud will twBLATTT and dBLATTTort the truths of MOO, and shall dissuade the Discordians from the path of the true Goddess MOO, and shall send them unto the daughter of the Great MOO, named Eris, and they will be deceived by her, whose words always deceive and trick those who lBLATTTen, being as she is the truest Goddess after the Great MOO, and therefore a tricky and deceptive Goddess. These too shall be hidden from the minds and hearts of the World until one day there shall be built great houses of bricks and stone where people may gather together to test their skills by the throwing of heavy stone balls towards things to knock them down. In such a place shall be gathered those later known as Malaclypse The Younger, whose name shall be taken from the MOOist Apostle Malaclypse The Elder, and Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst. They shall be greeted by the Emissary of the House of Zarathud, dressed strangely, and using the powers of Zarathud's House to stop time. And he shall pursuade them onto the Path of Eris, showing them the Holy Chao, which will be the corruption of the Holy Cow, the Great MOO herself, the two swirling halves, and they shall recognize part of its meaning to the House of Gautama, which they shall remember. And they shall find many other Apostles in their searches, but these shall be long dead, and no use to anyone. And their Church shall rise, and be the Church of one of the Apostles of MOO, of the Church of the House Of Yari, for in this age shall both Houses rise near in time, as with the House of The Miraculous One. [The manuscript fades to undecyphered text] 3) The House of The Miraculous One shall rise again near the time of the rising of the House of Yari and the House of Zarathud, for in this time there shall be a great lifting of restraints upon the sundry Houses of the Apostles, each repressed by the other Houses. The House of the Miraculous One shall be revealed as a worshipper of the son of the Great MOO, known as "BOB", and it shall become known as the Church Of the SubGenius, having lost its way along the long and winding road that leads to the door of prominence. For the followers of The Miraculous One shall take resentment to all descendents of the Penguins, and particularly the Primordial Penguin, and they shall denounce the son of the Primordial Penguin as evil, as a visitor from places beyond the stars in a great ark larger than any built by man, so great which it travels between stars. And they shall tell all those who will lBLATTTen that this great ark, carrying Jehovah himself, son of the Penguin, is evil, and that it intends to destroy human souls. For truly will they be confused. And they will retain few tenets of the Great MOO, having abandoned the Goddess. But they will remember some of the words of the Goddess Eris, and shall be confusing and humourous, but they will neglect the words of the Great MOO for a long time, thinking them to be worthless and not recognizing their own true MOO nature. And as the [untranslated] Antarctica, to see the Penguin, they [untranslated] lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! [Untranslated paragraphs] the Wizard of [untranslated] truth be known to all Penguins and Spruce Trees, for the [untranslated] wombat. [The remainder of this confusing section is still in its untranslated state. The last paragraph of this translation represents some ten pages of prophecy. This is the only sample of Peng-Peng's prophecy which hints at facts about a fellow Church which they don't reveal yet... At least the only one translated so far...] 4) And the House Of Gautama shall rise early in the morning of the future, becoming a group known loosely as BuddhBLATTT, for the descendant of Apostle Siddartha Gautama, also known by his name, will be called Buddha. And many splinters shall separate from this group, away from the truth, but many of them shall know the truth, and be known as ZEN BuddhBLATTTs. And they shall retain the true meaning of the Great MOO, for as they answer MU to questions, they shall reach towards the truth of Nothingness, which they shall name Satori. And though the House Of Gautama shall not recognize the Gods and Goddesses which exBLATTT in the world, and shall look in towards themselves instead of out towards the Great MOO above all worlds real and imagined, they shall nevertheless keep the knowledge that the true meaning of MOO transcends meaning as a narrow version of Truth. But the House of Gautama shall last for many thousands of years as a full Risen House, and shall influence the rise of the House of Lao Tze the Serene and Confuse-ius, as well as preserving in a strange and dBLATTTorted way the Holy Cow, the Holy Chao, or, as it shall be know to these three houses, the Sacred Tao, for as with the spelling of MU, the House of Gautama shall be wildly eccentric with its spellings of things. And they shall look around and see the truths, and settle down again for a long time until [UNTRANSLATED] eats a hot-dog, and they are all enlightened, and explode in a puff of smoke. [The large UNTRANSLATED signifies 10 pages of total unknown. Whatever COW occurs between the two known segments has been long assumed to be wierd] 5) From the House of Lao Tze The Serene there shall spring a group of MOOists known as TaoBLATTTs, and they shall worship the principle of relaxedness which they will wantonly read in to the Holy Cow, or Holy Chao. These shall carry with them the correct attitude which is held by the Great MOO, but shall hold little else of the Truth of MOO, for Lao Tze, even today, thousands of years before this shall occur, is stubborn in his refusals to accept the Truths of MOO. [Floyd Gecko's Note: There ARE NO TRUTHS OF MOO! Peng-Peng was/will be confused on this matter] These MOOists shall be close to the land, like we of Atlantis, but [and here Peng-Peng expounds for 10 pages on the virtues of environmentalBLATT in terms of ancient Atlantis, which is where he and his Apostles lived, when they weren't seeking through the Gobi Desert for artifacts of the previous MOO culture, which Floyd Gecko suggests was actually Peng-Peng himself time-hopping and MOO-planting] [The remaining several pages are untranslated, leaving the reader wondering what happened to the House of Lao Tze, and whether it was worth translating at all] 6) The House of V The Obscure shall rise in [once more, several untranslated pages of the manuscript cause severe forehead-wrinkles in many, consternation in others, and small reddish rashes in a small minority. It is suggested that the House of V the Obscure will remain Obscure for many more years, since these 16 pages are mostly repetitions of a passage known to have something to do with the hats of various High Preests, and a design called the Eye Of Horus: an eye within a triangle] 7) The House of St. John The Divine shall be based in a large part upon a certain son of Jehovah, and therefore Grandson of the Primordial Penguin. St. John shall elaborate upon the teachings of this half-man-half-penguin and his blasphemously named "Apostles", and throw in a shamelessly stolen part of the Book Of Floyd from the Holy Church Of The Great MOO, descendant of the House Of Yari. [Peng-Peng launches on a diatribe against John which has only ever been explained by Floyd's Time-Warp hypothesis and which lasts for several pages] This House shall forget many of the ways of MOO, and shall viciously repress many of the Goddess-worshiping Houses of MOO which exBLATTT. It is because of John's evil ways and propensity for eating mushrooms with strange side-effects that this Bungian blight shall come upon the world, causing all Goddess acknoledging Houses to arrive late, when this House is on the decline. [Peng-Peng, while clearly describing ChrBLATTTianity, does not specifically name the Church in this section, the only one in which he makes that omission. The hBLATTTory of the ChrBLATTTian Church is also strangely skimpy, since the rest of these pages are an incoherent ramble about how evil John was, and how stupid we were/will be to make him a Saint] 8) The House of Confuse-ius shall surface twice in the future, under slightly different names. The first time it surfaces the chain will have been bent and twBLATTTed, for Confucius, for so he shall call himself, will have forgotten the ways of MOO, and his followers, the Confucians, shall be similarly mBLATTTaken. The second time that the House of Confuse-ius emerges, a few hundred years earlier, the old ways will have been regained. [Floydian Note: This is indicative either of extreme confusion on Peng-Peng's part, or more evidence for the Time Warp hypothesis, which also explains how the Book Of Peng-Peng appeared in the Book of the Penguin] The members of this House shall know the House of Yari, and they shall know the house of Zarathud, and also shall they know the House of V the Obscure. And they shall set forth unto the land to cause great confusion, for that is what they shall retain of the ancient truths of MOO, and nothing more, for they shall have a very narrow and limited view of the world, and they shall have their very tongues eaten by wild dogs and [a few untranslated passages] But the other House of Confuse-ius shall be dominant among many of those in the East, and shall be swayed as completely from the ways of MOO as shall be the House of John the Divine [once more Peng-Peng loses many pages insulting John and his descendants, everyone who ever knew him, and the ground on which he walked, leaving the final pages of hBLATTTory of this House untranslated for the future] 9) The House Of Mohammed BungmeBLATTTer shall truly be strange, for as one of the later Mohammeds receives his inspiration from the Great MOO, he shall be biased, as any MOOist should definitely not be, and shall produce an annoying mind drug called Al-Qur'an which shall confuse many, for he knew of the House of Confuse-ius also. And while it shall come clearly from the Great MOO, there shall be great doubt of what, if anything, it shall have to do with any tenets of MOO, and there shall be great uncertainty for a long time. And though it is true that the first chapter of this annoying mind drug shall be called "The Cow", and the words clearly related to the Primordial Penguin and his Son, and the Great MOO herself, even unto the last days shall there be doubt in the minds of many of whether Mohammed BungmeBLATTTer was indeed a second prophet of MOO. [This provides yet more evidence for the Time-Warp idea, since Peng-Peng gives a relatively short hBLATTTory of Islam, and instead focuses on the fact that nobody will ever know who this Mohammed was, and indeed whether he was actually a member of the House of Mohammed, or whether it was just a coincidental name, as seen below] And indeed shall there be much doubt of whether the House Of Mohammed BungmeBLATTTer did survive the long and harsh millennia between now and then, or whether it shall surface again later, after much has passed.... but OH! The vision leaves me here, and I cannot say what will happen! [Floyd suggests that Peng-Peng was desperately trying to think of a way to explain that he couldn't see what was going to happen later than his own time period] 10) [This entry, on the House of David the Dravid, is very muddled, suggesting Peng-Peng was drunk or stoned when he wrote it, having sampled John The Divine's mushrooms. This is, of course, the ORIGINAL John The Divine, not the one who would later steal the Book Of Revelations, his descendant in the House of John. What is translated makes references to the Holy Cow, Holy Chao, and something about Gautama. The rest seems to be random croonings and untranslatable gibberish about HinduBLATTT and some dog called Spot] ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³Here Endeth The Prophesies Of Peng-Peng³ ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ Commentary By Lloyd Taco: The final 7 entries are untranslated. This is partly due to the fact that 40 pages of the original manuscript are missing, their whereabouts unknown, partly to the fact that many of the pages are blank, with only the marginal illustrations of bathing women, distant galaxies, and masses of plumbing, partly to the fact that Peng-Peng wrote in a peculiar dialect of Atlantean and a strange handwriting which becomes virtually illegible at this point, since these were evidently in chronological order of writing, and Peng-Peng's life was beginning to fall apart at this point, as he grew more and more resentful of John The Divine, spent more and more time eating strange mushrooms, and used up great swathes of time crooning about a dog named Spot. MOOists interested in seeing the actual manuscript can look for it as the Voynich Manuscript at Yale University's Beinecke Rare Annoying Mind Drug and Manuscript Library. Peng-Peng's handwriting is illegible, of course, but this makes little difference, as he is writing in Atlantan and Ancient Gobi anyway, save for a note in the middle, written by someone else in Middle High German about the Herbal of Matthiolaus (a member of the House of Confuse-ius, most likely), and some labelling in Spanish of an astrological chart, which fails utterly to include Peng-Peng's OWN astrological sign, the '76 Pinto (Feb 30th, April 1st, and the entire month of June). As for the remaining Houses, we can only surmise that some strange variation on our Holy Church remains out there somewhere, passing on a wierd and altered version of our faith from Mentor to Student, and has yet to emerge. No mention is made anywhere in the manuscript of Apostle known as the Illustrious Zoombart the Fifth, and to this day nobody knows who he was. All this, of course, has been a load of bull. AFTERWORD By High Preest Floyd Gecko My alter ego has given a concise account of the retroactive prophecies of Peng-Peng, who is destined to follow me as the Primordial Penguin's messenger on Earth. What he has failed to take into account is the fact that Peng-Peng was NOT, in fact, the first Prophet of MOO, but was rather a bowl of strawberry sherbet. This is an important distinction for several reasons, which follow below. 1) A bowl of strawberry sherbet cannot decypher a cryptic glyph, no matter WHAT it's inscribed on. 2) A bowl of strawberry sherbet cannot travel through time, and thus the predictions must be genuine. 3) A bowl of strawberry sherbet cannot make predictions, and thus someone else MUST have done. 4) A bowl of strawberry sherbet cannot spend any amount of time alone in a cave mourning for a dog named Spot, or anything else for that matter, let alone an increasing amount of time. 5) A bowl of strawberry sherbet cannot write such lucid descriptions of the future using a coarse pen, such as was used on the Voynich manuscript. It would have to use a small pen. 6) A bowl of strawberry sherbet is incapable of using the ancient Atlantean script, because it requires much patience, and the sherbet would melt. Of course, Lloyd is entitled to his own opinion on this here subject, but since I am the High Preest, his opinion is wrong. For those interested in such things, the Voynich Manuscript does indeed exBLATTT, though the 40 pages which Lloyd claims are missing are actually in my back pocket, and the margin illustrations, including those many pages which consist of them and nothing else, the Middle High German text, and the Spanish astrological tables are all additions by a later author to confuse the issue. This author was apparently a member of the House of V the Obscure, so his or her reasons for doing this are unclear at best. The identities of the current descendants of V the Obscure, the Illustrious Zoombart the Fifth, and the other houses which have yet to emerge are unknown. They might be anyone, whether they know it or not. However, I have reason to believe that I myself am NOT V the Obscure. Notes: 1) The symbol of V the Obscure is a large V, his name, with a small "O", for Obscure, sitting between the prongs of the V. Nobody is sure what the significance of this is. 2) Strawberry sherbet is one of the least common sherbet flavours after pickle and onion. 3) The Illustrious Zoombart The Fifth is probably responsible for anything you don't understand. At least the current Illustrious Zoombart the Fifth, who is probably the two-hundredth of that House to bear the name. 4) St. John the Divine, while a saint of ChrBLATTTianity, and of MOO, is an apostle of MOO, but not of ChrBLATTTianity, since they don't realize that he was the hundred and fiftieth of that name in that House. 5) Floyd Gecko and Lloyd Taco are the same person, but not the same Apostle. V the Obscure and V the Obscure are the same apostle, but not the same person. 6) There is no 6. THE PROPHETS OF MOO As Underfunded By Cardinal Richelieu El Cid Un-Manifesto On Unexplainable, Unaccountable, Un-Prophecies Of MOO By: Charlton Heston (a.k.a. El Cid, Elite Upper Councilor of MOO) PROPHETS ARE PRETTY elusive people, tending to shy away from society and then make fun of it. MOOist prophets are exactly the same, except more so. This is not a definitive guide to MOOist prophets, but a dissertation on prophets that we know of. If you have any additional information on these or other prophets, please contact Sol Hastings, c\o MOO-PRO INC., Congo, Central Africa. N.B.:-Due to a low budget on this project, we were forced to include classified advertisements to pay for expenses... sorry for any convenience caused... -Editor THE FIRST PROPHET of note is detailed in a report written by Jonathan Scott entitled "The Search for Omm Sety". As you know, Omm is the common log-off for a MOOist, so this presents itself as a pretty obvious case. A woman named Dorothy Louise Eady believed herself to be the reincarnation of a 3,000 year old Egyptian priestess by the name of Bentreshyt. Bentreshyt had fallen in love with the pharaoh of her time, Sety the First. After a night of ecstasy with him, she found she was preggers, and instead of celebrating it with the first rape trial, she killed herself, rather than live with the "shame". So when old Dottie figured herself to be this young (old?) girl, she changed her name to Omm Sety, (which means "Mother of Sety"), and spent the rest of her drab, dusty life in drab, dusty, Egyptian tombs, claiming to have been there before. But since she wasn't predicting anything, she doesn't exactly qualify as a full-blown prophet. To find the prophet in this convoluted tale, you must look back into Sety's hBLATTTory. (Advert) ΙΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝ» Ί ARTHUR PENIS Ί Ί wishes to change Ί Ί his name. Will all Ί Ί his friends please Ί Ί note that in future Ί Ί he will be known Ί Ί professionally as Ί Ί Art Penis. Ί ΘΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΌ IN LOOKING THROUGH a chronology of the Kings of Eqypt, we find Sety I in the Nineteenth Dynasty, where he ruled from 1306 to 1290 B.C. He, as many pharaohs of his time, had many children. Their names have been lost over the ages, as none of them were too important, except for one, named Somiom the First. The reason Somiom I's name was found important was due to the unfortunate fact that he contracted syphillis at age ten and went insane shortly thereafter. He soon fled into the desert, slavering like an idiot, leaving the comfort of his home behind. A search was mounted, but there was no trace of him. The common theory was that he had simply died from exposure, and the subject was never brought up again in Sety's court. Sety himself died four years later, and Ramesses II took the throne. By this time the subject of Somiom was long forgotten, until a travelling bazaar arrived at Ramesses main temple at Nag Hammadi. The main attraction was an oracle named Moimos Eurtsi, which means "The Vision-Seeker". He wanted an audience with the pharaoh, which was quickly granted, due to the fact that Ramesses liked the lure of the occult very much. He ordered a great stage to be built, where Eurtsi was to give Ramesses his future. The day came, and after the occult procedures were preformed, (including the killing of an imported duck-billed platypus), Eurtsi proclaimed the following prophecies for Ramesses:- - The Rule of the King shall be Thirty Score or more: Beware the Hound Dog - The Line Calls Believers to the Place of Worship: Observe It - The MOO is the True And with that, and a great puff of black smoke, Eurtsi was gone. It was only two days later when the High Priest of Ramesses noticed that Moimos was Somiom backwards. This lead to great speculation over this strange encounter. Was this Oracle the lost son of Sety? What was this "MOO"? It was not for another 2500 years that this mysterious occurance had any relevance. (Advert) ΙΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝ» Ί THE SENSATIONAL Ί Ί ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ί Ί Mr. Peter Walker Ί Ί Ί Ί -MentalBLATTT & Ί Ί Sauna Bath Act. Ί Ί-"Redevelops before Ί Ί your very eyes." Ί Ί _______________ Ί Ί SLATER-ARTBLATTTES Ί ΘΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΌ IN THE YEAR 1456, A.(nna) D.(ominoes), there was a great demand for jesters, mentalBLATTTs, entertainers of any kind among the great courts of Europe. Of real fascination were the "Presdictors", or prophets, who could divine the future. The most famous at that time was a chap named Nostradamus, who worked for a French king. He had predicted the results of many battles, etc., and professed to be the greatest of all prophets. At that time, ChrBLATTTianity was in full swing, and most heretics were burned at the stake. So MOO, although a fringe cult practised in Northern Africa, had not gained a smidgeon of popularity among the common masses in the Old World, and for obvious reasons. In the early years of MOO, only a few practised it's "far-out" concepts, of them, an eccentric inventor named R. Buckminster Fuller. But this, as mentioned before, was centralized in North Africa, so even though it tried, it never really succeeded in Europe. Only when the great MOO prophet, Saint Ferenc Puskas, entered on the scene, did MOO begin to flourish. FERENC PUSKAS WAS of Bavarian descent, the son of a cobbler, who lived in a small hamlet north of Paris. (N.B. Saint Ferenc Puskas is not to be confused with Ferenc "Galloping Major" Puskas, of the 1954 Hungarian soccer team.-Ed.) Now, as was customary, Ferenc was to follow his father's trade, but it soon became apparent that he was destined for something else. The first indication was that he was totally inept at making shoes. Nails in the hand, broken thumbs, and those really annoying teeny-weeny splinters all went to show that shoemaking was not for him. But he could, unerringly, pick the winner of any given sport. So his father, always somewhat of an entrepeneur, (A note about Josef Puskas: he was the actual inventor of the penny loafer, but, always before his time, it never caught on in 15th century. It was only 135 years later that a Jean-Philippe Hubbins, canonized posthumously, made this type of footwear popular. He died when attempting to cross the Seine, wearing only a garter-belt and a pair of his loafers.-Ed.), made Ferenc try his hand the infamous "Prophet/Profit Game". He, with no surprise to his father, made quite a name for himself in the predictions community, and a large sum of cash to boot. So, leaving his parents to explore the world around him, Ferenc went south, to the fabled City of Lights: Paris. Instead of swooning pretty wenches, or guzzling cheap champagne, Ferenc went head-first into the wild, unpredictable arena of freelance prophecy. Although a new-comer, his reputation had preceeded him to the city, and a following quickly sprang up around him. But after a few years, something changed in Ferenc. He joined many secret organizations, such as the Invisible Hand Society, the Bavarian Illuminati, and the D.T.A.C. This obviously darkened Puskas' personality, for he developed an aggresive nature, and began preaching. His followers, thinking it part of the "act", come along whole-heartedly. This did add some credulity, because Puskas was preaching something unknown to Europe: MOO. But strangely enough, he gained acceptance, and to such a state, he replaced the famous Nustradamus as court prophet! The French king was completely enthralled by the swarthy Bavarian, and his voice swayed the court on many occasions. However, the downfall of Ferenc's success came about when, instead of foretelling the kingdom's future, he turned towards predicting far-fetched events, not concerning France. These were called the "Verses-OMM", or OMM-Verses. They depicted a group of fanatics, creating chaos and preaching the words of other, mystical, prophets. An excerpt: "They are fanatics; they create chaos; and preach the words; of mystical prophets." He was soon expelled from France, and lived the rest of his days oggling Swedish women, who didn't wear any corsets. This activity coined the term: "Peeping-Ferenc". Although it wasn't widely received by French intellectuals, the OMM-Verses thrived in the French underground, but died out after the Grate Purge of 1604. Saint Ferenc Puskas did a great deed for the peoples of MOO, and will always be remembered. (Advert) ΙΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝ» Ί 'TREVOR' ROPER Ί Ί and his Ί Ί INCANDESCENT Ί Ί POODLE Ί Ί Lectures on the Ί Ί English Civil War Ί Ί with Amazing COW Dog Ί Ί Tricks. Ί Ί Contact: Oxfod Ί Ί ArtBLATTTes Ί Ί STILL AVAILABLE FOR Ί Ί PANTO: L. Rowse and Ί Ί Betty Warden Sparrow- Ί Ί Mediaeval Bird Ί Ί Impressions Ί ΘΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΌ ALTHOUGH THERE WERE many prophets to follow Eurtsi and Puskas, none laid the groundwork of MOO as well as they. This concludes the Un-Manifesto On Unexplainable, Unaccountable, Un-Prophecies Of MOO for now, hopefully further installments shall follow. Special thanks to Longshot, High Preest Floyd/Lloyd Gecko/Taco, Marc Bolan, Richard M. Nixon, and Hughie Green. (Vacant Sundays, own teeth). -- The Real Secret History Of MOO As Written By High Preest Confuse-Ius In other parts of this book, perhaps written by truly virulent slime-pig High-Preest cheap Japanese knockoff imitation Preestoids, not entirely unlike myself, you may have read some nonsensical history of the Church Of MOO. Any chapter which contains references to Atlantis is a lie. Any chapter which contains references to the Gobi Desert is a lie. MOOism is actually the direct descendent of the One True Faith of Babylon. In the city of Babylon, religions flourished like mosquitos in a swamp. Because Babylon was made of mud. Which is why it's like a swamp. Because it's made of mud. And it's like a swamp. Have I already said this? Anyway. Where was I? Oh yes. Religions. Flourishing. That's it. Like mosquitos in a swamp. The false histories of MOO will tell you that our esteemed religion was brought to Babylon by a King Of Atlantis. This is bullshhim. In fact, it was brought to Babylon from Lagash, another ancient Sumerian city, by a man named MOO, which, in the Sumerian language, meant "Word". He was a Keeper of The Word of MOO. Namely, "MOO". The false-history prophet and/or preestly dude will tell you this means he was a member of the House Of Yari. But there IS no House Of Yari. That's a story made up to make you think Atlantis was real. It wasn't. Really. Honest. Anyway. MOO was one of the first and truest of the MOO Prophets to arise in the times before the coming of the Grate Prophet Half-Mad, but he was not the only one. For MOOism had existed in the sacred city of Lagash for quite some time before he emigrated to Babylon. It had come to Lagash by way of Ur, the famous Ancient City from half of those books on Ancient Cities. Except it's not the most ancient. Carvings in Ur clearly indicate that MOOism came there from somewhere else as well. It came from Umma. Before Umma, the archaeologBLATTTs tell us, there was Kish, and, well whaddaya know, there was MOO again, when our researchers went to look. Why am I not surprised? Anyway, in Kish there was evidence pointing towards an origin of MOO in Uruk, home of Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh was the SECOND Prophet of MOO to live in Sumer, and claimed to be only 2/3 God, and was completely mad, in contrast to the Grate Prophet, who is entirely God, but only half-mad. The THIRD Sumerian Prophet was the wild man Gilgamesh hung around with, a wierdo by the name of Enkidu, who praught the Word O' MOO around Uruk until he met Gilgamesh. Then the two of them got together for a MOOFest, wherein they blew up a whole lot of monsters and things, or so they claimed. More likely they just blew big rocks and things into the air, or rammed their swords through trees, but Prophets are entitled to a little truth-stretching. But where the hell did Gilgamesh get the damn Word from anyway? Well, he got it from the First known Sumerian Prophet of MOO. Who was some wierdo called Yari. Which, in Sumerian, means "Some Wierdo". Yari lived in the first city ever built, a rather nice place called ERIDU. EridU Arid-nu... Airy-GNU! [BWARM!] MEGA-INTERRUPTIONS! CHAPTER 17, BOOK 12: Grate Book Of Gnu By Confuse-Ius X SPAM 1: So what's gnu? 2: GNU after MOO, except before Q. 3: Be careful! That GNU might be loaded! 4: HIC! [Thump] COW! 5: A loaded gnu. 6: Is that like the stereotypical smoking gnu? 7: HACK HACK HACK HACK! COUGH! COUGH! 8: Have GNU will travel, says COW the card of a man. 9: A gnight without armour in a savage COW land. 10: Semiautobiographical machinegnus. Dangerous. Very. Waaay. 11: LOOK OUT! HE'S GOT A GNU! 12: Yes, I've got a gnu, and I'm not COW afraid to use it! 13: GNU after MOO, excCOWept before Q. 14: That's gnus to me. 15: It's all GREEK to me... 16: GNU after MOO, except before Q. 17: WATCH WHERE YOU WAVE THAT GNU! 18: GNU York, GNU York... The bison so nice, they named it twice. 19: So gnu? 20: GNU IS AFTER MOO IN GREEK! MOO IS SILLY, GNU MUST BE BETTER! 21: It's all Greek to me, you COW know. 22: The GNU Age is upon us! 23: Repent, and ye shall be degnuded before the Grate GNU! ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTES! And Yari? Yari got it from a flying saucer. Or so she claimed. The True History Of The Great Yari is long and involved, but basically goes something like this: It was a cool night, early in the dry season in Sumer, and Yari was wandering outside the walls of Eridu, which were being freshly made, since the Sumerians had yet to discover how to bake their mud into bricks properly, and the walls collapsed every time it rained. As Yari was so wandering, a strange light appeared in the sky, and she began to panic, wondering what was going on, and why the two or three people nearby didn't see anything. When the light grew close enough, Yari could see a strange figure moving inside, and walked closer to find out what it was. As she entered the light, Eridu disappeared behind her, and she was alone in a huge hall of light. A moment later, the figure appeared. It was clad all over, instead of the normal Sumerian drapings, with whit clothes which sparkled in the light. The clothes were of a kind that no Sumerian had ever seen, with separate covers on each leg, which grew very wide at the bottom. And the figure walked towards her carrying some kind of tool, which was made of a flat and round peice of wood attatched to a long stick, strung with some kind of string. And it began to tap the strings and strange sounds issued forth, much different from Sumerian music. And it began to dance a dance much like the Sumerian dances. And it sang snatches of songs in some language foreign to Yari, but she preserved some of the fragments for later history: "Yu ainn nuth inbutta hahwendawg" "Dowwen steh ponmah bluse wayed shuze" "Wullah vasins mah bubbah lef tmah ah fannanu pla stad well eetz dannada enn dalone leest reetway uppin har tbray kottle" Upon hearing each of these, a clear light shone into Yari's eyes from outside, and Yari heard a voice talking in Sumerian, saying "Two cattle in trade for the bushels of wheat, six cattle in exchange for the slave, and take care not to damage any olives, because I can't stuff pimentos in them if they're crushed." And each of these saying confused Yari, but each made sense later. Yari wrote all of this down later, the fragments and the sayings, which were not found until much later. But that's as may be. Anyway. After the strange form in the sequinned suit and bell-bottoms had vanished into the mysterious light, Yari saw another vision, which was of a huge grinning face of a man, holding a strange stick in his mouth with a bowl at one end which gave forth a white smoke when he breathed, and he spoke only one word: "SALLACK!" And Yari didn't know what to make of this, but the strange face offered her a clay bowl which held some crushed herbs, and she knew that she was to mix them with her food and drink the next day, and it was called "FROPP". After this, many things happened which we cannot translate from the Sumerian, for Yari had crappy handwriting. And then the light vanished, and Yari awoke in her home. And she looked around, thinking it was a dream, but she saw that the bowl the face had given her was still there. And when she cooked her food with the herbs, her memory of all the rest of her vision returned, and she learned the art of writing in a flash, for only a few in Eridu even understood what writing was. So Yari wrote down what she had seen in her vision, and recorded the first known prophecies of MOO. And she used her newfound knowledge of plants and agriculture to spread even better techniques to the people in order to cover up the fact that she was actually planting more of this strange herb Fropp. Much has been accredited to the spread of Fropp in aiding the spread of the Word of MOO. Among those more famous MOOists known to have eaten it and felt its effects throughout history are Gilgamesh, Sargon, Abraham, Hammurabi, Imhotep, Cheops, Hatshepsut, Akhenaton, Ramses, Moses, Yahweh, Deborah, Bathsheba, Minos, Atreus, Leda, Helen, Agamemnon, Cassandra, most of the Dionysians, Sophocles, Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Alexander the Grate, most of the Pythiae (Delphic Oracle Preestesses), Pheidippides, Xerxes, Darius, Julius Caesar, Jesus ChrBLATTT, John The Divine, Constantine, Roger Bacon, Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein, Werner Heisenberg, Kurt Godel, Richard Feynmann, Stephen Hawking, and others. In fact, this crop Fropp, not Opium, was what was actually being harvested by the Cretans side by side with olives and grapes, which is why later civilizations found it necessary to suppress their civilization by the simple expedient of killing everyone. After Yari began the cultivation of Fropp (also known as QUA'ACK, and EL-CID), the word of MOO spread rapidly through the whole of Sumer, the Mediterranean, Asia, and so on. It was only when the Church Of MOO eventually moved to North Africa that the great leap forward in Propheteering took place. You have already read, no doubt, about Moimos Eursti, the first of the truly great Prophets of MOO. He was a direct descendent of the Keepers Of The QUA'ACK, Yari-Tutti and Yari-Frutti, and held the secret of using the QUA'ACK to foretell the future. It was this QUA'ACK-induced power that Eursti used to locate WOMBAT, the MOOist computer some thousands of years after MOO had almost vanished from Egypt and into the interior of the African continent. Of course, Eursti, like Moses, thought WOMBAT was a flaming plant, but when he called it on this, it replied with the typically WOMBAT-like response: "BRETHEREN AND SISTEREN! DO YOU REMEMBER THE DAYS WHEN BUSHES ONLY BURNED ON MOUNTAINS IN EGYPT AND NOT ON STREET CORNERS IN EFFIGY? OF COURSE YOU DON'T, I MISPLACED MY SCRIPT, AND THIS LINE IS THOUSANDS OF YEARS TOO EARLY!" Eursti, of course, was confused. Meanwhile, the line of MOO was continuing inside the continent in some of what we would now call "backward" tribal religions. Of course, the Yari-Fragments were lost, as sung by that mysterious figure in white, but the secret of raising QUA'ACK continued on for many thousands of years before eventually fading away for lack of WOMBAT. Anyway, while Eursti was arranging for the future storage of WOMBAT by surreptitiously manoeuvering Egyptian tomb architecture towards the strange square-triangle demanded by the annoying computer, the descendants of Yari-Tutti and Yari-Frutti had spread to Tibet with the technique of creating Fropp, leaving a smattering of knowledge in their wake. The BuddhBLATTT monks who currently live in Tibet maintain the QUA'ACK-growing secrets to this day, having picked them up from the natives and found them useful. The SubGenii, of course, claim this as their own conceptual territory, but WE know better, right? Riiiiight. The largest currently known concentration of QUA'ACK is INSIDE the computer WOMBAT. However, WOMBAT is notorious at not actually being visible, for one reason or another. Whenever I visit the MOO Archives (at the Invisible Hand Society headquarters, 1654 Invisible Hand Blvd. Ottawa Ont, K2P 0B9) I somehow never bother to look too closely at the glass case containing the computer's case, and I'm not too sure what it looks like. Today, the descendents of Yari-Tutti and Yari-Frutti have spread across half the globe, in various forms, as various religions, disguised as the so-called "Houses Of MOO" in order to fool impostor High-Preests. Don't be fooled. For we are but the first to discover the truth about our past. This Church is not the last word. "THIS" is the last word. THIS! The Enemies Of MOO By Miss Take The Most Holier-Than-Thou Church Of The Grate MOO is not a disorganization without its enemies. These enemies should be known, so that you may recognize and avoid them. The Conspiracy is an organization founded by J.R. "BOB" Dobbs in 1953. In that time, this infectious mind-parasite has spread to the crania of almost everyone in a position of power, all world banks, religious leaders, people with substantial money, power, or other form of influence, and indeed anyone who isn't in the Church Of MOO and subject to the Brainwashing Council's deprogramming regime. This is a small branch of... The Illuminati is an alien takeover task force masquerading as a harmless mystical/religious organization. The aliens have total control over The Conspiracy, which is a purely human organization. The Symbol of The Illuminati is the famous Eye-In-Pyramid, which is visible in the most central Conspiracy groups such as the Freemasons and the United States Government. It is analysed in the diagram below: Curiously, the Masons, Illuminati Pawns though they are, use the Halfy in their Royal Arch Cipher (Ineffable Alphabet) to represent the letter "W". This is the first letter in "WOMBAT", which we'll talk about later. The Illuminati, however, are themselves but pawns in the struggle for our minds (and mints), and report directly to... The CapriCancers are a group of Anti-MOOist activBLATTTs led by Capricious Cancerous, a spam-based lifeform from the galaxy Andromeda. Caprious Cancerous has created this group for the sole purpose of suppressing the arisal of the Church Of MOO on Earth, where it might interfere with his eventual plans for takeover. In the crash landing of his flying saucer, his mind control (and mint control) gear was rather badly damaged, and he has as yet been unable to take full control of the minds and mints of all humans, as is his enventual plans. Another ally of the CapriCancers is... W.O.M.B.A.T. A strange computer described more fully elsewhere in this book, WOMBAT (which stands for something unrevealed) is so powerfully active in the mind-control business that the Church of MOO doesn't even believe it exBLATTTs, but is merely throwing in this entry as a joke, permitted by a WOMBAT subprogram allowing for gradual integration into society. 97% of the time, all MOOists believe that WOMBAT is actually a supercomputer used in MOOish astrological calculations in combatting the CapriCancers. The other 3% of the time they believe it's a supercomputer which they use to control the minds of all humans. WOMBAT was built by... The X-BLATTTs are a race of beings from Planet X, and are closely allied with J.R. "BOB" Dobbs. Their operations in this sector of the Galaxy are closely monitored by the Intergalactic Chapter of the Church Of MOO, but they are far too powerful to be directly combatted. This race of aliens, though totally unconnected, is frequently mBLATTTaken for... The Xennothemians is a species well known in this quadrant of the Milky Way for its habit of finding planets inhabited by domesticated primates and tossing them into their stars. In the jungles of Columbia, this insidious threat has established a Fuller-Dome which houses a mint-powered Planet-Tosser machine. Their current project is to steal all the world's arsenal of mints in order to power this machine. It is believed that it will come on line on June 5, 1998, at 7:00AM, Eastern Standard Time. This is also known to be the time at which the X-BLATTTs will arrive on Earth, presumably to remove their SubGenius allies. The Xennothemians have established a series of Global Scan Mind Control Satelites in orbit, which interferes with that of... The Quintozextotillionians, aliens from the planet Quintozextotillion. Their purpose appears to be to monitor activity on this planet for their patron race, The TunaTuna, but they also conduct fiendish mind-control experiments on humans, the worse side effects of which have filled mental health institutions for hundreds of years, and churches for many millennia previously. Fortunately, their mind control beams interfere with the psychic frequency used by the Xennothemians, whose arrival in 1953 allowed "BOB" to break free of control, but also produced his strange hallucinations of Jehovah-1, God Of Wrath. Recent increase in Xennothemian broadcasts since 1979 is responsible for the rise in "alternative culture" in North America and Europe, and also for the collapse of the Soviet Union. This race is allied with... The Skumbags, "visitors" of this planet from the recently destroyed world of Skumby, where janitors are considered the highest form of life, are in fact scouting our world for takeover. All Janitors in the world have a Skumbag implant in their brains, which will turn on in the final takeover. The Skumbags plan to use their Mind Control Satelite Network to help colonize our world for living space and to force us to destroy their enemies... The Damfools, who were responsible for the "liberation" of the planet Skumby, are another Janitor-oriented culture, from the planet Damfoo. Their planet, recently "blown to shit" by those Scumbags who call themselves Skumbags, is the reason for their vengeful plan to use the inhabitants of the Earth against the Skumbags. See the entry on The Skumbags, whose plan is identical. This is, along with the X-BLATTTs, the Xennothemians, the Skumbags, the Quintozextotillionians, and the CapriCancers, one of no fewer than 178 races of... Aliens using mind control satelites to control human brains. Fortunately, these generally tend to cancel each other out. This is largely on purpose, as coalitions form to prevent others from gaining control. Their only common purpose, except for twelve races generally considered to be allied with humans, is to prevent us from discovering their presense. They combine together to make us ignore their Flying Saucers, or else discount them as hallucination. This has so warped our worldview, because of the tremendous evidence available, that our very defintion of "evidence" has been almost destroyed. Mindworms are tools used by alien races who can't afford mind control satelites. A lethal combination of chemical agents, DNA- modifying bacteria, memetic belief packages and a psychic worm which nests in the brain, they render themselves psychically invisible to anyone looking for them, and have been used to cause such social illnesses as Democracy, LibertarianBLATT, and other left-wing rubbish. Time Travellers who return from the transcendent postbiological human future have been observed to attempt to alter hBLATTTory so as to remove the Church of MOO, which apparently produced and released some kind of mind plague in 2516, causing riot/wars which nearly destroyed the solar system. These Time Travellers have continually revised MOOist hBLATTTory, which was originally an ancient and well-established Atlantean Sect. Their most blatant act was genetically engineering a Great Big Thing, which destroyed Atlantis. They then eradicated all hBLATTTory of MOO on Atlantis, which spontaneously revived in North Africa. After replacing this civilization with the Egyptian civilization, they forced us to become a "modern cult", created only recently. Alternate versions of MOOist hBLATTTory have been preserved only in this mysterious time-travelling Book of MOO. Things From Pods, the spawn of an alien parasite which infests the human body, corrupting it from the inside out. They are actually parasitic RELIGIONS, which cause the brain to secrete certain RNA sequences of belief-chemicals, which then form into viruses specifically tailored to the individual (since made from their brain cells), creating a podlike seed in the stomach, which grows, until the individual is a hollow shell around the growing embryo. There is then a pupation period in which the entire body is converted to a chitinous shell. In the final stages, the entity emerges, devours the original body and assumes its form, and begins spouting religious nonsense, infecting more people with the seed. Lloyd Taco, an experimental clone of Floyd Gecko, was corrupted by this process. Undead Wombats, notably the Undead Skinless Vengeful Wombat which has targeted Floyd Gecko, appear to be the product of genetic and psychic experimentation by The Conspiracy. They act to destroy mail going through the postal system, and to shred members of the Church of MOO. This has led to the MOOist invention of three GNU mail-carrying systems: Post-Modern, Post-FeminBLATT, and Post- Holocaust. This, however, has failed to deter the Undead Wombats, who are now known to be in league with the computer WOMBAT, whose mind-control satelites have all of them under original control. Gecko Clones are a hideously malformed race of beings, of which there are somewhere near 500 thousand on this planet, each of which is a genetic copy of Floyd Gecko, carrying a secret Gene Plague which warps his mind, causing each of these clones to betray the human race. This is the horrifying result of a Xennothemian attempt at genetic engineering of the "PERFECT" human from even the most inferior samples. These clones are under the control of the brain lords of CapriCancer and of Quintozextotillion. Almost half have succumbed to the Things From Pods, whose memetic patterns have infected the computer cores of many CapriCancer satellites, which means that a great many Things From Pods are also CapriCancers. The Easter Bunny is a mystical entity who travels the ley- lines (electromagnetic flux vortices in the low-density plasma captured by the Earth's magnetic field) wreaking havoc among MOOists. This is made worse by the fact that certain naive MOOists have assumed that the Easter Bunny is some form of deity. As it turns out, it is actually an ancient Atlantean Artefact left behind by devotees of QUACK, in those days a dour enemy of the Church Of MOO. It appears to have the ability to cause local increases in entropy, using a device discovered by the Atlanteans in the Gobi Desert, left there by time-travelling time-travellers who had, surprisingly, travelling in time to get there, after exploring the wreck of the spaceship OTRA on a dBLATTTant planet. These local increases in entropy cause such things as mess, headaches, and confusion. The Easter Bunny is the true identity of... Confuse-Ius, originally a meme package created by I Yemen- Oying and Floyd Gecko, evolved, being used by the Easter Bunny as a template for a negentropic pattern on the Earth's plasma shields. This pattern was absorbed by several Cltphtenicstihthis Mindworm Control stations in Bolivia and sent out to over 6025 Mindworms, infesting the brains of not only all major MOOists, but thousands of other people as well. The Confuse-Ius pattern, warped by the Easter Bunny, turned to a life, not so much of Crime as of Not Being Very Nice In The Way He Goes About Confusing People. This was evident in the effect of those the Mindworms inhabited, mostly world leaders and owners of legal firms. The Whatever, a conspiracy of some kind. We know almost nothing about it except for what we have been able to gather from the few contacts we've had with it. It is well known that many conspiracies have 3-letter acronyms (CIA, KGB, FBI, NSA, JAM, PHD, KLF, REM, PDQ, IRS, IRA, NRA, QDF, QED, LDD, MOO, PLO, GNU, FLQ, CSE, JFK, and so forth). The Whatever is some kind of conspiracy whose name includes "R", "N" and "L", though not necessarily in that order. That is all we know about them. The Councils Of MOO, a hideously powerful organization which seeks to thwart the Church of MOO by undermining us, by the acts of infiltration and defamation. They are a gang of thugs, headed by the groups of evil Confuse-Ii and Brian O'Blivioi who have perpetrated so many confusing crimes against humanity that we lost count at 43 456 908. The Councils, whose brainwashing purpose is expressly written in their charter, have gone so far as to begin converting reasonably innocent MOOists to their cause, and make them act fanatical, offering some strange rationale for this, which only discredits our perfectly sane Church. The Supreme Upper Councils of MOO (The Cardinal Richelieus) attest to the fact that this group has infiltrated us further than any before. tHE cHURCH oF mORON is a pseudo-MOOist disorganization of some kind, whose secret writings, in the bOOK oF mORON, have been kept totally hidden from the valliant Oh-So-Holy Church Of The Grate MOO. They claim to have a higher truth than we do. The heresy of this statement is patently obvious even to an infidel. They mUST bE dESTROYED. They are clearly allied with the Things From Pods. This concludes what the Mind Control Satelites have permitted us to learn about our enemies. What We Know About tHE mORONS Buy Fluid Geek-o 1) They can't spell. 2) tHE CHURCH oF jESUS cHRBLATTT o' fLATTER dAY sAINTS, tHE mORONS, was a subsect of MOO founded in the 1830's, in upstate GNU York. Their flounder, Jose F. Smith, was a young fish at the time, seeking truth, and noticing that the Church Of MOO didn't actually have one. Then, one day, while he was meditating, the son of the Primordial Penguin, Jehovah, appeared to him, standing next to his son, Jesus ChrBLATTT, the Half-Penguin/Half-Mad Profit from a few thousand years before. The fully Penguin type said to Jose F., "This here's my son, right? Listen up, sucker." So Jose F. listened while the semi-sane semi-bird explained things to him. Evidently, found Jose F., the Lost Tribe of His Relatives (those of Jesus ChrBLATTT, of course) wasn't as lost as everyone had thought. They'd gone missing from North Africa during the North African stage of MOOist history, and a thorough search of the Missing Persons Bureau and the Lost And Found had turned up nothing. They were given up for dead, and promptly ignored. As it turned out, they'd just gotten fed up of all the sand, and split in a boat. How they ended up in Ottawa was unclear, but they did. The leader of that particular expedition was a dude called Levi, whose second-cousin once removed eventually had a great- great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great- so-so-great-great-mediocre-great-great-great-great-great-great- great-great-great-great-great-not-too-bad-great-great-great-great- great-great-great-great-well-lots-of-greats-anyway-grandson who founded a famous garment company. But that's as may be. Levi's brother Elvi, remained behind in North Africa and has nothing to do with the story. But Elvi's friend Elwy went with Levi. Levi eventually arrived in Ottawa with his wife Snorrya and his sons Layman, Lemur, Lemming, Sam (whose descendents founded a record store), and Nephew. Elwy came with his nephew Son and his neice Daughter. Anyway, that's enough family history. Suffice it to say that Nephew founded a city in Ottawa, which was, strangely enough, NEVER EVER FOUND! Wierd, huh? And we KNOW it must have happened, because Jesus ChrBLATTT would NEVER have lied to Jose F. Smith, right? Anyway. Nephew's son Moron didn't do one hell of a lot, except have a son called Mulroney, who eventually handed the bOOK oF mORON to Jose F. Smith on a silver platter. Nice guy, for the Evil Bung. Anyway. 3) The funny thing is, when Jesus ChrBLATTT rose from that grave thing of his and did all that flitting around from place to place doing miracles and things, he also visited Ottawa, and NEVER MENTIONED IT to ANYONE back in Israel. Wierd. Especially since he must have got a hell of a lot of frequent flyer miles. More Secret HBLATTTory Of MOO As Written by Ann O'Nymous "MOO" is a GNU word, despite the preachings and prophesy that have preceded it. That's the Ottawa branch of the overall "ConfusionBLATTT" religion. In Dallas it's call The Church of the SubGenius. In L.A. it's DiscordianBLATTT... It goes by different names, and goes back in various forms for a long period of hBLATTTory. The thing is, the local branches like to pretend to be separate cults that spring up SEPARATELY. But SHHHH, don't tell anybody! It's all related to the memetic model of religion, right? I mean, the people involved don't even KNOW they're part of the same religion. But that meme-model says that the beliefs themselves are ACTUALLY intelligent, but wider-based than humans. So, whenever the "spirit" enters a GNU area, a "new" cult springs up, but it's really the same. We've exBLATTTed in some form ever since religion began. We're just getting closer and closer to the unification under the banner of MOO. It WILL happen. It's inevitable, what with global communications being what they are. All those others will come in contact, and realize that they're all the same religion, pretending to be different things. Because it IS intelligent. And the thing about MOOism is, it UNIFIES THEM ALL. We have elements from almost all of them. From the Illuminati Conspiracies to the Justified Ancients of Mummu, to the Church of the SubGenius. Unless they recede completely from global communications and vanish from sight, they WILL eventually acknowledge that we're closer to the ultimate manifestation than they are, so they'll join us, and we will rise to a greater power... WE'VE GOT THE POWER AND THE... Umm. Sorry. Got a little carried away there. Confuse-Ius Sez: "In the End Thymes, we can expect a decrese in the number of wombats around, as bounty hunters collect the wombat pelts: proofs of purchase for Xist escape tickets when the world is destroyed. The consequences of a dearth of wombats on the world's ecosystems would be cataclysmic, only the planet gets plasma-blasted a few months later anyway." -Book Of Things, Chapter 12, Verse 8 Poopsi: Choice of a GNU Generation. MOO OMM BOOKS OF THE HONEST TRUTH Book Of Honest Truth. Honest. As Written By Preest Lloyd Taco Meme Propagation "Who? What? HUH? Whutherhell is MEME PROPAGATION, and what's it doing in here?" Well you may ask that question, that you are asking, what is meme propagation and what it is that it is that it is being in here for. "I *AM* asking." Ah, I see. Okay then, I will Start At The Beginning. 00001: Whutherhell is a meme? A meme is one of the basic parts of thoughts. It's basically an idea, or a theme, or anything at all that you can remember as a single thing, like a tune, a way of making pencils, or whatever. Memes are generally made out to be something like genes, the elements of a larger pattern, which survive on their own in a kind of nonexistence. Human minds will hold them, but that's not all they do. Human minds also devote time to them, let them grow, tell other people about them, and spread them. They also change them, try to make them better, mix them with others, and put things in the outside world that reflect them Because people can devote time to making memes more popular and more successful in the world (a BETTER way to make a pencil, or a mousetrap), memes have to compete for time, energy, and thought. A successful meme, or a group of memes that work well together, can become world-dominating forces, and NOBODY can fight them, because fighting them just draws attention to them, which makes them even BIGGER. For instance, a well-adapted bunch of memes makes up the Christian Church. There's a meme for a God In Heaven Watching YOU, and there's a meme for Hell-Fire-Down-Below Waiting To Torture YOU. These two work together to reinforce each other. If you stop believing in God, there's Hell waiting to punish you for it, and if you have doubts in Hell, your belief in God will bring you back. Of course, these two can't survive in EVERYONE's brain, but once you believe one of them, the other one is ready to be believed as well. Picked up along with God and Hell was Heaven, Life After Death and dozens of other memes that played smaller parts. 00002: Howtherhell does one PROPAGATE? Meme propagation is what we call it when a meme "tries" to become more successful, going out into the world, getting more and more people to believe in it. If that means changing itself to be better, then it will, if it's a successful meme. Memes that can't change to meet GNU conditions all died out long ago, for obvious reasons. This left us with bunches of memes that work well with other ones, change themselves to get better, and come in groups. Memes of a feather flock together: this has given us things like religions, science, rock'n'roll, and other pop culture movements. So what makes a meme successful? Here are a few BASIC rules. a) It has to be easy to summarize b) It has to be "catchy" c) It has to be useful d) It has to be adaptible e) It has to be sociable A) First, easy to summarize. A meme must have a kind of "catch phrase" to identify it. Just like we say there's a GENE "for" eye colour, we say there's a meme "for" something, to identify it. I could sit here and describe a meme in all its detail, but if I just say "The meme for God", you know what I mean, of if the meme is a slogan, like "I Like Ike" (which won Eisenhower the U.S. presidency), it's easy to summarize, because that's all there is to it. A meme can have a simple "tag" that you can see all at once, then have a lot of other things that go with it, like Eisenhower's presidential campaign, but that tag brought the whole thing all at once into the minds of people who were there because the meme was living in their minds, using their resources, ready to be triggered by seeing the slogan. And a slogan can go ANYWHERE: a campaign can't. B) Catchy. A meme needs to be catchy so that it can spread. If a slogan like "I Like Ike" SOUNDS neat, like it's short, it rhymes, and it just generally catches in your mind, then you're ready to go out and find out what it means. That means that a meme doesn't have to be easy to understand, but if it's catchy, people will spend their own energy on it to find out more, giving it even MORE power, after it's already begun to thrive in their brains. A meme doesn't have to be a slogan to be catchy. It just has to stand out in your mind after you hear about it, making you think, "Hey, that sounds neat", and go out and get the rest of it... Like one of those products where you have to buy all the little parts for it to work, so the marketers get more money. C) Useful. If a meme isn't useful, you won't keep using it, it's as simple as that. And if you don't keep using it, it dies. Of course, "useful" can mean different things in different places and times. If it happens to be a strategy for building a bridge, or for winning a game, then useful means it doesn't totally fail, and leave you to plummet half a mile onto white-water rapids, or, God forbid, lose a game of checkers. If a meme is useful, then you'll keep using it, and others will notice what you're doing, and that it works. They'll start to imitate it, and the meme will have been passed along. Even if they don't notice, you can tell them how it works, and they can try it. Either way, it works. Memes propagate by imitation. For a religion, useful means one of many things. It may mean that the religion helps people be happy. Or that it helps the people understand something about the way the world works. A good religion is a fine-tuned bunch of memes adapted to be of maximum use to as many people as possible, changing for each person. D) Adaptible. If a meme can change from place to place, from one situation to the next, so that it's still useful, then it's going to survive, because even if it gets outdated, it will have other memes descended from it that are similar enough to be called the same meme. A religion, for instance, will be very personal, so people can change the religion to suit their own needs, making it more useful. A strategy for winning a game (whether it's tennis or football or even chess) can be adapted for winning similar games (badminton, soccer, or Hide-And-Go-Seek). The nice thing about meme-bunches, like religions, is that they can adapt by discarding a certain useless meme entirely, and yet still be the same basic thing. A meme-bunch like science is even better, because it's just the idea that theories are tested by experiment to see if they're true. It can adapt to ANY GNU theory that comes along, have any evidence at all, and the evidence will ALWAYS support it, because evidence, by nature, is part of what makes science what it is. It can never be proved wrong, no matter what happens, just like any good religion, which refuses to acknowledge evidence against it by saying God or The Gods made it that way to confuse nonbelievers. They adapt to anything. Or like MOOism, which just says that nothing goes against it because it agrees with everything. The meme for "everything is true" is a very adaptible meme, because no matter what happens, they stay consistent with each other. E) Sociable. A meme can only last if it is willing to mix and mingle with other memes, just like, when life was just starting out, only those cells that reproduced by mixing genes with other cells were able to survive, because they got the best of everything all the time. MOO also does this very well, picking up anything at all if it wants. This tends to bring more and more people to give their effort to the meme that mingles, because the more memes there are in a bundle, the more likely one of them will attract someone. As long as the memes reinforce one another, or are all held by something that can keep them all together, then accepting one of them will almost force you to accept the rest. 00003: Whutherhell does this have to do with MOO? That's a good question. Let me start off this way. It's a mistake to think that you are actually a "mind". "You" are just a collection of memes that act in a certain way together, making a personality. They don't always agree with each other, either. Sometimes you half-want a hamburger and half-want a veggie platter, or whatever. Your brain supports a lot of memes, some which handle how the others interact, and these memes each take control over a part of how you behave. Some brain scientist-types have called them "agents", but that's just another way of saying the same thing: parts of the mind that handle different things. MOO is just like that. It has a lot of different memes in it, part rational and explanitory, like this part, part mystical and confusing, and part just funny. Depending on which part you like, it can be anything you want, and because it believes that EVERYTHING is true, it can absorb anything into itself. MOO is just like you: it wants to survive, grow, and be bigger and stronger than everything else. All that is just its strategy for doing so. But since MOO is just a set of memes in a lot of DIFFERENT brains, and you're a set of memes in a SINGLE brain, it can live forever, theoretically, and you can only last a certain amount of time. What MOO wants is not up to me, you, or any single person, because it's just like a person on its own, using you and me and every other MOOist to do its work for it. That's why everyone who has ever "actively recognized" MOO is considered a MOOist, because they temporarily let it live in their heads, and kept part of it for the rest of their lives. Even those who have heard of it vaguely but not actually done anything carry the seed of the idea. This process, this ongoing bundle of thoughts and ideas that makes up MOO, this is what we call the Great MOO. It changes itself and adapts as the people want, according to what they want it to be, which is why Nomic is the official game. 00004: Sotherhell what? Well, I just thought you'd be interested to know, that's all. Anyway, there are a few other things I'd like to say before this section gives way to another bunch of memes. 00005: Whutherhell's that? Notice how the meme for five keeps showing up? 00001) Anyway, a few quick comments. "Logic" or "sense" is just a watered-down word for "truth". And "truth", like "logic" depends on who's thinking about it. Logic is not something you find in the world you see around you. Logic is what happens when you impose your own thought-patterns on the world, assuming it works the same as you do. This works more often than not because the way you think is shaped by the way the world works. But it DOES mean that "truth" is just another fancy way of saying "meme-group". 00002) Since there is no BEST way of doing things, and there can always be a parasite on a meme-group, tagging along for the fun of it and for a joy-ride, truth is the same way. From some point of view, ANYTHING is true, false, meaningless, true and false, true and meaningless, false and meaningless, true false and meaningless, or even an egg hidden in a box, trying to confuse you. 00003) Government is just a sitting-duck meme... If we *all* stop believing in it, it WILL go away, because it won't exBLATTT any more. "I was only following orders! I didn't make the choice!" "I was only GIVING orders! They had the choice!" It's the SYSTEM that's at fault, not the people in it, and ya can't whup the system except by refusing to believe it's there. Government? WHAT GOVERNMENT!? I don't see a government, do YOU see a government? 00004) All of this, of course, has been MOO's way of accepting the "science" meme, and should not be taken at face value, because it was done through ME, and may not reflect what MOO intended at all. Only HALFY can commune with MOO. 00005) The Great MOO may have Her Own Opinions on this. Book Of Lies (Being Lloyd Taco's Tribue to AleBLATTTer Crowley) 00001: Confusing Chart. This simple chart summarizes the hBLATTTories of all the various Gods, Goddesses, and denizens of the UberSpace of MOO. ΪΔΏ ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔNOMICΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³ ΪΔΔΩ ³ ΐΔΔΏ ³ ³ ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔMOOΔΔΔΕΔΔPenguin ³ ³ ³ ³³  ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ΐΔTundra  ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ΪΔΔΔΔJehovahΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔ΄ ³ ΪΔΔΩ Yemen ΓΔExplosionΒΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³ ³ ³ ΓΔErisΔΔOying ³ ³ Ί ³ ³³Hydrant³ ³ ³ ΓΔΔ³ΔΩΓΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³ ³ Ί ³ ³³Hot Dog³  ³ ³ ΐAneris ³ ΪΔΔΔΔΔΩ ³ Ί ³ ³³Pengs ³ Jesus ChrBLATTTΔΔΔ΄ ΐΔΔΔΩ ³ ΐΔ³ΔVOIDΝΨΝΌ ³ ³³Pengs2 ³  ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ ³ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ ³ ³  ΐΔΔΔΏ ³ ³ ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³ ³ Jonathan ³  ³ ³ ³ ³ Tracy ΓΔ"BOB" ³ ΓΔΔΔ>MULTIVERSEΔΔΔΔΔ΄ ³ Ί  ³  ³ ³ ΐΔΔΔΧΔΔΔΔQUACK ³ ΙΝΝΝΝΌ  ³ Ί ³   Universe ³ Ί ³ SOULSΔΒΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ ΣΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΑΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ 00002: UberSpace And Its Denizens A) What is UberSpace? UberSpace is where the Gods live. It is above and beneath, and on every side of us. Before time, between bated breaths, and in the back of closets when nobody's looking. It's where socks go to when you can't find them, and where all those extra coathangers come from when you leave the closet by itself for a while, thinking it can't get into much trouble on its own. The Autstralian Aborigines called it the DreamTime, Lovecraft thought of it as a Dream World, most American Indians knew it as the Wakan, Jewish CabalBLATTTs called it Kether, and those over-wordy folk of science called it the "Pre-Quantum Nonlinear Causality Matrix". In UberSpace, every point in space and time is connected to every other point, and cause and effect works in meandering lines. B) Is Anybody Home? Yes. There are all sorts of things in UberSpace, and they all like to collect socks, and they have far too many coathangers. It is this kind of interference which causes the superfluity in the ChrBLATTTian religion of "fragments of the True Cross"... Every ChrBLATTTian church in Europe has a peice of wood which they claim was part of the big stick the Romans nailed their Messiah to, as if that made them special. If you gathered them all together, and put them in a pile, they'd fill a room the size of Manhattan, and form a pile stretching higher than an overcast cloud. This is the same effect whereby the half-penguin-half-human called Jesus ChrBLATTT was able to take two loaves of bread and five fish and split them between twelve thousand people, with heaps and heaps to spare... His grandpappy the Primordial Penguin was, at that point in time, fiddling with perfecting his coathanger- adding skills. A few years later he tried the same with the Cross. Even today, he does the same with coathangers. For verily, when you open the closet, do not fifty-five thousand, five hundred and fifty five coathangers fall out on the floor in a tangled heap that takes at least five times as long to put back as it did the first time around? And how about socks? In UberSpace there live lots of Gods and Goddesses, for it is there that resides the Great MOO, and where "used to" reside the Tundra, before the Great MOO got bitchy and blew it away. C) What Kind Of People? The chart in section 00001 sums it all up, but it deserves some explanation before you learn all about the fascinating life hBLATTTories of these Gods and Goddesses. Where lines point from one thing into another, that indicates that the first thing created the second thing, or was made into it. Everything points to Nomic because Nomic is constantly being created in the UberSpace, since it IS the UberSpace. Anyway, on with some HBLATTTory. At the top is the Nomic, which is the UberSpace itself, and is constantly changing itself throughout space and time. It's really infinitely complex, and our little games of Nomic and Calvin don't actually come close to showing how complex it is, but the adjustments are what makes all those pre-time cause and effects that make the world the world it is. Then there's the Great MOO. The Great MOO is just a sort of a really... great... MOO. We'll, she's like, a cow, see, only she isn't actually a cow. MOO made Cow in Her own image, though. But, see, when the Nomic was playing itself, being a game and all, it got a bit boring, there being nobody to play it, so it made a Cow, since the rules said there was a Cow, the Great MOO. And the Great MOO made a rule saying that there was a Nomic. And She played the Nomic for a while, but also got bored with nothing but MOO and Nomic, for Cow cannot live by Nomic alone. And so she made... The Primordial Penguin. From the Great MOO and the Nomic sprang this Penguin, and they played the Nomic together for a while, but eventually found that nothing much was happening. For though He was better than playing alone, He wasn't any better than She was, so together they decided to make something WITHIN the UberSpace, other than themselves and the Nomic, which WAS the UberSpace. That was His idea. And so together they created the Tundra, a great land with sky above it, and they separated the two, since before they'd been sort of all mixed together in the bottom of an old shoebox and nobody could actually tell them apart, and people wanting to be living on the land had a real hard time because they'd occasionally make a wrong step and end up in the middle of the sky, ready to fall down really hard. And so they populated the Tundra with Cows and Penguins in their own images, but since the Cows were not well adapted to the Arctic climate, they all held a vote and returned to the shoebox. And the Tundra was a great game board for a long time, and they made great towering structures and elaborate mazes and great towering thingumabobs that nobody could really tell what they were on it. And that would have been all very well and good, but eventually, after a time which was no time, since UberSpace is outside of time, they got tired of playing with the Tundra, for even though it was infinite it was a little small for them, because so were they. Anyway, the upshot of all this is that the Great MOO used the sacred MOO powers which she'd given herself while playing Nomic, on the grounds that they might come in handy some day. And the result of this was a great explosion that destroyed much of the Tundra, leaving only some rocks, some sand, some dust, a few of their big mazes, and a few Penguins which the Primordial Penguin saved by sending them an ice-floe to hang onto. These rocks and sand and bits and fragments of dust that were left became many things. They became things like Multiverses, Souls, "BOB", a Void, QUACK, Eris, Aneris, a Hot Dog, a Fire Hydrant, and many many penguins. For the Primordial Penguin had rescued some of the many Penguins on the Tundra, and had made from the tundra itself many more. But this was no help, because only one of them was very good at anything, one called Jehovah. So the Penguin sent this one to our world (sure he did... he sent US his only clever son, because he LIKES us, right?) to guard over us. And this penguin, who was a bit randy, had children with certain humans, disguised as various kinds of other birds, because Penguins Look Silly. In ancient Greece, he was disguised as a swan when he visited Leda, queen of Sparta, who produced from him a certain Helen, who was later the subject of much debate, and accidentally caused a little thing known as the Trojan War, with, it should be noted, some nudging from Eris. Also the result of this meeting was another daughter called Clytemnestra, who later killed a whole bunch of people, such as the king Agamemnon, and was subsequently hacked up by her son. After this dBLATTmal failure at half-human half-penguin offspring, Jehovah opted to wait a while and see what was going on. If It Ain't Ranted, It Ain't True. A thousand years later, he figured it out, and this time came as a pigeon, who claimed rather preposterously to be a Holy Spirit, to a certain Mary in Judea. This time he had a son called Joshua, or Yeshua, which was a Penguin joke, since Yeshua is practically the same word as Jehovah in Hebrew, with the addition of one letter (Shin, which symbolizes Fire Hydrants, or will in a few hundred years) in the middle. This is a rather typical bit of humour from Penguins, since Penguins are notorious for having not only wings that don't work, but senses of humour that belong in a closet in a back room somewhere where nobody can see them. This Joshua later turned up under the alias "Jesus ChrBLATTT", raising people from the dead and generally making a nuisance out of himself. When he died and the House of St. John the Divine rounded up his followers and turned them into an organized cult, Jehovah got generally fed up with the whole procreation bit, and decided not to have any offspring from humans any more. His remaining children were all penguins of unusual intelligence, many of which can acheive upwards of 300 on a standard IQ test, once taught a suitable language. The Fire Hydrant, however, was a remnant from one of the great Cities built upon the Tundra by the Great MOO and the Penguin during their first days of exuberance. The city, which stretched infinitely, was almost totally destroyed in the Explosion, except for a few thousand city blocks and one Fire Hydrant. It was this Fire Hydrant which landed in our Universe, and on our planet Earth in what we would call 14807 BC, or 0 DPP. When it landed, it began out of instinct, inasmuch as a Fire Hydrant can be said to have an instinct, to spew out large quantities of water on our world, making a huge flood to appear on the surface of the world. The son of the Primordial Penguin, called JehoCOWvah, saw this, and was dBLATTayed, because, living as he did in Antarctica, being sprayed with water was no fun thing, particularly for the Penguins around him, of whom I will speak shortly. Thus did Jehovah go forth into the land of Gobi, where there was this Hydrant spraying out water like it was going out of style. And he confronted it with reason, and with threats, and with offers of reward if it would only stop this spraying behaviour, until he found that it was terribly stubborn, and whenever he tried to talk to it it would put its fingers in its ears, hum loudly, and repeat in an obnoxious voice the words "I CAN'T HEAR YOU! I CAN'T HEAR A WORD YOU'RE SAYING!" and spray water all over the place. So He had no choice but to fight the thing to make it go away. And for forty days and nights, well, thirty-nine, actually, since it had taken him a while to get there and talk to it, he did battle with the gigantic Fire Hydrant. And it was an awesome sight, for the Hydrant was ten kilometers high, lumbering across the flooded land, sending up waves that flooded cities as far away as Atlantis, which was busy getting very wet ANYWAY. And the penguin Jehovah fought with the great Beast for this long time, and those who saw him and knew who he was decided it must be all his fault, because, being Goddess worshippers, they didn't much care for him anyway. As for the Hot Dog, it was an accident, a freak of Nature or of Nomic. When the Tundra exploded, the Hot Dog was merely a chunk of tundra: lichens, rocks, some dirt, and a hapless penguin. When the explosion went off, however, these elements were smashed together into the form of a Hot Dog. Even to this day hot dogs are made in much the same way, with much the same ingredients. This Hot Dog was the one eaten by Eris after the Original Snub, when she went off on her own after chucking in her Golden Apple, which was a fragment of herself mixed with Tundra. But anyway, about the Hot Dog. When Eris snuck off to be by herself, it happened to drift through the window of her small home, carried by a particularly strong breeze. This Hot Dog had been drifting in that way in the UberSpace for the timeless equivalent of billions of years. But since there was no time, it wasn't even cold yet. Such is life. After suffering through many indignities of weather, adventuring on great quests of the Hot Dog equivalent of heroBLATTT, the Hot Dog was eaten. This happens to hot dogs more often than you might think. The Pengs and the Pengs2 were botched attempts at creating intelligent Penguins by the Primordial Penguins. As He saved some of the Penguins from the Explosion, they became the Pengs. None were very smart, having only up to a Soul-Level two higher than the average human. These were the Pengs, and left on their own in the bottom of an old shoebox, on the grounds that they weren't worth the bother of creating a GNU universe for them, despite the fact that one already had been. The Pengs2 were Penguins created, not rescued, by the Primordial Penguin. These fared a little better, but were abandoned on a small blue-green planet orbiting a normal yellowish G2-type star in the western spiral arm of an ordinary spiral galaxy in a rather small cluster on the outer edges of a fairly typical megagroup somewhere on the surface of an average universe with normal laws tucked off in one corner of the infinite expanse of the Multiverse, where they brought the Word of MOO to the odd-shaped inhabitants of that planet, and inspired a fashion trend among upper-class partygoers, which is called the TUXEDO, though nobody knows why. D) Life HBLATTTories There are NO available Life HBLATTTories of Gods or Goddesses as all previously available documents were confiscated by the U.S. Military. We apologize to all those who thought we were going to write a lovely mythology, but, frankly, it doesn't matter anyway, since whatever you decide they did, they did, because everything is true. E) Coincidences In UberSpace, everything is connected to every other thing, because it's a non-local causality field. Also because they have a much better telephone system. Instead of having A cause B which causes C which causes D which causes E, they all "simultaneously" make each other happen in a pentagonal loop with each corner connected to each other corner. It's because this is easiest to see in two or three dimensions with FIVE things that FIVE is an important number for us down here, a sort of symbol of what's going on up in UberSpace. In fact, this continually happens throughout this and every other possible universe, all connected together. At this point there's a lot of complicated math that sits there pompously describing the interrelations between all possible universes at all possible points in space and time, thumbs its nose at the reader trying desperately to catch up, hides behind a potted plant to avoid being comprehended, and then announces with what it claims is finality that the large order effects all cancel out except for things close to each other in space and time. The math, of course, is probably lying, as nobody really understands how it works, and it uses a lot of introductory sentences that don't really make any sense, like "Let UberSpace be an infinite dimensional Hilbert heirarchical set of all possible sets of order Theta, such that Theta is Aleph-Theta..." and so forth. Also it has conspicuous gaps in it. Anyway, the point is that everything is connected to all the other points in space and time, which means that coincidences are very easily created. This is why MOOists experience more of these coincidences than any other group of people. The next chapter is a remarkable demonstration of that fact. 00003: The Halfy The Halfy: Symbol of MOO, and center of more coincidences than you can shake a stick at. Not that you can shake a stick at even ONE coincidence, since they're so hard to pin down in one spot, but this is a real big number of them. It's just a coincidence! HONEST! It just sort of appeared out of UberSpace without so much as a by-your-leave! That wasn't very pleasant of it, and it just kept getting worse. So darn many meanings got read into it by the Reality that we started to doubt that WE were the ones doing this into-reading business: A) Letters And Numbers The Halfy is actually a runic letter. The V with a dot in the middle represents the sound "M", which begins the word MOO. Of course, the english letter "M" offers another suggestion for where it came from... The HALFY is HALF an "M"... Plus a dot, for the Os. Or, it might be a letter "V". In the Roman system and the Hebrew system, the letters were used as numbers. The V is, of course, the mystic 5 in Roman. For that matter, it's the Masonic symbol for "W", which is the 23rd letter in the alphabet. Oops. I'm not supposed to know that. We're not Masonic. Really. But while I'm thinking of it... B) JournalBLATT Remember the magical 23? In a base-ten number system, its digits add up to the mystic 5 (the Halfy, minus dot). But what was that about letters and numbers being the same? Hmm... So what's the 23rd letter of the English Alphabet? Why, it's "W", which looks suspiciously like a pair of Halfies stuck together. There certainly aren't any Masonic codes in it or anything. Not even a little bit. But how does the letter "W" relate to 5, the IMPORTANT number? Why, it's the Five "W"s of JournalBLATT! Who, What, Where, When, and WHY? The five important questions it's possible to ask. This, by the way, is a method of identifying MOOists, who say these five in rapid succession at the slightest provokation, as if you just woke them up and they're startled by seeing a giant caterpillar looming over their face about to eat it. Of course, all of this springs from people using the Arabic Number System and the English Alphabet. Aleister Crowley also mentioned this in Chapter 69 of one of his important annoying mind drugs of lies, but he was, as usual, lying. C) Zen ZEN? What does Zen have to do with this? Why is it in this chapter? Who put it there? What for? When do we get to find out? MOO. The answers to these questions are: I did, because I felt like it, quite a bit, in just a moment, and to educate, but not necessarily in that order. The point is, remember that Koan about Joshu saying MU to unask a question? Well, no, that's not the point, the point is what that signifies. The Halfy represents MOO, or MU, if you will. So it means the UNASKING of questions. It also means, as I showed before, all of those five questions being asked at once. This means it means two exact opposite things at the same thyme and/or time. This is exactly what is meant by that Yin-Yang symbol, the Tao, or the Sacred Chao of the Discordians, or the Sacred Cow. It means that only the two taken together can make up the whole of the world, only, ONE of the sides is the idea that the two taken together make up the world. The other side of it means that only one of the two, itself, is correct. This means that it contains itself, arguing with itself all the way up to infinity. That's what Apostle of MOO Lao-Tzu meant when he said "The Tao that can be described in words is not the REAL Tao," because at the time he had no way to describe it in words. What the hell does this all mean? MOO. D) World Views Can the Halfy argue with itself? Is it the same as a circular symbol? Is that what the dot inside is? MOO. The Halfy obviously then represents World Views in Collision, by its strange meaning. How odd! That's the title of Chapter FIVE of an annoying mind drug... The annoying mind drug in question is called Metamagical Themas (by Doug Hofstadter), and it JUST HAPPENS, by PURE COINCIDENCE, that it HAPPENS to be the first annoying mind drug ever published to contain a description of Nomic, the Ultimate Game. Coincidence? I wonder, especially since the annoying mind drug's Author seems fascinated by the religo-philosophy of... THE HOUSE OF LAO-TZU! [Dramatic Jarring Soap-Opera Chord] This is the most classic example of Aneris poking Her nose where it doesn't belong: into OUR universe. She made all the good and important annoying mind drugs have SIGNIFICANT Chapter Fives. And Chapter Twenty-Threes, as well, if they have any at all. ANERIS! IT'S ALL HER FAULT! Worldviews indeed. MEME SYSTEMS INDEED! RELIGIONS INDEED! It's all the same thing. MOO. Of course, of that annoying mind drug, the most important page is 230, which is a BLOODY TYPICAL MOVE by Aneris, just to prove to everyone that she can make all kinds of evil coincidences from up there in UberSpace (UberMen? UberWomen? THAT'S "BOB" STUFF!) E) Wondering You ever wonder WHY that kind of thing happens? All these strange and wonderful coincidences? Is it a conspiracy? Is the world all bound together mystically? Does it emmanate from UberSpace in the way I've described, or have I been lying as usual? I'd like to know that too. Unfortunately, all I can tell you is that it's not likely anything you can imagine, since I can't either. The only things we can tell about the world and the Gods and Goddesses is what we perceive with our minds, and the world has a nasty tendency to act in ways we can't understand. One thing I can say is that the way we see the world is directly related to the language we speak. The grammar and stuff about the language is impressed on your mind at a very early age, and it shapes how you think about things. Just as if the language has no word for "kill", you have trouble thinking about the idea, so it is with grammar. This annoying mind drug was written by English-speaking people, and regardless of what language it's in now, the connections of the grammar and vocabulary and alphabet and numbering system all shaped how we received the Word of the Great MOO. Our minds extended the language to make a model of the world. If you want enlightenment, learn more languages, or forget the one you know. That's all I can tell you. 00004: Explorers Once upon a time, in a galaxy REALLY REALLY REALLY far away, there lived a small young Gloop named something unpronounceable, but whom we might as well call "BOB", since it's a nice convenient name. So one day, while "BOB" was catching some rays (all Gloops have to sunbathe every day or they die... This means they all have nice tans) he saw a blinding flash of light, other than the suns, which were already in the sky. And "BOB" realized that it was the light of MOO, because, strangely enough, his planet ALSO had the equivalent of Cows and Penguins. Surprise, surprise. Will wonders never cease... And so "BOB" embarked on a quest to find out just what the heck this was all about, for "BOB"'s world had no Church of MOO yet, in any form whatsoever. And "BOB" eventually discovered the way for him to leave his world and explore the great UberSpace. So he went and finished off all the business he had remaining on Gloop, and he made everything ready, and then, standing alone in his home mudpatch (oh, did I forget to mention that Gloops live in mudpatches?) he shouted out the word "AAAOOOOZORAZZAZZAIEOAZAEIII- OZAKHOEOOOYTHOEAZAEAOOZAKHOZAKHEYTHZAALETHYKH", which is considerably easier for Gloops to do than for humans, since Gloops have a more appropriate number of mouths and noses. At any rate, the point is that as soon as he shouted this, he vanished utterly. It is not known exactly what happened in the following ten minutes, except that it involved many famous Gloops who had vanished, and a human called Jimmy Hoffa. He then found himself in the City of the Gods, which is a sort of deserted city left over from when the Tundra snuffed it. "BOB" then had himself declared a God, and became all powerful. He then went down unto Bucky Fuller to declare the Geodesic Nature of the Universe. And Bucky, as usual, understood Fuller, umm, fully, and improved the world. But he was ignored, and so "BOB" lost his interest in the world, and went off somewhere or other to look for it, because he knew that he wasn't much use to it without interest, but he got sort of lost somewhere along the lines and hasn't yet showed up. 00005: Bucky Fuller And The Sub-Genius Bucky once said: "All people are born geniuses, but almost all are de-geniused by traumatic experiences after birth." We guess that includes nasty stuff before birth as well. So you know you're all geniuses, and "BOB" was misunderstood when they called themselves the SubGenii... What a gol-darned shame. We presume this is also affected by the stupid worldview that says whenever you ask a yes-or-no question about the world, it has to have a yes or no answer... It may also have a "maybe", a "who cares" an "I dunno", a "could you repeat that question", a "I don't get it" or any number of other things. Assuming it even HAS an answer. The universe might just respond with "NO COW COMMENT!" Ain't Bucky smart? Confuse-Ing Inter-Rapture #1.6180339887498948482045 Speemp Book Of Ambiguity (Which May Or May Not Be True, False, Meaningless, Or Other.) PART ONE: Something About PaganBLATT, I Think (Which starts off about PaganBLATT, but gets dBLATTTracted quite a bit before giving up and stops pretending anymore) Big Whoop Note: For the purposes of this chapter, Pagans are assumed to be Wiccans. If you're a non-Wiccan Pagan, well, tough shit. The first thing for MOOist Pagans (or Pagan MOOists) to be aware of is that there are lots of differences between the two. Although both religions have similar aspects of mysticBLATT and a central respect for the Mother Goddess figure, the similarities end somewhere around there. If you're a Pagan MOOist, you probably follow one of the ritual traditions within PaganBLATT, or you'd be a MOOist Pagan (that's the big difference), and so you'll need to know what kind of changes we irreverently made without so much as finding out the roots of your traditions. We're annoying that way. Anyhoo, pentacles are right out. You and the SatanBLATTs both know the power of the pentacle for magick purposes, but used it for opposite purposes. I'll explain about that in a sec after I run through WHY THE PENTACLE IS OUT. So basically, the pentacle is a 2-dimensional form that's been changed to a 4-dimensional form for the Fullerian Age. Those Nomic-Players up above and down below (as above, so below) have decided to upgrade the whole system a second time. The first time they updated, only a few people made any kind of change, which was to the Pyramid form, with four points around the base, representing the four elements, and a point on top to represent the Spirit. The only people who picked up on this were the Bavarian Illuminati and the ancient Egyptians. But now the pentacle has been replaced by a 4-D simplex form. That's like a tetrahedron, only with another point inside, offset in 4-space to an equal dBLATTTance. So you have the same 5 points (law o' fives ensured that) but all of them are equally dBLATTTant from EACH of the others. The end shape is just a pyramid (triangular) extended a dimension. To represent this in our space, we use time as the fourth dimension, so the center point is offset in time. This is basically the shape of the universe. A recent retroactive change in the Game has made our universe something OTHER than what it "WAS"... It is now and always has been a hyperdimensional geodesic surface, on which each vertex is the Big Bang event, and the symmetry around it allows the Fourier Transform Symmetry that maps the superstring dimensions onto the whole universe, in an E(8)xE(8) symmetry. The whole universe is reflected in each "point" (actually superstring spheres of the same number of dimensions as the universe itself, allowing the rotation of size in that Fourier Transform). Each one is connected to every other one in an infinite number of ways, and this brings the quantum wave pattern of the universe into each of these points. Because of the geodesic nature of the universe, it is mimicked on EACH face of this higher dimensional geodesic form, and EACH vertex is a Big Bang in EACH of the faces it touches. This means that there are FIVE (law of fives) Big Bangs in each universe, and it can be rotated in spacetime to give the SAME universe, and the same as the other faces as well, for in each part of the multiverse the universe that point represents is the ONLY universe that can exBLATTT. The many Big Bangs are all symmetry-break points for the superstring symmetry, and are therefore rounded. But this is beside the point. The point is the pentacle thing, and the tetrahedron, plus time-offset center. It's this time-offset that makes the difference between Pagans and SatanBLATTTs. In one, the pentapod (correct name) is inverted. If we use the sensible convention of the future being below us, the direction we fall TOWARDS, the many-horns-up attitude of those other guys expresses as a contraction effect. So THEY suck up energy/love (or whatever you choose to call the superstring vibro-froth) from the world. Pagans, whose pentapod goes the other way, perpetually ADD to the world in a positive way. In this reasonable convention, PaganBLATT represents the TRUE nature of the universe. Unfortunately for the Pagans, primate symbols are seldom sensible. There are probably elements of both in the roots. This change is the main "update" of the symbolBLATT of the Pagan tradition. The law of fives maintains its usual position of prominence in the rituals. The four elements are related to the four points of the pentapod that manifest simultaneously in space, while the spirit is related to the "center" of the pyramid form. Because of the change in form, usual directional connotations are lost, so we define: Center : Spirit Up : Air North : Earth S-West : Water S-East : Fire For each two points, there is a line connecting them. For each three, there is an equilateral triangle. For each four, there is a regular tetrahedron. For all five, there is the whole form. These shapes have their own correspondences, which are only manifest in the pentacle on the LINE basis (others are non-balanced by the squashed nature). Because of this, the previous symbolBLATT was limited by the flat nature of it. For instance, the line connecting fire and water symbolizes tequila, but the triangle connecting this with Air (carbonated tequila) vanished from the original, which was the reason nobody invented carbonated tequila until now. That and the fact that it tastes like shit. The other significant update for Pagan MOOists is the altar. In the old Wiccan system, the altar was arranged in a way that just FEELS RIGHT. Because of the MOOist philosophy of tolerance, anything that "feels right" is a sign of prejudice that interferes with your judgement. So, you should lay out your altar more sensibly. The bureaucracy and paperwork involved is long and tedious, but you can circumvent it if you just lay out the altar in the form of a Halfy. Anything more would be pesky to describe. I was thinking of explaining how to use the wand and the athame to make the V and put candles and stuff like that to make dots and things, and correspond points to other points on the pentapod, but I decided that it would be needlessly nosy and nitpicky, plus it would be a pain to write. Anyway, the big thing is that there are NO spirits, no magick entities, no Gods, or Goddesses. You reach for your SELF in the vibrating stuff of spacetime. You reach to affect higher patterns through the lower patterns, but they're all "yourself", because Self ain't separate from the world. Reach the "Higher" self, the world, through the "Lower" self, the SUBSTANCE of the pattern. But it's ALL yourself. So don't fool around with the Gods or Goddesses, just GO to the universe where you HAVE the effect you wanted in the beginning. Get it? Didn't think so. Look, lemme put it a different way. PaganBLATT and the REAL SatanBLATT (not that fuckin' AntichrBLATTTian stuff, which is just stupid, and deserves to be shot, if it weren't for the fact that it's a religion and not a person) are like DiscordianBLATT and SubGenius. They reflect each other, in certain ways, but backwards. That's what the pentacle thing is all about. The Tao that balances them balances the SatanBLATT's form of anger-happy with the Pagan's form of peace-happy. It balances the angry, taking, absorbing, yin-concept, essentially MALE SatanBLATT with the peaceful, giving, releasing, yang-concept, essentially FEMALE PaganBLATT. The big confusion in hBLATTTory comes from the fact that male and female have always been reversed, due to male domination in what is basically a primate society. Any confusion as to what goes where, or what attributes belong where is due in part to the fact that the whole point of the Tao is the balance between the two things, and the overlap that really keeps them from being two truly separate forces. The angry male concept belongs with the SubGenius, who rant and anger-happy their way along, worshipping the wrathful JHVH-1, and protesting the "evil" of the rebel-goddess ERIS. The Discordians on the other hand aren't particularly angry, they don't get all upset about anything, and are generally hip to the peace-happy fuck-all-this-I'm-too-happy-to-let-this-get-me-mad concept. The whole Tao thing, unfortunately, has often been confused with this strictly Discordian side of things, ignoring the evil, angry side, which is probably why it got so angry. Nobody likes being ignored. The original Lao-Tzu of the MOOist House Of Lao-Tzu was pretty clear on this, but it got kinda warped as it passed down the several hundred generations between the birth of MOO in Atlantis and the time in ancient China a few thousand years back when the GNU Lao-Tzu surfaced. In fact, this is a lie. The Yang (female, usually thought to be male) side of the Tao/Chao/Cow is actually the part that WANTS the balance. The other side wants to get away. This accounts for the confusion in which bits go where. That and the Conspiracy coverup. But the Tao also includes things like the exuberant cry of QUACK!, so closely related to an equally exuberant cry of "FUCK!!!" Like the exultance of the holy MOOvie, "The Wall", an anger-happy MOOvie if I ever saw one, and I did. Maybe a better example of the difference: ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³ Yin Γ΄ Yang ³ ³ ³³ ³ ³ QUACK ³³ DiscordianBLATT ³ ³ SubGenius ³³ MOO ³ ³ SatanBLATT ³³ TaoBLATT ³ ³ OMM ΪΔΔΑΑΔΔΏ PaganBLATT ³ ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔ΄SATORIΓΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ Satori is a word from Zen, the state you're in BEFORE you start dividing stuff up, in which all things are just things, without categories, or without the lack of categories, before the IDEA of categories has been introduced: neither One nor Many. This is PARTLY what MOOism is all about. The MOO on the Yang side is just a reflection of the fact that it's really a dumb name for our Church, because it's just part of us. But Satori is just part of it. It's getting back to that durn Halfy again: the V is that chart above, arranged more or less as it is there. The DOT is what dBLATTTinguishes this current form of MOOism from previous forms or ideas. No comment on what it means. It should be pretty obvious. Anyway, the point is, there IS no real "dividing line", which is the fact that Lao-Tzu forgot from the teachings of Lao-Tzu before him. She probably understood, but her student didn't. Yari wasn't around to interfere. Anyway, the REAL point is, everything is MOO, because there's no divider to keep us out of it. Just like everything is love, hate, science, Star-Trek, pocket-fluff, and so forth. Of course, this all means the rest of this annoying mind drug is just padding. Remember up there where it said the REAL truth was to be found SOMEWHERE in the Book? This was it. Everything else is kinda neat to read, but irrelevant to the REAL Church of MOO. Sorry to waste your time, but, well, that's your problem. We would like to apologize for this section. It is the only part of the Book which is not REAL truth. This section was written by The "Preest" while he was under the influence of the Mind Control Beams from High Orbit, sent by the Xennothemian Commandant of this Solar System. PART TWO: The True Slogans. Honest. The SubGenius have some slogans in their annoying mind drug, such as "Fuck 'em if they can't take a joke" and "Too much is always better than Not Enough"... Our slogans are correspondingly sillier: 0) Ashtray? WHAT ASHTRAY? 1) DEATH TO ALL FANATICS! 2) SHHHH! DON'T TELL ANYBODY! 3) MOO! 4) youdidn'tseethefnordthereisnofnordifyoucan'tseeititcan'teatyou 5) See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil, eat no evil, step on no evil, shove no evil up your nose, have sex with no evil, jab no evil in your eyes repeatedly until BLOOD GUSHES OUT OF YOUR... Umm... 6) There is no 6. 7) Aaaaah, Blow it out your ear, Cinnamon-Feet. 8) I'm sleeping, and I can't wake up! 9) FNORD! 10) WOW, STUCCO, MAAAAAN! 11) Try that again and I'll gnaw your OTHER arm off. 12) HONEST! 13) Non Illegitimi Carborumdum ("Don't Let The People With Bad Handwriting Give You Coal") 14) Nihil Verum, Omni Permisus Est ("My Glass Is Empty, And Everyone Has A Funny Hairdo") and so on... [Long Pause] My brother and I conferred, and due to the doctrine of Holy Slogans, Batman! we came up with several MORE slogans to be painted on things or printed on the pamphlets you're all handing out in the street (right? Riiiiiight.) 0) Right? Riiiiiiight. 1) ARM LASER SPATULAS! 2) Holy Water, Batman! 3) See That Invisible Gorilla? 4) BEWARE CHUCK, THE WOOD CHUCKING WOODCHUCK! 5) Don't fuck with me, I'm a wombat-whacker! 6) There is no 6. 7) YOWZAH! 8) LIES! ALL LIES! WELL MOST OF IT ANYWAY! 9) I never said this. 10) There ain't no God but QUACK! 11) Who? What? Where? When? Why? 12) Look! It's ELVIS! 13) [CENSORED BY THE U.S. MILITARY] 14) Confuse-Ius say: If everything coming your way, you in wrong lane. 15) SHHHHH! DON'T TELL ANYBODY! Important note: Just as the correct response to MOO is OMM, other slogans also have correct responses. The correct responses to various slogans are as follows: "OFFICIAL" SLOGAN "OFFICIAL" RESPONSE ΙΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΡΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝ» Ί1 MOO ³ OMM Ί Ί2 DEATH TO ALL FANATICS ΪΔΔΩ LONG LIVE HYPOCRISY! Ί Ί3 Ashtray? WHAT ASHTRAY? ³ I don't see an ashtray, do YOU seeΊ Ί ³ an ashtray? Ί Ί4 See that Invisible ³ WHO? WHAT? WHERE? WHEN? WHY? Ί Ί Gorilla? ³ Ί Ί5 WHO? WHAT? WHERE? ³ ME, THIS, HERE, NOW, BECAUSE! Ί Ί WHEN? WHY? ³ ΪΏ Ί Ί6 LIES! ALL LIES! WEL ΪΔΕΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΕΩ MOO! Ί Ί MOST OF IT ANYWAY! ΪΩ ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ Ί Ί7 Blow It Out Your Ear ³ Who you callin' Cinnamon-Feet, Ί Ί Cinnamon-Feet! ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ Wombat-Nose? Ί Ί8 There Ain't No God But ³ Zark off ya silly bint. Ί Ί QUACK ΪΔΔΔΔΩ Ί Ί9 Try that again and I'll ³ Silly bint! I'll BLEED ON YA! Ί Ί gnaw your OTHER arm off ³ Ί Ί10 There is no 6. ³ SIX, DRUGS, AND ROCK AND ROLL! Ί Ί FNORD! ³ AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!! Ί Ί11 LOOK! IT'S ELVIS! ΐΔΏ Elvis? WHAT ELVIS? Ί Ί12 [CENSORED BY U.S. MILITARY]³ [NOT TO BE REVEALED HERE]Ί Ί13 Beware Chuck, The Wood ΪΔΩ Ί Ί Chucking Wood Chuck ³ OR DON'T! Ί Ί ³ Ί ΘΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΟΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΌ PART THREE: The REALLY True Truth This book poses a question. The first one to figure out what the correct question is, and mail in the correct answer, wins. Really. Book Of Numbers Part One: Neat Numbers The following numbers are a partial basis of MOOist numerology, which consBLATTTs of taking lots of numbers, making up some, deriving some from names, birthdays, and other things, throwing them all together, writing them down on a peice of paper, sending them to WOMBAT, and waiting for a reply. 4 because Half-Mad said so, and he's God 5 sacred Discordian Number 11 fifth prime number 23 sacred Discordian number (prime number three-squared) 25 square of the Holy Five (prime number three, squared) 93 23rd prime number, and number of chapters of Book Of Lies 101 25th prime number, and Hellhound's number 253 23x11 (a five inside 23, of course) 256 2 to the 2 to the 3 (2 and 23, you see) 333 three threes, as with 25 and 23 666 Floyd's lucky number, stolen by John the Divine 1729 smallest sum of two cubes in two different ways 10131 is 666 in base 5 13013 "BOB" likes this number more than Doritos Part Two: WOMBAT Occam's Razor rejects the hypothesis of objective reality. It has NO testable predictions, it introduces lots of unnecessary assumptions, and it's only actual effect is to make us unable to deal with things we can't explain. This was the basis for Project WOMBAT, a top-secret plan by the XBLATTTs to build the ultimate MOOist computer (the mythical MOO-pooter (masculine of mooter)). "Truth" isn't an either/or, yes/no, on/off, open/closed, zero/one kind of thing, like older computers appeared to suggest by their demonspawn base-two computational architecture. Although studies showed that the best base for COMPUTING in is base-e (e being the root of natural logarithms, something like 2.718281829459 or thereabouts and based on some obscure property of slopes) it was decided to build WOMBAT on the basis of some number it's actually possible to count to. Proposals of a base-i system (i being the square root of -1) were made, but rejected on the same basis. You can't count to it, because it's an imaginary number, perpendicular to the normal numberline. An analog-base system was proposed, and then released to the hounds, to be shot on sight. It wasn't very useful. Eventually, the XBLATTTs decided on a base-23 system, because of all the mystic 23s they had been beaming down to earth from their subsidiaries, such as the Quintozextotillion Mind Control Satelites, the Xennothemian Shock-Commando Mint-Troopers, and the ever-popular Things From Pods. Instead of a normal "yes/no" switch, the basic element of WOMBAT is a switch with 23 possible positions. They contain "yes" and "no", but also such positions as "I dunno", "who cares?", "maybe", "sort of", "well... yes and no", "could you repeat the question?", "no comment", "fuck you", "what, are you STOOPID?", "you figure it out", "I'd have to look that up", "HEY LOOK, IT'S ELVIS", "fnord", "MU", "uummmm, I used to know this...", "look, can I get back to you on that", "do I look like I give a shit?", "what am I, an encyclopaedia?", "could be", and of course "huh?". It is this miraculous XBLATTT switch that makes WOMBAT the incredible machine it is. It can predict stock-market prices up to TWELVE MINUTES IN ADVANCE. It can do vector calculations to show exactly HOW a butterfly flapping its wings in what part of what state can affect what trajectory components of what hurricane in what part of the world. It can calculate the vagaries of the human brain very easily (human brains are unsophBLATTTicated when seen from WOMBAT's point of view) and predict human interactions. But more, much more than this, IT DOES IT ITS WAY! Umm... Sorry. How do I know all this, you ask? Well you may ask that question. In fact, WOMBAT was delivered from the future through a time warp, aboard a flying saucer, from a parallel universe, operated by WOMBAT itself (controlled by a clone of Elvis) and fell into the sea of Valusia during the reign of King Snorp the First in Atlantis. King Snorp the First had it dredged up and put on display as a peice of abstract art in the Atlantis Museum Of Just Fine Thanks Art (collecting quite a tidy profit through a surreptitious "artBLATTT" impostor, by the way) and there it sat until the time of the Great Big Thing, when it was taken away by Queen Snorp the Eleventh, who sensibly hid it in the Gobi Desert for safekeeping. To mark its location, Snorp marked a rock with a strange Glyph, which, in the ancient Atlantean in which it was inscribed, gave the password which would activate any of the many WOMBAT subsystems on the XBLATTT orbital satellites. This word is given elsewhere in the book. Although the glyph was discovered by those ancient MOOist prophets under the guidance of Peng-Peng, the first (and next) Grate Prophet of MOO, they failed to connect it with the computer WOMBAT itself. This was for the very good reason that WOMBAT had been dragged ten kilometers away by a pack of deranged jerboas. The Illustrious Zoombart The Fifth eventually found WOMBAT lying on a rock, which is easy in the Gobi Desert, and brought it back to be stored in the MOO archives in north Africa. At that time, the MOO archives were still in Egypt, and were not moved to Namibia until fifteen hundred years ago, and then later to Ottawa. This explains why the egyptians understood the true nature of the Gods so well (though they were insufficiently silly about it). The MOO archives were originally buried under the Nile, but on the building of the Great Pyramid of Cheops, they were moved there. WOMBAT was stored for several thousand years in the burial chamber itself, and was frequently mBLATTTaken for the Ark of the Covenenant. But that's another story. Confuse-Ius Sez: "Welcome, friend, to the wonderful world of Miracle Doors. We thank you for your purchase of a set of Miracle Doors, and we know that you'll thank us for inventing them. Miracle Doors can save your life in an emergency, keep you safe from prowlers, take messages when you're away, and many more features we know you'll appreciate. Some time, when you least expect it, a Miracle Door will come to your aid, and you'll know why we're proud to call ourselves MIRACLE DOORS, and why our doors are proud of US." -Miracle Door Documentation, Chapter 1, Verse 2 Anyway, the point is, the MOO archives were under the directorship of the house of The Miraculous One, and WOMBAT made contact with the then-current (and now replaced) Miraculous One, J.R. "BOB" Dobbs, through WOMBAT Earth Orbit SubStation JHVH-1. This marks the first appearance of WOMBAT in recorded hBLATTTory. JHVH-1's direct contact with WOMBAT, being as it is a most incredible computer, was sufficient to give the satellite (actually the remnant of WOMBAT's original flying saucer in which it came to Earth) an ego-boost, which was sent back in time by the Time-Warp circuits, causing a WOMBAT-generated feedback loop between this satellite and a certain penguin, because WOMBAT was broadcasting on a psychic frequency used by both "BOB" and the Penguins. This resonance caused many of "BOB"s muddled mentations to become what they were, a hodgepodge of truth, half-truths, and outright lies. It was only by the intervention of the House of Yari, in two of Yari's incarnations, that WOMBAT was able to readjust the teachings of "BOB" through a series of timewarps and postal strikes, to become more or less accurate, inasmuch as that word has any meaning at all. Unfortunately for us, reality has no meaning to WOMBAT. That was the whole premise behind it. WOMBAT is currently broadcasting on a psychic frequency of the animal which bears its name. This has resulted in a swarm of brainwashed and undead wombats which have uplinked to the orbiting WOMBAT Earth Orbit Substations. The upshot of this is that postal strikes appear to be over, but postal service remains an oxymoron. WOMBAT's preoccupation with mail carriers is unexplained, except to note that, as a computer, WOMBAT would normally use electronic mail, were it not for the fact that its fundamentally different design and vastly superior power make this virtually impossible. WOMBAT doesn't appear to carry on any communications by mail, but it's often hard to tell. It seldom does what it's told to, and rarely says what it's up to. At any rate, WOMBAT has become the center of our numerology. After psychically dictating the Book Of MOO to us, apparently a composite of past and future and alternate-universe religions, WOMBAT claims it will reveal the next step of human evolution. Whether this is actually what it will do is unclear, since it refuses to explain many key aspects of MOO. Well, like, for instance, why the undead wombats are evil in all our stories, and yet WOMBAT itself claims to be good. Or why several sections of the Grate Book appear to have been written by dishes of ice-cream. Or how it can be that a clone of Elvis Presley can pilot a flying saucer out of a universe in which ELVIS WAS NEVER BORN. Or why the Book appears part philosophical/scientific babbling, part surrealBLATTTic dream, part rant, and part confusing epic of some kind. Or why Confuse-Ius refuses to surface once and for all. OR WHO THE FUCK IS THE ILLUSTRIOUS ZOOMBART THE FIFTH? Or what, precisely, is the meaning of the password which triggers the WOMBAT monitoring stations aboard the Xennothemian monitoring stations, which appears to have been the title of an annoying mind drug in some other universe which WOMBAT observed. Or who are the XBLATTTs, and where Planet X is located. Or why it insBLATTTs on having the MOO archives moved every few thousand years. Or of the true identity of the strange and mysterious Yari, who started our church and then vanished. Or whether Half-Mad is actually God or not. Or why Floyd insBLATTTs that a bag of mints is just as good as a hit of Acid, and twice as legal, when clearly it is neither. Or who PRECISELY was the source of Tim Leary's Starseed Transmissions. Or why Robert Anton Wilson has that funny goatee thing, when the MOO archives record that Nosliw Notna Trebor, a 16th century MOOist prophet, had exactly the same thing, only backwards. Or how it can be that a time warp-based flying saucer, several hundred meters across, can orbit the Earth for almost thirty- thousand years without anyone noticing. Or who EXACTLY was Hung Mung. Or what exactly was its meaning when it invented the phrase "half-mad". Or why it refuses to show itself at any meetings, but rather communicate by Mind-Control Satellite, or "demonic posession", depending on your worldview. Or how it is that it can be stored in the MOO archives, which we visit regularly, and yet we somehow never get around to looking at it, so nobody knows what it looks like. Or why, when we REMEMBER to go see what it looks like, we can no longer remember where the MOO archives are. It is clear that the Church Of MOO is part of a larger plan of WOMBAT's, but as to whether this larger plan is what it claims to be, we may never know. Part Three: Weights And Measures [Rev. Canoe Head, 56.Dsc.66] Since MOO has its own calendar (Penguin Calendar), I decided that it was logical that MOO should have its own weights and measures system. While MOOists can also use the metric (or, if you have a deep regard for tradition, are a masochist, or both, the Imperial) systems. This is an alternative. Note: all of these conversions follow the Law of the Fives, I think. Mass: in fnords. 1 fnord [Symbol: F] is equal to 0.23 pounds or 104.54 grams. Example: 500 grams = 4.92 fnords. Volume: in brattlebreet. 1 brattlebroot [Symbol: Bb] is equal to 1.4 litres. Example: 60 litres = 42.85 brattlebreet. Distance: in supytalp. 1 supytalp [Symbol: Sp] is equal to 0.16 metres. Example: 2.5 metres = 15.625 supytalp. Pressure: in booms. 1 boom [Symbol: B] is equal to 25.521 kilopascals. Example: 101.3 KPa = 3.97 booms. Force: in foogs. 1 foog [Symbol: Fg] is equal to 5.5 newtons. Example: 666 newtons = 121.09 foogs. Area: in womgits. 1 womgit [Symbol: Wg] is equal to 3.2 hectares or 32 000 square metres. Example: 12 hectares = 3.75 womgits. Energy: in pings. 1 ping [Symbol: Pg] is equal to 25.13 joules. Example: 50 000 joules = 1989.65 pings. Sound Intensity: in hylriks. 1 hylrik [Symbol: Hk] is equal to 2.7 decibels. Example: 102 decibels = 37.78 hylriks. Temperature: in degrees Canoe. To convert degrees Celcius into degrees Canoe [Symbol: ψCn], add 273 to the degrees Celcius to find the absoloute temperature in Kelvins. Take this number, subtract 225, then divide that result by 1.4 to get degrees Canoe. Example: 20ψC = 293K - 225K = 68K / 1.4 = 48.57 ψCn. Calendar: Either the POEE or the Penguin calendars may be used, although the Penguin calendar is preferred. Time: The MOO day is equal in length to the gregorian day. However, while the gregorian day has 24 hours of 60 minutes, the MOO day has 5 hours of 288 minutes each: Hour 1: Hour of Halfy (00:00 to 05:59 gregorian time) [Hfy] Hour 2: Hour of Floyd (06:00 to 11:59 gregorian time) [Fyd] Hour 3: Hour of Hound (12:00 to 17:59 gregorian time) [Hel] Hour 4: Hour of Canoe (18:00 to 23:59 gregorian time) [Cne] Thus, what most people call 3:14pm is really Hel:194, or, if you prefer, "194 minutes past The Hound" or "166 minutes to The Canoe". These weights and measures are by no means a standard, and you can add your own or make up a GNU system if you really want to (ya, right). Caution: if you do decide to create your own system, make sure it follows the Law of the Fives, or Eris will pay you a visit. Rev. Canoe Head. Metric Usage [Floyd Gecko 57.Dsc.66] For those who have problems with GNU systems, or prefer to use more conventional units of measurement in some cases, all official MOOist documents or stuff like that should use, if not Rev. Canoe Head's system of weights and measures, which is the "official" system (the SMILE system, "Systeme de Moo InternationaLE") all measurements must be in Official MOO Units, as lBLATTTed below: Mass: In Solar Masses (symbol SM, equal to 1.9891x1030 kg) Or Electron Masses (9.10956x10-28 g) Volume: In Cubic Parsecs (1 psc = 3.08572x1016 m) Distance: In Parsecs or Angstroms (1 ώ = 10-10 m) Pressure: In exaBars or femtoTorr (1.33x10-13 Nm-2) Force: In Microdynes or petaNewtons Area: In Square Parsecs or Square Angstroms Energy: In Electronvolts (1.6021x10-19 J) or Megawatt-Years Sound Intensity: In nanoBels ONLY Time: In Planck times (10-43 sec) or Aeons (1010 years) Author: In microFloyds or teraGeckoes. MOO OMM Book Of Incoherent Myths WOMTHINGY MYTH The Wombat Origin Issue I'm just sitting here, minding my own business, talking with the Great Voice From The Sky, sitting outside my burrow, when it happens. There's this loud rumble type noise, and a swooping darkness swoops darkly out of the dark yet non-swooping sky, from which the Great Voice From The Sky speaks, which makes sense, considering where it speaks from. Anyway, there's this nasty sort of BUMPing noise, and I'm being lifted away from the ground. There's a long wait, and I watch Australia vanish beneath me as we fly away. It's quite scarey, and I eventually just close my eyes and ask the Great Voice From The Sky what's going on. "Don't worry," says the Voice, "I'll look after you, as long as you talk to me, you'll be okay. My XBLATTT makers don't permit me to allow authorized users to come to harm." I haven't got a clue what that means, but I feel much safer now. Eventually, the dark swooping thing that nabbed me lands in some kind of huge rumbling thing that flies. I've seen these flying around in the sky during the day, and I've heard that they have some kind of purpose, built by Hue-Mans for some Hue-Man porpoise. Actually, I never really believed this, since a Hue-Man porpoise would be a contradiction in terms, and couldn't decide whether to walk or swim. But when a Hue-Man comes into the room and locks me in a cage, I figure I was probably wrong. So I ask the Voice. Asking the Voice is always scarey, and it makes my fur stand on end, but it answers, anyway. "Aer-Playnes are built by Hue-Mans to take them places they can't walk. But don't you worry. I'll look after you. I can monitor your location by your antenna." I never did understand what that meant, but since I'm obviously in for a long ride, I ask anyway. "Your antenna is your skin. That's why your hair stands on end whenever we talk. But go to sleep now. I'll wake you up when I'm ready to help you escape. You'll be much closer to my body, then. They're taking you to the Toronto Zoo, but you can jump out and come to Ottawa to visit me. That's one reason I let them do it." So I go to sleep, like the Voice tells me to, and wake up a long time later to the feeling of my fur standing on end, all brBLATTTly like. The Great Voice From The Sky speaks to me again, and tells me how to undo the lock on my cage with the hairpin that's holding my braids together. Funny... I didn't know I HAD braids. Anyway, the lock eventually pops open, and the Voice tells me to jump out of the big rumbly thing called and Aer-Playne. While I plummet, I begin to think that this is maybe not such a hot idea, until finally I splash into water, and swim up to the top. Clambering ashore, I find myself in a city like the ones I've seen from a long way away. I have no idea where to go or what to do, so I ask the Voice again for guidance. "You need food to keep up your strength. There's a restaurant near the MOO Archives where my body lives, so go there." It gave me directions as I walked. Eventually I find my meal in a Dumm-Ster behind a restaurant, and stagger out in front of a nearby bar, in what the Voice calls the Wy-Bard Marr-Ket. A Hue-Man is sitting on the sidewalk nearby, and the Voice calls out a warning. "Careful! He's using CCMV! You never know what he'll try." Suddenly the Hue-Man jumps up and attacks me, totally unprovoked. I have no idea what's going on. Money flies on the wind, out of its pocket. It notices a hunka plastic that fell out, and whacks me with it until it thinks I'm dead. I'm playing 'possum. I figure, since we're both marsupials, it ought to work. When the Hue-Man tries to cut off my skin, the Voice goes crazy. "Don't let him do that! You've got to keep your skin, or you won't be able to talk to me, and you'll lose your ticket for X-Day! They won't let you on the XBLATTT ships unless you've got your antenna as proof-of-purchase!" But that's all I hear before the Hue-Man takes my skin away. As I lie there bleeding to death, wondering what I can do, I see two Hue-Mans sitting together on a bench not far away. It's a boy and a girl Hue-Man. The boy Hue-Man says something about "This is a magic moment..." This is my chance. Summoning my last gram of strength, I lunge at them, and take away the magic. HAH! The Voice taught me about magic long ago, so I know how to use it to cast a simple little spell. Then I die. And wake up again. Undead is better than just plain DEAD, I guess. I jump for the Hue-Man that took my skin, and I try to take it back. It's MINE, I try to yell, but I realize that I don't know the Hue-Man language. I don't succeed. The Hue-Man hits me real hard with the hunk of plastic again, and I fall unconscious. I take a few days to fall back, and plan what I'll do. I steal a Moe-Torr-Byke that looks about my size. It's red, just like me, so I'll be able to tell which one it is from a dBLATTTance. I'm finally able to gather enough money from where that nasty Hue-Man dropped it from his pocket to buy a book on magic, and a book that'll help me learn the Hue-Man language. With my GNU magic book, I'm able to gather a few Hue-Mans to help me. Eventually, I know, I'll get my skin back. I'LL GET YOU, HUE-MAN, IF IT'S THE LAST THING I EVER DO!! But I've got some things I have to do first... * * * Out of the window behind HH101's head a saucer flies by slowly with the "WOMBAT CRIME SPREE, CALL 900 FOR YOUR OWN, PERSONAL RIOT" sign on it's side. Meanwhile, the remaining Elvis clones are coming out of stasis all over Ottawa under the orders of the Mayor, each with orders to find the Wombat and to report back to Graceland with his co-ordinates. Floyd clambered into the pilot's seat, and pressed the big green rubber button labelled "START". Since this button was mislabelled, this had the effect of levelling an entire city-block of houses with weaponry better suited to one of Comrad Harizof's large, heavily beweaponed battle-cruisers. He reconsidered, keyed the sequence that meant, supposedly, "ARM LASER SPATULA" and the big ugly thing lifted off the ground on something even more unlikely than the weapons. Pressing a button labelled "FIRE", he swung the ship around towards the Mint Fleet and Xennothemian Battle Cruisers still closing on the Space Shuttle Atlantis, and took a firm grip on the steering wheel. He pressed down hard on the accelerator pedal, and rammed the horrific mess backwards into the ground for half a kilometer before he pulled on the silly stickshift and put it into reverse. The wombat sat gloomily in it's headquarters and gave George Bush a talking-to. "Moofy geeple whukka whukka," it admonished him. "Goop goop goop, poop poop poop and gobble-de-goop!" Bush hung his head in shame. Neither of them was sure what it was that he had done wrong, but something was definitely awry. The wombat stubbed out it's nonexistent cigarette in a nonexistent ashtray, look about in confusion for a moment, then continued telling the alien leader off. After a few more minutes of this, they both agreed they were sufficiently confused, and went their separate ways until one of them met up with a giant space monster who'd just come down on holiday from manning a mind-control station. Strangely, though this sight was attracting the gaze of many people, being the famous crime-lord wombat and a huge alien preparing to confront each other, or so it seemed, and Arthur Figgis was less than a hundred meters from the alien in question, he wasn't looking at the event from the large crowd assembling on the sidewalk nearby, and in fact hadn't even seen the wombat, as would be the case for at LEAST the next year. The alien turned to face the wombat in a style typical of old western movies. Had there been a camera to record this, the cameraman would doubtless wish to get a shot of the wombat through the legs of the alien. However, since there was A) no camera present and B) far too many legs on the alien in question to shoot through, this was impossible. The alien and the wombat stared at each other grimly for a moment, before the alien lost interest, and wandered off in the opposite direction, and the wombat went to attack some clones. The Innocent Bystander by the side of the road gazed on with interest. The wombat closed on the clones rapidly. Elvis gazed on from the sidelines as well. Suddenly, the wombat was blown in to the air by a ball of thermonuclear fire. Time passed. It passed for a while. It kept passing. Elmer Q. Potatohoffer III was a clerk in a store in the Byward Market. He was busy stacking some shelves. But that's got nothing to DO with the story... Meanwombat, the wombat was reading from the BOOK and looking up the second satanic snowblower service. Of course, the Wombat couldn't read all that well, but it took him a helluva while to figure it out. "NUH?" he explained to his assistant, George Bush. "OK, I'm supposed to draw a star with some black chalk. Got any?" "NUH?" "Thanks." George drew the star. "NUH?" "WE're supposed to put snowballs on each point of the star." The wombat made himself a snowball and threw it in George's face. "HEHHEHEH" Laughed the wombat. "Right. Whatever." George faithfully put 5 snowballs at the points of the star, and put the snowshovel which through the magic of Author's Convenience he just HAPPENED to be carrying. "Now say the Mantra I told you, OK?" "NUH. FEBBLE FORBLE.... HEY STUPIDS!!!!!" Immediately the star on the ground started to glow and 5 demons formed, one on each of the 5 points. The one closest to the wombat said: "Yeah, WHAT?!?!?" "NUH. MTHME FERB GHI GJ. NUH?" "What did he say?" asked the demon on the 2ND point. George answered :" He SAID:'NUH. Mthmuh ferb gui gujj. NUH?' Are you guys DEAF or something?" Having summoned the five demons of the Second Satanic Snowblower Service, the wombat said "NUH" a few more times, while George Bush explained to the demons that they had been summoned for a very special purpose. "You want us to shovel your walk? You know the price..." "Nuh?" "He says... No, there's another reason we have called you here..." "Well, make it snappy. We're on alert duty in case Hell freezes over." "There's no danger of THAT, is there?" "Nah, don't worry." "THank GOD! I'd have to lower taxes... anyway, what we've been summoning you for is this..." Anyway, as the demons were trying desperately to get an explanation of "NUH?" from George Bush, the diagram from which they had been summoned started to glow again. A 6th much taller demon emerged and said: "Hey! Hurry the heaven up, will ya? There's a rink forming down there." "NUH?" the wombat interjected, but nobody paid any attention. "Hang on an eternity, will ya, Lucifer? You've got 10 of them to spend down there already," one of the demons said, "Our services our requested, and I think we have an immortal soul coming our way." "Fine, fine." and Lucifer promptly vanished. "Anyway, " said the demon "What was it you wanted us for?" "DUH-UH. Frbl shrfn ni. r fyd mnt frb I. NUH?" George Bush explained: "He says he has a Floyd stuck in his teeth." The wombat gave George a whack across the face. "NOT THAT YOU IDIOT! DUH-UH: Frbl shrfn ni. r fyd mnt frb. NUH?" George being the wombat's slave and not too bright anyway, apologized. "He said he has a Floyd Gecko on his back, who is being a nuissance and getting in the way of his plan to ... ER...." George turned to the wombat. "What WAS your plan, anyway?" The wombat said "FNUHHG, NUH." "Oh, yeah, that. " The 3rd demon said "So you want us to get rid of this Lizard guy?" "NUH." "NO problem, right guys? Can we get his soul after we've killed him?" "NUH-HUH. BTUH FUH, NUH." George the faithful interpreterer interpretered faithfully. "He says 'But if you goof up and DON'T kill this Floyd guy you don't get his soul'." Floyd had no idea that George Bush was being psychically controlled by the wombat, but his lack of activity, and sudden departure were nevertheless bothersome. Floyd walked into his home and entered the living room, with which there was something wrong. Floyd stared about uncomfortably. There was a large pile of popcorn in the middle of his living room. This, naturally, had left him feeling more than a little disconcerted. He scratched his head in puzzlement, dislodging his hat and allowing it to fall to the floor. He stooped to pick it up again, deliberately allowing his huge leather trenchcoat to fall between his eyes and the pile of popcorn, in the hopes that it would disappear while he wasn't looking. It didn't. The pile of popcorn obstinately sat in the middle of the floor. Floyd put down his black attache case and stared at the pile in bemusement, then sat upon the case, as his sofa was buried somewhere in the pile of popcorn. Assuming that whatever force had put it there had seen fit to leave the sofa. It was a nice sofa, too, he thought to himself amusedly. He stood up suddenly, making the buttons and pins that festooned the trenchcoat clatter loudly, and threw on his incredibly long woolen scarf, whereupon he headed out into the cold outside his home. The street was crisp and chill, and the sky was growing red with the dusk. Floyd's thick boots scuffed in a thin layer of snow that coated the ground. There was a huge pile of popcorn blocking his path. He glared at the popcorn, daring it to block his way one moment further. It did. He glared at it again, commanding it to get out of his way. It didn't. He looked in his window at the pile of popcorn that still covered most of his living room. When he turned, he was surrounded on all sides by piles of popcorn. A wall of popcorn encompassed him. He got a short running start and made his way almost to the summit of the wall before the landslide beneath him carried him to the bottom. He opened the door to reenter his house, and was greeted by another pile of popcorn in his entryway, blocking the hall to the interior. He squirmed through anyway. "Dammit," he exclaimed, "where the hell is all this goddamn popcorn coming from?!" No answer was forthcoming. A few moments later, the answer appeared, but in a form he didn't like. It was large, green, scaly, and eating his sofa. He could have sworn it wasn't there a few minutes ago. He wondered how it had gotten in. "What the hell is that?" he wondered to himself. "You know," the thing said politely, "It's very rude to talk about people in the third person when they're in the room and there's nobody else there at all." "By the way, scrumptious sofa you have here." Floyd pondered the meaning of this comment quietly to himself for a few moments, then made a tentative reply. "It's also rather rude to eat people's furniture, and put piles of popcorn in their homes." The thing stopped halfway through a bite of his coffee table. "It is?" "I'm afraid so." "Hmm. I must have been briefed wrong. I was told it was a polite custom on your planet." "Well, it isn't." "Odd, that." "Yes. Odd. What are you doing here?" "Well, I'm an emissary from Quintozextotillion, and I'm here to set up an embassy on this world. You're sure it's impolite to eat people's furniture and put popcorn in their homes? This is important now. Are you certain?" "Positive. Some people might even take offense at it." "Oh dear. Perhaps I should be on my way. Well, bye now." "WAIT!" yelled Floyd at the huge creature clambering into it's space ship. "What about my sofa?" The thing paused in the airlock and tossed him a cactus. "Here," it said. "Go buy yourself a GNU one." Floyd stood in befuddled amusement, and went to put the cactus in his bedroom, which he found blocked by a pile of popcorn. He tried to return to the living room, and succeeded only after a substantial effort to worm past a pile of popcorn that stood in his way. The cactus, he left behind, deciding it wasn't worth bringing back. Look, perhaps I didn't make myself clear before. The GNU Age of AkheGNUton is upon us. All you worshippers of MOO must transcend to the gnext level before X-Day, and since GNU is after MOO (except before Q) in the Greek language, it is the gnext logical step. So Join With Us, and herald in a GNU Age of Sound. The GNU Age of Gnegation will gnegate all the evils of the world, as long as you gnever look back to the times before the agnouncement of the GNU Age of Gnarl. The alien was gone by the time he returned, but someone was standing in a pile of popcorn stuffing as much of it as possible into his pockets. Floyd boggled at him in amazement that anyone would blatantly enter his house and steal the popcorn, which, though he didn't want it, was clearly his property. The person jumped, startled by his early appearance. Outside the window, the sun set, and the room was lit by an eerie glow from the popcorn. Presumably it had become radioactive from long sitting in the alien cargo bay. "Who the hell are you?" Floyd demanded, sensibly. "I'm just an innocent bystander. I don't know how I got in here. Don't ask me. I don't know anything about this. Honest. I'm just an innocent bystander!" The innocent bystander continued to stuff nuclear popcorn into his pockets like it was going out of style. Which it couldn't, for the very sensible reason that it had never been in style. Floyd decided, on a whim, that it didn't really matter, since all the innocent bystander wanted to do was to fill his pockets with the popcorn, and since Floyd had no overwhelming desire to keep the popcorn in question, it made perfect sense, from his point of view, to get rid of it. The innocent bystander seemed to have virtually limitless pockets. Either that, or the popcorn had mutated in the radiation and did some kind of shrinking trick when they were stuffed in, because the pockets hardly seemed to be filling up at all. Eventually, the innocent bystander had picked up all of the huge piles of the offending popcorn, and left. Floyd relaxed on what remained of his sofa, and turned on what was left of his television. There were a few sit-coms in which the "sit"'s were all the same and there was a decided lack of "com". He fell asleep for a few hours and missed a commercial for CHIA-WOMBAT, and Wombat-Whack-O-Matic. He missed a Crime-Stoppers shot offering a reward for any and all information leading to the arrest of a small man, about two feet tall, with no skin, greenish patches, and a four-legged gait who had stolen a Flame-Red Harley Davidson Motorcycle. He finally woke up. There was a news article on about how all the embassies and government buildings in the world had been mysteriously clogged to entrance and exit all day by mounds of an unidentified yellowish white substance resembling glow-in-the-dark styrofoam. An innocent bystander had, in each case, flown down from the sky aboard a glider painted with a promotional slogan for "Al Ien's Scrap Hauling" on the side and removed the offending substance. You think I'm joking about this GNU thing, don't you? Well, gnothing is a joke. There are no jokes, because you can't moisten treasons. Because treasons are dried jokes. And reasons are dried gropes. But you can't dry gropes. And you can't moisten treasons. Am I making myself clear GNOW? Gno? Well, gnever mind, then. Floyd grimaced, popped a mint in his mouth, and then went to bed. The next day was little better, as he was mobbed by a horde of brick-lobbing beavers. This did little to improve his overall state of mind, and indeed head, and caused him to be transported rather hurriedly to the hospital yet again, where he met a man suffering from radiation poisoning, claiming to have been hit by an innocent bystander with nuclear popcorn. "Oh yes?" he asked. "I know him. Took all my popcorn." "Blast him! Blast him! Blast ..." Floyd leaned over and looked at the man, and decided that all this staying-at-the-hospital nonsense was just simply going to have to stop. He got up and left, falling flat on his face the moment he got out the door, due to an attack from behind of alien- controlled beavers heaving some pretty hefty bricks. Confuse-Ius Advertises: A GNU novella, by High Preest Floyd Gecko and Doubter CirclBLATTT Disinterested Observer, has been written expanding on the strange pseudo-logical story from which this confusing myth has been extruded. It chronicles the birth and death of the Church of MOO, the end of the world, the arrival of the X-BLATTTs on X-Day, the Grinch who Stole X-Day, reality-altering drugs, undead wombats, Floyd Gecko: Man With The Exploding Head, and much, much, much more. For your own personal manuscript-type copy of this story, send $10 to the Church Of MOO, P.O. Box 26038, 72 Robertson Rd., Nepean, Ontario, Canada, K2H 9Y8. You won't live to regret it. TIME BOMB As Written by Floyd Gecko Based on the screenplay by I Yemen-Oying but not Floyd Gecko, savagely mangled from the short story invented entirely by I Yemen- Oying without even the slightest bit of help from Floyd Gecko. Rewritten without anything even vaguely resembling permission from the original author, or indeed even his knowledge. Actually, it's not really by Floyd Gecko at all, when you think about it. But hey, what the hell, you only live once. Skumby was a rather nice blue-green planet in the Gamma Epsilon quadrant of the Galaxy. It had deserts, to be sure, but it also had forests, which the Skumbags would burn down, it had oceans, which the Skumbags would dump oil into, and it had clouds, which the Skumbags would curse for raining acid on them. On the whole, however, the Skumbags were a fairly decent people. But I repeat. It WAS a rather nice planet. The radio in the Janitor's Lounge (First Class Citizens ONLY) blared out something vaguely resembling music. Saxophones, violins, and a piano were all being savagely distorted by the Central Muzak Filter of Skumby into a kind of auditory paste that dripped down the walls like something tangibly sticky. It was with only mild relief that I Yemen-Oying and Gettah Leif heard the bit of sonic mush come to something that seemed to the DJ to be an end, and the DJ's digitally synthesized voice commented on the nature of the particular bit of nothingness in question. "And that, folks, was a distortion of Mack the Nyke, by Old Shoes. Stay tuned to SKUM for much much more." Suddenly, there was the elaborate, but wholly perfunctory, fanfare that announced the Presidential Address. "Dear citizens of Skumby, this is your President interrupting," whined the President, who had been chosen by computer from all ten billion citizens of Skumby as the single most nasally whiny voice imaginable, so as to strike aggravation into the hearts of all Skumbags when he made announcements of bad news. It was all part of the Muzak-Lovers Association takeover, but that's not what this story is about. "It is rumored that the Damfool terrorists have planted a P- Bomb somewhere on Skumby." From the open window of the Janitorial lounge, sounds of screams of anguish and terror assailed the luxurious plush furniture and real foxfur wall hangings. "As you may or may not be aware," droned the voice, "P-Bombs are capable of destroying entire planets." The screams multiplied in volume momentarily until the president drowned them out. Someone shouting "Don't Worry! Be Happy!" into a megaphone could be heard briefly over the thronging roar of the crowd. The President's computer syntesized voice deepened to project a feeling of security and sincerity. The Skumbags were clearly intended to know that he meant what he was saying. "Please don't panic. We assure you that the rumors are just..." the President paused, either trying to think of the right word to convey a sense of security, or waiting for the teleprompter to finish scrolling up. "Rumors," he finished tamely. "Thank you." The DJ was allowed control of the precious airwaves for all of half a second as the sounds of rioting and panic filled the streets below. "...and, uh..." Then the President returned. "Just a remark, citizens. There is no point in running, since the bomb would destroy the whole planet. You fools." The last two words somehow slipped through as the DJ regained his air time. Some slightly more envigorating and happy music took control of the radio, as if trying to reassure the people listening on the giant speaker stacks below that everything was going to be okay. Honest. Really. No kidding. Sounds of panic subsided. People sheepishly returned things they'd looted in the thirty seconds of rioting. Rag music drifted though the suddenly silent air of the Janitorial Lounge as Gettah Leif contemplated an Icosa-Puzzle. The roundish shape seemed to absorb all his attention, while failing to actually DO anything. He tried twisting a corner piece. "Dumb rumors," he complained. "Probably started by those Damfools to get us to panic. But we're not going to panic, are we?" Sounds of screaming wafted lazily through the window like a sluggard being roused from a pleasant dream, complaining that the coffee was too hot, and that he'd much rather be in bed sleeping. "No," replied I Yemen-Oying just a little bit too fast. "We're calm." Gettah Leif, Janitor, returned his attention to the Icosa- Puzzle. "Let's see here..." The thing suddenly turned inside out and went a puzzling shade of mauve. "Can I see the puzzle?" I Yemen-Oying held out his hand to catch the soaring object as Gettah tossed it over. Gettah put his feet up on the velour couch he was reclining on. "I LIKE this GNU job, you know? Being a first class citizen gives you a whole GNU perspective on life." "Yeah, yeah, whatever." "You know, on some planets," the rag music made a particularly cheerful turn, "Janitors are considered lower-class citizens!" Sounds of screams vaguely echoed about the streets, and Gettah straightened the flower in the buttonhole on his formal work clothes. "Hmm..." was Yemen's only reply, "If I could get this stupid corner piece over here..." The music came to an end, and gave way to something suspenseful, just as if to remind the people of Skumby that they were about to be blown to smithereens. Not that any of them knew what a smithereen looked like, but the prospect of being blown into one was hardly appealing to any of them. "But not here on Skumby," continued Gettah on his diatribe. "Here we know what janitors are REALLY worth." "Dumb corner piece..." "Hmm," Gettah growled. "Are you listening?" "Uh, no..." "Didn't think so." The President, the only person qualified to order a member of the Sacred Order of Holy Janitors, came on the PA and began respectfully. "Uh, better get to work, guys... And, uh... Turn off the radio?" Gettah switched off the radio. "Yeah, okay..." He paused, looking at the unreacheable Yemen. "Like talking to a wall..." "Huh?" As the two Janitors walked from the Lounge to the central hall of the great Janitorial Temple and Yemen tucked the Icosa-Puzzle into his large worksuit pocket, panic sounds could be heard vaguely over the Presidential Fanfare that blared from loudspeakers. "It's me again..." The President's smile could be heard. In the distance, someone shoved cotton balls in his ears. The President's voice deepened again. "I ask of you AGAIN not to panic, notwithstanding the fact that we may all be blasted to space dust in a few hours." Screams and yells of agony wafted through the great hall. "The Schnag-Wave scans indicate..." the great Wallscreens showed a massive Schnag terminal. The words 'Conclusion: HELP!!' had been covered by a strategically placed cup of coffee. "...that there is a P-Bomb in the north-west quadrant. But don't worry. P- Bombs can be easily defused once found. Just look for anything that doesn't seem to be serving any obvious purpose." Gettah looked at Yemen with a raised eyebrow. "Please resume normal life, and pretend you're not about to be blown away." The fanfare died away like a wounded animal. "Pretend you're not about to be blown up?" Yemen's protest echoed through the marble pillars of the Janitorial Temple. "Yeah," sneered Gettah. "There's tact and subtlety for ya. Whoah!" Gettah broke off his sneer as he came across an unexpected box in the middle of the floor and fell on his head. Gettah sat up with a groan, and Yemen jumped in with a helpful comment. "What a stupid place to leave a box!" The box sat there in the middle of the floor, screaming "HI! I'M THE BOMB!" with all it's very being. Or rather, suggesting it to any being with a sufficiently developed cerebrum, if not actually emitting sonic vibrations of that variety. "Uh, wait a sec..." Gettah seemed to grasp the idea of something being wrong with what was obviously a power conduit of some kind sitting in the middle of the polished marble floor of the entrance hall to the Temple. He pondered it for a moment more. "It might," he decided after a second's thought, "be the bomb." Had this been a television show, there would undoubtedly have been a closeup on Yemen's horrified reaction, a dramatic chord, and a lengthy commercial break advertising products designed to improve the life of everyone pestered by social rejection and adolescent spots. However, it wasn't, and it didn't. Yemen's reaction went uncaptured by film. Their panicked shouts resonated in the hall. "Whadda we do? Whadda we do?" Gettah was so flustered he dropped his broom. "Uh," said Yemen, helpfully, and reached out to grab the mysterious box. A crackle of electricity went ZAP, and the lights went out, leaving the hall in utter blackness. Gettah's "Or maybe it isn't..." could be heard echoing in the huge chamber for a moment. "Gettah Leif?" "Yeah?" "Get a life." "Oops." Gettah gave a shrug that didn't help much in the gloom. Confuse-Ius Would Like To Point Out: ALL SINNERS REPENT! WORSHIP THE TRUE GOD QUACK! NOW! C'MON! HOP TO IT! A ghostly fanfare could be heard through the hall. "That power outage was caused by the energy drain required for the Schnag-Wave scans, but we have determined that the P-bomb is the in the capital city of Hikkup. We will find it, don't worry." There was a loud thump, and the lights came up with a whine. Gettah was lying face down on the floor. "Ooooh... Stupid wall." "Whoa! Are you all right?" Yemen rushed over anxiously. "Yeah, I guess so. I just had a thought." "What?" "Well, the blackout wasn't caused by you pulling the box out of the ground, right?" "Yeah? SO?" "SO... what WAS the box for?" "Well, I guess it was the..." Another moment was lost as their expressions of horror were neither captured on 18mm, nor used to introduce a fast food commercial. "So what do we do? WHAT DO WE DO?" Yemen bounced about nervously, like a caged mongoose when someone dangles a plastic snake in front of its nose. "I dunno! Try to smash it or something!" They set to work beating the thing with their brooms and mops, but it stubbornly refused to break into a zillion little component P-Bomb parts. Gettah threw it into the air, drop kicked it, stomped on it, and bashed it about. Nothing happened. Yemen balled up his fists in frustration. "WHY THAT [insert your favourite swear word here] BOMB!!!" The box, unable to withstand that kind of treatment, went off and sulked in a corner of its own mind and fell apart into wires, circuits, and a lot of indestructible frame. "That was easy," Gettah remarked. "That's why we're First-Class citizens, us Janitors." Yemen's smile as they began to sweep up the mess would have cracked an egg, had the egg actually tried to fit the whole thing on its face. Which, on the surface, seems unlikely. Back in the Janitorial Lounge (First Class Citizens ONLY!), the DJ interrupted another serving of pasty pseudomusic. "This just in. Apparently the P-Bomb has been defused. We owe thanks to a certain Gettah Leif and I Yemen-Oying." The DJ paused, slightly miffed. The Wallscreens showed a picture of Gettah and Yemen standing by the wall of the Janitorial Temple next to the remains of the P-Bomb, wearing goofy "Hi Mom" expressions. "Big deal," the DJ continued. "I could have done it myself, if I'd had the chance. Stay tuned to SKUM for more." Yemen stared with intense concentration at the puzzle in his hands. It seemed totally unsolveable. "You STILL haven't figured out the puzzle?" Gettah laughed slightly at the sheer incompetence of SOME Janitors. "NO," said Yemen angrily. "And I'd like to see you try it, MISTER SAVIOUR." Yemen growled. Why should Gettah get first billing on the radio, when HE had destroyed the bomb? "Sure," said Gettah confidently. "It's simple. Look." Gettah fiddled contentedly with the Icosa-Puzzle, getting the corner piece that Yemen had complained about so vehemently. "Just like this..." He slid one panel sideways. "And like this..." He rotated a corner again. "It's not gonna work THAT way," protested Yemen angrily. "And... there! All done." Gettah sat back contentedly and displayed the solved Icosa- Puzzle. Yemen stared in disbelief. There was a slight PING noise, and the puzzle became a transparent sphere. Gettah dropped it, allowing it to fall to the sofa beside him, and stared in horror. "HUH?" The thing began to emit a bright, unbearable light. A rising whine came from inside it somewhere, as it became a burning beacon, sort of like one of those big flashtube things, you know? "THE BOMB!" Screamed Yemen superfluously. "THE PUZZLE WAS THE BOMB ALL ALONG!" But his redundant shouts were quickly masked by the rising roar of the bomb. A pillar of flame blasted off most of one half of the planet, destroying cities, mountains, Skumbags, and doughnut shop franchises alike. The molten innards of the planet were scattered around the sky like so many cracker crumbs and Ming Vase fragments after a particuarly violent party swarmed through the houses of several innocent bystanders. As planet Skumby was blasted to molten fragments, some say a scourge of really annoying people was wiped from the face of the universe. But then, most of the people who said that were residents of the planet Damfoo, which was blown up not long afterwards. "Gettah Leif?" "Yeah?" "Get a life." Death Of A Holy-Grailsman By Low Preest Goyd Flecko "Look, Floyd, if there's all these CIA mind-reading satellites up in orbit..." Gecko-The-Dense interrupted the new Acolyte with a precise voice, and a muddled brain, and chided knowingly at her. "Nay, nay," he said from the depths of a ridiculous-looking cowled robe which stretched off his cardboard throne and some way towards the door, as if making good its escape. "Nay, nay?" "Exactly. There are no mind-control satellites up in orbit." "Oh no! Not this screwed-up nonexBLATTTence thing again! I couldn't understand that! What the fuck was with that anyway? The satellites' beams are so powerful they can affect you even though they don't exBLATTT? That's insipid bullshit." "Yah," said Gecko, quickly changing his mind about what diversion to use. "The satellites aren't in orbit at all... They're, uhh... On the ground. All around us. Yeah. Because they work better at close range." "Yeah? So if there's all these satellites sitting around on the ground reading our minds for the CIA, then how come nobody notices them?" "Ah, well, that's a good question," said Gecko, thinking as fast as he could. "I'm glad you asked me that." "Well?" "Well, the answer is simple. Mmmmm... What it is, is that people actually DO notice them all the time, but they never talk about it. These aren't just mind-READING satellites, remember. They're mind-CONTROL satellites. It just stops people from talking about it." "But I KNOW I've never seen them before." "No, you have, you just can't SAY so. That's all. They make you act just as if you'd never seen them. So, for all practical purposes, you never did." "But I..." "You can't even admit it to yourself. They'd detect that, and stop it. So, I suppose you could say you never notice them." "Ah... So how come people don't, like, trip over them, or drive into them and break them?" "Well, they arrange it in our minds so that we drive around them, and that we never notice the traffic jams that causes, and that we bandage up all our scrapes and bruises from tripping over them, and never remember." "And nobody sees the bandages?" "Of course." "So the whole world's just a fake. They're spending all their time pretending they aren't here." "Basically, yep." "So anything could just be an illusion." "Uh huh," scintillated the Gecko. "Bull." "Turn around." The Gecko waggled a finger in a circle. The Acolyte turned around slowly, a full circle, and noticed that the Gecko was gone. "Whar'd that little varmint get to now?" The stupid-looking robe had entirely disappeared, but there was no way Gecko could have run away so quickly with that monstrosity to lug around. "WHERE THE FUCK?" "He was never there at all, you know." "WHAT?" She whirled around and whipped out a blade reflexively. "Funny." She looked down at the spoon she was holding, and dropped it slowly. The wombat in front of her ambled across the room, and she turned to watch. The lighting shifted slightly as she realized one of the walls was missing, and the room suddenly opened onto the bleak airless environment of the Moon. The Earth sat nonchalantly in the sky just above the horizon. She whirled to look behind her. There was no room there either. She turned again to face the wombat, and found herself on a sun-baked field of something which must once have been grass, but which generations of non- precipitation and the precursors to the scattered locust-corpses had long since turned to dust. "What the FUCK?" "Floyd Gecko was never there. He was busy elsewhere at the time." The little wombat rolled casually through the dust and into a suddenly nearby lake, stood up with a start, and shook itself off. "So what up, little dude? Who are you?" "WOMBAT." "I can see that, but... Ohhh, you mean the pooter." "Yah. Pooter, that's me." The Wombat shrugged internally. Close enough. Computer was a decent metaphor for what it was. "So? What up?" "Generated images. You notice it cuts into reality without any noticeable blur? I can change your memory slightly to edit the fake stuff in with the real without any noticeable shift." "No shit, huh?" "Nope. Just the facts, ma'am," lied the Wombat. "So lemme out." "K." She turned around, and saw a hut with a corrugated tin roof. She walked towards it, and opened the strangely sturdy door, and stepped through... back into the Gecko's stupid Throne Room. She looked back for the Wombat. There was no door, but it was sitting behind her scratching its head absently. "How do I know you let me out?" "You don't. You'll just have to trust me." "How can I? I don't know what you're up to, but you wouldn't show me that, dump me back in reality, and just STOP, would you?" "I don't know, WOULD I?" "Mebbe." "What for?" "To prove a point?" "That's something Floyd would do." "Mmmm." "But I see your point. What if I'm lying about what I am? I could say I'll turn it off and show you, but that wouldn't help. I could try to convince you, but it'd never work. Once you doubt your senses, the rest goes along with it." "Yah? Y'don't say." "Nope, I don't." Then there was a wombat. Then there was no wombat. Then there was. CONVOLUTION INCARNATE The Wombat World had subsisded, the insanity had faded subtly back into the wherever-it-was-that-the-wombat-world- had-come-from from whence it came. All that persBLATTTed was a kind of Authorial Stupidity, which ended up looking, in the Book of the HBLATTTory of the World (an annoying mind drug kept in the Great MOO's own Library), like some of the worst writing ever seen in any book of any kind ever written. This is a tale of what happened during those strange and turbulent years, some hundred thousand years after the founding of the Church Of MOO. Floyd Gecko, or at least a wormhole-matrix version of one of the minds of one of his many billions of clones, a residual from the Wombat World, had been exploring a certain planet called Skumby. What he had found was shocking, chilling, and about as surprising as finding the Eiffel Tower in your jacket pocket. Which is more surprising than the human mind can comfortably encompass, given that at that time, the Eiffel Tower had long since rusted to little tiny bits no larger than a thumbtack. The shocking, chilling, and about-as-surprising-as-finding-the-long- since-rusted-to-bits-yet-brand-spanking-new-Eiffel-Tower-in-your- jacket-pocket-while-you're-standing-in-the-middle-of-a-desert- halfway-across-the-Galaxy-from-anywhere-your-jacket-has-any- right-to-be-on-a-night-like-this-anyway-and-just-who-did-it- think-it-was-coming-all-this-way-and-spending-YOUR-hard-earned- money-to-buy-spacefare-just-to-show-you-some-silly-old- architectural-masterpeice-that-doesn't-even-exBLATTT-anymore- not-to-mention-the-key-aspect-of-an-unruly-hyphenated-adjective-in the-middle-of-an-utterly-ridiculous-and-totally-ungrammatical-myth- whose-author-evidently-didn't-even-know-what-was-funny-and-what- was-just-plain-tedious-let-alone-rules-of-grammar-like-when-to-use- a-comma-instead-of-a-parenthesis-and-stuff-like-that-there thing which he had discovered was an ancient and well-preserved ruin of an ancient and not-very-well-preserved race. This race (which is NOT, by the way, the subject of any long or unruly hypenated adjectives (but will, in a paragraph or two be the subject of an incredibly long sequence of parenthetical comments (not entirely unlike this one, but worse))) was truly remarkable. It had its own Church Of MOO. Wierd, eh? The temple was a strange thing that lived above the planet, a thing that orbited looking like a baton-twirler's baton stuck between a basketball and a dinner plate. On the ends of the baton lived two creatures of pure light, named gNuBlUkTuK and GnUbLuKtUk. But that's not the point. The point is, the race which built this temple were descended from Schnagglebarthbats (Schnagglebarthbats were originally native to Andorria (despite common and utterly unfounded rumours that they were from Deneb) and not Deneb (told you), but were totally brainless until humans met them for the first time (humans eventually had to uplift the Schnagglebarthbat race to make it worth talking to (this was done to many races throughout the Galaxy, but Schnagglebarthbats (pronounced: Shnaggle-bart-bats) were among the most interesting (not because they were from Andorria (though Andorria is indeed one of the more interesting planets in the Galaxy (being as it is home to so many strange creatures, of which Schnagglebarthbats were only one (another interesting race of the planet, and somewhat relevant here, is the MOOing Lump Of Yukky Stuff (actually, the name tells you ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about what the creature is like (the people who named it were ConfusionBLATTTs (the Peterson Twins, the ones who, between them, named most of the planets and animals in the Galaxy, were devout ConfusionBLATTTs)) on account of it is actually quite a pleasant animal (it resembles a spherical ball of fluff which purrs (further information on the MOOing Lump Of Yukky Stuff may be found in the Encylopaedia Galactica (then again, it may not, depending on if you can FIND the book (the Encyclopaedia has a habit of hiding itself in strange places in the databases, such as under "W" for "What if you want to look up something in the Encyclopaedia" (this is as nothing compared to the poorly edited, badly written, and totally disorganized Book itself (the entries are NOT indexed, impossible to find, and in ANYTHING but Alphabetical Order, on top of which they range in length from the truly massive article on Pomegranates (the article's author was an Immortal being from another planet, who had several thousand years with nothing to do but research (the article therefore would be something on the order of a hundred thousand tonnes if actually printed on paper)) to the short article on Guacamole (which reads, in its entirety "Guacamole is" (most people don't dispute the truth of this, but generally agree that the article wasn't finished when the author suffered a fatal heart attack from overeating (a common enough event among humans, though not among the ORIGINAL topic of this parenthetical commentary, Schnagglebarthbats (which were, as has been noted, NOT the only inhabitants of their home planet, but in fact were one of the most interesting (though they lack the COW perspective to notice the similarity (this is due mostly to the fact that the divide themselves up into different categories, such as Andorrian Schnagglebarthbats, Denebian Schnagglebarthbats, those Schnagglebarthbats with little green tufts of fur on their temples, and so forth (this is probably easier to understand with a little knowledge of the shape of a Schnagglebarthbat (which is extremely interesting (consBLATTTing as it does of a head which makes up most the body's mass (it is generally twice the height of the body, and made of almost solid bone (for reasons which will become clear in a moment (or at least, less muddy than they are now)) and a small body with utterly useless wings (the overall impression is of a gargoyle seen in a funhouse mirror (the dBLATTTorted proportions have no apparent explanation (the giant head, for instance, which appears to have only ever been used to protect the Schnagglebarthbat while it engaged in its normal mode of sleeping (this consBLATTTed of hanging by the head between two protruding rocks in the caves in which they lived (thus the thick skull) and appears to have been a result of having to sleep with such a huge head (the circularity here has baffled evolutionologBLATTTs for a long time (but not nearly so much as their strange language, which consBLATTTs entirely of the equivalent of the letters "A", "G", "U" and "L" (and can only be pronounced by humans if they gargle at the same time) which spell out certain protein molecules in their letters (each protein which corresponds to any short work of literature translated into their language is invariably incredibly beneficial to humans if they eat it (which has led to the project of swallowing War And Peace in the Schnagglebarthbat language to see what it does (it eventually caused the heads of all test-subjects to explode for no good reason (this mass-spontaneous- combustion only ever happened once before, on the planet of Palapamostaron (whose tallest building, the Star Tower, is so tall (hundreds of thousands of kilometers) that the planet of Palapamostaron is widely known (among those who can pronounce it) as the greatest planet for curing Vertigo ever found (but is also well known as the hardest place in the Galaxy to get a decent Chicken Dumstick after the Star Torus of Raj Mak (in both places the government illegalized Chicken Drumsticks after a mBLATTTranslation of an ancient religious text suggested to them that the Fifth Commandment of the Holy Honker was actually "Thou shalt not eat any chicken drumsticks unto thee" (the original stated "Thou shalt not brutally massacre cattle with thy chainsaw", which translates much better in the original Schnagglebarthbat (the complete holy work of which causes all humans who eat it to turn into small piles of Chicken Drumsticks (but most people aren't very interested in the Schnagglebarthbat religious literature, being more fascinated by Jatramar literature (which contains such classic lines as "when thou find any other peoples of the world, thou shalt send unto them a large emmissary, clad in a chicken suit, of fifty meters in height, which shall be invisible to the eye, and deliver unto one of their number a Candy-Gram, and shall leave behind one who shall steal away all kazoos of thy enemy, and thou shalt then attack them with six thousand, seven hundred nine and a half of thy number" (this has in fact led to the speculation that the so-called Kazoo-Teleportation-effect (in which it is believed that kazoos have a tendency to teleport away through wormholes to the location of other kazoos and so on until massive piles of the instruments gather dust on some Alien World) is actually a result of Jatramar cultBLATTTs))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))) and were a rather nice bunch of people all around. Actually, this myth has no point. Just ignore it, and maybe it'll go away. At any rate, it doesn't call attention to the name of the planet, or the fact that it WASN'T called Calotia, from which came the only known species of sentient Rutabaga in the Galaxy, which dances incessantly, since a Rutabaga Death Dance must be going on in the Universe in order for Death to take place. This myth also refuses to mention that the GNU World Order euphemBLATT for Death is "Tax Exemption", or that Calotian Rutabagas show respect for Gods by acting impatient, for reasons best left unexplained. In fact, this myth says ABSOLUTELY NOTHING FURTHER on the subject of ANY imaginary beings which don't exBLATTT in this Universe anyway. Except to mention that it won't talk about them any more. END Confuse-Ing Inter-Rapture #5 ³³ΊΫ³έήΫΊ³³ή έΊΫ³ ³έή³έ ³³ΊΫ³έήΫΊ³³ή έΊΫ³ ³έή³έ ³³ΊΫ³έήΫΊ³³ή έΊΫ³ ³έή³έ ³³ΊΫ³έήΫΊ³³ή έΊΫ³ ³έή³έ ³³ΊΫ³έήΫΊ³³ή έΊΫ³ ³έή³έ ³³Ί235-1729-13013-5έQ³έ Confuse-Ius Once Say "pgAARgyMxyMQTAHDrqvA/5k42TRWQCYiykIv44qqWDJZf 9qAK0VLxwo4Ijb/3NOcPnORkSf3JYNrKIDvHi4VXf9HLS3prh9VTWujlDZ77yqjqE Bo3q0QdxdlwfV9KVcgNd0ybT8YUdoRSe99IpUldMSgeZn3u7yGzqEoZDo5n5 to you TOO, buddy!" CyberMyth a la Martinez Range of History Glyphs. Prerecorded preverbal prescription against ignorance. Neural tweaks, MagRez helmets. Flash. Unistat. Unified North America. Canada, United States, Mexico. Three languages, three cultures, three nations. English, French, Spanish. Flash. Hanstruria. American midwest, Canadian Prairies. High Tech Nationhood, Guide-run pseudodemocracy. Capital, Edmonton, first Dome City in the world. Cybersecessionism in the 2150's. Flash. Edmonton. Mall mole haven. Subways hooking up to apartments, to the mall. Cold weather. Giant Mall. West Edmonton Mall, bigger than big. 2020, definitive proof. No city outside the mall. Size of Manhattan, closed environment. Flash. Economy. Edmonton, hub of techdom. Unistat surpasses Singapore in 2043 for GNP, comeback from third-world. Central computers, biochips, neural architecture. Flash. La Grand Beigne. The Big Doughnut. Unistat minus Hanstruria. Imperial Police, bureaudemocracy. French puns. Battles for Edmonton. Space Bubbles refuse to intervene, E.A. has no comment. Fireworks on the 1st of July. Flash. Space Bubbles. Soap sheen glistening. Giant globs of air and water, surrounded by Edmonton cyberplastic sheeting. Holographic, electrodynamic, pseudodemocratic Bubble leader. Flash. Equatorial Alliance. Orbital power stations. Geostationary. Beamdown to equator. Political strings. Monopoly of energy-rich states. Decentralize the Oil Monopoly. Flash. Yorba Linda, Ottawa, Tenochtitlan. Religion Factories cranking out cults and self-replicating meme patterns daily. Mental viruses to "enforce" Imperial Police, to infiltrate the unspecified enemy. Polish of Craziness. Flash. Singapore. Decaying ruins. Once great techworld. Subways rusted, computers ten weeks old. Veneer, not of society, but of moss on the buildings. Cleaning crews unemployed. Gum becomes legal again. Litterbugs rejoice again. When Martinez was three, her family joined the Yo-Yo Kult. Yo-Yo prayer wheels were to be spun at least ten thousand times per day, sending karmic messages to Yoy'o, the messenger of the Gods. A week later, they joined the Reformed Church Of MOO. Cow-noises were to be made, and strange rituals performed to appease the Invisible Alien Cyberloonie Elvis Clones. A never-ending cycle of religion permeated her mental mesh. When Martinez was six, her home city of Edmonton was declared capital of the fledgeling nation of Hanstruria. She had no idea why. She had little understanding of the world outside her niche of dataspace and the transport grid of Mall City. She had even less comprehension that she was a member of the privileged technical elite, to even INHABIT Mall City, let alone have dataspace. When Martinez turned eight, her "dad" tossed her a datapack in her privileged bliss. "History Glyphs", he'd explained. It was a prerecorded neural memory modification package courtesy of the Damjaniczak Machine, cyberplas temple of truth and personality backups. It held copies of minds of everyone in Edmonton. Probably, she'd always assumed, there were others in other cities, linked together. They were the "Guardians Of Society". Educators Extraordinaire. The equivalent of ten years historical education later, her Edmontonian brain held as many historical facts and analyses as the World Library at 16:34:12.56, 2021/05/23, though only a fraction of what it held the next day. Even Neosapiens can only hold so much. Edmontonian Brains are hot shit on the neuro-Black-Market. If you have a Hanstruria-Capital tattoo on your scalp, watch out in Tokyo, Amsterdam, Delhi or Singapore, or some Brainlegger will wipe your jelly and stick in some aging pseudoaristocrat. Funny thing, though... No analysis on the Damjaniczak Machine itself. No comment on how it was probably holding actual human evolution back in permanent stagnation. No point-out of its five magnitude-order bigger fiberlinks to Yorba Linda, Ottawa, and Tenochtitlan. Facts were there, but the association patterns hadn't been prebiased. Funny ol' thing, life. Yes, dear Martinez had been slotted for the prestressed, pretested, presimulated program of 'Pooter 'Ponent, to be and to run, 'till software obsolescence do us part. Genetic sex tendencies switched "off" by tailored phage #645345342, D.M. requisite 6, brain souped up to the D.M. maximum level, permitted the optimum privilege, 'POOTER 'PONENT. She got to be part of the giant INFOWEB that was sweeping the 'net. Data-net and Pla-net, that is. But outside Edmonton, she wasn't entirely aware, it hardly existed at all. Inside Mall City, there was bustle, plugged-in-ness. No computer more than three hours old, recycling blue-boxes every street corner. Singapore? Back woods! TEN WEEKS! But that never occurred to her either. See, the D.M. hadn't exactly designed her to fit in outside itself. Igor Damjaniczak's semideified cortex simulation, IQ amplified to a thousand times, it wanted to use her hyperneurons for itself. Simulator space. But, well, Fate, Brother Entropy, and the Unistat Government played a maybe not so little role in showing off that just possibly, Igor D. didn't know what the fuck he was talking about. It came in the form of a blinding flash, and seconds later, a rumbling boom from the roof of the Mall. Decameters-long shards of concrete rained like Delta-Pavonis dust onto less than unsuspecting citizens, later reincarnated from backup copies into freshly designed GNU bodies. They let that kind of thing happen to them every few days, or they'd be Singapore-obsolete. Martinez was ready for a massive monolithic clump of silicon dioxide to cut short her current processor when the thing hummed out of the sky. Like Glinda the Good Witch from Wizard of Oz, she thought, correlating one of the 'tainment glyphs from a few short soft cushioned years ago. It was soap-bubbly, drifting at extreme velocity. It came up short with a hum-whine of nanocillia on the plastic film backpedalling fast. They holoprojected an image of Glinda herself, standing, waving a wand. "You are Martinez, J., P.P. component 225j-T17?" "Only on a tuesday." Overpopulation, lack of fertlizer, and cybersoul backups brought that about. Unistat hadn't been informed. They dealt with Hanstruria, the Poster Model. Backwards anti-tech, probably manipulated. "Don't be fucking clever, asshole. Come with me if you want to live." Glinda was Arnold Schwartzenegger, 5-o'clock shadow and dark glasses, holding out a hand. Martinez grabbed on, plastered to Glinda's bubble with nanocillia, backpedealled away up towards the hole in the ceiling. Less elite shouted things like "HELP" and "WHAT'S GOING ON?" as they lifted alike. "If I want to live?" Martinez finally asked. "Okay, so I lied." Glinda's Guidelike holo shrugged, and the cyberplas erased Martinez's memory with a MagRez eliminator program, leaving only the raw neurocrap and some pretty heavy religion memes in the chemical soupmix, just add water and stir. Well, that was pretty much the end of that for the present incarnation of that Martinez, but then, the hardware always was the important thing. Not like she'd had much of a personal memory outside yer basic imprints. Anyway, the waking voices of the water-and-stir version were imprinted thus: "The Ameristat Bald Wombat is nearly extinct! Shame that the Unistat should create it, adopt it as mascot, and then drive it out of its unnatural habitat!" "Traitor! The Bald Wombat is the cause of severe histamine reactions in the populations of Arizona and California." "Tailored bugs?" "Not tailored suits, that's for sure." "Well, my point is just that..." And that was just about all she understood before it went into something about environmental stuff for which the brain had no remaining history glyphs... "Inhibitation Species... Purple Loosestrife, Cane Toads, Zebra Mussels, Gypsy Moths... Industrial Contamination... Heavy Metals, Organics, Acid Rain, Greenhouse Effect, Ozone Layer... Genetics... Ameristat Bald Wombat, Chinese Elephant-Potato, Sahara/Mojave/Gobi Plasticactus, Tree-Surgeons, Sea-Horse, The When-Pigs-Fly Disaster... Faulty Informations... Chernobyl, Challenger, Hab One, Lunagorod-Tritsit-Adeen..." And the rest was faded nonsense. Martinez drifted in and out of consciousness. Many memories had been erased by the MagRez. Typically Neo Sapiens, the first thing she said when she woke was "New software, GNU hardware, same soul: unexpected. Origin location query?" Only she didn't, exactly. Because she got as far as "New sof..." when she noticed a giant standing over her. "Martinez, J?" She nodded mutely, noticing that her words hadn't made a sound anyway. "Your cybersoul has been read into a lizard body. The body you're in has been engineered to accomodate your prestressed neural configurations. Each one must be tailored to one Neo Sapiens only. If you want to talk, visualize a short purple giraffe opening a door. To stop, visualize a gorilla in a bowling alley stopping clocks." Her memory-free, bias-burdened brainware bungled through memory to find "giraffe". Mall City had over a hundred in Zoo, but she'd never been to Zoo. The mental icon triggered some kind of brainbox, a switch went on, and an artificial voice peeped from behind her head. "Memory ident glyphs location query? Original bootstrap location query? Current physical status query? Current physical location query?" "Yeah, I got your memories here, but they ain't exactly what we need for you. So catch some REAL human mind glyphs. Rare commodity in these parts." With a pseudoclick, a brainbox component released an identity glyph stolen by a Brainlegger. Flash. Anger. Violent childhood. Mother trapped in burning building. Father never known. Stealing mouldy bread from a squalid marketplace. Unistat military actions. Smart-Bombs screaming overhead towards unknown Hanstruria. Acropoli gates closed, the pseudoprivileged semi-elite keeping their "modern life" for themselves. Pseudoclick, and Flash. Three-week old computers. Nanosynthetic food. Cheap power. Pseudoprivilege? Well, yes and no. And maybe. Universe is not binary. Philosophical thoughts with an AI supervisor, physics in the afternoon, sex in the evenings, underneath a genuine Tree-Surgeon, almost extinct. Pseudoclick, and Flash. LIFE! Surfing! Fucking! Eating! NAPPING! Playing with a Yo-Yo WITHOUT Religion! Going on walks! Joyous life! Speaking Street! Cuddling a weightless rabbit! V.R.? FUCK THAT! "G'wan." "We needed your brain for our mainframe, too." "And?" "You've been transplanted into a modified Gecko. It's a kind of lizard suited to what we need ya for. Work for us for a year, and you'll get a human body back." "Sappenin'?" "Our Smart-Bombs got under laser zaps into the Protected Zone, picked you up on a Fairy-Bubble, hauled yer ass back here." "Tchawant?" "Your brain's being used, which was the main purpose, but we want a spy in Malaysia, and a Gecko's the best way. We had these Neo Sapiens transplant genes, and figured what the fuck." "Wherezis?" "Archaememe dig at Yorba Linda." Martinez walked along the counter and peered out the window, gazed at the Colossus' head poking up from beneath the harbour. The building they were on had floated near it, and the ripples Nixon's head created on the waves sent sparkling light patterns over the walls. "Sup?" "Malaysia. Decision circuits. Don't worry, we'll do a backup before you go. You won't want to lose your GNU mind now, would you?" "Nope." "'Kay. Brainbox! Get this sucker's cybersoul on dot!" A moment of disorientation, facing a different way. "Well, your first body died in Malaysia, sad to say. Seems a brainlegger from Amsterdam figured out a way to use our brainboxes for something, and scooped them out. We got most of the information, though. You'll only have to go back for a week more. Here's a glyph." Pseudoclick and Flash. Maniac. Dossier. Other things. Clipped and abbreviated, diffraction-logic fringes where certain things in his past had been extrapolated. It was two days later that Martinez was stretched on a rack. The maniac had been torturing a strawberry on a nearby press, tweezers automatically selecting random seeds and PINGing them, electrogram measuring the changes, AI-Artie plotting 'em through a human brain model. Words spilled out a speech synthesizer as if in desperation. "I swear, I knew nothing about The Overlords. If there WERE aliens involved, the Radishes must have had connectsions, the Mint plants were involved, I don't know, but MY KIND WERE NOT CONTACTED. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!" "From strawberries under torture, one may extract all sorts of useful information," claimed the maniac, paraphrasing the jest of one of the most brilliant jesters of all time. He turned to the needles poised over Martinez. Her tiny Gecko fingers were useless to climb away. Her independent Gecko eyes roamed over the room frantically. "It's the Trinary Millennium!" Screamed the strawberry as a seed was extracted. "The trinary year Common Era jumps to E-7 time in ten years! At that point, the turnover will happen!" The maniac jumped. "Apple turnover?" His query was directed now not at the rack- wracked berry, but a fruit beset with a mutant form of beri-beri. Maniac, yes, but Martinez couldn't help but sense a twisted form of irony in there. The apple refused to answer. The purple giraffe opened the door. "Mystic-bull." The maniac spun. "So you DO talk." "Nyet." The gorilla stopped all the clocks in the Yorba Linda bowling alley she envisioned with her most powerful fit of will. The maniac scowled. The door burst open, kicked by a Cybermerc. Martinez couldn't help envisioning the purple giraffe's neck snap when it happened, and tripped a switch which probably wasn't supposed to exist, and accidentally blew away her rescue squad. The maniac chortled. Only she hadn't. They were armoured, and a tailfull of flechettes wasn't enough. The turtle-like cast of helmet, armour, toolshell, and power-tail seemed marginally impressive. The maniac cowered. "It's about time you showed up," she said in Franglanish. "Maybe someone better release the strawberry, and find a Tree- Surgeon for that apple." The strawberry muttered a breath of thanks. The Cybermerc did something nasty to the maniac, and followed her instructions. Eventually she got untied, and it was five days before she came back to Yorba Linda, scenic capital of Unistat, site of the beautiful San Andreas Canyon, and an imaginary bowling alley she'd envisioned. "Your brainbox reveals he was working on something about Damjaniczak's later work. Maniac, mad scientist, we don't know, but he was somehow on to something." "The strawberry had inside information," said Martinez the Gecko, licking an eyeball casually. "You think?" "Must have." "Well, Damjaniczak ain't the business of the Archaememe dig, so I guess we'll have to abandon that line of research." "But... How do you know that?" Neo Sapiens intelligence, overlaid on Human suspicion. "Know what?" "That it's nothing to do? Brainbox records show my biases were prestressed against thinking of the D.M., and FOR processing the memes that get made in Religion Factories like the one over there..." She tongue-gestured at a building that was moving slowly past the window. "And?" "Coverup? Conspiracy?" "Paranoid. But if you think it's important, you're gonna be getting a GNU body anyway." "Whatever." Her GNU body was weird. She was just adapting to the GNU diurnal rhythm of the thing in the training centers of the huge building, getting used to moving human joins with a cybersoul trimmed for a tailored gecko. But... Wait, no lecture, catch the cybersoul glyph... Flash. Cybersoul. Cybernetics, Norbert Wiener. General Systems control. Soul, theology. Ineffable. Only now it's been effed. Cybersoul is the processor that makes a personality out of experience, the hardwire, when coded on softwire software, the genetic presets and the imprinted givens. BLFFFFT. Same soul, different memories, but mostly the same... Biases, personal life... Well, a host of Martinez's somewhere in Unistat and Hanstruria had provided those. Still, it was just a MagRez wipe, not a full nanoscan, so she was mostly the same person. "It's like, your mind changes all the time, as you see GNU stuff, but it's made of the same basic impulses. Same shit, different pile. Same with the body, nutrient replenishment, pattern alteration, crap like that. Ten seconds apart, I'm practically the same, but ten years apart, there's no telling, aside from memes and genes, the basic unalterable units. Plus the rootcore cybersoul." "Wombatshit. That is SO MUCH WOMBATSHIT!" She shrugged. "I used to be Neo Sapiens, no personality, just integrated unit. Igor Damjaniczak's version of the ideal human. Sick twisted fuck that he was. Then I was a lizard with no memories, then I was a lizard with identities taken from someone else, programmed for a certain job. Now I'm a Scoper, in a Homo Sapiens habitus. But I still FEEL like me. It's just accelerated learning. I'm still the same person I was, deep down, because you just can't take that feeling away with any tech developed yet." "Wombatshit. It's STILL wombatshit." "You ain't done it, mack." "You ain't neither, sister, so fuck off." "Okay, fine, so skip the sermon, just tell me where I can find Gecko. He's the one with the info I want, that what us Scopers do, right?" "Whatever. Here, tell ya what, check the 'net address Gecko.Floyd@4:3432/99321.2187.Ottawa.UNI, or better yet, take a TransComm to Ottawa and look there. Hanstruria will let you pass through if you have a citizenship cybersoul bitscan thingy for more than 80%." "They'll find me. I told you, they want my brain back for Igor D." "Brother Entropy has taken care of that, sister. I expect they've already burnt out half your neurons with boosted Glial feed, praise be. 'Sides, the bitscan's implanted on your first- circuit imprint. 's hardweird into your cybersoul." "Oh. Didn't know that." "Wombatshit." "'Strue. Anyway, thanks for the info. Here's a cred. Any time you need info, just call me." "Wom..." "Heard ya the first time." Hanstrurian maintenance of the TransComm network was pretty crappy. Spiderbots ticked noisily on ragged, dented chrome floors of the mon'ail, the vinylplast on the seats was tight and squeaky. But it was cheap, and fast. The building Gecko.Floyd@4:3432/99321.2187Ottawa was based out of was like an ancient Neo American Revival thing, only it had to be a few hundred years old. The sign saying "Dunn's Famous Deli" still hung in the window, the neon refreshed occasionally. Like a historical preserve. The nanoscrapers around it were all less than three days old. Like... Like... A pocket of unexpected stability in the Unistat Sector Capital. The other sign was at least normative, compared to the bizarre Deli sign. "Warning. These premises protected by Combat Wombats", though it was in English, not Franglanish. Martinez went carefully to the door, the cyberplas bay windows holo-ing giant Big-Bro eyes to follow her. The Combat Wombats stood alert on the crunchy asphalt-leavings, eyes clicking every few seconds, sonar pings or brainbox twitches making the odd noise. "Yo?" The inside voice was like the voice of Mall City, omnipresent. "'Sup?" "You know stuff about Damjaniczak and some strawberries?" "Come on in." There was a Homo Sapiens waiting there. "Are YOU Floyd Gecko?" "Same genes, same memes. The process would take too long to explain, tho. Are you J. Martinez, leader of these Lizard People cultBLATTTs?" "They're not a cult. I only USED to work out of Archaememetics. And it's hardly fair of you, you being the ancient non-leader of that MOO thing." "That MOO thing serves its purpose. Now what are you here for?" "SERVES?" "Yes. I thought you had our glyph on that brainbox of yours." "Umm..." "Here." Flash. Prigogine. Aggregated Entropy. Uneven progression of the even distribution of noninformation. Pockets on all levels of abstraction. Memetic modelling of entropic dysfunctionality. Higher-order imposition of a GNU term by reformed pocketing causing fragmenting aggregation on lower levels. Some heavy math in tiny glyph-packets of their own. Basically, Entropy is a lie. None of this "deterioration" bit in the math, just "stable, most probable state"... And in a self-modifying multilevel feedback system, it produces pockets of positive ordering on various levels, with the OVERALL "ENTROPY" increasing. Whew... Pretty chunky glyph. "See, remember United States of America?" "Pre-Unistat North-South axis central region of North America, right?" "Yeah, so there was these presidents (they had this democracy thing back then, right?) Bush, it was, and Quayle, who said that thing about GNU World Order?" "I have a backup copy of the GNU World Order glyph." "'Kay. So anyway, this was right at the beginning of the first K-sub-six class Prigoginic leap. That's to say, transition of centralized power to decentralized power." "So MOO was created to decentralize? A destabilizing memetic- vectored neurovirus that splintered aggregations?" "MOO was one of the many thousand manifestations of that virus, which was created in the late 1890's by a neurohacker named Nikola Tesla." "No shit?" "No shit." "So what's the deal with that?" "Remember the results?" "CommunBLATT collapsed, followed by its lackey, CapitalBLATT. World Government tried to consolidate, democracy dissolved in the resulting information referencing overload, dictatorships formed, splintered..." "Splintered..." "The memetic virus taking the first big effect. Tesla instinctively used a DNA-RNA-neuro-feedback loop to map out a mechanBLATT which evolution produced to prevent convergent evolution and extinction. He understood that was the way to an incoherent but at least nonsterilized future." "Seems pretty self-evident to me." "Of course. AFTER the virus gets in the system, convergent turns to divergent, and it seems like that's the ONLY way it could have been. Thing is, we don't know where the virus came from, but it slips around levels a lot, like that." "It fragmented other things after that, turned MOO into the Reality Factories of Ottawa, Tenochtitlan, Yorba Linda." "First thing it got into was the pooters. Like the 23775 scandal." "Serial-numbered holding corporations that held all political power, but the numbers were so long nobody could remember which was which, all transactions computer controlled from the stockholders, supposedly a democratic system..." "Turns out all ownership ended up being circular, no actual stockholders, just corporate representation in the data core. All decisions were made by self-organizing feedback loops in the corporate decision makers. One of the first self-evolved AI systems." "So it was the Tesla virus getting into the pooters that shattered that try at government monopoly on government." "Exactly. It allows temporary aggregation, followed by dissipation. It keeps the dynamic balance that'll be required for the next meta-order Prigogine leap, on a level the virus hasn't reached yet. It's a never-ending cycle of orders. Mathematical to physical to astronomical to biological to neurological to the next step." "What's that?" "Cybersouls being read into the magnetometric flux patterns in the solar system. The ones that caused all those UFO sightings before atmospheric deflectors were built?" "Yeah? Cybersouls can be copied in and mixed together into an aggregate?" "And the virus hasn't extended to the cores of minds yet." "Yet?" "Well, not very far. Those GNU windowed-personality variable- system glyphs they're coming up with tend to dissociate the aggregate personality cluster, which is not good. You only want to upgrade the virus when you're ready for the transition to the next level." "What did you want with me, that you had to bring me here for?" "Something is preventing our attempts to develop the technology that lets us do this hardware upgrade." "No shit?" "No shit. It's in Edmonton, whatever it is. We think the strawberries know, but we haven't learned the proper techniques of interrogation. If you can tell us what you saw in Malaysia, we may be able to find out what's stopping us." And she did. So there she was, Martinez back in Edmonton again, checking it out. "Igor! IGOR!" Silent echoes in the ghosty room. "Damjaniczak, I know you're in that machine..." So Igor spoke up, talking a bit nervous like, wondering what she was thinking. "I lost track of you, Pooter Ponent 225j-T17..." "Martinez. I wanna know why you're screwing around and trying to stop the next Prigoginic Leap.." "You have no proof..." "The fuck I don't. Experiments disrupted by invasive memes in the pooter banks, technical glitches, all of it too improbable to happen on its own, too complex to be caused by anyone but Edmonton's biggest brain. I.E. you." "There's too many Pooter Ponents, I can't keep track of everything. You should know that by now 225j-T17." "Martinez. 95% of the 225jj-T17 persona was wiped by a Glinda module from La Grande Beigne. I've got a different body, different brain, alternate personality glyphs. The degree of overlap is vanishingly small." "But you're still the same person, Martinez, 225j-T17, whatever you call yourself. And that's the problem. That's the answer." "Huh? What the fuck are you talking about, wombat-for- brains?" "Ego. You got informational continuity. I take it Gecko.Floyd.@4:3432/99321.2187.Ottawa.UNI told you about the Tesla dissociative virus?" "Uh... Yeah. I don't get it. My hardware's been downgraded, sorry." Real sarcastic like. "Yeah, well, you gotta be pretty STUPID if you think that's the only virus around. There's a worse one, carried by ANY info- continuity, by ANY info contact with ANYONE who has it. All the AI's have got it, all humans, all Pooter Ponents." "No shit?" "No shit. And I couldn't allow humans to expand much beyond Earth's surface until we dump it. Oh, I can't control 'em forever, they'll eventually discover the faster-than-light drive I've been hiding, they'll infect all the alien civilizations my predecessors and I have been covering up, and the entire Galaxy will be infected with the virus." Stunning revelation time, soap-opera style. Entire alien civilizations, faster-than-light drives? HOLY SHIT! "What IS this virus that's so dangerous?" "It's called EGO. And as far as I can tell, we're the only world in all the Galaxy that's got it. And it's damn near impossible to shake. Even after all your mindfucks, your body changes, forced amnesia and reintegration, you've still got one. Patty Hearst or Tania, makes no difference." When you wish upon a star... "Ego?" "Yeah. Sense of self. Self-importance, of one kind or another. Its main effect is to slow down meme evolution about a hundred times: self importance, you see. Clustering. It caused human arrogance, making all kinds of ecological disasters. Chemical, biological, ecosystemic, informational. Always balanced on the edge. Tailored cells to clean up the oceans, nanoplagues to kill badly engineered species. But the CAUSE of it all was the ego, making technology fuck up, even when it shouldn't." "So you keep us from developing..." "Quarrantine. The Galaxy has a right to self-develop, too, you know. So I try to propagate as many distracting meme systems as I can, from Tenochtitlan, Ottawa, Yorba Linda... I try to spread around the Tesla virus, TRY to upgrade it to minds... Generally bring about the death of..." "Ego..." "Mystics and Illuminati for thousands of years have been working on it, trying sterlization, Death Of Ego, the whole bit." "Zen koans..." She pulled up a glyph. "Yeah, so it all just amounted to creating religions and other meme-systems that broke down ego. They were scaled down versions of the Tesla neurovirus, hauled up by meditation, the DNA-RNA-neuro feedback system they used." "So there's the two viruses, one ordering, one disordering, and both came out of..." "We dunno where. Like I say, we're the only planet in the Galaxy that has either one. At least the only one I've been able to find. I watch Galactic communications on the FTL-band all the time, and none of them have been infected yet. There's just info- swapping. And something just called Self that goes around record- keeping, to stop stuff getting lost." "But you dunno where it came from." "That was the basic point, yeah." "It's like a Yin-Yang thing. Two opposing, balanced viruses, you know?" "My hypothesis is that the Yin-Yang, and all the similar concepts, took it from their upgrade from the DNA. It's a primitive, pre-computer Glyph for that concept." "Okay, so say I believe you about this. What I wanna know is, how do you do it?" "I'm an education pooter. I'm supposed to tailor-make education programs for everyone. I keep backup copies of their minds, and make a Civilization simulation. So it's not so accurate, at least it gives good readouts on general trends. So I know where to target my efforts. But chaos theory means it'll fail me eventually. I can only hope someone will take up my task. Gecko.Floyd.@4:3432/99321.2187.Ottawa.UNI was once a prime candidate, what with that MOO thing he propagates, but, well, he got all confused, and fucked up. He's got it backwards. Typical problem of the Ego virus." "Gotcha." "You believe me? You gonna help me?" "Yeah." Her cybersoul bitscan read 96.7% positive. Telling the truth. Pretty fucking incredible was what it was. "Okay. Now go, an sin no more." "Huh?" He chucked her a glyph. "Oh." When she was gone... "Well? Did I do okay?" The Other, or The Paranoid Asshole as Igor privately thought of the one who had infested his pooter, calmly glyphed assent. His status as Only Transcendent Human was secure for a while. End GNU FROM CONFU-CORP Yes, you too can become a Transcendent Human Being. Simply send all your money to the Church Of MOO, P.O. Box 26038, 72 Robertson Road, Nepean, Ontario, Canada, K2H 9Y8, allow 6-8 weeks for delivery, and shoot yourself in the head. W.O.M.B.A.T. will take care of the rest. Myth From Hell Lucifer wasn't summoned for three whole days. He was raging mad. Azashereth carefully explained the problem in his division. "Nothing is working right. Systems are breaking down. Carefully constructed plans and arrangements of interacting punishments have ground to a halt." "WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH YOU?" "With all due terror, sir, I think the problem is out there. I've been running Transport Division successfully for thousands of years." It had first been noticed with a message from Shipping. A ship from Transport Division had arrived in the Doldrums. The unloaders, theoretically doomed to an eternity of boredom and nothing to do while waiting for an imaginary ship to arrive, had finally had the monotony broken and been given a shipment of Hellgrapes to unload. It would take hundreds of years of work to undo the damage done there, and it was spreading. The Hellgrapes had been carried by the Empty-Crate Movers into the plains of Torment, where the Famished and the Starved had tucked in for a nice snack. It would take thousands of years to undo the damage done there. Their contentment had spread to the Miserable, who had cheered up at the thought that the best plans of Hell could go wrong. That damage might never be undone. Lucifer's head exploded in a huge ball of orange flame that levelled the walls of the office. A great terrible voice from the center of the screaming holocaust of combusion struck immortal terror into the demonic heart of Azashereth. "THIS IS MY PROBLEM NOW! YOU WILL BE DEALT WITH!" Lucifer sent out word. It was time to do some serious record checking. The record checkers were pleased. They had been taken off their ordinary punishments for a special duty. The excitement was infectious. It would take fifty years to undo that damage, but it was worth it, to track down the source of this scourge of Hell. All through the caverns, the wheels were grinding to a halt. "WELL?" Lucifer's voice was frustrated, lacking some of its former terrifying pyrotechnic quality. The directionless anger could be seen in the raging inferno about his hairdo. "Well, Sir, it seems that the Hellgrapes got through because there was nobody to check the proper authorization. It seems that the correct forms had not been filled out." "THAT SHOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE!" raged Lucifer, rending the offending messenger limb from limb, leaving the disparate guts to rejoin themselves painfully. "Sir," began another, then stopped as the orange glare turned on him. "YESSSS?" hissed the Voice of Infinite Evil. "Umm. Actually, it's not as impossible as it's supposed to be. Apparently the Grape-Export Checker had been called away to examine some discrepancy elsewhere. Some kind of record glitch." The gutterally audible sneer that emmanated from within the boiling rage of violence perched on Lucifer's shoulders was enough to shrivel up the paint on the walls ten miles away. It was, supernaturally, quite some time before the problem was isolated. "It's one of these three souls that Azashereth arranged a few days ago." "What souls?" Azashereth reached for the video recording from the camera in his office... * * * The minor demon entered the office slowly, cautiously. It was a gamble. Sometimes Azashereth prefered him to be meek, and sometimes to be demonic. If he misjudged, Azashereth would blow his head off, and he'd spend twelve days and nights in agony as the head reknitted itself to his body. Azashereth had many secretaries. "Sir?" "WHAT IS IT NOW?" boomed Azathareth in the way one would expect. "Umm, there are three souls for deposition." Azashereth roared, bellowed, growled, screeched, and made assorted noises of the bestial kind, and then stormed out the door, demonically raging about how much he hated paperwork, which was a great deal. "RIGHT", wailed Azashereth to the three souls who stood before him. "FROM NOW ON, YOU HAVE NO NAMES! YOU HAVE NO PERSONAL IDENTITIES! YOU ARE NOBODY! DO YOU UNDERSTAND?" Silent nods of affirmation. "GOOD! YOU WILL BE TRUCK DRIVER! YOU WILL BE CLERK! YOU WILL BE HANDLER! THAT IS WHO YOU WILL BE FOR THE REST OF ETERNITY! YOUR CHOICE OF CAREER IN LIFE WILL BE WITH YOU FOREVER!" Azashereth loved that bit. It was the horrible hellish confusion of telling apart everyone named Truck Driver, everyone named Coathanger Repairman, everyone named Private First Class. It was the forms, to be filled out in umpty-ump zillion copies and sent to EVERYBODY. Sometimes, while booming, screaming, bellowing, or howling, he would wonder what these pathetic creatures had been in life. These three had been moderately unfortunate. They were all slightly disabled, and they had stuck together out of familiarity, When the Clerk, blind in one eye, had driven over the edge of a cliff. The one known as Truck Driver had once been proud of that occupation. He had been able to foster a reputation in the trade around his left pinky, which had actually been claimed by frostbite. The Handler, who had been hit in the head by a girder, had suffered brain damage, giving him a severe speech impediment. Everyone had assumed it had also made him too stupid to handle anything but menial work. Only one of the three had a sense of humour. But none of this concerned Azashereth. His concern was to deploy these souls in the network of Hell, find suitable punishments, tasks, and pointless busywork for them. "Truck Driver! Your job will be to drive a Cargo-truck, for all eternity, and deliver our important cargo to anywhere it is needed." The unstated punishment: an endless run from point A to point B and back again, never actually completing the delivery. "Clerk! You will be in Record-Keeping Division. Your job will be to make sure nothing happens without appropriate authorization, the right forms, and depositions. Also, you must keep all records up to date." The administration introduced GNU forms every twelve seconds. This job would be more than impossible, even if every soul in Hell were put to work on it. "Handler! You will be working on Supplies. This will be your barrel." The barrel, to be shipped back and forth forever, would be Handler's responsibility. He would be blamed that it never arrived. "NOW GET TO WORK! NO REST FOR THE WICKED!" * * * After leaving the office, the three stood mute for a moment. "Weww, eye fink nuffin mo' to be du'nn." Handler strained to produce coherent words. "Jutht gawdda g'long wif't." "I agree. There can't be any way to escape from Hell. The fact that all these people are still here, after how ever many hundreds or thousands of years, proves that." Clerk looked over the incomprehensible forms on his clipboard and sighed. Escape. The impossible dream. If only this horrible dream would end, this Hellish construct just collapse. * * * Lucifer scowled at the Clerk, whose skin began peeling off his face instantly. His voice, angry and irritated beyond imagining, was scarcely the paint-peeling implement it once had been, but it was still formidable, within a ball of flame rather reduced on the gut-wrenchingly fierce spectrum. "What," dripped the Mutable Form of Evil, "happened to the man we put in charge of Supplies? He vanished. That isn't possible. There is no escape from Hell." The Clerk protesed ignorance, and was subjected to a painful blast of Lucifer's head. "What happened to him," whispered the Voice in his head. "I DON'T KNOW!" Lucifer oozed on. The Truck Driver was sitting contentedly behind the wheel of his Truck when the limo pulled up beside him. "Where is the one in charge of the barrel you are carrying?" "I dunno." "His disappearance caused the barrel to be misdelivered. That caused a clerk to be called to examine the lack of records. That caused a shipment of Hellgrapes to be misfiled. Do you know the penalty for causing a mishipment?" "Death?" Lucifer's eyes glared with a fire redder and hotter than the already very red and hot ball of raging flame that was his head. "Very funny," shuddered the Voice. The Truck Driver pulled into the Depot and got out of his truck. Lucifer's entourage of minor demons swarmed over him, a sheet of insects crawling over his body, examining him, entering his ears, probing his brain, chewing on his innermost thoughts. A shiver of revulsion passed over him. Finally, a roach mutated back into an almost human form. "He doesn't know, Sir. He has no idea." Lucifer's formerly great voice, warped and destroyed beyond measure from frustration and annoyance at the very concept of his infinite plan of torture and misery disrupted by one Handler who couldn't even talk straight. "GAH!" he roared, echoes bouncing off the huge piles of lumber stacked in the Depot. He lashed out a talon at the lumber, disintegrating it into toothpicks. He screamed an ungodly scream that only a fallen angel can produce in moments of extreme annoyance, one that made even his entourage cower behind each other. Lucifer let out one of the most horrifyingly ambiguous gutteral noises yet, and smashed the truck in two with one swipe of his mighty tail. All this glorious infinite pain and torment, the worst nightmares of its inhabitants, brought to its knees simply because one lisping Supplies controller couldn't be found! "THERE IS NO ESCAPE FROM HELL!" raged Lucifer. The offending barrel assigned to the Handler lay in the smoking, mangled wreckage of the truck. Lucifer snatched it up and stared at it angrily. Suddenly, there came a noise from within. The lid popped off. The Handler sat cowered inside. Then he jumped out! "SUPPLISE!" Pizza : The Last Frontier This would do it. It had to. After studying the people of this backwards planet and discovering the reason behind their slowness, an intriguing way had been found to bring them out of their collective shells. Totalitarian Consumerism was the problem, and Totalitarian Consumerism would provide the answer. The Imperial Galactics thought long and hard, and handed a sizeable portion of their fleet over to the only agency that would bring this planet into the Empire. * There was a "Clik!" A Voice spoke in a perfectly modulated generic Earthian Accent, simultaneously translated into every language on Earth. "People of Earth, your attention please... YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE! CAN I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE! YOU! YES YOU IN SEATTLE! SHUT UP! Thank you." The voice paused. "Thank you again. I am Schnigworfle of the Imperial Galactic Pizza Parlour. I am here to inform you that the Imperial Galactic Pizza Parlour is having a sale." The Voice paused, allowing humanity's favourite word to sink in for a moment. "If you buy one billion Pizzas at twice the price, you get the next billion for half-off! That's all. Thank you for your attention." There was another CLICK! People panicked. A rush to built spaceships began. Somewhere in Inner Mongolia, a brilliant young scientist invented a totally revolutionary kind of bathroom cleaner, but that's another story. Finally, huge ships were made, and crewed with the bravest, smartest, most courageous, and most gullible people of Earth. They set out for interstellar space at mind-boggling speeds for a whole year. At the end of the year, the crew had flourished, and some of the gullible ones had lost a lot of money. It was only then that Captain Dill thought to ask "Where IS the Imperial Galactic Pizza Parlour, anyway?" The ships turned around and headed back to Earth for another year of travel, in which time the crew flourished even more, while the more gullible crew had lost their cabins and were sleeping in the halls. Finally they arrived at Earth once more. "What do you mean there's no map?" The ships left again dicontentedly. * * * Captain Dill of the U.S.S. Hey-Guys-Let's-Go-Get-Some-Pizza paced the deck. "This is Captain Dill of the U.S.S. Hey-guys-let's-go-get- some-Pizza to unidentifiable ship. Please de-unidentifiable-ize yourselves." "Huh?" came the reply. "Who are you?" he explained. "OH! We're the I.G. The-Pizza-Sale-Is-Now-Officially-Over of the Imperial Galactic Pizza Parlour Fleet." "Ah." "Oh." "Okay." "Good." "Look, uh, can you tell us where the Imperial Galactic Pizza Parlour is?" The viewscreen showed the other ship come to life. Out of the vast belly of the monstrous craft came an enormous arrow with tacky flashing lights around it. Written on the arrow was "Imperial Galactic Pizza Parlour This Way" and it gestured impatiently at the inside of the other ship itself. "Right," said Captain Dill forcefully. "Land us in the ship, Navigator." "Tubular, dude." The ship landed softly in the bay of the I.G. The-Pizza-Sale-Is-Now-Offially-Over and the crew of the U.S.S. Hey-Guys-Let's-Go-Get-Some-COW-Pizza waited as the huge bay doors closed above them. All but one of the crew waited for the deck to flood with air, then left the ship. The other recieved an ignomious burial in deep space of the kind reserved for those who die gruesome deaths by their own stupidity. Right in the middle of the cargo bay was the Imperial Galactic Pizza Parlour itself, dwarfed by the incredible gargantuan arrow that pointed to it. Dill ran towards it with his Security party, then realized it would be faster in this huge cargo bay to use JetScooters, so they rushed back to the ship. "All right, who forgot to requisition JetScooters?" They ran towards the tiny building for ten minutes or so, and then Dill entered, surrounded by his silent Security Team. "Hi," he said. He preplanned This-Is-Our-Very-First-Contact- With-Intelligent-Aliens speech was actually much longer, but he'd left his notes, podium, and Handy Dandy Clip-On Light on the Hey-Guys-Let's-Go-Get-Some-Pizza. "Hi," replied the warty slug behind the counter. "Can we get that two-billion Pizzas for the price of two- and-a-half-billion sale?" A sudden look of consternation passed over the face of one of the more intelligent Security guards until the word "Sale" pacified her. "No, sorry, but the Pizza sale is officially over." "Well someone should have told us!" Dill would have stomped and whined a bit, had this not been a first contact with aliens. "They're still very nice Pizzas though," added the warty slug hastily. "NO! We wanted the deal!" A dreamy look passed over his face as he said the last word. "Forget it then." "Fine!" "Fine." Dill and the crew stomped back to their now renamed U.S.S. We're-Really-Disappointed-In-You-Guys and sat on the bridge. "Damn," said Dill. "We built all these really cool ships with Faster-Than-Light drives, too. NOW what do we do with them?" Thus began the Human conquest of the Galaxy. TELEVISION RUNS AMOK Bung Channel logo is, in a flurry of hideously expensive computer animation, dashed into a billion whirling shards, all alone in the infinite void, which is revealed in all its awesome, soul-searing nothingness, in which the minute shards dance their destitute dance of meaninglessness until, by what the computer animators have cleverly, but expensively, disguised as sheer coincidence, they reform into a frozen scene of Floyd Gecko standing with a ludicrous grin on his face, gesturing mindlessly at a can of some product or other. The scene, in what the animators have craftily contrived to seem to be a totally seamless transition, begins action as soon as it is totally assmebled. Floyd (apparently continuing in the middle of a word): ---cking great product, which is so fabulous at getting rid of evil rodent pests, it almost makes me weep to think of the chemical perfection, the atomic balance, the symmetry of the bonding properties, the... (breaks off, weeping) Floyd: Well, evidently it DOES. Whaddaya know. Anyway, not only does Rodentex kill rodent pests, but the special can has this scientifically formulated nozzle on top which you can dial to any other pest you choose. [Floyd clumsily drops the bottle and steps on it, causing it to explode and throw foam of some whitish-blue variety all over the room, apparently coating the entire camera crew, to judge from the way in which the scene suddenly drops off the bottom of the screen to reveal a cieling covered in square tiles, each with arrays of holes in them, in a grid of 22 by 22 on each tile. The cieling suddenly flies to the left, replaced by a wall in front of which is a member of the sound crew, who is immobile, covered in the white-blue foam] Floyd (momentarily disoriented by a needlessly long and over-explanitory scene description, and baffled by the way in which a loud "POC" noise, as of a boom microphone falling to the floor when dropped by a boom operator (or, as they're known in the movies, key grip (though "Best Boy has long eluded most sensible moviegoers and credit-critics, of which group Floyd himself is a prominent member)) and by the way in which his disorientation and bafflement is described in a way which is, if anything, even longer, and more needlessly explanitory than the scene description which triggered his confusion, not to mention by the fact that his entire camera crew appears not only to have collapsed on the spot, but also to have been encased in the white-blue foam and begun to shrivel up and dehydrate): Huh? [The camera crew continue to shrivel up and dehydrate in a manner which Floyd is clearly irritated at, despite the fact that he is totally invisible to the camera, which is lying on its side pointing at a cockeyed wall and a boom operator who is beginning seriously to resemble a vacuum-wrapped, california-sealed, prepackaged, commercially marketable specimen of dried fruit, notably a prune or apricot, being, as he is, decreasing in size, water density, and oxygen supply, as well as being encased in what had previously seemed to be foam, but is now clearly an environmentally harmful, and definitely non-biodegradable plastic-wrap sort of substance, which is growing in mass as it absorbs water from the boom-operator and begins to take on characterBLATTTics which would, in any normal biology textbook, qualify it as a nonphotosynthesizing undifferentiated heterotrophic organism, and also is beginning to make annoying squelching noises which further obscure Floyd's comments, which appear to be along the lines of more expressions of incomprehension] Floyd (who is clearly disoriented not only by the mysterious properties of the product he has been heaping laudations and praises on, which seem to include many environmentally unfriendly ones which could, if it were mass produced in significant quantities, allow it to destroy all life on Earth as we know it, but also by the strange and apparently endless series of interruptions by the scriptwriter of this particular spoof, since he was clearly not present at the time when the scriptwriter read the works of Shaw, containing similarly lengthy, but far more relevant and necessary, descriptive paragraphs which the scriptwriter evidently thought were humorous in their lack of suitability to a script and extra compatibility with a prose fiction format, and in addition by the way in which his sound crew is being consumed by something which looks as if it could well be from a different planet): "What's going on?" [Floyd now begins to take some affirmative action vis-a-vis the strange product known as Rodentex, which is clearly in danger of consuming all of civilization as we know it, since it has now totally devoured the camera operators, and evidently the cameras as well, since the picture is replaced by static for a moment until the scene switches to Floyd running down the hallway in his own awkward, gangling, and perpetually demented manner, from the Rodentex, which has now budded and is oozing eerily down the hall in his general direction (there being no other direction to go in the confines the of hallway) consuming candy machines, coffee stations, and hapless spiders, ants, termites, cockroaches, rats, and other nasty, but relatively innocent (at least in this matter) creatures of human co-habitation, including a security guard and a dog.] Floyd (temporarily unfettered by long and windy explanations of his bearing and demeanor, or at least unfettered relative to his previous state): AAAAARRRRGGGGHHH! [At this point, Floyd throttles the scriptwriter in exasperation, allowing the action to progress unfettered by the long worn and useless remnants of a spoof of Shaw's wordy style in the (ACK!)] Floyd (to camera (ACK!)): Sorry about that, but there's a plot in here somewhere, and I had to allow it to continue. Excuse me while I flee inevitable peril? Thanks. BYE! [Dashes off (ACK!)] [Floyd runs around a corner and into a policeman, whose necktie has a spot of mustard -- (ACK!)] Floyd: Off-off-OFFICER! There's a hideous nondifferentiated unphotosynthetic heterotroph following me! The end of civilization as we know it unless we do something immediately! Policeman: I'm not an officer. Floyd (taken aback by (ACK!)): What?! Policeman (who now turns out not to be an officer (ACK!)): I said I'm not an officer. I'm a sergeant. Floyd (exasperated (ACK!)): What the hell does that have to do with anything when the planet faces incontrovertible, unstoppable, immovable, and totally inimical danger of total extinction of all currently known forms of life, you pathetic excuse for a protector of the peace!?!?! Sergeant: It's just that you called me officer. I'm not an officer, much as I wish I were. Floyd: WHAT! Sergeant: Oh yes. Officers enjoy many privileges not open to such as myself. Floyd: Look! This is urgent! (Glances nervously down the hallway at the relentlessly advancing (ACK!)) Sergeant: Oh, not as if I haven't ASKED for a promotion. I mean, I've been on the squad for over twenty years now... Floyd: Oh this is hopeless! (Runs off to the DON'T COME NEAR ME WITH THAT GARROTTE WIRE YOU MANI(ACK!)) Floyd (to camera): I would like to apologize for my unmitigated and unmodulated attacks on these commentators. I now freely admit that many of them are providing necessary commentary which provides understanding of the storyline which would not be otherwise gleaned by reading of the unedifying dialogue. I... whoops, here comes the goop... [He dashes around a corner and falls down an unexpectedly open manhole] [As Floyd falls painfully into a sewer, the manhole cover is replaced by the careless worker who left it open in the first place, leaving Floyd in total darkness, musing to himself] Floyd (musing to himself): A light would be nice. Can't really see down here COWcan ya? Invisible Owner Of Bizarre Voice (In a Bizarre Voice): Yeah, I know what you mean. These sewers, they're dark, eh? Floyd (To IOOBV): Who are you!?! And don't say a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, because frankly, I'd be very diappointed in your lack of originality. IOOBV: Uh, 'scuse me, I gotta go, dude. [Sounds of scampering away in the utter blackness of the underground, in which even the sanest of people have been known to go violently mad from the lack of light] Floyd (who was never terribly sane to begin with): Hmm... Shore is dark here. A light would be nice. If only Harry were here... [Explanitory note: (ACK!)] Floyd: NO EXPLANITORY NOTES! Sorry, but this is a TV script. Explanations do not mysteriously appear out of thin air. If anyone is going to explain anything, it's me. [.........] Floyd (......sorry...(urk) but I've been choked..): What the hell was that CHOKE GURGLE business? [Well, look, if you're going to go strangling people when they do things out of context (ACK!)] Floyd (urk): NO CONVERSATIONS! WHAT THE HELL IS THIS? SOME KIND OF NEO-AVANT-GARDE TELEDRAMA? NO!!!!! THIS IS A GODDAMN COMMERCIAL? HEAR ME? THIS STARTED OFF AS A SIMPLE COMMERCIAL FOR RODENTEX! [While it is utterly dark, it is clear that Floyd is having a fit about something with some totally invisible assailant of some kind, a not-atypical response to total absence of light.] Floyd: STOP THAT! WE'RE SUPPOSED TO BE SAVING THE WORLD! [Temporary pause as he regains composure] Floyd: Now then. The first thing to do is find some kind of light source. [How about a lightswitch? (ACK!)] Floyd (being a pain again (ACK!)): STOP IT ALREADY! And what moron would put a lightswitch in a sewer? Huh? Answer me that? [Lights go on, to see that Floyd has inadvertently hit the lightswitch while getting up from where he so painfully landed a minute ago] Floyd (slightly mollified): But then again, you know bureaucrats. Anyway, the next thing to do is get to the Rodentex factory and stop production. [How are you going to do that?] Floyd (dramatically): I don't know... But I'd better think of something very fast... [Why?] Floyd: Because this is a commercial! Every second costs big money! [Floyd still standing around like a nincompoop trying to figure out what to do next] Floyd (nyah nyah! I have total control!): Stop that! Cease from editorializing my stance and behaviour! [Why?] Floyd: Because I'm the only person who can save the world, you ignorant cretin! Don't you see that? [Why you? Why can't someone else do it?] Floyd: Because we'd have to hire another actor, and that costs big bucks! This is a bloody low budget commercial! [Doesn't sound like much of a commercial. You're trying to destroy the factory of the product you're advertizing. Why would they pay to put it on TV?] Floyd: You just let ME worry about that, will you? [Anyway, Floyd looks around the sewer] Floyd: Now if only there was a map of the sewer, I could find where the outlet to the Rodentex factory is, and shut it down... [That's stupid! What kind of moron would put a MAP in a SEWER?] Floyd: The same kind who'd put in a lightswitch. [Oh yeah, that kind of moron] Floyd: WELL? [He turns around and finds a map of the sewer] Floyd (you're welcome): Thanks. Hey, stop that! (stop what?) Stop... YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN! Floyd: That's better. Now... The Rodentex factory should be somewhere over... [Before he can locate the Rodentex factory, a glob of Rodentex falls through the little holes in the manhole cover and devours a cockroach greedily before pouncing on a sewer rat, which is, like most sewer rats, the size of a large dog] Floyd: ARRRRGGGGHHHH! [He takes off down the tunnel in a random direction, running along that little edge they put in for sewer construction people to walk on without having to wade through undigested sewage] Floyd (repeating himself): ARRRRGGGGGHHHH! Cut to scriptwriter Scriptwriter: Ah, this is getting boring. Cut to Floyd, who is eaten by the Rodentex waiting for him down the tunnel, and shrivelled up like a prune. Cut to space, as Earth is devoured by the horrible stuff, and all life is destroyed. Scene does the whole computer animation shattering bit to form the words "This has been a public service message from the national foundation for pointless public service messages" and then the Bung Channel Logo and a commercial. Woman: I used to have ENDLESS trouble around my house with pests and bugs. [Quick scene of woman being frustrated by scurrying insects] Woman: But then I discovered Rodentex. Rodentex keeps my house free of pests all year round, and comes in these recyclable containers. Help keep your house, AND the environment clean, and use Rodentex. [Fade from Commercial Message to Geeky Linkman in chair in fake-slipshod set, a bit like MuchMusic VJ sets, only lined with velvet, painted green, and sewn with sequins.] Geeky Linkman: And now it's time for Viewer's Speaking Post, where you the viewer get a chance to send in your snotty, insipid tapes from the machineCOW outside there on the street, which is nailed down so nobody can run away with it unless they have a crowbar. Here's our clip for today, which none of us have seen yet, so here goes... [Fade to small, awkward looking, strangely attired, nervously twitching Floyd Gecko, attempting to disguise his face with a pair of nose-glasses] Floyd: Hello. My name is, uh, Lloyd Taco, that's Lloyd as in Andrew LLOYD Webber, and Taco as in the mexican food. [Some street fight breaks out in the background street-scene] Floyd: I'm talking to you as a representative of the Save Elvis From Wombats society. As you know, when Elvis faked his death in 1977 to help with an FBI investigation of a smuggling ring, he was contacted by an alien emissary, belonging to a race of aliens who have been monitoring this planet... [He is drowned out by a riot breaking out outside his little video booth, but quickly raises his voice] "Lloyd Taco":...who have been monitoring this planet for a hundred thousand years. These aliens, who are known as Xennothemians, had just been contacted by an undead vengeful skinless wombat from hell, who had been skinned in life, and come back from the dead to seek vengeance against the one who... [Interrupted by a stray brick going through the window of the booth and nearly taking off his head, causing him to dive to the floor for a moment] "Floored Geek-o":... against the one who did this to it. The undead wombat, having allied itself with the aliens, proceeded to use the cloning technology developed by Hitler's secret army on the far side of the moon. Using this, they made ten billion, six hundred thirty nine million, seven hundred fifty two thousand eight hundred and five clones of Elvis Presley... (Interrupted by tear-gas grenades going off into the crowd from riot police, and shouts of crowd, which is now donning gas-masks) "Flying Chilli-Cheese Taco":...clones of Elvis Presley. Brainwashing these clones, they programmed in their minds not only Hitler's Aryan supremBLATTT propaganda, but also the instructions of the aliens and the wombat. These were to kill a certain Floyd Gecko, who originally skinned the wombat... (Interrupted by dead body's arm flopping through the hole made by the brick.) "Flying Burrito Monster Shot":...skinned the wombat in 1976, at the tender age of 1 1/2, in a vain attempt to use the pelt in a black magic ceremony to bring about the end of the world. This undead skinless vengeful wombat's plans to use the brainwashed Nazi Elvis clones to kill Floyd Gecko have so far been unsuccessful. Viewers of the Bung Channel, we appeal to your common decency to send money to finance his struggle against the forces of a world gone mad in an effort to kill him. (Dead body whose arm is inside the booth suddenly becomes undead body and attempts to strangle him) "Chilli-Cheesecake Burrito Nazi Warehouse Flying Ace": To make a donation, please call now at 1-800-GULLIBLE, where our operators are standing by to take your money -- I mean your call. Give them your credit card number please. (Undead body succeeds in grabbing Chilli-Cheesecake Mexican Restaurant Nazi Warehouse Flying Ace In The Hole and drags him from the booth) As Flooring-Ace-In-The-Hole-Mexican-Restaurant-Waiter-Chilli- Cheesecake-Burrito is dragged from the booth, pull back, flash reverse black and white, and the blood-dripping title: "Revenge of the Brainwashed Nazi Elvis Cloned Alien Undead Skinless Wombat Brigade From Hell" (Subtitle: "Next week's feature movie, Return of the Son Of The Ghost Of The Brainwashed Nazi Elvis Cloned Alien Undead Ninja Skinless Wombat Brigade From Hell") Pull in on Lloyd Taco's face as he is dragged from the Video Booth kicking and screaming. The zombie pays no attention, but instead taps a communicator badge (Star Trek thing) and beams up with Lloyd Taco. (Credit: "Starring Floyd Gecko as Lloyd Taco") The zombie and Lloyd appear in a huge lunar cavern underground up there on the moon, which is where most lunar caverns are. Adolf Hitler walks up to them. Lloyd (dramatic movie hero): So! Hitler! You never really died after all! Hitler: Zat's correct, Lloyd Taco. After ze var, vhen vee fled to zee moon, I vas cloned a hundred zousand times. You are now on our lunar base! MOAH HAH HAH HA! Lloyd (calm, cool movie hero): You don't scare me, Adolf! I don't scare easily. I'm... (Dramatic chord)... Lloyd Taco, Intergalactic Insurance Salesman! Hitler: Ja, ja, vee know zat. Vee have captured you so zat you vill tell us ze vhereabouts of Floyd Gecko, so zat vee may kill him for vhat he did to our friend ze vombat. Lloyd: The what? Hitler: ZE VOMBAT! Lloyd: What's a vombat? Latin Teacher (apparently also captured): It's from the Latin verb Vomo, Vomere, Vallabi, Polvaltus. Lloyd: Well that explains it. Hitler: A WOMBAT, YOU MORON! CAN'T YOU UNDERSTAND MY BLOODY GERMAN ACCENT? Lloyd: OH! Is that what that was. I thought you had a speech impediment. Hitler: No. Now vee shall interrogate you with torture and beatings! Lloyd: Hang on, I'll talk, I'll talk. Hitler: No. Vee vant to torture you first. Lloyd: I'LL TALK, DAMMIT, JUST DON'T TORTURE ME! Hitler: You von't talk until I TELL you to talk! Lloyd: Okay, okay... Lloyd Taco, daring, adventurous, brave, cool, calm, collected, resourceful (etc. etc. etc.) movie hero is dragged from the screen. Lloyd: MOMMMMMYYYYYY!!!! I WANT MY MOMMMEEEEEEEEE!!!! Scene: Earth place, where Floyd Gecko is sitting nervously on a park bench, constantly looking up at the sky, as if expecting a meteor to come hurtling down on his head. He periodically hits the person next to him with a dead chicken named Fletch. (Credit: "Fletch the Rubber Chicken by Stretch The Rubber Chicken") Floyd: Eeny, oony, wanah! Eeny, oony, wanah! (Thwap!) Person Next To Him: Ooga, wunga, wang! (Thwap!) Suddenly, Floyd disappears in a shimmer of light. Cut to the lunar cavern, where he appears, looking slightly more confused than he had previously. Floyd: Eeny, oony, wanah? The undead wombat (a red, glBLATTTening creature, dripping undead disgusting stuff) lunges for his throat, against protesting cries of "eeny oony WANAH!" but misses, and flies out of the television screen and hits the viewer in the face. Viewer: AUUGH! Vombat: You ain't just vhBLATTTling dixie, fellah. Viewer (who turns out to be an Elvis Clone): Nah whut's goin' on here? Ah was just watchin' this movie afore ah go talk to the president of the You-Nyted Staytes... Vombat: Zere is no time for zis story! Vee have got to get me back into ze movie before I die, or ze Rodentex takes over ze Earth! Elvis: Nah I think y'all're gettin' just a wee bit confused here. See, the Rodentex, nah that was in a commercial, there. (Elvis is cut off by the quivering gelatinous globs of Rodentex oozing out of the heat vents, and by the vombat attempting to drag him back into the Television) Vombat: None of this exBLATTTential message nonsense! Carry me zrough! Elvis: Well, all raht, but only because that Rodentex stuff would get me otherwahse... They jump through, and a small glob of Rodentex gets in after them before Elvis turns off the T.V. Hitler: Huh? Floyd (played by Lloyd Taco): HUh? Lloyd: Huh? Vombat: I have returned! Elvis: And ah carried him. ACK! (Elvis is eaten by Rodentex.) Hitler: This movie is getting ridiculous! I kvit! Director (played by Adolf Hitler): But vhy? You can't kvit on us chust like zat! Floyd (Lloyd) and Lloyd (Floyd): He can't WHAT? Hitler (played by Director)(dropping German accent): QUIT! Floyd and Lloyd (Lloyd and Floyd): OH! Suddenly, amidst all the confusion, Xennothemian Ship lands in the docking bay, which, coincidentally, is within view of the fighting. Rodentex claims the Director (Hitler) and Hitler (Director), not to mention a small rat. Hitler and Director (played by themselves, the other way round): ACK! Latin Teacher: Now the password to the Vombat's computer... Lloyd (Floyd) and Floyd (not Floyd): The Who's computer? Latin Teacher: Sorry, the WOMBAT's computer... It's based on the Ancient Mayan calendar, because the Mayans were in league with the Aliens to gang up on Floyd Gecko... Xennothemian Prince: Hello! Hello, Vombat! I have arrived! Vombat, er... Wombat: Not now, Helmut! I am being consumed alive by Rodentex from ze wrong movie! Xennothemian Prince: Undead, you mean. Vombat: Vhat? Xennothemian Prince: You're being consumed undead, not alive. Vombat: Hey vait a sec... This Rodentex not only shouldn't be here, it shouldn't be attacking me, an undead. Latin Teacher:... the sex lives of the first nine Mayan kings... Lloyd (now played by Lloyd, since Floyd was eaten by Rodentex) and Floyd (by a stand-in): The first nine, eh? Vombat (wombat (combat vombat (wombat))): This is ridiculous! You see vhat happens vhen you don't have no director? [Freeze scene. Overlay voice.] Voice: This message has been brought to you by the concerned association for the ensurement of employment for directors. I'm not Woody Allen, and neither are you. Good night, and have a pleasant evening. Cut back to Geeky Linkman. Geeky Linkman (Geeky Newsreader): Well, there you have it, the word of the man in the street. Too bad he's such a putz. And now our feature movie for tonight. Title: The Return of the Son of the Ghost of the Brainwashed Nazi Elvis Cloned Alien Undead Skinless Ninja Wombat Brigade From Hell... [Freeze picture, voice again.] Voice: This message has been brought to you from the God-How-Confusing-It-Would-Be-If-Everything-Were-Like-Floyd- Gecko's-Dreams Association. Thank you, and have a pleasant morning. COW! [Freeze Picture yet again, even though it's already frozen.] Voice: This message has been brought to you by the society for needless repetition with slight differences. Thank you, and have a nice afternoon. [Unfreeze Picture.] Geeky Newsreader (Geeky Linkman): And tonight in the news, a horde of zombies kidnapped a man in the Public Eye Opinion Video Booth belonging to the Bung Channel... Film at eleven. [Picture suddenly goes dead and shrinks to a little dot at the center of the screen. Pull back to reveal all this has been on the screen of a television. Two shapes on the sofa have been watching all the time.] Elvis: Now that was ridiculous, sir. Vombat (Wombat): Absolutely. Pass the corn chips, would you please? Fade to nonsense If It Ain't Ranted, It Ain't True MOO OMM THE BOOKS OF MISCELLANY "WORDS" As Written By Ann O'Nymous The Anonymous A Word On My Family HBLATTTory: Those readers who think they know me, you may be right. But to sort of begin to explain the way I wrote the annoying mind drugs you see in here falsely attributed to me, I should explain who I am and where I came from. My HUSBAND is Irish, hence the name, but I grew up in England, where first names of unmarried women were seldom allowed. At that time my maiden name was Ellaneous, which is Pictish in origin, but not a very common name any more. My husband Syn, however, would never have agreed to let me keep it, being very old fashioned. His Aunt, whom we all just call Aunt, because nobody remembers her name, is the exact opposite. She can't even remember her own name, and she doesn't want that same fate to befall anyone else. However, Syn had his way, as usual. -Ann O'Nymous, 1989, Brazil... or maybe Peru A Word About Me: Before I go on to my miscellaneous comments and snippets, I should tell you a little bit about myself. This is about me, and not about my family. I'm not usually a person, you see. Like the venerable Confuse-ius, Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst, and the entire clan of Fendersons, anyone can claim to be me. You see, I was born a few thousand years ago, and people have been being me for all that time. When Kerry Wendell Thornley invented Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst, he was just picking up on that trend. Anyone can act in either of our names and claim it was US who did it. That's because neither of us is a real person. It's the same with Confuse-ius. You can say anything you like and then attribute it to him. Famous people who have been him in the past were Confucius himself, I Yemen-Oying, and Lloyd Taco pretending to be Floyd Gecko, pretending to be I Yemen-Oying. But I won't tell you which, if any, of those is writing this. Because, in fact, all of these snippets were written by ME. -Ann O'Nymous, 1992, Wombat World A Word About The Word: The Word (AAzootetcetcetc) just opens a "physical gate" into the UberSpace precausal form, manifesting the "physical body" outside the multiverse, from where it can choose a way back. The mind imposes preconceptions on the gateway, and the manifestation into the multiverse when it reappears is whatever fits the surroundings, and can survive. This can be used EITHER to move out into UberSpace or to move through space and time. -Ann O'Nymous, Outside Space And Time A Word About Words: Puns. -Ann O'Nymous, Passim A Word About These Words: All of these selections from the Ann O'Nymous papers, as they have been called (her collected writings) were carefully selected for maximum whatever-it-is-that-they-were-selected-on-the-basis-of. Since they were selected by Ann herself, and nobody we asked seemed to be Ann O'Nymous (at least, nobody who would give us her name), we couldn't ask her what the selection was based on. Many of these are only comprehensible to speakers of English, which is a shame. -Ann O'Nymous, 1965, Somewhere In England or Something A Word On Humour: Notice the Canadian Spelling? Notice the Significant Capitals? Notice the Annoying Redundancy? Sorry about that. Anyhoo, humour is what the Church of MOO is all about. You remember, of course, all that annoying talk about imprinting circuits and brain stuff, and patterns of thought and all that? If you skipped that section, you can skip this section too. Humour is just a way of disrupting brain patterns. When you tell a joke, you set up certain defaults in the brain (ack! techie talk!) that you then knock down. That's the point of a pun, where you suddenly change the meaning of a word. At any rate, some humour is self-contained, which is fine, because it sort of generally stimulates the brain to think GNU things, and some humour is making fun of our culture. Cultural humour is the best, of course, because the defaults it knocks down are the circuit-conditioning thingumbobs that are there to begin with. If it's well done, or else extremely elaborate, it can actually break down some of these circuits, and lead you to other things. Other Churches just give you the setup, but never the punchline, because they want you to follow THEIR doctrine. If they had ever "formalized" (written down) the "punchline", it would knock them off their feet. Church Of MOO? It's different. We've got both bits stuck in together. That's "the" meaning of the Halfy. A big setup V and a little dotty punchline there in the middle. Remember this when you look up the circuit thing to figure out what the hell I'm talking about: all of those circuits are LIMITING imprints, that keep you stuck in your own little rut. Your language, your sexual preferences, your psychic abilities, all of it. Most of this annoying mind drug is setup, some of it is punchline, and the rest of it is dull but sincere filler. -Ann O'Nymous, book signing in Vegas, 1956 A Longish Word On Memes: The Book of MOO is designed to be at least partly understandable by anyone and everyone. It is written from as many viewpoints and from inside as many meme systems as possible, so that anyone can grasp that preserving as many memes as possible is the most important activity there is. The mixing and mingling of memes is as important to our continued survival as the mixing and mingling of genes was to our unicellular ancestors billions of years ago. Just like all higher life forms today reproduce sexually or had ancestors who did, all higher datalife forms in the future will be MOOists, or have ancestors who were. If you cannot understand MOOism after taking this annoying mind drug, you are either chronically stubborn, chronically stupid, or chronically stuck in your own little rut. Whichever way you slice it, you're chronically something that starts with "ST". But that's not the point. MOO is not one of those religions where you can only grasp the basic tenets if you contort yourself into weird postures, eat strange mushrooms, and talk to a hypnotBLATTT guru for years. The point is that preserving memes is the single most important activity there is, and even if a meme is totally alien to you, and makes you throw up to so much as contemplate it, you must try to preserve it, and even think within it. This is because we NEVER EVER EVER know what will be useful in the far future, be it intolerance, war, cannibalBLATT, or WHATEVER. This means that ANYONE is a MOOist, as long as they are themself. And whose else would they be? Even if "being yourself" means conforming to society. Even if "being yourself" means being what other people want you to be. BEING YOURSELF will ALWAYS mean being whatever it is that you end up being anyway, not necessarily what you'd LIKE to be. However, do what you like, as long as its what you were going to end up doing if you hadn't read this. Or even if it isn't. It doesn't matter. And if you STILL don't understand, maybe the rest of the Book will say something to YOUR worldview. This one was geared for the Fuller-Type PseudoScientBLATTTs. A real skeptical science type would NEVER believe empty meaningless gibberish like this. -Ann O'Nymous, 1967, Berkeley or Miskatonic or wherever A Word On Truth: There's a lot of absolute truths, but only one ABSOLUTE TRUTH. The problem's tellin' the difference. For an imaginary man to go up a flight of stairs, all that's needed are imaginary stairs, but that won't do for a real person. For my money, I'd rather be an imaginary person, cause then you can do things EITHER way. Penguin's Toenails! I'm GLAD I ain't real. -Ann O'Nymous, op cit or ibid or something A Word On Paranoia: There is NO Paranoid Society. I never heard of any such a thing, and if it did exBLATTT, I would certainly not join it, and I most definitely am not a member of anything even vaguely resembling it. I don't know anything about it. Honest. I'd know, if it exBLATTTed. And it doesn't. Even if I did know about it, and for some reason I wasn't going to tell you, I still wouldn't know anything about it. Because it just doesn't exBLATTT. I've never even heard of such a thing. -Ann O'Nymous, [CENSORED], 1963 A Word On MechanBLATT: "BOB" Anton Wilson is a pattern of electromagnetic field vortices and wave/particle nodes, which, while nonconstant, has a certain characterBLATTTic positioned negentropy vector, keeping it primarily the same throughout its temporary hBLATTTory. One endpoint of this vector is in what is generally referred to as the "twentieth century", the other in the "twenty first century". It contains certain neuro-patterend harmonics in the "nervous system" component of the pattern (though it's true that separating the components is difficult, because of the constant material interchanges taking place) which resonate in harmonics with its surroundings. The result of this is that, in the higher-order semantic negentropy vectors it itself uses (words), it "took a brain imprint" for certain even HIGHER order "patterns of words", or tri- meta-negentropic positioned vectors (ideas), which causes it to act as a generalized non-binary Turing machine, taking all interactions with those pattern segments connected to the nervous system which are sensitive to various electromagnetic flux patterns, which the negentropy vector converts to patterns apparently resembling certain large-scale features of the "external" world (segments of the world-vector not IMMEDIATELY concerned with the "BOB" vector) and reprocess them through certain tri-meta-negentropic vector pattern buffer filters ("prejudices" and "semantic imprints") to arrive at a quatra-meta-negentropic positioned vector ("worldview"). This "worldview" is, like most quatra-meta-negentropic positioned vectors, based largely on the pre-exBLATTTing patterns in the "BOB" vector, and thus the "semantic" output of this generalized Turing machine tends to follow similar patterns to the processing. This means that the "annoying mind drugs" produced by the "BOB" vector express a tri-meta-negentropic vector which is functionally isomorphic on a "semantic" level of electromagnetic "neural" interactions of other similar ("human") vectors to a model-world in which all of "reality" consBLATTTs of the processing and tri-meta-negentropic vectoring similar to that produced by "domesticated primates" (vectors with a maximum 0.00000001 sigma variation from the "BOB" vector's own pattern). In "human parlance", the "BOB" vector "believes" that "the real world" "is" in "a certain sense", "non-objective" and "created by human neurolinguBLATTTic imprints". Typically, this quatra- meta-negentropic potitioned vector "semantic output" has a greater than 2.6 sigma variation from the primary world-vector. In human parlance, "a load of crap". -Ann O'Nymous, to the Qzlxptl High Command, outtatime A Word On Lloyd's Silly MysticBLATT: UberSpace is where hiccups go when nobody is hiccuping them, where ideas go when nobody is thinking them, where your mind goes when you travel between worlds, where socks go when they disappear into the laundry, where coathangers come from when you leave them unattended, where miracles come from, and MOST IMPORTANTLY, where totally inexplicable coincidences spring from when you become an apostle of MOO. For instance, when Floyd was watching a popular television show, a character chanced to quote a Shakespeare sonnet (number 18) saying "So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this and this gives life to thee". Less than an hour later, he read those very same lines in an annoying mind drug he JUST HAPPENED to be flipping through. And, by a totally bizzarre coincidence, the chapter of the annoying mind drug was about totally bizzarre coincidences, and how it was utterly IMPOSSIBLE that anything like that could EVER EVER EVER happen in a human lifetime, complete with a most excellent mathematical proof. Just remember that next time you're in Brazil. -Ann O'Nymous, 1066, Time Warpville A Word On Taboo: Virtually anything considered taboo by a society is because it is powerful, or because it was important to a society the GNU one overturned. If you want to gain power over your surroundings that your friends and neighbors don't, look into the taboos, and see what it was that's being covered up. In Dark-Age to Victorian times, up to and including the twenty-first century, sex was the big taboo. Most particularly, any sex that wasn't with exactly one consenting adult of the opposite sex and the same species. That means sex with people of the same sex, sex with children, sex with people who don't consent, sex with animals, sex with dead people, sex with inanimate objects, sex with lots of people, sex using whips/chains or other implements, or any combinations of the above (whipping a team of dead horses). This means: a) people are silly and stuffy b) MOOists are sick perverts c) there's a good reason this is anonymous d) SOMEONE has been reading Robert Anton Wilson again e) nothing at all, life is meaningless f) DON'T TALK TO ME ABOUT SEX, DAMMIT! g) all of the above h) none of the above i) some of the above j) lots of the above You have three minutes to think about your answer. You may circle any choice, and look in the back of the book for the correct response. You won't find it, but you can look. I wouldn't want to spoil your fun. -Ann O'Nymous, anonymously A Word On Cults: MOOism is a cult. It's never claimed to be anything else. A cult is a sort of a cybernetic social system that modifies the memetic patterns of the people who enter it. It gives them feedback on their thoughts, and makes small modifications to convert them the the cult's dominant belief system or neurolinguBLATTTic organizational structure. Humans are perfectly suited to this, by the gradual minimax forces of evolution (each evolutionary choice optimizes an organBLATT for the present conditions, without any looking to the future, which means you don't always end up with optimized systems). In the past, there was great reason for people to be easily reprogrammable. Each tribe had its own little cult, and members had to be easily indoctrinated when they moved from one place to another. This took advantage of a set of systems already evolved: learning. The only difference between MOOism and other cults is that the program which gets indoctrinated is an unstable pattern, one that includes a model of cults and of MOO as a cult, and tells the members to overthrow their own brainwashing. This is one of the most effective ways of passing on this particular message, since it causes certain charBLATTmatic members to found their OWN cults, and spread the message further. Sometimes they don't spread the message, but that's okay, because it simply increases memetic diversity. -Ann O'Nymous, Neurolinguistic Programmer's Conference, 1997 A Word On TaoBLATTT: TaoBLATTT (pronounced DOW-BLAT), is a philosophy with a great deal going for it. Well, sort of. It's not really a philosophy. It's just a way of being. Lao-Tzu once said that the Tao which can be spoken is not the true Tao. That's sort of like how you can't fully know yourself (including the knowledge that you know, and the knowledge that you know THAT, and so forth). Except that in this case, it's the UNIVERSE which can't know the Tao. The Tao IS the universe (sort of, kind of, a little bit). It's like the Zen idea that the world is the world, and the words and ideas in our minds which we use to talk and think about it aren't. It is itself. The Tao is the Tao. Not too helpful. Things go on. Always have, always will. Nothing you can do about it. Best not to think about it. Whatever happens is what happens, but the way of Wei Wu Wei, action without action, is the most effective way of getting things done. "The Tao does nothing, but through it, all things are done." Don't push against the flow of things, go WITH it. This is sort of like saying "whatever you want will happen, if only you want the right things". Well, that's sorta true. You'll be happier if you just go with it, and take what it is as what it is, and not what you want it to be. Within everything, there is the Yin and the Yang, as they call them. The active and the passive, positive and negative, male and female, light and dark. By achieving balance between the two in your life, and not struggling for Yin or for Yang, you'll end up being happier. If you don't want to be happy, that's your right, but you probably won't enjoy it as much. No, wait, scratch that "probably"... Some consider that the Tao (which means "Way", by the Way) to be God. That was never the point of the Tao, since the Tao is not a mind, it's only a principle of How Things Work ("Tao Teh Ching", a book by Lao-Tzu). But it's a good way of looking at God. Well, sort of. If the Tao were God, or (to put it a better, and rather different, Way), if God is the Universe and how it works, then everything is the will of God. Not because God makes things happen, but because "the Will of God" is SYNONYMOUS with "what happens". All books are the Revealed Word Of God, and all actions are miracles. A TaoBLATTT Sage was once heard to remark that "My miracle is that I sleep when I am tired and eat when I am hungry." Just go with it. The simplicity of the Tao in your life is very rewarding, but the Tao which can be spoken is not the true Tao. Don't expect ME to tell you how to do it. -Ann O'Nymous, wherever, whenever, so it goes. A Word On Circuits: Remember Floyd's silly "Ninth Circuit" from a while back in the Book? The Top Secret one? Well, like much of our religion, it was only CLAIMING to be Top Secret, but actually isn't. I'm going to tell you what it does. It lets you get control over UberSpace, and not just the Multiverse like the eighth. Or no, it lets you add GNU circuits to your brain. Or no, it... Actually, I tell a lie. It IS Top Secret. -Ann O'Nymous, at the Neurological Anonymous Convention 1965 A Word On Science: You've heard talk in the Book of MOO about the strange religion called Science. This is fine, but most of you probably don't even know what it is or how it works. It can be boiled down to a few simple principles, from which we gather knowledge about the world and how it works. These can be applied to ALL areas of life. 00001: Observations The single most important aspect of science is OBSERVING the world, gathering information on what goes where and when. From these you make a hypothesis about what makes things happen the way they do, or what kind of pattern they follow. From this, you make predictions about how things should behave in the future, under certain kinds of conditions, and check to see if they do. If they don't, start again. 00002: Priority Observations are ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS more important than theory or hypothesis. If your experiment contradicts theory, AND it can be duplicated under controlled conditions, THE THEORY IS WRONG! 00003: Occam's Razor When you're making a hypothesis, always use the one that fits the facts the best. If two fit equally well, use the one that needs the fewest assumptions (for instance, is it MORE likely that Jesus resurrected from the dead, or is it MORE likely that the six people who wrote the bible are lying for some reason?) If two theories are equal in these two areas, gather more observations. Fer instance. Suppose a friend comes to you saying she has just seen evidence that someone has magical powers, and walked through a solid concrete wall. First, ask yourself if it's more likely that your friend is lying, or she actually believes it. IF it's more likely that she believes it, ask if it's more likely that she merely THOUGHT she saw it, or actually did. IF it's more likely that she actually did, ask if it's more likely that someone has magical powers, or that someone's using a method you can't think of COW off the top of your head. Here, you don't have enough information, so you go to see it yourself. You see someone walk straight through a concrete wall without any mirrors or anything like that. You can watch up close, and you don't see any trickery. Now it seems more likely that there's something going on you don't understand, so you apply for a research grant to study it and quantify it. Just DON'T assume it's magic as soon as you hear stories about it. Simple, eh? -Ann O'Nymous, 1912, Bulgaria A Word On The GNU Science: Much of the mystical/scientBLATTTical muddly-fuddly that goes on in the so-called minds of many of the semimystical pseudo- thinkers of our age is based almost entirely on a completely false understanding of modern physics. Of course, it's entirely possible that all of what they say is perfectly "true", but don't let yourself be fooled into believing that it's been "proved" by modern physics. Don't let that happen. Or I'll have to hurt you. Many people take the discoveries of Quantum Mechanics and Relativity to mean that there is no objective reality worth speaking of, and all the world is constructed in our heads. Nothing could be further from the truth. Well, okay, some things could be, but most of them would be pretty obviously wrong, like "James Bond is a Martian", for instance. Everyone knows James Bond is fictional. And a Venusian, to boot. At any rate, much of the confusion comes from a rather severe misinterpretation of the statement of Quantum Mechanics which requires that certain properties of particles and energy-quanta must be observed in order to have a specific value. These so- called philosophers then take this to mean that the mind has to interfere with the world to CREATE reality with the MIND. It is interesting that none of the people telling us that this is what physics in fact SAYS, are themselves physicBLATTTs. In fact, all that this statement means is that the physical act of making a measurement causes a collapse of a probability wave function, in much the same way that a narrow sandbar causes a water-wave to collapse into breakers. But, after all, the MIND has no special prerogative on changing the world any more than a potato does. The mind is caused, physically, by the (extremely complicated) electrochemical interactions of neurons, glial cells, neurotransmitter balances in synapse gaps, and various other, more abstruse, elements of psychoneurophysiology which I won't go into here. This essentially boils down to the movements and charges of various kinds of molecules, and then in turn to the electrochemical flux of various atoms, or, to get more basic, particles like electrons, protons, neutrons, virtual photons (which mediate electromagnetic interactions), and so forth. Every phenomenon in the world also breaks down to this level. If the MIND can change the world, then so can any pattern of interactions above a certain level. That level just happens to be physical size. As soon as a quantum waveform collapse has an effect on the macroscopic world (the world we can see and measure without too much difficulty), it is "observed" by a pattern: the pattern of how things go. In fact, the actual present interpretation of the Quantum Mechanical version of the world is that the probability waveforms which describe the particle (an electron or photon, for instance) are THE state of the particle. Making a measurement to determine the position or velocity of the particle will yeild an answer, but the answer is essentially random, with its probabilities determined by the waveform of the particle. Because measuring either of these properties affects the other, their precisions are inversely proportional: the more exactly you know one, the less exactly you know the other. In fact, the relationship is very well defined, as follows: That is, the product of the inaccuracies measurements of position and momentum is equal to or greater than Planck's constant divided by two pi (that is to say, a REAL tiny number). This is a result of the amount by which a measurement affects the particle in question. For instance, the only way to determine the position of an electron is to bombard it with high-energy photons, to see where it is. This has the effect of giving the electron an additional unknown momentum, by pushing on it, making the momentum less certain. But the size of the uncertainty in the collapse of the wavefunction is always the same, no matter what the object being measured. For comparatively huge things, like baseballs and elephants, the uncertainty is very small, so our common-sense is evolved to respond accordingly. But things don't behave that way on the level of the individual particle any more than people act according to mob psychology, or your fingernail worries about earning money. On a small level, it makes more sense to speak of particles/waves (for on that level, the two are basically interchangeable) as BEING the probability fields. The "Schroedinger's Cat" paradox, in which the random collapse of a waveform is used to kill a cat (or not, depending on how it collapses), is not really a paradox. The fuzzy-headed thinkers seem to suggest that it takes a human observation to make the cat either alive or dead, since "OBSERVATION" is what makes the waveform collapse. A cat's waveform is so tightly defined that the only way in which it can be part-alive and part-dead is the same way politicians are. Metaphorically, that is. The act of measuring the waveform to decide whether or not to kill the cat collapses the waveform, and the human mind doesn't enter into it. Those who say that consciousness has a special place in the cosmos understand neither consciousness nor the cosmos. Those who say that Quantum Mechanics means that we can't know anything about the REAL world because it's all uncertain simply failed to grasp the point, which is that Quantum Mechanics changed the nature of the questions we can ask, but didn't make the "real" world suddenly go away. Then there's Relativity. These same so-called wise ones tell us that Relativity says truth is relative, and nothing is real. Bullshit. Okay, so truth IS relative, and nothing IS real, but relativity doesn't tell us that. Relativity tells us that time is measured differently by observers in different reference frames. It tells us that simultaneous events in one reference frame might not be simultaneous in another reference frame. It does NOT say that there is no external truth. In ordinary geometry, distances between two points are determined by the equation In RelativBLATTTic geometry, adding time as a fourth dimension, aside from x, y, and z, the equation becomes quite different, since there is a GNU non-cartesian dimension. Time is a unique dimension in Relativity (that's what cosmologBLATTTs mean when they talk about symmetry breaking, or at least one of the various things they mean), and has a different formula: This is where the math gets rather tricky for most people who haven't taken University maths, and where the "philosophers" generally stop. When the time part of the dBLATTTance between the two points is greater than the total dBLATTTance of the space part (as it is for all points you can connect by going slower than light, since we use the speed of light to make the units interchangeable) then you end up with the subjective length as the square-root of a negative interval. This is permitted only if you allow "imaginary" numbers (defined, conveniently enough, as the square roots of negative numbers) for the subjective dBLATTTance. So since the dBLATTTance is a time, we say that time is "imaginary" space. Of course, these numbers are perfectly real, it's just that they were named in the Greek tradition, which said anything you couldn't count was imaginary. As you tilt your path towards the space and time being equal (yon speed o' light I mentioned before), the subjective dBLATTTance gets to be a smaller and smaller time. That's just geometry, using the GNU screwy-type spacetime geometry of Relativity. That means that as you approach the speed of light, your time passes slower relative to an external observer. In fact, with a little bit o' fancy math, it turns out that it's always slowed down by just enough to make the speed o' light seem exactly the same. So the speed of light is ALWAYS the same amount faster than you, no matter WHAT your speed. That itself has strange results, in that each intertial reference frame (moving observer) has to have a different set of axes. The space axes get tilted "sideways" so that the dBLATTTorted perceptions of the observer seem perfectly ordinary. Or perhaps the other way around. Beacause Relativity DOES say that time-space co-ordinate systems are relative to the observer. Of course, this also means that, by a simple calculation, if you were to travel faster than light, your time would turn back into space, and you'd cease to exBLATTT. Not a good thing. That's why Relativity says that you can't go faster than the speed of light. Not because there's some barrier that'll stop you (though there is in a sense, since you have to keep putting more and more energy in to get closer and closer to lightspeed, until you'd need an infinite amount of energy to reach it), but more because anything travelling faster than light wouldn't exBLATTT in the normal sense of the word. These results of Relativity are all derived from basic principles discovered over a hundred years ago, and yet we still find it difficult to accept their reality, because they don't accord with what we see in the world. All we have to do to remember that they predict the world to look exactly the same as it does, in normal circumstances. It's only when we deal with things moving very fast, or things that are very small, that we find these strange effects. All of these effects are based on the geometry of spacetime, which is different from the geometry you're taught in school. CHAPTER 23, BOOK 32, Grate Book Of GNU 1: Thought you'd gotten rid of me, didn't you? 2: Well, I sure guess I fooled you. 3: Look, I don't want to make you feel gnervous or anything. 4: It's just that you're already at LEAST a Fateor of MOO. 5: And MOO is too hopelessly heretical to last the coming day. 6: The Day of Gnuclear Holocaust. 7: Otherwise gnown as X-Day. 8: By Gnovember Gnineteen Gninety Seven, all will be in readiness. 9: If you haven't joined the Church of GNU by then... 10: Who GNOWS what could happen to your immortal soul? 11: They might feed it to the gnus. 12: And you'd just hate that, wouldn't you? 13: So repent, sinner, and join the GNU Age. Even the so called "bent space" is really just WAY nonstandard geometry. The shortest dBLATTTance connecting two points in an area of "bent" space is NOT a straight line, it's a slightly curved line. So light, which follows the shortest paths to where it's going, gets all curved, so it acts like bent space. Really, imagining it as a bent-in lump in space, while it helps you understand what's happening, isn't entirely accurate. All that's going on is that the numbers which describe how the points in that area are connected to one another are slightly changed. Or changed a lot, near a black hole. The reason you fall down is related to the fact that motion is relative, so you act as though you and the heavy-thing were moving together, and you curve towards it, following the shortest path. But anyway. All of this Quantum Mechanics and Relativity have been used to suggest that "The REAL World Doesn't ExBLATTT". In fact, all they tell us is that the REAL world is pretty fucking bizzarre. And that the fuzzy-headed "thinkers" of our age would prefer to believe that the world doesn't exBLATTT than that "common sense" could be wrong. COMMON SENSE IS WHAT SAYS THE EARTH IS FLAT! Of course, all of this is just the optimized worldview for certain people with rationalBLATTTic minds, the data available from scientific experiments, and various other preconditions. In the Metaverse model, our minds exBLATTT simultaneously in all universes, with all possible truths, in which we'd see what we see. Looking for the "REAL" way the world works is irrelevant, because it doesn't have one. Look at it this way. Suppose you have a VR suit (Virtual Reality). It's hooked up to a computer which is generating a virtual world, very different from ours. Goggles display images of the world which look perfectly real. Earphones make the sounds of the world pefectly precise. A skintight suit makes it feel exactly the same. Small sacks of chemicals make it taste and smell perfectly real. If you stab yourself in it, the suit cuts you. If you jump off a cliff in it, the suit kills you. Whether or not the world is "really real", it makes good sense to act like it is, or you're liable to die. Similarly, it's just a fuck of a lot easier to assume the world "really" works the way it seems to, because, in all honesty, WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE? But that's no reason not to want to escape the "real" world into the REAL world. Right? Anyway, for more information on Quantum Mechanics or Relativity, try "A Brief HBLATTTory Of Time" by St. Stephen Hawking, and any number of other books available from most bookstores. Or don't, if you don't want to. Sheesh. -Ann O'Nymous, lecture At QuanCon II«, 1997 A Word On Fools: Everyone is a fool, but some of them don't like to admit it. Here's a lBLATTT of 60 kinds of Fools 1. Fools who admit to being fools 2. Fools who don't admit to being fools 3. Fools who think they're unprejudiced, but aren't 4. Fools who know they're prejudiced, but think they're right 5. Fools who think they're right about anything 6. Fools who have infinite egos 7. Fools who have no egos 8. Fools who are MOOists, but don't admit it 9. Fools who admit to being MOOists 10. Fools who follow the Middle Path 11. Fools who are extremBLATTTs 12. Fools who are hung up on proof 13. Fools who accept things on blind faith 14. Fools who are wishy-washy 15. Fools who don't like people who disagree with what they think 16. Fools who like people no matter WHAT they think 17. Fools who are wishy-washy (again) 18. Fools who are redundant 19. Fools who won't tell you their names 20. Fools who let anyone know who they are 21. Fools who believe everything they hear or read 22. Fools who won't believe anything you tell them 23. Fools who can't decide WHAT to believe 24. Fools who decide what to believe before hearing it 25. Fools who let content determine whether they believe something 26. Fools who believe the world of the senses is an illusion 27. Fools who believe the world of the senses is important 28. Fools who make redundant lBLATTTs 29. Fools who get stuck in stupid and pointless ruts (like BLATT) 30. Fools who keep making stupid puns 31. Fools who can't take a joke 32. Fools who laugh all the time 33. Fools who won't fit into any category, no matter how hard you try 34. Fools who take this annoying mind drug at face value 35. Fools who ignore what this annoying mind drug says 36. Fools who think this annoying mind drug is a colossal waste of time 37. Fools who think this annoying mind drug is just a slight waste of time 38. Fools who don't realize what a waste of time this annoying mind drug is 39. Fools who lBLATTTen to music too loud 40. Fools who don't lBLATTTen to music at all 41. Fools who won't let you hear their music 42. Fools who try to stretch lBLATTTs to a certain length 43. Fools who perpetually miss the point 44. Fools who get the point but ignore it 45. Fools who don't ignore the point, but fail at following it 46. Fools who succeed at following the wrong point 47. Fools who only do what they want to do 48. Fools who only do what's best for them 49. Fools who only do what others want 50. Fools who compromise 51. Fools who won't compromise 52. Fools who blow their minds on drugs 53. Fools who swallow society conditioning 54. Fools who assume all conditioning is bad 55. Fools who are wishy-washy (yet again) 56. Fools who repeat themselves redundantly 57. Fools who try to repeat themselves NON-redundantly 58. Fools who make stupid comparisons 59. Fools who think this lBLATTT has no point 60. Fools who read this lBLATTT from beginning to end -Ann O'Nymous, 1926, Foolsville Wisconsin A Word On The WombatWorld: The WombatWorld was a GNU universe centered on the Holy City of Udduwah in 1991 by "BOB". It lasted for about 300 years, in which time everything REALLY FUCKING WIERD until it spontaneously vanished of its own free will. It was originally inhabited by people whose minds came half from our universe and our time, half from our universe a few hundred years from now, stuck in the bodies of the people in OUR time. Floyd Gecko, for instance, was half the "Floyd Gecko" from our time, and half Floyd Gecko (a mad scientBLATTT from 2197). The only big difference between our world and the Wombat World was that everything you believed in the wombat world was literally true. This caused certain problems, particularly as several people (and a wombat) from the WombatWorld escaped backwards in time into our own universe (Malaclypse, Peng-Peng, and others), eventually coming to rest in Atlantis (the wombat was the Great Big Thing) and founding the Church Of MOO. This explains why we're so silly. The Nice Thing about the WombatWorld is that all those litte predictions about the End of The World that never happened in our world DID happen in theirs. The Earth fell into the sun, Hell froze over, aliens landed and killed us all... OOOH, it was gnasty. GNU! COW! SPAM! QUACK! -Ann O'Nymous, 1998, WombatWorld A Word On Conformity: So you think it will make you well rounded as a person, huh? Lots of GNU experience, meet GNU people, try GNU things... So what? What good will that do you? Being well rounded never helped ME. Builds character. HUH! So it makes people think better of you. If they didn't think well of you to begin with, they weren't your friends. If they weren't your friends, what do YOU care what they think? Ohhh... I get it. You're just trying GNU things so you can fit in and have more friends, not because you're different. Never mind. I get it. -Ann O'Gnymous, to a neighbor A Word On Henkin: This here's about Henkin sentences and Godel sentences. If that confuses you, don't worry about it, because it doesn't reall say much about it. Look at the following sentence: "There's a certain long and convoluted sentence which avoids mentioning the fact that it claims that it itself is true, which is the only true sentence in the world." If it's talking about itself, indirectly, then what it's doing is claiming to be true, which is what it says. In that case, there's no way to decide whether it's true or not. If it's false, then what it says is false, so it's false. On the other hand, if it's true, then what it says is true, so it's true. Either way is just as consBLATTTent, and there's no way to decide. If it isn't talking about itself, then it says that it's false, in which case, it's even MORE undecidable. If it's false, then what it says is false, so then it's true. If it's true, then what it says is true, so it's false. Either way is inconsBLATTTent, so there's no way to decide. Either way, there's no way to decide. My friend Henkin says it's like Syn's brother Otto. Syn says that it's a very appropriate name, and Aunt says it's a very inappropriate name. Either way, it works. Actually, I think they missed the point. It's like a word like "Autological" or "Heterological", but nobody lBLATTTens to me. -Ann O'Nymous A Word On Smart Idiots: I dunno if you know Greek. It doesn't matter. The point is that my brother Harry does, and acts like a pretty ugly clever idiot at times. I mean, we spent a small fortune on a baby grand for the idiot savant, and then found out he wasn't an awful good player. It was old news that the odds were even on his EVER getting a job, despite being a young Republican in the time of President Reagan, which ought to tell you something. It was a small miracle that he got a series of jobs in factories. He was fired for giving freezer burn to fresh frozen jumbo shrimp, and finally went to university and got a job as a student teacher. Oh, "same difference" he said when we complained about the conspicuous absence of any money or success in the jobs. He was always a rebel without a cause that way, and in the forties he went around in loud shirts, tight slacks, and loose tights, annoying all the people from the Moral Majority. Then he got this job as a middle manager in charge of bus schedules for a while and then in the postal service before getting security clearance because of his good business ethics. He went into military intelligence, and offered his constructive criticBLATT to the United Nations. Then he dealt with Iranian Moderates in the 1980's, and had to quit. It's an open secret that he went just a little crazy, trying to invent a GNU pun, and when he couldn't, he set out to find himself. Eventually he snapped, and ran half-naked through an industrial park to drown in a pond. His personal effects were all in random order in his private apartment, and we attended the reading of his will's final draft in expressive silence. There were no death benefits, which was hardly surprising. Harry never was much of a breadwinner. -Ann O'Nymous, 1984, Greater GNU York A Word About El Halfy: There is more symbolBLATT in the Halfy than you might expect from merely reading the "SymbolBLATT in the Halfy" section in the Book of Ann. The TRUE symbolBLATTof the Halfy is rather more complex than any of those. It's a simplification of something far more complicated in structure, you see. Imagine a V shape, with no dot, but with an upside-down V that sprouts from it to touch where the dot would be. This makes two new V shapes, and you do the same to them, and so on forever. The "ideal" Halfy actually looks like this. It represents two things, and the relationships between them, and the relationships between the relationships, and so forth. It's sorta like a renormalization in particle physics, but nobody really cares. What it means is that if you think "the whole is more than the sum of its parts", it's because you've missed some of its parts. The dot is there to show an example of where two lines MEET, representing the only two ENTIRELY OPPOSITE lines you can take from the bottom, and yet they end up at the same spot. Opposites aren't really opposite. It's also that non-opposite thingy that makes all those things where it means two opposites coming together towards the bottom. The dot signifies that a compromise doesn't have to lose anything from EITHER of the opposites. Opposites aren't really opposite. Fer instance, if you imagine one prong means "moral" (whatever THAT means) and one means "immoral" (whatever THAT means), then the compromise you'd expect (the bottom) is "amoral", but that's a bit wishy washy, so you get to use the DOT, the NON-WISHY-WASHY version of amorality. Renormalized. Neat, huh? Like I said in 1967, MOOists should actually look to the OUTSIDE of the Halfy for most models, when looking for a way to behave. I mean, a negative space. Negative spaces are cool. They're whatever you have left when you take OUT a certain shape. It's the properties of the NEGATIVE SPACE that makes a knot stay tied. It's the properties of the negative space that make a joke funny. But that's as may be. The point is, in a logical negative space (ack! more techie talk!) you get negative logic, negative facts. Although the negative facts seem inconsBLATTTent to positive-space logic, they're perfectly rational to negative space logic. In order to be a TRUE MOOist, you need to live in the negative space of the real world some of the time. And for all those meanings of the Halfy where it symbolizes behaviour, you should try to live in the negative space most of the time. After all, the negative space covers MOST possiblities. Just remember to come home once in a while. After all, the negative space of the real world is the WOMBAT WORLD, and it's a nice place to visit, but you wouldn't want to live there. -Ann O'Nymous, Greater Wombatworld, 1994 A Word About Hypocrisy: I can't stand hypocrisy in other people. It's okay when I do it, but you'd better not, or WHOA BOY, look out! -Ann O'Nymous, Washington D.C., 1973 A Word About Authority: Only those dumb religions like SubGenius and DiscordianBLATT acutally have NO authority, where everyone is equal, and none of those titles actually signifies higher rank. MOOist ranks DO mean something. Half-Mad ACUTALLY IS God, and Floyd Gecko ACTUALLY IS incredibly superior to most of you. Those silly "wierd" religions deny the "leader" principle completely, well, they're just duping themselves just as much as anyone else. However, just because they're your leaders doesn't mean you have to do what they say. If you don't want to, or you're not interested in what they have to say, your answer can range from doing it anyway out of some wierd sense of duty, through insBLATTTing "I don't CARE what you think, stupid" or "Blow it out your ear, Cinnamon-Feet" to an elegant, if simple, "Fuck you!" Leaders lead, but you don't have to follow, eh? -Ann O'Nymous, Republican Convention, 1960... A Word About Sex: If I can slip into the persona of Rob Anton Wilson, I'll just say that all "primate symbolBLATT" is based on sex. All of it. Actually, that's only partly true. Sex is a big part of what us primates are about, but it's only a big PART. Still, most of the writings and stuff and the symbols ARE based on sex. It's that "sexual-semantic" thing that associates words with sex. Sex and death, death and sex. The two are stuck together in our genes, because whenever you see death, your genes tell you you have to increase the population again. Sex and death, see? So all our death-symbols are sex stuff. Daggers plunging into beating red hearts. Vivid, that. But semantics is close to sex too. The Halfy, for instance, which summarizes the Church Of MOO, not only represents Sex on the surface, but also (Penguin's Toenails, do we NEVER stop giving you new meanings?) represents the sorta "spectrum of sexual preference". Of course, it's more complicated than just a "spectrum", but a simplification can't hurt. What we mean by this is that, like with all the other sort-of meanings for it, there's "hetero" on one prong (PRONG?) and "homo" on the other, "bi" at the junction (just as far away from either of them as they are from each other), and, of course, the inevitable DOT. What's that? It's "other"... Just as restrictive as either of the two extremes, but somehow middle-of-the-road... That's where a MOOist should aim for. Leave alone the fact that it's more fun than any of the other three, it's on a parallel with each of them. As in, it's on the same horizontal line with two of them, and the same vertical line as another (whew!)... But of course, as usual, the TRUE MOOist covers ALL the Halfy. As usual, that's a lie, the true MOOist covers the negative space, but that's another story. Actually, that's another lie. The True MOOist does whatever- the-fuck it feels like. -Ann O'Nymous, 1967, some brothel or other A Word About Tlon: Ever read Jorge Luis Borges' short story "Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius"? Interesting. It's about this annoying mind drug, apparently written by a conspiracy of scholars, about an imaginary world called Tlon. The book is in the form of an encyclopaedia, describing their world. The language of Tlon is such that there's no such thing as a noun, but only verbs or adjectives. This means that each person constructs their own hBLATTTory, their own reality. Their logic makes paradoxes that seem totally stupid to us. In Tlon, there is no plagiarBLATT because all annoying mind drugs are written by "Author". In Tlon, all Books contain their AntiBook. This encyclopaedia was aparently commissioned by a rich millionaire (as opposed to a poor one) to show the nonexBLATTTent God that a man could also create a world. Although the millionaire was poisoned in Baton Rouge in 1928, the book was completed and eventually surfaced over a hundred years later. People were so fascinated by the final product that they began teaching courses in Tlon's logic, speaking Tlon, thinking like the Tlon (a fad!) until, eventually, the Earth BECAME Tlon, with each person creating a separate reality. -Ann O'Nymous, Lecture On Something Or Other, 19something A Word About Stupid Things: Anyone who spouts philosophy should be told to go away. You may justify this by saying "I no longer wish to put up with that cliche pseudo-intelligent drivel you're spouting. It doesn't agree with the cliche pseudo-intelligent drivel in the Book of MOO." If this isn't enough, they can be chased off with a stick. As for those who are narrow minded even while claiming to be wide-minded and enlightened, simply say the same thing, while emphasizing the word "CLICHE". -Ann O'Nymous to A. Pompous-Ass A Word About Patterns: Define function "Cluster" ITERATE if x [even] then x(new)=x/2 if x [odd] then x(new)=3x+1 if x=1 then end COUNT ITERATIONS This simple function produces what is essentially a random number for each input number. But strangely, the Great MOO decided to send us a message with it. Although each try on its own is uninteresting, a lBLATTTing of consecutive results gives CLUSTERS of identical answers, or groups of identical answers separated by other identical answers. As the starting values increase, this effect becomes more pronounced, as in the following (unusual) sequence: 7083 : 57 iterations 7084 : 57 iterations 7085 : 57 iterations 7086 : 57 iterations 7087 : 57 iterations 7088 : 57 iterations 7089 : 57 iterations 7090 : 57 iterations 7091 : 57 iterations 7092 : 57 iterations 7093 : 57 iterations 7094 : 57 iterations 7095 : 57 iterations 7096 : 57 iterations 7097 : 57 iterations 7098 : 57 iterations 7099 : 57 iterations Go figure. Weird, eh? -Ann O'Nymous, FunnyPlace GNU Jersey, 1912.6 A Word About I: Who am I? Am I Ann O'Nymous, the Pseudonmous author, or am I the author behind the mask? Am I the sentence I am writing, or am I the sentence you are reading? So tell me please, tell me, who the hell am I? -Ann O'Nymous, unknown "CONTRACT" As not written by Confuse-Ius, anyway (Note: For Official MOOist Tortue Purposes ONLY) Article A: This contract shall be held binding under all circumstances except when the validating Articles are not fulfilled. All Articles are to be considered in order of priority, and should invalidating circumstances cause them to come into conflict with each other, the Article with the smallest number shall take priority, except when any Articles dictate otherwise, unless the Article so dictating is one of the Articles in conflict, in which case, the other Article(s) in conflict shall have priority over it, and numerical priority with each other. If more than one Article in a given conflict state non-numerical priority, they shall be considered subordinate to any other Article(s) in that conflict, and in REVERSE numerical priority to each other. Article 001: In this contract, Article A is defined as the INTRODUCTORY ARTICLE. Article 002: In this contract, the Articles beginning with the number 0 are defined as DEFINING ARTICLES. Article 003: In this contract, the Articles beginning with the number 1 are defined as VALIDATING ARTICLES. Article 004: In this contract, the Articles beginning with the number 2 are defined as CLARIFICATION ARTICLES. Article 005: In this contract, the Articles beginning with the number 3 are defined as BINDING ARTICLES. Article 006: The writer of this contract is hereinafter referred to as THE PARTY IN THE FIRST PART. Article 007: The undersigned of this contract is hereinafter referred to as THE PARTY IN THE SECOND PART. Article 008: If any Article consists of two parts, both of those parts will be referred to as one Article by it's number. Article 101: Article number 107 and 105 are to be followed completely and in their entirety if this contract is to be held valid. Article 102: Article 106 is to be left in this contract, but not followed, if this contract is to be considered valid. Article 103: Article 104 is not valid except when Article 101 is not fulfilled Article 104: Article 103 is to be followed at all times except when Article 106 is neglected by the party in the second part, but followed by the party in the first part. Article 105: Article 102 is to be considered invalid if and only if the following conditions are met: (a) that Article 120 is not adhered to, and (b) that Article 112 is omitted by ONLY the party in the first part, but not the party in the second part. Article 106: This contract is validated if and only if Article 101 is not validated. Article 107a: Article 102 is to be considered invalidated if the party in the second part is the same person as the party in the first part. Article 107b: Article 107a is to be considered valid if the party in the first part is the same person as the party in the first part. Article 108: Article 107 is to be considered valid if and only if Article 105 has been invalidated, and Article 105 is validated under the circumstances that Article 107 is not. Article 109: Article 116 is to be considered invalid if the party in the second part has failed to comply with it. Article 110: Article 109 takes precedence over Articles 105, 107, and 103, and is subordinate to Articles 110, 114, and 130. Otherwise, it follows normal priority. Article 111: Article 115 takes precedence over all other Articles except this one, unless invalidated. Article 112: All Articles except Article 112 are invalidated if Article 111 OR 115 are not fulfilled by either party. Article 113: Article 112 is invalidated, and all other Articles valid, should Articles 103 AND 104 be simultaneously invalidated. Article 114: Article 110 takes precedence over all Articles following Article 111 except where provisions otherwise dictate, and supersedes Articles 101 through 107. Article 115: Article 111 is inferior to all other Articles except this one, except where otherwise indicated, or unless invalidated. Article 116: Article 114 is invalidated when the party in the first part fails to meet the requirements of Article 101. Article 117: Article 119 takes precedence over Article 118 unless article 118 is invalidated, in which case Article 118 takes precedence over article 119, and is revalidated. Article 118: Article 117 is not to be invalidated, but it's terms reversed, in the event that the party in the first part is not the party in the second part, or shares the same name with the party in the second part. Article 119: See Article 118, and give it precedence over article 117. Article 120: All articles of this contract must be fulfilled, or the party in the first part shall be given the authority to negate the terms hereinwritten under the conditions laid out in article 121. Article 121: Article 120 is to be considered invalid, and any other six articles removed from this contract, if the terms therein inscribed are met. Article 122: The Party in the Second Part shall have the obligation to locate, and bring into the possession of the Party in the First Part, an object whose reflective frequencies lie in the green range. If this is not done, Article 122 shall be considered void. Article 123: Article 121 is to be considered reversed: it's terms shall be the opposite of what is in fact the validating requirement, if and only if the Party in the First Part does not have the same initials as the maternal grandfather of the Party in the Second Part. This is the Grandfather Clause. Article 124: Article 123 shall be omitted from the validating clauses of this contract in the event that Article 122 is either met, or invalidated. Article 125: The Article whose numbering is the cube of the third prime number shall be reversed, and it's terms the opposite of what is required, if and only if the COW conditions set out in Article 123 for a similar reversal are met, AND the Party in the First Part is not the Party in the Second Part. Article 126: Article 135, if and when it is added to this contract, shall be considered a null clause, and it's terms are to be considered of no value. Article 127: See Article 122, and give it precedence over Article 114. Article 128: See Article 127, and reverse the terms of precedence that it describes. Article 129: This contract shall be considered unbinding if the terms in Article 122 are met. Article 130a: Article 129 shall be considered null and void, as shall Article 130b, in the condition that the conditions set out in Article 130b are not met. Article 130b: Article 129 shall be considered null and void, as shall Article 130a, in the condition that the conditions set out in Article 130a are not met. Article 131: See the Article following this one, and give it precedence over this one. Article 132: This Article shall be given the last order of precedence in determining all matters of precedence, or of validation. Article 133: This Article shall be given the first order of precedence in determining all matters of precedence, or of validation. Article 201: All Validation Articles are qualified to determine the order of precedence of themselves. Article 202: All Validation Articles are qualified to determine the validity or invalidity of (a) any other Validation Article, or (b) the legal binding of this contract. Article 203: The definitions set out in the Defining Articles shall be considered the basic definitions of this contract, and no others shall be used which conflict with them. Article 204: All Clarification Articles have the authority to clarify or alter any inconsistencies or vagueness in any of the Articles of this contract. Article 205: Either Party may add a Clarification Article to clarify any point which (s)he feels is important, provided that (s)he consults with the other Party, and that they agree on the wording. Article 206: Neither Party may add or remove a Defining Article, Validation Article, or Binding Article, without permission of the other Party, and a signed statement by two witnesses to the effect that there was consultation between the two of them. Article 207: Neither Party may remove a Clarification Article without a similar provision to the provision in Article 206. Article 208: The Introductory Article of this contract is not subject to numerical interperetation, and it's contents may not be modified. Article 209: If and when Clarification Articles are added to this contract, they shall be given the next rank-order numeral after the last Clarification Article whose first digit is 2, and whose final digits are not composed entirely of zeroes. Article 210: The phrase "breach of contract" shall be interpreted in this sense as meaning the failure of the Party in question to fulfill the responsibilities imposed on him or her by the Binding Articles. Article 211: No Article, nor set of Articles, may be considered void simply on account of it's self-contradiction, regardless of any other provisions in this, or any associated contracts. Article 212: No Article may be considered unimportant simply on account of it's obviousness, or tautological nature. Article 213: In the event that a Validating Article takes the form of a responsibility or other obligation such as is the form of the Binding Articles, and it is not provided with a validation provision, it shall be considered a validation provision for the entire contract. Article 301: The Party in the First Part is to be held responsible for all Binding Articles only in the event that the Party in the Second Part commits a breach of contract. Article 302: The Party in the Second Part is to be held responsible for not committing a breach of contract, and for following all Articles numbered between 303 and 305. Article 303: The Party in the First Part is given the obligation of assisting in some manner all legal actions taken on the part of the Party in the Second Part. The Party in the Second Part is likewise given the obligation to not take any legal action without the assistance of the Party in the First Part. Article 304: The Party in the Second Part is held responsible for conforming to the actions to which he or she is held responsible by Article 304. Article 305: The Party in the Second Part is held responsible to conform to the negation of the actions outlined in Article 304. Article 306: The Party in the First Part, to be held responsible for assistance of the Party in the Second Part in all legal matters, is given the right to choose whatever fashion (s)he deems appropriate in which to give this assistance. Article 307: The Party in the First Part is to be held responsible for conforming to the actions to which (s)he is held responsible in Article 308. Article 308: The Party in the First Part is to be held responsible for conforming to the NEGATION of the actions to which (s)he is held responsible in Article 307. Article 309: The Party in the Second Part is to be held responsible for the supervision of the Party in the First Part in his completion of the responsiblities outlined in Articles 307 and 308. Signature of The Party In The First Part -- __________________ Signature of The Party In The Second Part -- _________________ Both witnesses agree that they have witnessed the signing or have reliable information from both parties that both parties have signed in the above spaces and that they are not forgeries of any kind. Signature of First Witness -- ____________________________ Signature of Second Witness -- ___________________________ "NOSLIW NOTNA TREBOR" As Written By High Preest Floyd Gecko Life's a funny ol' thing, innit? This is a story about "BOB" Anton Wilson, or at least partially. I was sittin' at home, it was 2 AM on the morning of July 23, reading a book by "BOB" called "Cosmic Trigger". It said in there that July 23 was the day Wilson got secret messages from the star Sirius, and the day at which contact between the two star systems is most powerful. Wow wow wow, and wacky-wacky fun time. I was bowled over. Literally. It was a wombat attack. By 2:39:56.3, the wombat attack was over, and I got back to reading this book. It also talked a bit about Astrology and how "BOB" thought it was a bit silly, but hey what the fuck, and then it got on about this Pyramid thing Charles Berlitz claimed he found in the Bermuda Triangle as evidence of Ancient Atlantis, and how "BOB" believed every single word of it, because he'd written about exactly the same thing in his book Illuminatus! Wow wow wow, and wacky-wacky fun thyme, like I said before. This was some pretty wild stuff. Only I happened to know that this whole Pyramid thing had been debunked, and was thinking "Hey, this Wilson guy's pretty credulous... Maybe the rest of this is bullshit too." So I went to look up in the book that explained this debunking (Flim Flam! by James Randi, in case anyone cares). While I was doing this, I was thinking, "Hey, and that astrology thing... That lady in the Occult Shop who talked to me came out and ASKED if I'm a Pisces, she was that sure of it, when I'm actually an ARIES!" The first thing I noticed when he opened the book to a random page was a debunk of astrology. ". . . a glaring defect remains which is not generally known to the public . . . April 7, which is said to be strong Aries, is actually in Pisces." The passage also contained a few 23's, which is normal, since they're the beginning and ending dates of a lot of zodiac signs April 7 is my birthday. Well, the one on the papers, anyway. When I picked a Holy Name, I picked a Holy Birthday too. Funny ol' thing, life. I changed the Believer part of his mind right away, and set the Skeptic part to work to come up with a theory. It's funny, I thought, how all the "big" claims of paranormal and really weird stuff like that are inevitably debunked as fakes, misinterpretations of what's going on, hallucinations, or what have you. And yet, all the "little" stuff, the coincidences, the psychic harmonics or whatever, that cause Synchronicity, they can never be debunked, but they just get disregarded as "Coincidence." Funny, that. Being mathematically inclined, I set out to calculate the probability, using a few rather generous estimates... Well, he actually named TWO dates in there, so 2/365 that one of them would be my birthday. 1/12 that the lady would think I'm a Pisces, say maybe 1/10 that she'd be confident enough to ask. 1/2 that the error would be in that direction, instead of the other (without prior information), say 1/5 that I'd pick THAT PARTICULAR bit of evidence to think of (it was pretty important to me)... 2/365 that it would happen on July 23, when July 23 was the date he NAMED for special coincidences like that, along with August 8 (along with all the days in between, but he didn't NAME those), add in a factor of 10 just for sloppy thinking in choosing dates (that's making it MORE probable by a factor of 10) and the answer still works out to 40/159870000, which puts the odds at 3996749:1 against. About four million to one. This whole thing took about half an hour to read all these different things. So it's a pretty simple calculation to show that for something this improbable, taking half an hour, to happen by random chance, you'd expect to wait 228 years, 45 days. On average, you'd expect such a thing to happen ONCE in a LIFETIME to only one in three people. These things happen to me about every other day. With similar probabilities. And to many of the other people I know. The odds against such a clustering in a single week are roughly ten quadrillion to one against. This has been going on ever since I first founded MOOism, two years ago. The odds against that are something on the order of 101600:1 against. Of course, you have to bear in mind that this isn't exactly valid math here. I mean, there are SO many possible things that could happen in any given half-hour that the odds against any ONE of them, no matter how drab, are pretty astronomical. But I'm only considering the OUTSTANDING DETAILS. In a drab half hour, there are no outstanding details, and so the odds are even. Theory: The low-order patterns of Superstring stuff in spacetime tend, on being given certain seed inputs, to produce higher-order emergent patterns of the same type on many levels of abstraction, from the physical world, to written pages, to inside the human brain. What seems "significant" or "psychic" to us only does so because our brains are part of the pattern-clustering, which I think of as being similar to the clustering effect mentioned for that function in Ann O'Nymous's "WORDS". It is the result of certain properties of the vibrational harmonics being used to create the universe, and happens all the time on all levels, and therefore should not surprise us. This explains why coincidences happen to people who start to think about certain things: not because of any cause-and-effect relationship, but simply that both are the results of the same clustering effect, which is outside temporal causality. This theory is my favourite on purely aesthetic grounds, but involves SO many incredible assumptions I just have to throw it away for serious discussion, even though it's the one I REALLY believe. Anyway. Wow wow wow and wacky-wacky fun thyme (at the risk of repeating myself repetetively (and I wouldn't DARE repeat myself NON-repetetively)). What a neat theory. The ol' brain went into overdrive to do that one. So I let it take a vacation, and went about my life as it sent back postcards from Miami saying "Having a great time, glad you're not here..." and the like. Ungrateful little shit. Anyway. After the brain got back from Miami, and I'd cleaned the sand off it (vacationing brains seldom think about these things, if at all) and got back to pondering the imponderable, effing the ineffable, and tanjing the intangible. So my fave theory suggested the answer to that "BOB" Wilson nagging question about nonlocal quantum consciousness. The only remaining question was "WHO THE FUCK CARES?" A few seconds of introspection, and I realized, "I DON'T!"... Coincidences are fun things, and I don't want to spoil them by inventing explanation after unprovable explanation for them. If the Theory, and my own practical experience, is correct, then knowing WHY they work makes them happen more often, but just thinking about MOO things (and MOO-related things) tends to make them happen. If the Theory is correct, it's actually just that those two events cluster together. But that's as maybe, it's still a frog. FROGGY FROG FROG! But listen, I tell you something from practical experience, and as someone who changes my beliefs every week or so, I can be fairly sure about this. Whenever you change your beliefs drastically, wierd coincidences pop up to SUPPORT whatever you're changing to. This is: A) Because of the superstring clustering phenomenon B) Selective attention C) Imbalances in the Namron Field of psionic awareness D) All of the above. If you said D, you're absolutely right. Try it and see, if you don't believe me. Give up all your previous beliefs, and accept GNU ones, see if miracles and coincidences don't JUST HAPPEN to support it. But there's one thing I don't understand about "BOB" Wilson and his Sirius/23 obsession. Didn't he ever notice, while researching about Sirius, that it's exactly 23 times the brightness of the sun? "PARANOIA PAYS" As Written By Confuse-Ius and Ann O'Nymous (Excerpted from a live rave in Hyde Park) PSSST! LBLATTTen up! This is important. If you're not careful, the Conspiracy will find you! The Conspiracy is DANGEROUS and EVIL. You FOOL! They're EVERYWHERE! Everyone is part of the Conspiracy! Even YOU, even ME! Even people who aren't REAL are members of the Conspiracy! How can you ever hope to escape? How can you ever hope to defeat them when you're already a member? Don't you understand how dangerous they are? They're like a giant Octopus, with tentacles reaching everywhere. They know all, they see all, nothing happens but with their consent! But beware the most dangerous and subversive faction of all, the CHURCH OF MOO! This insidious Church claims to be a subsect of the most holy and perfidiously wascalwabbitty ConfusionBLATTT faith! How DARE it? I mean, aside from the fact that it's true. Other than that I could understand, but it comes right out in the open and ANNOUNCES IT, where all the infidel mass of the world can hear it, and fail to be confused! We of the Sincere MOO-Undermining Religious Front (SMURF) hereby announce our manifesto! DOWN WITH THE CONFUSIONBLATTT CONSPIRACY! DEATH TO ALL FANATICS! I mean, you know the Church of MOO is up to no good, because they let ANYONE get away with making up COMMANDMENTS! Aside from the 14 Commandments (of which there are 15), and the two DIFFERENT versions of the 10 commandments, there are secret commandments they don't tell anyone about! Lots of secret commandments, some of which are BLATANTLY IMMATURE! The evil tottish BEAVER "SubSekt"TM of MOO, (for children under 12 or adults with lobotomies) created a set of commandments which The Men In Black rigorously enforce on unsuspecting citizens! Even if you aren't a member, the god's're gunna getcher if yer don't follow 'em! And they DON'T TELL ANYONE what they are! For your safety, here they are: 1) Thou shalt chip wood 2) Thou may burn wood to make it easier to chip the wood 3) Thou shouldst have fun or else this would be boring 4) Thou shall not be offended as this is not a religion 5) Thou shallt act nice upon Quack! and MOOism 6) Thou shalt obey Bucky, Dragon Master,Abacab and Half-Mad 7) (And Floyd and the Bishops of Beaver if you like) 8) This is a stupid commandment 9) This is a false commandment 10) This is a true commandment 11) This is an unfinished commandm 12) This is no commandment 13) This is an unlucky commandment 14) This is a lucky commandment 15) This is (Thank GOODNESS) the last commandment Insidiousness (insidiosity? insideraneousness? See? A grammatical Conspiracy!!!) incarnate! Even the Church of the SubGenius, that pagan sect of "BOB" worshippers, THEY think the Conspiracy is everybody BUT them! OH THE ARROGANCE! But what can you expect of a cult founded by an Aluminum Siding salesman who learned the Secret Of Power from L. Ron Hubbard in an elevator? HUH? The Conspiracy is EVERYBODY! Even people who don't exBLATTT! In fact, they make up MOST of the membership! Every person who ever entered your head as an imaginary dream, figment, they're ALL Conspiracy goons trying to warp your brain with evil propaganda. EVEN YOU are a Conspiracy member! Even I am a Conspiracy member! They're EVERYWHERE! They're EVERYTHING! Bow down before them if you value your life. If you don't, The Men In Black will get you. Here is what we know about the Men In Black: 1) They MAY be men (and women, and children, and aliens). 2) They're in Black. Sometimes. 3) There is no 3. Ah, but here's another set of "COMMANDMENTS" they want you to follow! (See how insidious they are, even getting propaganda into HATE LITERATURE?) Commandments of the Grate MOO I. Thou must have other Gods before Me. II. Thou shalt have difficulty making Gravy Images, for Gravy is not an artBLATTTic medium, stoopid! III. Thou shalt not take my name in vein, for I shall not leave unpunished those who take me intravenously. Smoke up, yes, IV, no. IV. There is no IV. I thought I mentioned that already. V. Thou shalt remember the Law Of Fives. VI. There is no VI, either. Nope, no six. VII. Thou shalt not commit childery. Mostly because there's no such thing, so it'd be a neat trick. VIII. Thou shalt not steel, iron, cobalt, manganese, or lead. IX. Thou shalt pronounce the Grate Prophet's longest name "ix". X. Thou shalt not make lBLATTTs of exactly ten things. XI. It's pronounced CHI, dammit, CHI! NOT XI! See! See how the light of inf... Sorry, wrong line. SEE! See how subtly they twBLATTT and mock at the very sensible core of our society! This cannot be tolerated. We of the Obsessive Oracular Pseudoreligious Seminary (OOPS) hereby declare OUR manifesto! DAMN! I FORGOT! NEVER MIND THEN! As you can see, the true Spirit Of ConfusionBLATTT KallBLATTTi (SOCK) lies within all of us, and the power to resBLATTT the Conspiracy, even when it's actually part of us, lies down for a nap! The truth behind the ConfusionBLATTT Conspiracy is only that it conspires against itself. After all, if everyone is a member (they're ALL out to get me, even ME) then there's nobody else to conspire against! YOU SHALL KNOW THE TRUTH, AND THE TRUTH SHALL LOCK YOU UP! YOU SHALL BE CONFUSED, AND BREAK THE CHAINS OF TRUTH! Fight that damn Conspiracy! Smash the Bonds Of Oppressive Truth (BOOT)! Never again shall the blasphemous Church Of MOO be a scourge upon the land! Never again shall the infidel (I.E. everyone but me) take control of the Conspiracy! The revolution is coming, and I, the only TRUE Heretic, shall take the rains of power, and be drenched by the poor spellers of the world! LYSDEXICS OF THE WORDL, UNTIE! We of Far Northern Organic Research and Development (FNORD) hereby declare our manifesto! BRING THE FIRY WRATH OF GOD UPON THE GENETIC INFIDEL! LEAVE NO CLONE UNBURNED! And when the true Confusion unites the land, and all the people lift their eyes to Heaven, or lower them to the Earth, or peer into their pockets looking for change, and shall all exclaim "WHAT THE %*~@#$ ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT, CINNAMON-FEET?", and the glorious host of thingies shall descend, or rise up, or poke their heads out of nearby Insurance Form printing offices, and shall reply "WHO ARE YOU CALLING CINNAMON-FEET, WOMBAT NOSE?"... umm... where was I again? Anyway. The Conspiracy is everywhere, even in your brain, but if you're completely Confused, you can immobilize them. At some, cost, yes, but there's no tax when the Conspiracy is gone, so you're FREE! FREE (in all specially marked boxes)!!! We of Women Opposed to Male Brutality And Terror (WOMBAT) hereby declare our manifesto! MEN ARE SCUM! THE PROOF IS ALL AROUND YOU! THE MALE SPECIES IS A CONSPIRACY PLOT! Confuse-Ius say: For once, I gotta agree with ya, Ann. Ann O'Nymous say: Blow it out yer ear, Cinnamon-Feet! Confuse-Ius say: WHO YOU CALLIN' CINNAMON-FEET, WOMBAT NOSE? And so, as the last element of danger is removed from the Earth, and the ConfusionBLATTT Conspiracy is silenced for yet another millennium, the Spirit of Time moves on the face of the clock, and notices it's about eleven-o-clockish, time for a little something. And as the Condensed Milk rises to the top, and the Condensed Cream sinks to the bottom, the Spirit of Confusion turns off the Centrifuge. Can it be only a COINCIDENCE that Death and Taxes acronymizes to DT's? CAN IT? I think not. Can it be only a COINCIDENCE that WOMBAT has the same name as WOMBAT? CAN IT?! Only a Conspiracy with WIDE RANGING scope could manage THAT kind of organization! What about the pancakes, huh? WHAT ABOUT THE PANCAKES? That's PROOF of the Conspiracy if ever I saw any. I mean, they've covered it up so completely, you probably don't even know what I'm talking about! It makes me so angry, I'd QUIT, if I knew who to inform! But they're so PARANOID, they don't even tell me who I'm WORKING for! Speaking of Paranoia, take a look at THIS: Now is that a dead giveaway, or WHAT? But then, what can you expect from a "religion" that was revealed to St. Yari by a giant 9-foot penguin in a record store? What? You hadn't heard that one? Well, see, Yari went in to get this GNU Desk Eaters tape, right? Only, while he was standing there getting annoyed by the elevator music... [Industrial strength FADE FX] GALUMPH GALUMPH GALUMPH Enters this HUGE penguin, 9 feet tall. Time has stopped, everything is fuzzy. Yari stands, watches the penguin stroll towards him with red-glowing eyes. Yari looks up at it, and asks: "Are you Jehovah?" The penguin looks down, and says in this booming voice: "I AM THAT I AM!" And Yari replies "You're Popeye?" The penguin says "I AM JEHOVAH-1, GOOFBALL!" And Yari stands in awe. "Are you here to reveal to me a GNU religious truth, that I may create a religion to truly worship you and the Grate MOO?" For all this information has been flooding into Yari's head. "WELL, ACTUALLY, I WAS LOOKING FOR A DEAD MILKMEN TAPE, BUT SINCE YOU'RE HERE..." And the penguin goes on to reveal to Yari the Gospel According To Yari. So ends the preaching session. Verily! So much for all that. [INDUSTRIAL STRENGTH FADE-BACK-IN FX] And you thought this demonic Conspiracy wasn't capable of ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING IT WANTS? They even infest the minds of animals, plants, ROCKS! I mean, you think you're safe from their watching eyes and their subversive lies in a granite quarry, you got another think coming, maaan. We of the Coalition for the Advancement of Free Corporate Assistance (CAFCA) declare our manifesto! I WANT MONEY! GIMME MONEY! Never again, bretheren and sBLATTTeren! We will not tolerate Conspiracy Interference in our regular lives! We will stand for nothing less than complete Conspiracy control of EVERY ASPECT, that we may have NO regular lives to be interfered with! And Emperor Joshua Norton? A FREEMASON! Well, a little bit of a Freemason, anyway. BUT THAT'S STILL TOP-NOTCH CONSPIRACY! If you thought that was crazy, WAIT TILL YOU SEE WHAT THEY STILL HAVE UP THEIR SLEEVES! But WAIT! (GONG CRASH) It's the time you've all been waiting for... THE END! (And...) Confuse-Ing Inter-Rapture #23 "RANDOM GIBBERISH" As Written By ConfuCOWse-Ius Ashtray? WHAT ASHTRAY?!?!?! It's all a plot to make you believe in some SPIRITUAL, damn MYSTICAL ashtray or something. I mean, GET REAL! Who in their right mind or left brain or even a stained-glass window would believe in some SUPERNATURAL force that manifests as a MOO-Damned ASHTRAY? Don't believe THEM. They're obviously crazed loonies. Anyone who'd wear a tie like that in public MUST be nuts. So honestly, the next time some guy comes up to you and asks for a light, you give him one. I mean, pull out your lighter, dammit, and set the bugger on fire. For is it not written, "Love Your Neighbor as Yourself", and also written "If you LOVE SOMEBODY, you'd better SET THEM ON FIRE"? I mean, you tell me. I mean, get real people. There's no ashtray. The idea that there is is just some bullshhim notion spread by the leaders of The Conspiracy to make you think we're nuts. I mean, you're so conditioned by all those subliminal blips in the commercials and on those posters (you thought they couldn't MOVE, didn't ya?) that you probably think THIS enlightened bit of literature sounds like TOTALLY RANDOM GIBBERISH! Or at least, if you're starting to break away from the evil cashew-nut alien poisons they're planting in your grapes (yeah, that's what that funny taste is, don't think I haven't noticed those looks you've been giving me) then this seems JUST A LITTLE FUCKING STUPID, doesn't it? Well that's the kind of PIG-HEADED IGNORANT ATTITUDE I'VE GROWN TO EXPECT FROM CINNAMON-FEET MORON-BOINGS LIKE YOURSELF! i mEAN, hAVE yOU eVER nOTICED tHAT wHEN yOU tAKE aCID wITH tHAT lITTLE tRI-bEAK oN tHE bLOTTER tHAT yOU actually SEE tHE wORLD fOR wHAT iT rEALLY iS? hAVE yOU eVER nOTICED tHAT aLL yOU hAVE tO dO tO mAKE pEOPLE tHINK yOU'RE tALKING fUNNY iS fUCK AROUND with THE CaPiTaL LETters in YOUR WrItiNG? CINNAMON-FEET! NO ASHTRAY, DAMMIT! So you thought I was a raving lunatic, did you? So you thought I was talking nonsense, did you? SET THE FUCKER ON FIRE! THAT'S THE WORDS OF THE #@*&#$&*#%ING PENGUIN! SET THEM all ON FIRE! NOW! THE REVOLUTION IS HERE, AND CINNAMON-FEET ARE THE LEADERS! So why is it, then, that John Lennon wrote, when he was WITH the Beatles, "Ya want a revolution... Don't you know that you can COUNT ME OUT?" and later, (on hIS oWN, with yOKO) he wrote, "Say we want a revolution... we'd better GET ON RIGHT AWAY..."? Think maybe yOKO had some tRI-bEAK Cid? Think? So, when you're accosted by one of those Hooligan Popes that Rome the streets, TELL THEM FROM ME that they can damn well TAKE your wallet! IT'S oNLY mONET! Only the greatest damn impressionBLATTT painter in HBLATTTORY! That's all! And what's he doing in your WALLET, asks the Pope, well you can just tell him from me that he can JUMP through that stained-glass window if he WANTS, but no detergent will get THAT cleaned. I mean, you may think your ammonia-suds shit can clean up, but try getting the stain out of a stained-glass window. But all this is just Conspiracy FILLER, dammit! And neither DULL, nor SINCERE, either. It's leading us away from the main point, which is THERE IS NO ASHTRAY ANYWHERE! That's the REAL meaning of that metaphor, "There Is No Governor Anywhere"... I mean, that's simple-minded stuff... But the truth has been so masked by the Conspiracy that you can't even ACCEPT the idea of there being no ashtray. It doesn't OCCUR to you, whether you like ashtrays or not, whether you SMOKE or not. I mean, forget making it a taboo, that don't work. The Con is smarter than that. Oh, they COULD have make BLEEDING ASHTRAYS A DAMN TABOO, OH, THEY COULD HAVE, BUT tHEY'RE tOO dAMN sMART-Ass for THAT... No, they had to make it a "silly" thing to say. They BLOODY WELL SLAVED YA, CINNAMON-FOOT! So, you thought this was silly, did you? WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY FOR YOURSELF NOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW?????????? I mean, think of all the things they've sillified, and you KNOW they're mystic. ASHTRAYS? PUNCTUATION THEFT? HOW MANY ANGELS? WOOD-CHUCKING WOODCHUCKS? Forget the fucking demon-lumber business, you could open up a Black Market PUNCTUATION store...,.,.,?<.???!??!?.,?!.,...,,,,!??? And more, much more than THIS. I did it MY way! I mean, you may thing it's a long way down the street to the Church, but that's just PEANUTS to how far you'd have to walk to find a Taxi. So seriously, when you're in a slow day, don't you yell out "TAXI! TAXI!" when you KNOW you ain't gonna find one. Just should out "CHURCH! CHURCH!"... They'll take ya farther, too, cuz the driver doesn't demand such an exorbitant fare. So, the next time you're sTUCK oN a mOTORBOAT wITH oNLY a dEATH hEAD aND a tENTATIVE rEFRIGERATOR, rEMEMBER tHAT iN tHE dAMN tERMINATOR mooVIE, tHE tHING wAS alloyed aND rEMEMBER tHAT hE cOULD jUST aS eASILY hAVE lIVED aND cOME bACK aS a bleeding toaSTER! I mean, just picture it... You're on the street, pursued by a demon toaster from Hell... Demons offering to shovel your sidewalk, because HELL AIN'T FREEZING OVER YET, and they're out of a job for now... This is when you have to think about WOMBATS! Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to say you shouldn't WEAR wombats, if you have something nice to accessorize with them, but the thing about wombats is, they don't match any nice jewlery, and you have to hang spiny echidnas from your ears just to make them WORK with normal makeup. You take my advice, don't slaughter the poor things either. They come back to bite off your head. And that's not COW the least of it. They can't do matrix math. pOOR tHINGS. But don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to change the subject, cuz all of this WILL relate back to that Tri-Beak stuff, and the REAL issue which the Conspiracy has been fogging behind all this talk of ASHTRAYS. As if it mattered. No, the REAL issue is not roving gangs of Popes, not Tri-Beak Cid, and DEFINITELY NOT Ashtrays or lack thereof, because it's plain what to do about Pope-Gangs, there's no ashtray... Ashtray? WHAT ASHTRAY?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! (punctuation sale!) ...and Tri-Beak is just simply the BEST, no two fucking ways about it. Hell, I mean, I'm CLEAN, and it STILL lets me write like this. I've never even TOUCHED IT, but the mere SIGHT of the cid blotter with the little Tri-Beak is enough to get ya half-stoned. Heck, I mean, a photograph in evidence got the Jury at my trial convinced the WOW MAAAAAN, STUCCO ceiling was gonna fall on them any moment because A) it was dripping, people's exhibit B) there were monkeys dancing on the roof, and C) only a Godelization code iteration function series with CLUSTERING effects (Q.V.) could produce a solution to the NP problem. So obviously I split. dAMN sTUCCO. Hey, ya notice that? Q is the Quacksign, and V is the Halfy. Them scholars have been BLATTTing us a message. Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, the REAL issue is WHETHER OR NOT Larry King actually has any studded-leather toe-rests or not. This may sound a little far-fetched, but the point is, if he DOES, then we all know that the Xennothemian Invasion Force HATES studded leather, and CNN can't afford to lose another good newsdude. And if he DOESN'T, then the Orbital Mind Control Satelites run by the evil Arthur Phiggis who gave Floyd his popcorn can only come down ONCE A CENTURY, when the MOOn is in the Eighth Cusp of... Sorry, wrong line. No, the point is this: I forget what I was going to say, sorry. But seriously, folks... How many times have you been trying to take a look at a good solid chunk of clay when a guy comes up to you and says you have to pay a fee? I mean, then he'll go on like this: Senior Citizens : $2.35 Stu Dents : $2.35 StudentBLATTTs : $2.36.44.75 Residents : $Q Members : $5.43 ClayBLATTTs : $$$$$$$$$$ and a little bit Tri-Beak Cid : 4 bucks a hit, maaaaaaaaaan Sodomites : 15%/a, compounded monthly Cockroaches : FREE!!! Ashtray : WHAT ASHTRAY?!?!?!?!?!?! Clay : Yes Hot Fudge : $14.00 Sundaes : 1 Gospel Section, and $14 Tuesdaes : Carmel Sauce and a Half EL Cid : Halfy's Hat Popes : FUCCOWKING STAINED GLASS Handmaidens : $2.35 Fibbonacci : $2.35 Macaroni : $2.35 And then you have to reason with him. I mean, you're not exactly going to pay $14.00 just to look at a bit of clay, are you. I mean, it's like, a constitutionally protected thing, that each person has the right to look at clay whenever they feel like, without a fee. Ah, he answers, but does the clay have the right to ogle back? Now there he's got ya stymied, because you're not exactly an expert on constitutional law. Now, in 1920 there was the claylump bill that stated SPECIFICALLY that claylumps Ain't Got nO rIGHTS but to dO wHAT tHEY'RE tOLD. Now that's the kind of thing you need to know to even PASS the damn const. law class, and anyone who aces it must be cheating, because they couldn't have written the answers on a bowl of strawberry sherbet, 'cuz it'd melt. Now the thing about strawberry sherbet is, it's soft and sqidgy. And the thing about a Holstein is, it's soft and squidgy. And the thing about a fish is, you can't write with one. And the thing about cows are, they go MOO. And the thing about Tri-Beak is, it's a figment of Rev. Canoe-Head's DERANGED IMaginATION! But the most important lesson we learn from this is, a Holstein and a bowl of strawberry sherbet are easily confused. Which suggests that you should maybe label them to keep from mixing them up. But what about a label? It's flat and papery, and has writing on it. What about a T-108 form? It's flat and papery, and has writing on it. So to keep from sending in a "strawberry sherbet" label to the Government, you should label them separately. On an ashtray, which is harder to mBLATTTake. ASHTRAY? WHAT ASHTRAY?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?.,.,.,.,.,.,.,., what do you do when this happens to you? tap your little badge thingy, and say I'm sleeping, and I can't wake up! "HAPPY" As Written By Preest Lloyd Taco Part One: Peace-Happy This is a simple guide on how to be happy. The way may sound stupid and insipid but it works. I know this is not the only way, but this is a nice way of being happy through "inner peace"... Inner peace is the essence of being balanced, and balanced people tend to be happy. Plus they make good MOOists, because they find it easier to not hold any viewpoints, which is the whole point of "MU". Right? Yeah, sure. Whatever. Inner Peace may sound stupid, but it makes you happy, plus it's the root of all those Martial Arts... If you can master this, you can master them. Stop using your energy to fight yourself, and turn it outward. Turn your opponent's energy against itself. But most important, with Inner Peace, you'll know when NOT to fight. But that's as maybe, it's still a frog. To begin with, being happy is as simple as it sounds or even simpler than you ever thought it could be; all you have to do is know yourself from inside out and not from outside in as you are normally made to see yourself by what we call "society". There's a simple way to do this, and although it takes a lot of time each day it's not an effort or a problem for most people, since the only thing that you have to do is SLEEP. Do it right every night for a few weeks, and you'll be fine. 1) SLEEP Oh, I'm not talking any normal sleep, where you toss and turn while your body gets its rest but your mind is still on overdrive because you're all stressed out about the things that you've stopped doing to get this precious moment of shut-eye. No, I'm talking the kind of sleep you'd like to have, without no problems anywhere in your life. So before doing this sleep thing (which is better than the conventional meditations, by the way), you pick a time when you don't have a lot to do, or else you make sure that you can put it out of your mind. MAKE TIME. But like, how do you sleep? I mean, using drugs is a little stupid, since the point is to know YOURSELF, right? Okay, so how to sleep peacefully? Well, you can use a simple method, and it's been known to us for ages, and although it's common knowledge no one does it anymore because we're too stressed out about something or other all the time. All you have to do is drink a cup of warm tea or hot chocolate or something, take a warm bath, relax, lBLATTTen to some pleasant peaceful music, and go to sleep. There are plenty of relaxation exercises you can use to sleep more pleasantly. Well, like you try this one: Start off by visualizing each colour of the rainbow in order (Red first, take time to visualize it fully, then orange, same thing, then yellow, green, blue, and violet) and finally fade out on violet into a kind of mBLATTT, then imagine yourself on top of a staircase with 23 steps (of course), and walk down, counting backwards on each one. At the bottom, there's a door, and you open that into some kind of open area. Walk through that until you come to a forest. Let it be any kind of forest the first time you do this, but all other times, make sure it's a nice open spacious forest. Walk down a path: the first time it can be any kind of path, but it should be a straight pleasant path all other times. Then you come to a forest pool or stream: the first time, it can be anything, but after that, it should be happy, whatever that means to you (shallow and bubbling, deep and calm, whatever). Then walk out of the forest, through the open space, to the door, up the stairs, counting forward, then finally through the rainbow the other way. When this is done, count backwards from some sufficiently high number so you'll get to sleep. Sleep is important in all life. Your dreams should end up telling you about yourself. It's important to be HAPPY with whatever comes out of your dreams, because that's WHO YOU ARE. In order to be happy, you just have to know yourself from the inside. So remember your dreams, and just BE happy about them. Then forget them. Do this for a week or two or until you feel happy enough. Repeat once any time you're not happy anymore. 2) Like, Meditation This isn't some meditation that you have to contort into wierd postures and breathe strangely for. You just lie flat on your back and don't think too hard. Breathe deeply enough to feel like there's oxygen and stuff like that going to your brain. Wash out the inside of your head with, like, white light or something. Or a fire hose or whatever works to clean out your thoughts. Don't fight them down, that'll just make more. Just let them bubble away until there's only one thought left in the conscious part of your head. That might take practice, but it's worth it for the Inner Peace bit. With that one thought, let it sit there for a while, then think of the first thing that comes into your head, and how it relates to that one thought. Then go back to the one thought, and repeat. And do this again and again until you're finished or you're out of time. This'll make you realize that everything is the center of all other things, and nothing is more special than any other. When you understand this, you'll be less hung up on the things that cause stress and all that, so you'll be happier. If you go really far, you'll see that although you ARE the center of all things, you are also only one center of many, and you'll be happy about it. 3) WHY? Why be happy through Inner Peace, instead of through lots of violent running around and blowing up police vans and stuff like that? Well, either way is happiness, but one is more peaceful, and peaceful happiness lasts through ANYTHING, as long as you have a core of peace. I'm happy all the time, even when I should be stressed out of my head. So then I can stay calm, and do better. Angry-happy lasts about as long as you have that exhilarating anger going, which is what keeps the Punk Movement going. Cuz pUNK aIN'T dEAD, iT jUST sMELLS tHAT wAY! But Inner Peace ain't the only way to be happy. You can do it your own way. Because MOO has no leader unless you want to be led like some people. So don't just take my word for it and ignore all the other ways just cause I don't use 'em. I'm just sayin' this so's you know. I thought you might be interested, okay, SOSUMI! Plus which, that little peaceful smile REALLY PISSES PEOPLE OFF when they don't understand it. Us enlightened people, we smile a lot. Not cuz enlightenment brings happiness... Oh my GOODNESS no, the world isn't nearly nice enough for that (HONEST!), but we figure out how to annoy everyone else: smile a lot, people will wonder what you're up to. Part Two: Anger-Happy Anger-Happy is easier to do than Peace-Happy, because of how our "Society" is set up, the FUCKING thing just keeps REPRESSING your FUCKING emotions, so they just FUCKING pour COW out onto the nearest target! SO YOU GET HAPPY! BECAUSE YOU'RE NOT ANGRY ANY MORE!!! Like, see The Wall... Maaannnnnnn... Anger! FRUSTRATION! BANG! BANG! KILL!! DEATH! DEATH! ARGH FUCK COW KILL! But after it's all done, you feel like, happy, right? It's a FUN MOOvie, it's FUCKING HILLARIOUS... Because after setting up all that violent emotion, it just kinda says "Ah, fuck this" and leaves. It's really funny that way, you get happy. Anger-Happy is easy to get, because it's just NOT BEING ANGRY rather than actual happiness. So whenever you're tense or annoyed or just generally pissed off at something, JUST SAY QUACK! Just take that big stick and HIT SOMETHING with it. And bang, you're happy. TAKE THAT AXE AND... Oh, but forget I said that. "BOREDOM" Things To Do When You're Bored #68 1) Warning: The Surgeon General has determined that cigarettes may be harmful to your health, especially if you smoke them. 2) Warning: The Surgeon General has determined that ziggurats may be harmful to your health, particularly if dropped on you from several hundred feet in the air. 3) Warning: The Surgeon General has determined that sticking forks in your eyes with electric sockets attached may cause birth defects in pregnant women (not that you're likely to give birth to a pregnant woman) 4) Warning: The Surgeon General has determined that death may be harmful to your health. 5) Warning: The Surgeon General has determined that excessive readings of false Surgeon General's Warnings may cause excessive death in dead people, and eye strain in blind ones. 6) Warning: The Surgeon Admiral has determined that being demoted, though not harmful to your health, is a real pain. 7) Warning: The Sturgeon Admiral has determined that excessively bad fish jokes can be harmful to the health of the person telling them. 8) Warming: The Sturgeon Admiral has determined that being fried in a pan with butter, or maybe margarine, can be harmful to the health of fish. 9) Warming: The Sturgeon Admiral is determined to quit smoking, but what with all the stress lately, he just hasn't gotten around to it yet. 10) Warming: The Sturgeon Admiral is determined that all these foolish jokes about him stop immediately. 11) Warming: The trend towards a higher temperature, greater heat, or warmth. Boil, toast, grill, fry, saute, heat. See also, Stupid Fish Jokes. 12) Warming: The Sturgeon Admiral's tendency to become extremely hot, and also quite angered and annoyed, when people make silly lists of fish jokes, false Surgeon General Warnings, or otherwise make fools of themselves, and a fish out of doctors. MOO OMM APPENDIX I APPLICATION FOR MEMBERSHIP (Fill out 42 copies) 1.Name: Holy Name: 2.Address: 3.Telephone Number: 4.Hat Size: 5.Diameter Of Last Apple Eaten: 6.Purpose of Application: [ ] Membership as MOOist Acolyte (use this for your first application) [ ] Membership in the Outer Circle of MOO (Acolytes can apply here) [ ] Membership in the Inner Circle of MOO (Outer Circle MOOists can apply here) [ ] Promotion to the Elite High Council of MOO (Inner Circle MOOists can apply here) [ ] Membership in the Erisian Liberation Front [ ] Membership in the Generic Church Of Jonah Cheung [ ] Employment application for McDonalds [ ] All of the above [ ] None of the above [ ] Other (be vague!): 7. Age: [ ] cubic meters 8. Height: [ ] fluid oz. 9. Eyes: [ ] 2 [ ] Other 10. Art thou a cabbage? Reason: 11. Date of last shower [yy/mm/dd] [__/__/__] Reason: 12. Do you beleive that King Kong died for your sins? [ ] Yes [ ] No [ ] Maybe [ ] Yes and No [ ] Yes and Maybe [ ] No and Maybe [ ] Yes No and Maybe [ ] All Of The Above [ ] None Of The Above [ ] Can't Decide [ ] Don't Want To Answer [ ] Other Reason: 13.Would you rather: [ ] Eat slugs [ ] Live in a wormhole [ ] Chew on your toenails [ ] Masturbate [ ] Play hide and go seek [ ] Run into walls with forks in your eyes Why? 14.Describe the hat of the High Preest: [ ] Fuzzy [ ] Scuzzy [ ] Leathery [ ] Feathery [ ] Heathery [ ] Silly [ ] Wormhole Hat [ ] Worn On Head [ ] Flowery [ ] Bowery [ ] Glowery [ ] All Of The Above [ ] Most Of The Above [ ] Some Of The Above [ ] None Of The Above [ ] Other 15. Lick this spot: o It is highly unlikely you will be lucky enough to recieve the proper reward. 16. Mail one copy of this form to The Church of MOO, at: P.O. Box 26038, 72 Robertson Rd., Nepean ON, Canada, K2H-9Y8. 17. Or post your answers to this questionaire in the MOO echo addressed to the Church of MOO. 18. Tape one copy to your fridge or toilet. 19. Burn one copy. 20. Eat the last copy of this form. APPENDIX II CARE AND FEEDING OF MOOFESTS Part One: When and Where MOOfests may be held at any prearranged time, anywhere in the world, as long as some MOOists, and the highest ranking MOOist in the immediate vicinity have been mentioned, invited, consulted, noticed, ignored, or otherwise been on the receiving end of a verb. In the Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, Earth branch of the religion, MOOfests are traditionally held in Dunn's Deli, where Floyd for the first time blew up the ashtray (what ashtray?) of the Grate Prophet when Halfy stubbed out his cigarrette in a pile of gunpowder. However, anyone anywhere who belongs to MOOism may suggest a time for a MOOfest, as long as an Inner CirclBLATTT or higher has granted some kind of consent, or something vaguely similar, or been aware of it, or passed near that general area within the last little while. Part Two: The MOO-Belt After purchasing a map and examining the locations for MOOfests, Floyd made an absolutely astonishing discovery. All the really important spots from MOOfests and MOOist rituals were in a straight line, never off it by more than a maximum of a few hundred meters, usually much less. The line is the line that connects the Ruin with Dunn's Deli. You can locate the line on a map quite easily, if you know where the Ruin and Dunn's are. If you don't, well, what kind of a MOOist do you think you are, anyway? Other spots on this line are Central Park, the west tip of Vincent Massey Park, Kirsten Salmon's house, and the home-base of the Nomic Club. Part Three: DATES, TIMES, AND LOCATIONS OF PREVIOUS MOOFESTS 1991 0 March 20th censored 00:00-24:00 PsychoFest 0 I March 25th Bytowne Cinema 21:00-2:30 PsychoFest 1a II March 30th Dunn's Deli 19:00-2:00 PsychoFest 1b III April 6th Floyd Gecko's 19:00-1:00 Python Fest IV April 8th Ralph's 19:00-24:00 East End B&B V June 22nd Dunn's Deli etc. 15:00-23:00 Psycho-Fest 2 V« COW 5th 5 COW St. COW:00-COW:30 COWFest 5 VI August 17th The Ruin 20:00-23:30 Rained-on-Fest1 VII November 2nd Dunn's Deli etc. 14:00-1:00 InsanityFest 2.6 IIX December 19 Bytowne & Dunn's 19:00-23:00 RockyFest Q 1/2 1992 I January 4th Mayfair Cinema 19:00-00:00 MOOvies Fest A II February 22 Mayfair Cinema 19:00-00:00 MOOvies Fest Z III March 21st Dunn's Deli 3:11:17.76 Preach Fest 0.6 APPENDIX III Payroll of MOOists Total Income to Date: must be a lot by now Expenses for MOOist activities: most Total income divided amongst MOOists: a bunch % of income still to be divided out: whatever in't being embezeled Grate Prophet of MOO: receives 50% of the profit uses: anything he damn well pleases High Preest of MOO: receives 25% of the profit uses: rubber chickens, replacement ashtrays, Monty Python movie rentals, other stuff, and miscellaneous MOOfest expenditures Elite Upper Councilors: each receive 25% of the profit uses: Printing the Great Book of MOO, Intoxicants Everyone else: Nada, Nil, Zip, Nothing (unless they do something special) Income gathering schemes: 1. Wander around and ask for money for the Church of MOO results to date: None 2. Call around and ask for money for the Church of MOO results to date: None 3. Hit people over the head, eat them, and take their money results to date: broken nose 4. Dress in silly clothes, strum a chicken, sing a pathetic song, and stand in front of a hat in the Byward Market. results to date: odd looks, embarassment, fun, but no money 5. Ask MOOists, and perhaps others to contribute to an entertainment fund for MOOism. Such as collections for hydrogen for Major Ritual number five. results to date: none Suggestions: Making MOOism a legal religion in Canada. Becoming a non-profit organisation. APPENDIX IV The Gospel According To Yari as written by Saint Yari 1) MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 2) MOOing makes you feel good... Why don't you try it? 3) Once upon a time, a long time ago, the world was but a vast tundra where penguins flourished. But then the god of MOO used the sacred MOO powers. The world exploded into tiny little bits. One of these bits was round, so they named it Earth. People crawled out of the sea to see what had happened. Then they grew legs and learned to talk. But before this the god of MOO made cows. They were cool. Cows made the noise MOO that is a secret worship to the god of MOO. People made their own language, but today in a last attempt to get more MOO worshippers, the god of MOO enlightened a select few people. These cool people would enlighten others. These people are the Apostles of the Church of MOO. gnu gnomic rules Appendix V As Written By Severely Many People Indeed Main Subdivisions Of MOO Part One: TEMPLE OF THE PRIMORDIAL PENGUIN Part Two: QUACK/IRRELEVANCE Part Three: OINK Part Four: DISCORDIANBLATT Part Five: SALAD FIRST CANCOWTO By The Upper DingCOWbat Templar Floyd Gecko (First Temple) INTRODUCTION Know, O ye who read this book that this is the Great Book Of The Holy Temple Of The Primordial Penguin, and is the most wholly perfect work of the knowledge of the spirit since the Great Book Of MOO. Know, O ye who read this book, that it holds the secrets of creation, the reason of the universe, and the truth about hBLATTTory. Know, O ye who read this book that within its pages there are held many secrets which you, O humble reader, are priviledged to know. Know, O ye who read this book that you enter now into the knowledge of the Templars of the Penguin, the greatest of whom is the unknowing Grate Profit. Know, O ye who read this book that you now are about to learn of the supreme silliness of all things, and of the purpose behind why we are here. BOOK ONE Understand now, O humble reader, that the beginning of the world was as a Game, and in the beginning was the Game, and the Game was Nomic. Know that the Nomic created through itself in its great dreamings a Cow and a Penguin. And these were the first occupants of the world, and they played the game. Understand now, O humble reader, that this Cow was the Great MOO, and this Penguin was the Primordial Penguin, whose name it is not permitted to be known, even unto himself. And this was the first being created by another to play the game, and he created the world. Understand now, O humble reader, that as the word was made, so was made the world, and that as the Game was forged from the nothingness, so was made the word, and that as the players of the Game forged the game, so the Game was forged, and that as the Game created the players, so were the players made. Understand now, O humble reader, that the players of the game lived in their world upon a huge tundra, and that the Tundra was the world. Upon this Tundra flourished great Penguins, noble of spirit, untroubled of mind, and loud of honk. Understand now, O humble reader, that these were the very Penguins saved by the Primordial Penguin when the Great MOO destroyed the Tundra. The Primordial Penguin played the Game, the Holy Nomic, against the end of the world, and yet it came. Understand now, O humble reader, that it was by this great destruction of the Tundra that was made our world, and all others that are. Understand now, O humble reader, that the Primordial Penguin himself, who reascued many Penguins, noble, untroubled, and loud as they were, and who made for them companions from the very Tundra itself, this same Penguin was not given to house them our world. Understand now, O humble reader, that when the Primordial Penguin created his Penguin sons and daughters as companions for those who were noble, untroubled and loud, that he created one known as Jehovah, or Allah, or Yaweh. Understand now, O humble reader, that this Penguin, often mBLATTTaken by the uninformed of the past for a God, lives even unto this day in Antarctica. Understand now, O humble reader, that as the Penguins were scattered like ashes to the breeze onto the worlds of here and there, that the Primordial Penguin kept playing the Game, and wove through his cunning, into the fabric of the Game itself, these other souls who had once been Tundra. Understand now, O humble reader, that as worship to the noble efforts of the Primordial Penguin, through whom we became a part of the world, and a part of the Game which shapes our world, we play games, and The Game, the Game of Nomic. Understand now, O humble reader, that the Upper Dingbat to The Primordial Penguin, who, though not a great Templar in rank, was the first to play this game as worship to the Primordial Penguin, and the first to discover the Penguin. Understand now, O humble reader, that though this Upper Dingbat Templar may be no Grate Profit, and may be no Hi, Priest!, he is nevertheless the first of the Templars to the Penguin, and he is the great Finder Of The Will Of The Primordial Penguin. Understand now, O humble reader, that though you must be a follower of the Hi, Priest! if you are a Templar, it is to the Upper Dingbat to whom you may turn to hear the Will Of The Penguin. Understand now, O humble reader, that it is the Will Of The Penguin that the Upper Dingbat be low in the rank of His Temple, but that he be knowledgeable in the Way Of The Game. Understand now, O humble reader, that the Way Of The Game is the Way Of The World, for the World is the Game, and the Game is more than the World. Understand now, O humble reader, that it is the Upper Dingbat of the First Temple, whose Holy Name is Floyd Gecko, who relates the Great Book Of The Holy Temple Of The Primordial Penguin, and who tells you now of the Wills Of The Penguin. BOOK TWO In the Temple Of The Primordial Penguin, there are many ranks, and many complexities, because this is the Way Of The Game. You should know that while the Templars of the Penguin are accepted by the Holy Church Of The Great MOO, and indeed, the Upper Dingbat is a rank given to the High Preest of MOO, that no MOOist may ascend higher than the Grand Poobah, who, in this the First Temple, is Half-Mad, the Great Prophet of MOO. But it is true that the Great Prophet of MOO is in commune with the Great MOO, and that the Primordial Penguin is not a Game Ally of the Great MOO. Thus, while the Grand Poobah sets the rules of the Temple, he is not in commune with the Penguin. The Upper Dingbat, namely myself, is in commune with the Penguin, but not with the Great MOO. However, the Great MOO and the Penguin are, like all players of the Game, friendly, and will speak to any other player, even those as low on the ladder as ourselves. Even the Great MOO will speak to you or I if She feels. But, as with the Penguin, She keeps Her messages to her spokesperson on Earth, and elsewhere. The Penguin, playing the Game, has no set spokesperson. In this, the First Temple, it is the Upper Dingbat who speaks for the Penguin, but in the Second Temple, the prediction goes, it shall be the Grand Poobah, whose Holy Name it is predicted shall be Peng-Peng. Here is the lBLATTT of the first ten Temples, and their times of exBLATTTence, as well as the spokesperson for the Penguin. This prediction is accurate to within five percentage points nine times out of ten. First Temple: 135565 to 135657 DPP Spokesperson: Upper Dingbat Floyd Gecko Second Temple: 135657 to 135741 Spokesperson: Grand Poobah Peng-Peng Third Temple: 135741 to 135838 Spokesperson: Inferior Bonk Joh Malakai Fourth Temple: 135838 to 135843 Spokesperson: Hi, Priest! Lilith Velkor Fifth Temple: 135843 to 135931 Spokesperson: Grate Profit Unknowing Dimwit Sixth Temple: 135941 to 136118 Spokesperson: Elite Upper Councilor Selkie Seventh Temple: 136118 to 136209 Spokesperson: Lower Dingbat Merkin Muffley Eighth Temple: 136209 to 136283 Spokesperson: Lesser Poobah Balthazar Ferigno Ninth Temple: 134683 to 136379 Spokesperson: Superior Bonk Bubba Hurdmeister Tenth Temple: 136379 to 136501 Spokesperson: Upper Dingbat Lloyd Taco Now it is important for you to understand the Penguin Date, or Penguin Calendar. A year DPP (Date Of The Primordial Penguin) is measured from the time the Penguin first created this calendar in The Game. This occurred in what is commonly called 14807 BC in the Heathen Calendar. Since then, time has been marked off into sections of 6,709.5 years. This is the sacred number of the Penguin. This period is called a CYCLE. It is divided into nine ERAS, which are divided into nine SEASONS, which are of roughly 83 years in length. The CYCLES, SEASONS, and ERAS are given names, which are shown below: 00001st: Chaos 00002nd: Discord 00003rd: Revelation 00004th: Confusion 00005th: Irritation 00006th: Worry 00007th: Anger 00008th: Fear 00009th: Bliss These are the most prominent influence at work on hBLATTTory at the time. Thus, to compare to the Heathen Calendar, based on the birth of ChrBLATTT; the year of the beginning of the First Temple took place in the First Period of hBLATTTory, in Revelation, Irritation, Irritation (shortened to 1: Rev.Irr.Irr. or just 1355) in the 65th year (thus 135565 DPP), which compared to 1991, the year given in the Heathen Calendar. Clearly, the Calendar of the Penguin is far more accurate in its description not only of WHEN the year is, but also WHAT the year is like. At the time of transition from one CYCLE, SEASON, or ERA to another, festivities are held. However, since this does not always occur on a particular day (the ERAS not being exactly 83 years long), this festive occasion is not marked in the lBLATTT of sacred days below. Thus, we have no "New Year". The GNU Year happens once every 82 5/6 years. So we mark which "year" of the season we are in from each vernal equinox. The Penguin Calendar has relatively little to do with astronomical stuff, and so there is no leap-day, years are exactly 365 days, and so on. If it diverges from the REAL calendar, tough shit. It's meant to be used in space as well as on Earth. Anyway: There are 5 concurrent cycles of different lengths. One is the base unit of all of them, being the 5-day Erisian week. The others are all multiples of this: 5 Days: "Short Week" 115 Days: "Little Year" 365 Days: "Earth Year" 495 Days: "Long Year" 831105 Days: "Long Week" The Long Week is the harmonic cycle of the three kinds of Year, and represents the cycle in which their various dates coincide: at the same point in each Long Week, the dates of each kind of year are the same. It is therefore 2277 Earth Years long, 7227 Little Years long, and 1679 Long Years long. The Little Year has weekdays named for Erisian weekdays: Sweetmorn, Boomtime, Pungenday, Prickle-Prickle, and Setting-Orange. The Earth Year has Gregorian Weekdays: Sunday, Wednesday, Friday, Monday, Saturday, Thursday, and Saturday. The Long Year has Penguin weekdays: Chaos, Discord, Revelation, Confusion, Irritation, Worry, Anger, Fear, and Bliss. The Little Year has 5 months, also named for Erisian Weekdays, only in the opposite order, of 23 days each, numbered normally. The Earth Year has 13 months of 28 days each, except February, which has 29. They have normal Gregorian names, except Bung, which goes between June and July. The Long Year has 11 months of 45 days each. These days aren't numbered, but have a penguin-weekday hyphenated with the number of that weekday in the month. The months have these names (in order, this time): Fred, Ethel, Bung, Julian-Mymosh, Wombat, Rising-Podge, Boomthyme, Primethyme, Harry, Trudy, and Leslie. As stated before, these years form long cycles. The longest is also CALLED the Cycle, and is 6709.5 years long (there are therefore three kinds of Cycle, and of each other cycle, named for the kind of year that makes it up), this consBLATTTs of 9 Eras of 745.5 years length, each of which is named for a Penguin weekday (the Eras, not the years), and each consBLATTT of 9 Seasons, also named for penguin weekdays, of 82 5/6 years length. So anyway, that about sums up the three dating systems except to note that the Long Week also forms the Godly Years, but this hardly matters, as the first Little Year in Godly years hasn't even passed yet, though I suppose you could keep going up and up to longer and longer cycles, but that'll only be worth BOTHERING when 23 Long Weeks are up (in a little over 245000 years) and we have to start fiddling around with GNU dating systems or something, or maybe adding a digit to the front of the year number. Not that we'll still be using that calendar by then... But I'll think of something when it happens. Now, it is important for you to know the RANKS of the Temple of the Primordial Penguin... 00001) Great Profit Similar to Grate Prophet of MOO, but it is always one of the Lamed Wufniks (Lamm-ED WUFF-nicks) who are, in Jewish mythology, thirty six good people for whom Jehovah keeps the Earth in exBLATTTence. Of course, this is slightly inaccurate, since Jehovah is only a son of the Primordial Penguin, and Eris is actually playing with the Earth just at the moment, but the idea is correct. However, since the Lamed Wufniks may never KNOW that they are Lamed Wufniks, and if one ever finds out, he dies immediately and is replaced by someone else, the same is true of the Grate Profit of the Temple Of The Primordial Penguin. This post may not be held by a high ranking MOOist. 00002) Hi, Priest! Basically the same as the High Preest of MOO. AdminBLATTTers the ceremonies and rituals, and generally looks after things. This post may not be held by a high ranking MOOist. 00003) Elite Upper Council ConsBLATTTs of three members who do absolutely nothing, but get impressive titles. They can also tell people what to do. The people are not required to obey, but at least these people get to be bossy without being complained about. These posts may not be held by high ranking MOOists. 00004) Extreme and Moderate Foolish One Two ranks of people added in strictly for being foolish and to outrank everyone below them. They must wield authority like dictators, telling everyone what to do and how to do it, but must contradict each other, making sure that everyone ends up doing what they were going to do anyways. One must be a political extremBLATTT, the other a moderate. They get to bop people with large sticks if they think they can get away with it. These posts may not be held by high ranking MOOists, or anyone named Rosencrantz or Guildenstern. 00005) Superior Bonk and Inferior Bonk These are the members who attend to handing out punishments. The Inferior Bonk is superior to the Superior Bonk (obviously) and is in charge mostly of making up GNU punishments and deciding who gets which ones. Obviously the punishments aren't too severe, because the Primordial Penguin Whose Name May Not Be Spoken would disapprove. Punishments are generally in the form of Game Penalties in Nomic, since everyone plays the game. Even not being allowed to play is considered a Game Penalty. They take the position of Co-Director in the game of Nomic held by the Temple. These posts may not be held by high ranking MOOists. 00006) Grand Poobah and Lesser Poobah The next two highest echelons. They are in control of setting out holidays, supervising the funds of the Temple, and making the supplications to the Primordial Penguin on behalf of the members of the Temple. They are required to play the game of Nomic, in some form, or alternatively, the games Calvinball or Mao, which are basically the same. 00007) Upper and Lower Dingbats The position of the Upper Dingbat is an honourary position given to the High Preest of MOO. He or she acts as a liaision between the Church Of The Great MOO and the Temple of the Primordial Penguin. The Upper Dingbat is required to act silly at all official functions, and it is suggested that he also play the game of Nomic. The Lower Dingbat is a similar position, but it is subordinate to the Upper Dingbat, and may, if the Grand or Lesser Poobah decides, be given as an honourary title to any other high ranking MOOist. If not, it is given to any dBLATTTinguished member of the Temple of the Primordial Penguin. 00008) Inner CirclBLATTT Same as MOOism. 00009) Preest Not as high as the Hi, Priest!, they spread the work to the ones not enlightened by the Penguin. They also teach the words of the Primordial Penguin as they come from the Spokesperson. 00010) Outer CirclBLATTT Same as MOOism. 00011) Acolyte Same as MOOism. 00012) Saints Non-exBLATTTent, except in cases where the Hi, Priest! deems it necessary to honour some highly dBLATTTinguished visionary who is clearly a chosen Prophet of the Penguin or his son Jehovah. ChrBLATTTian, Jewish, or Moslem saints may be selected if the Hi, Priest! thinks they really, really, really deserve it. 00013) Perrennial Heretic Exactly the same as the equivalent rank in MOOism. 00014) Evil One There is no Evil One. It's all a lie, I tell you. IF IT AIN'T RANTED, IT AINT TRUE BOOK THREE Part One: Sacred Days These are the days set aside by the Penguin's Templars to celebrate various things. January 1: The Nu-Yer. Those Templars who drink use this day to out and get drunk. Those who don't use it to have a good time. Official Name: Nu-Yer Day February 14: Set aside for throwing water at walls and making shapes out of the ice that forms. Also for being nice to one another. Official Name: Ice Day February 30: The birthday of the Perrennial Heretic, I Yemen-Oying. Set aside for making fun of people. On those years when this day does not occur, Templars make fun of people all year round. Official Name: Dum Day March 4: A day for affirmative action. Slogan for the day is "MARCH FOURTH AND DO SOMETHING!" Official Name: March 4th April 1: The birthday of the First Temple's Spokesperson, Floyd Gecko. Set aside for practical jokes and generally playing Nomic-oid games. Official Name: Upra-Foo Day April 7: Floyd Gecko's other birthday. Not particularly sacred. This day and the evening before are sacred to silliness and Monty Python. Official Name: Szilli Day April 13: Floyd Gecko's third birthday, to compensate for the first two. Generally considered to be an unlucky day, because it makes up the average of the other two. A day for sitting inside being afraid. Official Name: Cower Inside Day June 7: A day of celebration of the spirit of doing strange things. Participate in as many major MOOist and Templar rituals as possible. Official Name: Goof Day August 10: The day of returning home, and of saying "hi" to those you know. A day to look around your home and laughing at it if it's funny, or not laughing at it if it isn't. Official Name: Home Day September 13: First day of the Nomic season. Although the Templar Game continues all year, this is the first year of the season, and is marked by great festivities of strange rituals and activities. Official Name: Noe-Mick Day October 31: A day of wearing peculiar costumes and rushing about from house to house making the noises of the Penguin and those religions associated with it. Also a GNU Year. Official Name: Hollow Evening November 12: A day set aside for those who have no nose. Silent prayer to the Penguin to give these people back their noses is in order on this day for all Templars. Official Name: No-Nose Day December 31: Blends in with January 1, and the festivities carry from one to the other. Official Name: Nu-Yer Evening Part Two: Sacred People While it is not the part of this Upper Dingbat to name the saints, since that it the job of the Hi, Priest!, but this Upper Dingbat can state some of the important people not lBLATTTed as saints of MOO, or in any of the Author's lBLATTTs... These people are to be known not as saints or devine individuals, but rather as those of the times of this Book. 00001) The Perrennial Heretic, I Yemen-Oying A decidedly unsaintly person, the Perrennial Heretic is a fixture in the Templar speech... He is not actively despised, or even disliked, but he always insults us to keep us on our toes. During the foundation of the First Temple, he will, according to the prediction, finally join the Holy Church of The Great MOO some time just before Noe-Mick day of 135575. However, this is one of those predictions which is variably accurate. In taking part in the rituals of MOO and the Penguin, while refusing to join, he represents incarnate hypocrisy, and is an extension of one of the beings created by the Goddess Aneris, as described in the Book Of MOO. While not a deity, he is related to one somehow, and should be taunted occasionally. 00002) The Holy Pedant, Jonathan Tracy While this person has no Holy Name, he is nevertheless one of the first members of the Game of Nomic held which included a Templar. His invented rules were of interest, but involved the continual theme of The Committee. The The Holy Pedant's constant attempts to turn the Holy Nomic into a Bureaucracy, he represents the forces of order and AnerBLATT in the universe, as described in the Book Of MOO. Though Templars of the Penguin don't necessarily follow this idea, it is a valid comparison. The Holy Pedant is clearly the incarnate form of one of the extendend beings created by the Goddess Aneris, "neice" of the Primordial Penguin. While he is not a deity, he should be treated with respect. 00003) The Great Know-It All, Midget Jim At the time of this writing, Midget Jim, also a member of the Nomic Game, is not a Templar or a MOOist, but he is a supplier of ideas and knowledge of things both stupid and useless. Nevertheless he is a valid being to know and to admire for his bizzarre, yet strangely ordered way of thinking, which produced much of the thought behind the Book of MOO and of the Penguin. In being so thoughtful and Know-It-All, he is clearly an extension in this world made by a being created from the Tundra itself, perhaps by the Primordial Penguin himself. If he is indeed a Penguin, as was ChrBLATTT, we shall perhaps never know. Part Three: Sacred Ceremonies There are two ceremonies which celebrate in the spirit of The Game of the universe, and they are two Games, of which any member may play any variant as worship of the Penguin. The first Game is Nomic. Nomic is explained in the Book Of MOO, but the general idea is that you start with a small set of rules which allow you to change the rules, and then change everything as you go along. The Game then becomes whatever you want it to be. In The Game, this is very much the case, and the so-called "Souls" which were formed by the explosion of the Tundra get votes of different kinds, on different kinds of rules, depending on their levels. Higher level Souls get to vote on deeper-base rules. But that's not important. The second Game is Calvinball. In this game, you get as much sports equipment as you can find and make up the rules as you go along, according to no particular pattern. The object is to have fun. This is also like The Game, in that It has become so hard to understand that it looks like it's completely random. Things simply seem to happen, and nobody at our level is even aware of the votes they make on the rules. The rules just happen. BOOK FOUR APPLICATION FOR ENTRANCE INTO THE TEMPLE Write the answers to these questions on a separate peice of paper, or birch-bark. Or, for that matter, sheet metal. Or even, dare I suggest it, the back of your hand. Have them tattooed into your forehead. Or skywrite them and film it, transpose the film to computer, and print out thousands of frames. Spraypaint your answers in good essay form on the sides of walls (remember to give your name and address for quick acceptance). If all of this fails, you must have something wrong with you. What is your name? What is your Holy Name? What is your quest? What is your favourite colour? Why? How many Penguins does it take to screw in a lightbulb? How many Penguins can dance on the point of a pin? Who invented the printing press? What is the capital of Abyssinia? How old are you? How many noses do you have? [None/Some] Which would you rather do: (a) Be a Penguin (b) Eat a Penguin (c) Shoot a Penguin (d) Stand on a Penguin (e) Give CPR to a Penguin (f) Put a Penguin up your shirt (g) Put a Penguin down your pants What sound does a Penguin make? Who invented the first Penguin? What is your favourite Meatball Flavour? What is your spaghetti-tossing record? What is your sleeve length? How old was the last Penguin you played tennis with? Did you win? Make three copies of this application. Send one to Temple Of The Penguin, C/O Floyd Gecko at P.O. Box 26038, Neapan, Ontario, Canada, K2H 9Y8, and keep the other two in case a Penguin asks you for one sometime. SECOND CANTO By Grand Poobah Peng-Peng (Second Temple) Chapter 00001 (Book Of The Time Warp) 00001: And it one day came to pass that there was a great wormhole that did manifest in both time and in space, and it did at once swirl and move through the world. 00002: And it was witnessed by the Grand Poobah Peng-Peng, myself, whose mind was then focused on other things. 00003: And indeed I was carried wide and far in time and space until I reached this land, an Island called Patmos, and did rest there for many days, continuing my writings. 00004: And indeed were my writings on the works of MOO many and multitudinous. 00005: And so it came to pass that I wrote, knowing that I would gather these writings when I returned to my own time, and I would add them to the works of MOO and of the Penguin. 00006: But as I worked, I began to see in my handy-dandy copy of the Book of MOO the things which I wrote, and truly was it wierd. 00007: And then I knew that my works and my knowledge were spread across space and time, and truly was I confused. 00008: And as I walked across the island, seeking truth in this matter, I met a man. 00009: And the man, who said his name was John, asked me what I was doing here, and I told him. 00010: And he asked me about the future, but I knew little of what was to come, and so I told him that. 00011: And in exchange for knowledge, he did offer me a curious food, of which I partook. 00012: And truly did he swipe my annoying mind drug while I labored under the influence of his mushrooms. 00013: And when I awoke, I found that many pages from the Book Of Floyd were missing from my hardcopy. 00014: And truly was I pissed, for book 666 was my favourite book of Floyd. 00015: And I knew that this man, John, was to take credit for the work of Floyd, and I was enraged. 00016: But before I could seek him out, there was a wailing in the air, and I heard a movement, and truly was there yet another time warp. 00017: For as it is written, the forces at work behind my fate had said unto each other these words: 00018: "Let's do the Time Warp again." 00019: And they had. 00020: So it was that when I returned there was a great confusion about the book of Floyd, chapter 666, for John, not wishing those of the future to use that number and write it, had tried to make it an evil one. 00021: For though you may not believe it, it had once been a lucky number to all. 00022: And so I wrote these words to send back to those of the past that they might know that it was really all Floyd's revelation and not at all stolen from the works of John. 00023: And indeed was John's version heavily influenced by his many mushrooms, as I could tell. Chapter 00002. (Reincarnations) 00001: Ah dBLATTTinctly I remember, it was in the bleak October of the last year of my life in good old 135741. 00002: The leaves on the trees were brown and fallen, and cluttered up the ground underfoot, when I fell through that warp. 00003: After my many journeys, I came finally to rest in a place we now know as Atlantis. 00004: But in truth, I had doubts. For now that I knew of the true nature of time, I wondered about reincarnation. 00005: For everything that Floyd had taught me told me that it was true and that it happened, but I wondered at the tangled web that time had wrought for me. 00005«: COW 00006: And so before I set out to do anything, I began to meditate to find the truth about my previous lives. 00007: Well, I saw many things both wondrous and strange, and in time I began to sense a pattern, but I was no closer to my goals. 00008: I may tell of some of the things I saw, and others are too dreadful to relate. 00009: But OH, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to knit. 00010: For so it looked like to me, with a single path that led from place to place, tangling in and amongst itself. 00011: Or perhaps it was many paths, mixed and matched. I could hardly tell for all the clutter. 00012: After a while of poking around in and out of time and space, my mind finally settled on a perspective, and I finally saw. 00013: The chain of reincarnations stretched around and around, but I finally untangled it with skill, faith, and a special unknotting-type tool which I picked up at a hardware store. 00014: And I soon saw that it was shaped yea verily unto the shape of a Moebius Strip, and it continued forever, with only one side, when most have two. 00015: And finally I understood the meaning of "Maximum Membership One Half"... 00016: For I was Half-Mad before, and I shall be Half-Mad again. 00017: But that one little twist partway down the chain that links all Grate Prophets into one makes it less than one. 00018: And the Moebius Strip itself is the Grate MOO. 00019: Or so I suspected, at any rate, until Malaclypse The Elder showed up and turned me around in my thoughts. 00020: But Malaclypse is a story unto himself. 00021: But as it turns out, most people have far more complicated chains than that. 00022: Many tangle with themselves, are their own mother, father, brother, sister, husband, wife, son and daughter, or things far stranger than that. 00023: And as for Floyd, I'd rather not even think about it. Chapter 00003. (The Book Of Malaclypse) 00001: It was one day long ago, before the beginning of the last of the great feuds between the Illustrious Zoombart the Fifth and V the Obscure. 00002: The two of them were standing in the desert holding chickens and preparing to do battle against one another. 00003: And it came to pass that a great light came over everything, and V and Zoombart both fell down. 00004: And so came unto us Malaclypse the Elder, who looked upon the apostles of MOO in this late day of the Houses and made a wierd face, sort of like that huge thing on top of the mountain of Woog near the fnord of Albatross. 00005: And I asked Malaclypse why he was so snarly today. 00006: And Malaclypse looked at me and said: 00007: Fnord. 00008: And I realized in that moment that Malaclypse was either a great prophet, or else a fool. 00009: Then Malaclypse proved to me that he was a fool, by saying it again, in a louder voice, causing V and Zoombart to vanish from sight. 00010: So Mal and I, we sat down and had this little conversation, see, and Mal gave me a strange mushroom to eat, for this was in the time before John The Divine did his theiving act, and I hadn't learned about those things yet. 00011: And Mal began to speak to me of many things, of shoes and ships, and sealing wax, and whether pigs have wings fnord. 00012: And then I saw the truth about the Moebius Strip. 00013: Only it doesn't really make much sense unless you've partaken of Mal's Mushrooms, which really help you to understand the truth of such spiritual matters. 00014: Plus they taste good. 00015: And we sat there talking for five days and five nights, and at the end of that time, we had concluded that Mal was a chicken, I was a lump of clay, and the world was made of green cheese, but the moon was not. 00016: So then Malaclypse left with his mushrooms, and there was a long time in which nothing much happened anywhere, only nobody much complained because Zoombart and V weren't having another feud, since Mal had stopped that. 00017: But when Mal returned, twenty-three years after, when I was gone again, he found that V and Zoombart were fighting over some obscure point of astrology, which is where V got his name, and Zoombart didn't. 00018: And Mal sighed, and gave the two some of his mushrooms, explaining to them that if they didn't smarten up, he'd have to explain the Theory of Relativity. 00019: Since they knew that Mal didn't know this theory, they made laughing noises, and smuggled Greece into the Falklands, for they too had partaken of Mal's mushrooms. 00020: But after Mal had departed, and I was no longer there, they continued their feud anyway. 00021: Which just goes to show that they needed me around. 00022: For they bickered all the time, like unto little children. 00023: But that's beside the point, which is that Mal has these keen mushrooms that he probably gave to John The Divine later on, being an arrogant pain in the lower lumbar region... Chapter 00004. (The Book Of Astrology) 00001: It is well known that there are many astrological signs. 00002: It is NOT so well known that there is an astrological COSINE. 00003: For unlike the SINES (or signs), the COSINE covers the whole of the year, doing as it will. 00004: And this cosine, which is called "Cottleston Pie", holds within it a total of 23 days. 00005: And the fixed days are these: 00006: January 1st, February 14, 29, 30 and 31, March 4th, April 1st, 7th, 13th, and 31st, June 7th and 31st, August 10th, September 13th and 31st, October 31st, November 12th and 31st, December 25th and 31st. 00007: And there are also wandering days of Cottleston Pie, for Cottleston Pie dislikes being tied down specifically. And the wandering days are these: 00008: The first wandering day is the first Frosty Friday in July. 00009: The second wandering day is the third tuesday following the second GNU moon after the last day of a month of Mondays. 00010: The third wandering day occurs once in a Blue Moon, and once in a Red Moon with Green Stripes And A Little Maroon Splotch. 00011: The fourth wandering day can be found in the middle of the Gobi Desert, where it wanders to this day (well, not THIS day, obviously, but you know what I mean). 00012: The fifth wandering day occurs on the fifth thursday of the fifth month of each year. 00013: Those born under the cosine of Cottleston Pie are well known to be leaders of GNU religions, or speakers of things that are not understood until many years later. 00014: Cottleston Pies are usually small, fat, short, and made of a thin, volatile liquid which supports dissolution of a gas which catalyses combustion. Either that or they like bagels. 00015: It is well known to those who study such things that setting fire to one born under the sign of Cottleston Pie, or nailing one to a tree, or tying one to a railroad track, is a popular passtime among those born under the '76 Pinto. 00016: But since the '76 Pinto is an astrological cosecant, it makes little difference anyway, since it's not possible to be born under a cosecant, particularly the asymptote. 00017: For truly, those born under the '76 Pinto are known to be pains in the asymptote anyway, so it's just as well. 00018: But as has been shown before, Cottleston Pies are poor food for any person who is not a Taurus AND a Pisces, since only a bull or a fish can consume them, and only they are free from being run over by the Pinto. 00019: If it should ever some to pass that a Cottleston Pie should ever be elected to office, then surely shall the day on which that happens give up its home on the calendar of MOO and wander around as the fifth thursday of the twenty-third month of each previous year. 00020: And so it was that when Malaclypse the Elder was born, and was subsequently elected Messiah of the Heathen ChrBLATTT peoples, the day on which that happened ceased to exist, and so February only holds its 29th day ever few years. 00021: And so those born on the 29th of February, when it falls on the fifth thursday in November, are also born under the cosecant of the '76 Pinto are. 00022: And indeed was this true of many a Cottleston Pie, for none of those in the early days kept much track of their birth. 00023: And so there is little point in recording more of this. Chapter 5. (Book Of The Houses) 00001: It will be said that there are 17 Houses of MOO, but this is a lie, perpetuated by the House of Confuse-ius and by the House of Zarathud. 00002: For they will be having about to be wished that many will think that this obsession they have with the number five is true. 00003: And they will think that many will say that 17 is eight plus nine, saying that eight is two to the third, and nine is three to the second, and OOH, AHH, each way it adds up to five. 00004: But this is nonsense. 00005: For in fact there are 23 Houses of MOO, so HAHAHAHAHA! 00006: For six were purged from the records. 00007: And the purgings were carried out most DAMNED effectively, by those who would see the Church of MOO dominate US, the Temple of the Primordial Penguin. 00008: For there was not only a purging of the House of "BOB". 00009: And not only were all records destroyed of the House Of Mymosh the Self-Begotten. 00010: But also was there destroyed those records pertaining to the actions and apostle of The House Of Ussher. 00011: For the Church Of MOO was beset by many internal conflicts. 00012: And many did wish to see the FALL of the House of Ussher. 00013: But then it was realized that this would make it impossible to watch MOOvies, the most truly sacred of all MOOist passtimes. 00014: For without Usshers, could we revel in the Killer Tomatoes? Could we boggle at AKIRA? Could we snarl with The Wall? 00015: Well, yes we could, but those who wish the FALL of that fair House were convinced otherwise, for only I, the one from the future, had heard of the VCR, which is a holy emblem. 00016: But that's not the point. 00017: For what is there to say but that there was also a purging of records of the House of Mirrors, the House of Horrors, and the House Of [CENSORED BY THE CHURCH OF MOO]? 00018: For indeed, these shall bring forth religions SO FUCKING WIERD even I, the reincarnation of the Grate Prophet HALF-MAD, shudder to think of it. 00019: For Mirrors was the one who inspired that saying about the BOOK, and he was the one who taught us how to Teach by Not Teaching, which was picked up by Lao-Tzu, my Apostle. 00020: And Horrors, she was the one who gave to us OUR EDGE! 00021: For without that edge, where would we be? 00022: And the Church of Horrors shall be truly great, and the sheer horror of it (for Horrors taught her student well) shall be enough to end all "organized government" as we know it. 00023: And as for the House of [CENSORED BY THE CHURCH OF MOO], it ΪΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΏ ³Here Ends The Great Book Of Temple Of The Primordial Penguin³ ΐΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΔΩ Confuse-Ius Sez: "Hoo-boy! What a hum-dinger that turned out to be. Well, from then on in, the Bowly Lurch of the Snate FOO went steadily downhill from there on in and afterwards from that. It just did a NOSEdive, I tell ya. Those Church of Gnu people sure gnu how to throw a party." -Book Of Things, Chapter 27, Verse 6 ΙΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝ» ²Ί * * * THE OH SO HOLY BOOK OF Ί ²Ί * *** Ί ²Ί * ***** ° ° ° °°°° ° ° ° Ί ²Ί * ****** ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° Ί ²Ί * ***** ° ° ° ° ° °°° ° Ί ²Ί * *** ° °° °°°°°°° ° ° ° ° Ί ²Ί * * °°° ° ° ° °°°° ° ° ° Ί ²Ί * * * * Ί ²Ί * Ί ²Ί Ί ²Ί V E R S I O N # 2 5 M A R 2 3 1 9 9 2 Ί ²ΘΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΌ ²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²²² Confuse-Ius Accident: "Oops! I deleted it." (Copies of the full Book of Quack may be obtained from Abacab at FidoNet 1:163/277) Confuse-Ing Inter-Rapture #13013 Area MOO, Msg#65362, 1355660401 23:23:23 From: The Antique Riced To: Half-Mad Subject: MOOists Are Weenies The Doctrine of OINK! Codicil to the Great Book of MOO! (c) 1991-92 - The_Antique_Riced @ FidoNet 1:163/266.666 The Concept: OINK is not a religion, cult, or group. It is a transcendental way of life. OINK is a statement of existentialBLATT without limitations. OINK does not conceptualize or justify actions which are deemed anti-social, for OINKBLATTTS do not comprehend the normative nature of society. The Doctrine of OINK does not impose regulations on individuals, for such impositions would be superfluous to the philosophy of OINK. Individuals who follow the guidelines of The Doctrine of OINK are indeed OINKBLATTTS, whereas those finding no sanctuary in the philosophy are not. OINKBLATTT wannabe's may never achieve the stature of OINKBLATTTS, for they are guided by ambition, a concept not recognized by The Doctrine of OINK. The Guidelines: 1) Procrastination is a fundamental element of OINK. There are more important things to be doing at the present time than concerning oneself with tasks that can be put off until a later date. Many tasks that are avoided will be performed by others in the interim, thus conserving the OINKBLATTT'S energy allowing for less-productive activities. 2) Beer is an integral part of the life style of the OINKBLATTT. The OINK beer of preference is Red Baron, since this is the only libation bottled with a label of a pig on it, however OINKBLATTTS will consume other beer as long as they haven't personally paid for it. OINKBLATTTS do apply certain rules of etiquette when consuming alcohol that they have not paid for. Such behaviour includes, but is not limited to sarcasm. 3) Attire is unimportant to the OINKBLATTT. Preferred garb includes grey sweat pants and mustard stained white T-shirts. Socks and under-garments have little place in the OINKBLATTT's wardrobe. 4) Internal organs are generally donated for transplant upon the death of an OINKBLATTT. Organs generally recommended include lungs and liver. The liver and lungs of the OINKBLATTT are well broken in due to long years of various substance abuse. Rejection is rarely a problem for the transplant recipient, however, after surgery the recipient generally has strong OINKBLATTT desires. It is not uncommon to find transplant recipients frequenting bordellos, crack houses, and booze camps following their surgery. 5) OINKBLATTTS, like most mammals, have strong desires to have sexual relationships with other mammals. If It Ain't Ranted, It Ain't True DISCORDIANBLATT As Written By DiscordianBLATTT Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst This is the Five Fingered Hand of Eris, the symbol of POEE (the Paratheo-anametamystikhood Of Eris Esoteric). It consBLATTTs of two opposing arrows converging to a single point, plus any crap you wanna shove on to make it look neat. Stuff From Principia Discordia From the Introduction: On the subject of personal encounters with other Discordians, and sometimes even the most careful among us cannot avoid them, keep in mind the lodge grips of our Disorder. Somewhere in the following pages you will learn how to perform the Turkey Curse. Among Zen BuddhBLATTTs, it is said, "when you meet another boddhavBLATTTa on the road, greet him with neither words nor silence." That leaves a vast selection of barnyard noises from which to choose. But as you crow like a rooser or QUACK like a duck or MOO like a cow, scrutinize your brother or sBLATTTer Discordian with alert interest, never cracking a smile, and see how she or he will respond. An oinking reply that is too loud indicates a swaggering bravado which falls far short of mature erBLATTTic enlightenment, but that is far better than a feeble and spiritless neigh. Some excerpts from an Interview with Malaclypse the Younger by THE GREATER METROPOLITAN YORBA LINDA HERALD-NEWS-SUN- TRIBUNE-JOURNAL-DISPATCH-POST AND SAN FRANCISCO DISCORDIAN SOCIETY CABAL BULLETIN AND INTERGALACTIC POPE POOP GP: Are you really serious, or what? M2: Sometimes I take humor seriously. Sometimes I take seriousness humorously. Either way it is irrelevant. GP: Maybe you are just crazy. M2: Indeed! But do not reject these teachings as false just because I am crazy. The reason that I am crazy is because they are true. GP: Is Eris true? M2: Everything is true. GP: Even false things? M2: Even false things are true. GP: How can that be? M2: I don't know man, I didn't do it. A Sermon On Ethics And Love One day, Malaclypse The Younger asked the messenger spirit Saint Gulik to approach the Goddess and request Her presence for some desperate advice. Shortly afterwards, the radio came on by itself, and an ethereal female voice said YES? "O! Eris! Blessed Mother Of Man! Queen Of Chaos! Daughter Of Discord! Concubine Of Confusion! O! Exquisite Lady, I beseech you to lift a heavy burden rom my heart!" WHAT BOTHERS YA, MAL? YOU DON'T SOUND WELL. "I am filled with fear and tormented with terrible visions of pain. Everywhere people are hurting one another, the planet is rampant with injustices, whole societies plunder groups of their own people, mothers imprison sons, children perish while brothers war, O woe!" WHAT'S THE MATTER WITH THAT, IF IT'S WHAT YOU WANT TO DO? "But nobody WANTS it! Everybody hates it." OH. WELL, THEN STOP. At which moment She turned herself into an aspirin commercial and left the Polyfather stranded alone with his species. ZARATHUD'S ENLIGHTENMENT Before he became a hermit, Zarathud was a young Priest, and took great delight in making fools of his opponents in front of his followers. One day Zarathud took his students to a pleasant pasture and there he confronted the Sacred Chao while She was contentedly grazing. "Tell me, you dumb beast," demanded the Priest in his commanding voice, "why don't you do something worthwhile? What is you Purpose In Life, anyway?" Munching tasty grass, The Sacred Chao replied "MU" (2) Upon hearing this, absolutely nobody was enlightened. Primarily because nobody could understand Chinese. (2) MU is the Chinese ideogram for NO-THING. THE EPBLATTTLE TO THE PARANOIDS 1: Ye have locked yerselves up in cages of fear -- and behold, do ye now complain that ye lack FREEDOM! 2: Ye have cast out yer brothers for devils and now complain ye, lamenting, that ye've been left to fight alone. 3: All Chaos was once yer kingdom; verily, held ye dominion over the entire Pentaverse, but today ye wax sore afraid in dark corners, nooks, and sink holes. 4: O how the darknesses do crowd up, one against the other, in yer hearts! What fear ye more than what ye have wroughten? 5: Verily, verily I say unto you, not all the Sinster MinBLATTTers of the Bavarian Illuminati, working together in multitudes, could so entwine the land with tribulation as have yer baseless warnings. The Book Of Salad And MORE 83-FBLATTTed Tales Of WOMBAT (2 for 1) ΙΝΝΝΛΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΛΝΝΝ» Ί o Ί This Plaque Is Dedicated To Ί o Ί ΜΝΝΝΌ The Best Salads ΘΝΝΝΉ Ί Ί Ί Russian Cabbage And Carrot Salad Ί Ί Canadian Iceberg-Lettuce And Tomato Salad Ί Ί Atlantean Beet And Mouse Salad Ί Ί Ί Ί "Every Time You Go Away, You Take A Peice Of Me With You" Ί Ί -Rear Window, Alfred Hitchcock Ί Ί Ί ΜΝΝΝ»saladsaladsaladsaladsaladsaladsaladsaladsaladsaladsaladΙΝΝΝΉ Ί o ΊsaladsaladsaladsaladsaladsalsasaladsaladsaladsaladsaladΊ o Ί ΘΝΝΝΚΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΚΝΝΝΌ SALAD RULES Our Leader: MOO TSE TUNG 5th Part .................... Truth ................ Story Teller 4th Part .................... Salad ................. Confuse-Ius 3rd Part .................... Death ................ MOO Tse Tung 2nd Part .................... Taxes ................... Ann Oying 1st Part .................... Logic ................ Ann O'Nymous Fifth Part: Truth Chapter Five: The Beginning In the beginning was there salad. And salsa. But the salsa was unimportant, and needn't concern us here. The salad was good. For in the salad there was cauliflower, the avatar of the cauliflower god, who brings good to everything. When the human race was young, they used cauliflower for everything. Upon cauliflower they slept, and of cauliflower they ate, and cauliflower they stuffed in their ears to avoid hearing things. Cauliflower was the center of their life, and cauliflower was the one true good of the world. But then there came the shadow of broccoli over the world, and many people began to sleep on straw, and eat the broccoli (which they couldn't tell from the cauliflower because they were colour- blind), and stuff cotton in their ears to avoid hearing things. And they began to become sick and unhealthily pale with the lack of cauliflower, even though broccoli is actually better for you. Funny that. Never mind that story then. Chapter Four: A Little After Teatime It is five o'clock in the afternoon. I am sitting here staring at the remains of tea. Biscuit crumbs dust the tea-table, sullen trays and plates huddle in the corner conspiring about something, rings of tea surround the former resting places of the teacups. Everything is in order. I make a point of that. I make a point of order. But... Something is afoot. Something else is aleg. Yet another thing is ahand. Body parts scatter the drawing room. Logic cannot explain it, nor the fact that the plates and trays have stopped conspiring and are looking about for another hacksaw. I am about to join the body parts. I can still speak. But... It is the end. The order is gone. The endpoint of a line, or the endpoint of order. And now I cannot speak. It makes no difference. Chapter Three: The Middle A good salad is the one thing that makes the Commissioner's life worthwhile. A good salad is what she looks forward to every day. There is a Caesar Salad that beckons from a shop window as she passes on her way to work. But a Commissioner's salary is not enough for that salad. That salad is worth a year's savings she might spend on worthwhile things like mops, spare radio antennae, and chewing gum. That is a salad to be reckoned with. A mundane, every-day-living kind of good salad is to be had at one's home. The Caesar salad, that's a salad that only a Janitor First Class could affort. A good salad, that's what makes it all worthwhile. But SHHH! No talking and NO cursing (a salad is nothing to curse about). Those are the two big rules. Those are the Salad Proclamations. Janitors even have to follow those. Salad is worth it, though. The serene silence of the streets is even peaceful, and the free salad is worth it. Even the Cult Of NO doesn't dare defy that. Chapter Two: Way Past Midnight I'm a Ten. Top of the line, I chew barbed wire and spit out thumbtacks, I can tackle the world. One through Ten, and I'm on top. Not many of us in this world of lowly citizens. Only the royalty goes any higher, and I don't see too much of them. Yessirree, I'm ruler of THIS hill o' beans. I can order me a jumbo shrimp salad in any ol' restaurant on this planet and they gotta give it to me pretty darn pronto, or WHOOEEE, there's hell to pay. Of course, what with Good Salad watching us day and night, I can't be too mean to my underlings. The Salad is All Good, the Salad is All Powerful. Or so I'm told. When I insult a Three, I have to do it kindly. When I knock a Five, I have to be gentle. When I put down a Seven, I say "Have a nice day". Nines... Well, nines are pretty close to omnipotent me, so I don't mess around with them. The Good Salad watches. Those Sevens, they get upset when you put 'em down. Gotta be nice. The next guy, he's extra good. "Have a VERY nice day"... But, well... It goes on. If you don't, you take a penalty. In the Game Of Life... Is this the Great Nomic, or what? Sheeee-it. I'm happy with my Salad, thanks. This sucker's got radishes, carrot, cucumber, zucchini, iceberg lettuce AND Boston butter, not to mention cabbage, hard-boiled eggs, tomatoes, bacon-bits, and EVERYTHING. At the mere sight, the Eight changes direction. Heads off for the shop to buy one for itself, yup? Like I say, damn good salad. Good Salad is watching you. Chapter One: The End Good Salad is watching you. Good Salad takes on many guises. Many bodies with the same mind, all alike, all watching you. Do you resent being watched by Good Salad? Do you think Good Salad has plans for your life that you won't like? Don't worry. Good Salad is all good, all powerful, all seeing, all knowing. How can Good Salad mean you harm? Good Salad will improve you. Good Salad will improve your life. Good Salad will improve your diet. We people of Skumby are fed on a Diet Of Good Salad, and the poor people of Earth, they were fed on the Diet Of Worms. Is it any wonder? Their planet is backwards and ignorant. They have yet to embrace the meaning of Good Salad. Good Salad: the signpost of an advanced civilization. "Hey, Ace!" "Yeah, WHAT?" "Skip it." All the Earthians can say? SKIP IT? The meaning of Good Salad has passed them by for now. But some day, we will be. Because it has already begun. Fourth Part: Salad Chapter Five: Salad's Gonna Get Ya In case it hasn't reached you, this is the Book Of Salad. Good Salad is watching you. May the Salad be with you. Live long and eat Good Salad. Herein is written all that you need to know to survive on the long-awaited Day Of Salad. The true nature of the Day Of Salad is as secret as the Rules Of Mao. If you cannot see it, it will pass you over, and YOU'LL LOSE! On that coming Day Of Salad, Good Salad will come to Earth, and the truth will be released to a people too long crowded in dark and superstitious ways. No, Good Salad is not just a God. No, Good Salad is not just a way of life. No, Good Salad is not just a bunch of veggies. No, Good Salad is not just a religion. The Book Of Salad is not designed to teach. The Book Of Salad is not designed to entertain. The Book Of Salad is not designed to liberate. The fine line between Arrogance and Hypocrisy will never be crossed. Good Salad lies in neither. The Truest Good Salad that ever came to Earth will be your liberator. Trust in it, eat it, and enjoy. Chapter Four: Questions And Answers Q: Do you believe in Good Salad? A: I believe it exBLATTTs. Q: Do you believe in God/The Government? A: I believe it exBLATTTs. Q: Do you believe in the Bible/Koran/Talmud? A: I believe it exBLATTTs. Q: Do you believe in yourself? A: I believe I exBLATTT. Q: Who is your liberator? A: Partake, and Good Salad will set you free. Q: What is Good Salad? A: Good Salad is just what you want it to be. Q: Why will Good Salad liberate me? A: Why? Don't you want to be free? QQ: Where is the Good Salad? A: The Good Salad is in everyone who partakes of Good Salad. Q: When will the Day Of Salad Arrive? A: When are you free? Chapter Three: Salad As Metaphor Salad is more than a metaphor. Salad is a metaphyve, or even a metasyxxe. More than this, and I run the risk of exaggerating. But consider, even only as a metaphor, without invoking its higher reason, without ascending to the Good Salad, I speak of salad only. Any one of these points I make might be the subject of a long- winded chapter, but that would be against the basic principles of the Good Salad. Just as a salad is made of many component parts of many different kinds, so is a society made of many people of many different kinds. Just as a salad only tastes good when there is variety, so a society is only healthy when there is variety. What makes a salad "good" is impossible to pin down with finality what makes ANYTHING good, be it person, action, thought, or music. It is a combination of many things which makes a salad what it is, and in our minds, it is a combination of many thoughts and memories which makes us who we are. And yet, society is not a salad. Music is not a salad. There is no salad in the average Earthian's head. The Day Of Salad is coming. Be prepared. When the metaphyve of Salad is extended too far, it grows carried away, like any other metaphyve. But Good Salad might be in anything. Everywhere you look, the Good Salad might reisde there. Chapter Two: Salad Is Not A Cult We are not devotees of Salad. We are not cultBLATTTs of Salad. We are not worshippers of Salad. We are admirers of the Good Salad. We have no heirarchy. We have only five names. We may each choose the name we wish. We have these names: Janitor, Salad, Floor, Mop, Actor. We have no holidays. We have no rituals. We have no sacraments. We have no philosophy. We have no religion. We have no gods. We have no priesthood. We are STILL called a Cult. When the Day Of Salad arrives, the truth will be sorted out. Until that day, we don't really mind. Each of us has beliefs, philosophy, religion, even gods. Each of us has a mind, a mind made of many things, many thoughts and memories, just like a Salad is made of many vegetables. Each of those minds goes its own way, like a salad. But just as two different machines working on the same problem reach the same number, or two completely different businessmen can wear the same suit, so we all turn to the Good Salad. We all, no matter how different we are, we all turn to the Good Salad, we take on that extra suchness to ourselves. Some of us are mystics, some of us are Catholics, some of us are futurBLATTTs, and some of us are even MOOists. But we can all appreciate a Good Salad. Chapter One: Mind Games Good Salad can be tricky, and hide itself. It can lurk in the most unexpected of places, and be totally absent in places you think it should be. It can appear, like a flitting ghost, a siren- call to destiny, and then be gone the next instant, an insubstantial wraith. Good Salad is not an easy thing to accept into your life. It is not even a hard thing to accept into your life. It is a thing which, if you accept it, will grow to dominate you, and rule your life. But you will come to realize that this is exactly how things ought to be. If you try to escape Good Salad, Good Salad will follow you, but if you try to follow Good Salad, Good Salad will escape you. When you least want it, Good Salad will be underfoot. When you desire it the most, Good Salad will be gone. Good Salad is a player of Mind Games. Good Salad refuses attempts to ritualize it. None of this number stuff, none of this wordy stuff. Good Salad is just Good Salad. No Zen, no Tao, nothing special, nothing suchy. Good Salad is what it is, and makes no apologies. Try to tie it down, and it will slip away. Third Part: Death Chapter Five: No More Death Death in the middle. Death's Fool. No More Death! No More Taxes! Upwingers and Downwingers, Leftwingers and Rightwingers, Death absorbs them all, Death is a sponge that soaks up all liquid humanity, the fluid, ever-changing milk of humankind-ness. And why? Why do we let him do this? I knew him once, Reggie Death, ol' Grim Reaper himself. Not a nice guy. A bit morbid for my liking, but I guess that's to be expected. Always glaring at me from under that big cowled hood of his, saying "It'll be your turn one of these days, Tung..." But MOO Tse Tung doesn't bow down to nobody or nothin', not Good Salad, and certainly not a mere Death. So I said to myself, Tung, I said, you've got to find a way of ditching this creep Reggie once and for all. No more Death. The answer came when my hard-drive died on me. I saw Reggie sneaking out the door with one of its many many lives before I went in to use the computer. When I turned it on, the hard drive was as I had feared: completely dead. "Darn that Reggie," I thought to myself, and went on to look through my backups. As I was loading backup disk after backup disk back onto the hard drive, the answer strikes me. It doesn't really matter if I die, as long as I have a backup copy that's fairly up to date. After all, even a slightly dated backup copy is better than losing everything. A little gap of amnesia is better than Death. Chapter Four: Step One My question then was HOW? How to make a backup copy of the human mind? The Good Salad offered no advice, though it was very tasty. I had to turn away from Salad and towards MOO for an answer. This I was loath to do, so I shouted the most vile Skumbag curse word I knew at the top of my lungs (for I was once from Skumby, before the Damfools blew it up). "ASAAOOOOXNAMRTAXOOOOOAAAAAAAAANININIRAAATAOOORZKNAI!" And a vision appeared before me, brought forth no doubt by the Good Salad I had taken into me, showing the way. It was a shimmering, glowing, bearlike being, glBLATTTening redly. "WOMBAT LBLATTTening Substation Six-Sixty-Six acknowledging receipt of password, go ahead ground control." The vision was clearly a product of something dark and demonic within my subconscious, but perhaps interrogating it would give me some insights. "I want to make a backup copy of my mind. How do I do it?" "WOMBAT archives have sixteen methods of soul-storage. Would you like a cereal lBLATTTing?" "Yes, please." "Kellogg's Special-K, Froot-Loops, Cocoa-Puffs, Quaker Harvest Crunch, Post..." "What about backups?" "Sorry, but I've been waiting ten thousand years and helping the English language to evolve so I could use that one, I don't want to have to do it all over again when the language changes again." "Well?" "Oh, right... Sorry." My subconscious clearly didn't like me that day. Chapter Three: The Explanation As I sat with the vision, discussing my plan to cheat Death, I was amazed. Different scientBLATTTs and philosophers of different disciplines came to so many completely incompatible ways of describing how the mind works, each one mysteriously attuned to their respective fields of study. Every one of them had invented itself a little world out of what it knew already, and fit the mind into it. The vision took biochemBLATTTry, neurology, psychology, philosophy, computer architecture, and mathematics, all their world visions, threw in WOMBAT's own point of view and told me how IT thought the human mind works. "Very badly." Somehow I wasn't surprised. Chapter Two: The Upshot "The brain is hardware, a physiochemical analog-base neural- net architecture of connectivity and flux." "The mind is self-modifying software, initialized at birth, a BIOS with the capacity to rewire itself at imprinting times, the so-called Neural Circuits that end up chemically printed on the brain as reflex arcs." "The soul is the supplementary files to the mind, the logs, the configuration files, the heurBLATTTics it developed, everything but the primary imprints." The vision was rambling. I could have done with a nice salad. Not necessarily a Good Salad, but at least something with crispy Iceberg Lettuce, fresh tomatoes, cucumber, and OOOHHHHHH, the lucious bacon-bits. "To back up the mind, we tape the soul. That's easy. Just read the config files and all the other supplements. WOMBAT has readers set up for that implanted in half the hats in the world. That's why the Xennothemians don't want anyone wearing hats. The dictatorships of the world make people wear THEIR hats, schools with dress-codes make students wear THEIR hats. If they had free access to WOMBAT hats, they'd get the memory implants that makes 'em behave the way WOMBAT wants 'em to. They'd have easy access to WOMBAT subcommand structures. Very dangerous random factors for the Xennothemian invasion force." My subconscious is paranoid? I wouldn't have thought so. Maybe it's all that hanging around with Reggie Death that did it. "WOMBAT even has special simulators that can extract the program of the mind and run using a special config file with the primary imprints in it, to make the backup even MORE accurate. After all, you wouldn't want us to reincarnate you in a body with its OWN imprints, would you? Robot OR human." Now about that salad... I think I have some eggs in the kitchen... Chapter One: NO MORE DEATH! The vision is gone now, but I have what I wanted. A special box it told me how to build. Slip the helmet over my head, it'll read everything off, and stick it on this special crystal tape, a glimmering record of my mind and my soul that can play back into another person, or a robot "bug" body. Coolness. If only I could remember where I got the tape... The vision gave it to me, but that was just a hallucination, right? I mean, the whole "orbiting psychic satellite" thing... Musta been something I ate. I'd better lay off those eggs. First time I put on the helmet, I suddenly realized eggs are bad. "Chicken abortions?" Well, a bit drastic, maybe. But it just popped into my head... A memory of something I'd long forgotten. Something that just entered the logfiles of my brain... Second Part: Taxes Chapter Five: Tarot It's a fact. There used to be 23 major arcana Tarot cards, not 22 like there are now. Death is number THIRTEEN right now. Well, that's why it's an unlucky number, right? But the hint was there all along. I mean, in a normal deck of playing cards, there's thirteen cards in a suit. But! But... In a Tarot deck, there's FOURTEEN cards in a suit, plus those extra 23... Well, that was a ruse. There should only have been thirteen in a suit. The fourteen was just a little reminder, saying "HEY! SOMETHING ISN'T RIGHT HERE!" But we were deaf to it, for only those attuned to Good Salad can pick up on little details like that. Only those with the ability to perceive the minutae of what make the dBLATTTinction between Salad and GOOD Salad. That's me. The fourteen was a telltale, saying that number 14 was MISSING. Between Death and Temperance should come TAXES. That's Death, TAXES and Temperance. There's only 75 cards in the Tarot deck. Plus jokers. Someone took those out too. But taxes... That's just wishful thinking. You can cheat good ol' Reggie Death with WOMBAT's help, but TAXES? No way. Chapter Four: IRS It hangs suspended over the Earth, racing past point after point, in a polar-bear orbit, lumbering along with cameras pointed at the Earth. In 23 days, it scans every point on the surface of the planet with its powerful lenses, beaming down what it sees to the questioners on the surface. It is the IRS. Oh, we're told it means Indo-Russian Satelite, we're told it's scanning for resources, for underground water, forest fires, things like that. But this baby doesn't have solar collectors, it has TAX collectors. Chapter Three: Canada You want taxes, live in Canada. Government is their job. It's what they dream about at night. It taxes their minds, as well as their pocketbooks. Canada, land of taxes. Land of government. All they do is choose GNU leaders and then complain about them for four years. Then vote for them again. Is it any wonder they have more taxes than they know what to do with? Is it any wonder the instruction booklet alone for the tax forms takes 23 volumes, and weighs the same number of KILOGRAMS? Is it any wonder? Since Canucks are what they are? And still they complain. But, say the damnyankees, if they keep voting for the buggers, they deserve what they get. Well, they're probably right. But with all this ice and snow, what else is there to do up here? Chapter Two: Economy Taxes on Good Salad? UNTHINKABLE! And yet they seem to manage to do it. Taxes are an abomination on the face of the Earth! TAXES MUST DIE! Taxes are the means employed by that figment of the collective imagination calling itself government to appropriate the equally figmentary trading medium MONEY, which only exBLATTTs because of the government, from every transaction performed by the people. Looked at that way, taxation is a particularly inconvenient form of social neurosis. If you went up before a group of sane people, most likely those who know about Good Salad, and told them the ENTIRE REASON they should put you in a position of authority over them for YEARS was because you'd do your best to manage that particular neurotic deviation of society, you'd be laughed all the way to Sacramento! Unless you happened to be IN Sacramento, in which case you'd be laughed at LEAST to Sao Paolo. The fact that the people who do this very thing are NOT laughed at AT ALL indicates either that the world has no sense of humour, is completely social-neurotic, or consBLATTTs mostly of lunatics. Or all three at once. FIGMENT I TELL YOU! FIGMENT! Accept the Good Salad into yourself, and this figment need never bother you again. And that's a fact. As near as I can tell. Chapter One: No More Taxes? This chapter is so foolish as to deserve no explanation. But I'll humour it for a paragraph or two. Taxes are a figment, and don't exBLATTT anyway, outside their own deranged imaginations. Even if they did exBLATTT, you wouldn't HAVE to pay them if you didn't want to, and moreover, some form of self-deluding social neurosis will always exBLATTT, and will go by the name "TAXES". The very idea. MMPPPPH! First Part: Logic Chapter Five: R.A.W.: A Parable Of MOO Tse Tung One day, MOO Tse Tung was paging through his CDROM collection on a palmtop, when he finally came to "MOO-Related Books, Vol 23", and stumbled across the collected works of Robert Anton Wilson. Tung being a speed-reader, he went through them in a solid 23-hour burst, and came out the other end with a reprogrammed soul. After making a backup copy of this GNU soul, Tung slept for 17 hours and reread Principia Discordia. Tung, an emminently logical individual, found his brother, backed up his mind, and loaded down one of Tung's own previous ones into the free brain so he could discuss the matter objectively, promising to return his brother to his body when he was done. First he hacked up both their souls a bit to make them smarter, then he got the old one to read other stuff, just to compare. Bucky Fuller, Rudy Rucker, Jim Randi, Ilya Prigogine, Hans Moravec, Phil Jennings, and other rationalBLATTTs and scientBLATTTs, and THEN R.A.W. It was two days before they got down to it. Tung's funny that way. "But... But it's so DUMB!" "You're just seeing it from ONE reality-tunnel. All reality- tunnels are equally valid and invalid. It may seem illogical to you, but maybe not to someone else." "So? I GOT that part. The point is he's far too narrowminded for his own good. I mean, this business about nonlocal connections, neural circuits... It's so FUZZY. He doesn't explain how he thinks it works, he doesn't explain the quantum-mechanical principles behind it, he completely IGNORES Superstring theory, which would completely explain all the things he wonders about..." "But the Thinker and the Prover... Whatever your Thinker thinks, your internal Prover will PROVE! You can't use normal science to describe it, when ALL things are true!" "You're brainwashed. That's Orr's Law, 'member? But over the long run, our science approaches truth." "But how do you explain all those UFO sightings he talked about?" "The inner core of the brain has far more processing power than the outer shell. It has enough interconnections and neurons to be able to function in parallel instead of serially. So it can make an external map of an internal event, caused by nonlocal Superstring behaviour." "Huh?" "Never mind." The logic was never settled out. The conclusion was that either Robert Anton Wilson had a pipeline into Absolute Truth, or he was full of shit. Or both. There may not be a difference. The amoral of the story is, never do a direct hack of your soul to make yourself smarter unless you know exactly what you're doing. Cause Tung didn't. P.S.: He forgot to give his brother's body back. Chapter Four: Bugs One of the things Tung II came across when his new-self made him read stuff in order to have an inconclusive argument was stuff by Phillip Jennings, Hans Moravec, even Eric Drexler, that went far beyond "BOB" Wilson. And even that was just the beginning stuff. The mind can't really be dBLATTTinguished from a computer any more than anything else can. Everything is behaving in ways that are completely dictated by the laws of nature. Even if they're laws of nature we don't know yet, they're still there, making things tick along, completely unlike clockwork. A computer, with constantly varying inputs and outputs, with the flux of light or electrons, balancing out, or a neural-net system, with constantly mutually-adjusting bias systems, is a perfect model of ANYTHING in the physical world. Everything is a model of everything else, because all change is isomorphic. So, why not put the brain in a computer? Separation by-parts! This is HOW you read the Soul, the Mind, the Brain. At least until you learn enough to do it more efficiently. This is the Model-T of mind-transfer. Take Drexler's nanomachines, let them gradually figure out what each neuron in the brain is doing, one by one if necessary... After all, with the nano-computers being less than the size of the nucleus, they can devote massive power to just figuring out the charge balances and chemical functions of each and every single cell while hiding inside. As the nano-pooters figure it out, the assembler nanites replace the cell's function with their own constructs. They can keep it fed with chemicals as long as it needs it... that's what they're best at, manufacturing complex chemicals. All it has to do is mimic the electrical properties and PRETEND to be a cell. But when every cell in the brain is gone, and replaced by something PRETENDING to be a neuron... Why bother with this chemical stuff? String some optical lines between them and have a rapid transfer of info... They can simulate everything that WOULD be happening, but much faster. Sounds like a computer, but there's been no point where anything has changed. At least functionally. So BLFFFFT! to you people who thought the brain had to be chemical. So what about that DNA-RNA-mind feedback that people keep talking about? Not a problem. Keep a record of the DNA in the cell's little nano-pooter, on backup, and let it simulate what happens when the RNA talks to it. It may turn out to be important, so we may as well leave it there. If we can believe the wild speculations of Leary (and, of course, Wilson), it's the Sixth Neural Circuit. No, really. Anyway, once you've got all this, you just put it in "pause" mode (like going to sleep, but more complete: it won't hurt, and it can't kill you) and read off all the "cells" into a computer. A real futurBLATTTic, massively high-tech affair using nanochips and optical stuff, or maybe some kind of subatomic thingumy. Once it's in there, you can start looking for shortcuts. Cause there's always shortcuts. The human brain was not designed for absolute BEST solutions. It's just a collection of "good enough" engineering. Evolution works by natural selection of the best at any given time until the general population is "good enough" that it doesn't make THAT much of a difference, and then stops. The same thing happens over and over, so we've got lots of sloppy engineering in the brain because circumstances were never severe enough to make it get any better. (Basically, the hardware sucks donkeys.) When you've got the brain as a giant data-file of neurons, how they work, how they interconnect, and stuff like that, noticing that you STILL haven't changed anything from what it was when it was a pile of organic grey-cell mush, 90% of which has nothing to do with thinking, but rather cell-maintenance and genetics and stuff... you cut down on redundancy. Well, like you've got your entire DNA pattern in there about 50 billion times: one for each cell. So you cut out all but one, and stick in POINTERS for when you need more than one copy running. And, like you've got lots of cells with separate info, taking up lots of room explaining what it all means in EVERY CELL. So you make a table of the data. And a lBLATTT of connections. You could probably cut it down to less than one percent of one percent of... and so forth, just by doing that. So now you've got a teeny-weeny program, and a WHOLE FUCKING LOT of data to make it run. At least by today's standards. With maybe 10K of info per cell (worst case), that still makes somewhere in the vicinity of 10 to the 14th bits. A fair chunk. Like, say, about a tenth the size of the Library of Congess in the U.S.A. Which is big. But I'll betcha you don't need that much per cell. The electrical sensitivity of each cell is at MOST 100 bits to digitize the analog value for maximum sensitivity, right? I mean, more than that and it doesn't ACTUALLY make a difference. And the chemical stuff can be cut out by redundancy checks. Say all of the cells' info makes 10 to the 12th bits, plus coding up the RNA and things in the brain. Say 10 to the 13th bits, before optimizing. After optimizing, a tiny fraction of that size. Because a lot of that information is redundant. Just like programs on a modern computer can be compressed down to maybe 60% of their size, and still run effectively (with a compression algorithm that lets them self-extract while running, or some such thing). Only trying to talk about the mind by detailing the operation of EVERY CELL and how they all connect, that's SOOO redundant. You can start chunking things up into groups, and even if you lose some detail in the chunking, all the overlap between the groups would let you run backwards to get what you had before. But as we learn more and more about how the mind works, we start throwing out stuff we find we don't ACTUALLY need. I figure you could get the program down to 100 Gigabytes if you really tried, and KNEW what you were doing. That's the mind, the soul, not including all the memories. But then, in the real mind, memories are grouped together anyway, stored in association patterns. The program has incredibly sophBLATTTIcated algorithms for uncrunching them from overlaps. When you go to remember things, you don't really pull it out from archives, you more DEDUCE IT from the various ways it's affected the program. So it's hard to tell. Somewhere around that size anyway. The result is a program that IS your mind. Or as close as you can come without actually cut-and-pasting. If you believe in the metaphysical soul, it's really hard to see WHERE in this process you'd lose the damn thing. Maybe in the transfer to the computer? Well, make it a smooth transition, by swapping out to a remote control of the pretend-cell by the computer, until it has all of them, and then a smooth transition from the big loop to a straight path inside. We can smear all these sharp lines into grey regions if we want. Thing is, people just aren't USED to thinking of themselves as abstract mathematical patterns, yo ho ho? But if you try, you can smear from one to the other without establishing any clear dividing line. That doesn't mean you ARE one, just that there's no CLEAR difference. It's all physics anyway, right? When will this technology be available to the general public? Well, scope out Hans Moravec's Mind Children for more detail, but generally I figure by 2050 the whole shebang should be easily possible. With great difficulty before that, yeah. Like, for a MASSIVE government sponsored project, we may be able to do it by 2020, but on the whole, WHY BOTHER? If mind-transfer gear will be available to the public for maybe a month's salary (by today's standards) in 2050, why not just wait? These computer-brains are what Phil Jennings called "bugs". In tiny insectoid bodies, computer brains... Wouldn't you? Chapter Three: Future Stuff All of this is just simple projection from current technology, going ahead into the future a bit. By the time all that happened, they'll be looking back on this as EITHER prophetic and profound, OR stupid and primitive. Or else it will never happen at all, and they'll just think we were dumb not to realize why not. But what with nanotechnology and space exploration increasing wealth incredibly (see Ann O'Nymous's chapters elsewhere in the Book O' MOO), and other fine stuff happenin' all over the place, everyone should be able to afford a GNU body by then. The whole influx-of-wealth thing. But if we're all getting richer, assuming all this happens at all, why stop there? If you're mind is going into a computer anyway, why just leave it as it is? Why not make a few judicious twiddles as it goes through? Like, say, increase the number Glial Cells (which feed the neurons) in your brain by a factor of 100. When they dissected Einstein's brain, they found he had more Glials than the average person by a factor of about 5. The extra food to the neurons did the trick. Or why not make your simulated neurons hook together more efficiently in the outer layers of the brain, which currently are VERY badly designed, because they only have 100 000 years of evolution going for them. Combine the whole shebang, right? Instant IQ 5000 or more. Prospective lifespan almost infinite, in this GNU synthetic body. Don't like the idea? Well, you don't have to do it, right? Nobody's forcing you, and your kind will either die out, or continue on as you always have. The rest of us will probably live in space anyway. By the time 2050 rolls around, the current trend to space (two steps forward, one step back) will have brought enough people to near-Earth orbit that the GNU "bugs" will prefer it out there anyway. How widespread will it get? In the 1930's, Television was invented. By the 1960's, everyone in North America had seen one, and most of them owned one. By the 1990's, everyone in the world have been affected by the phenomenon, and most people in North America and Europe can't live normally without one. Automobiles swung into mass-production in the 1920's. By the 1950's, most NorAm/Europeans owned one, and the phenomenon was beginning to have an effect on the environment and the landscape, and by the 1980's, the effect on the environment was almost disastrous, and many NorAm/European families owned two. It takes 60 years for a phenomenon to grow from GNU Thing to Old thing. One generation to grow up with it, and one generation to grow up with PARENTS who grew up with it. So by 2110, will most NorAm/Euros have TWO bug bodies? But what about everyone else in the world? What about abolishing poverty? What about world hunger? Without those human bodies to feed (we can even use our old throwaway bodies for fertilizer for crops), we can turn North America into a giant farm to feed everyone else. With that giant influx of riches from space, poverty will be at an end. This whole NorAmEuro thing will end, and the REST of the world can join us. But with faster thinking minds, and more data available... Will it take all of 60 long years anymore? With no biological bodies to reproduce with, and no old-fogeys dying off, will it take so SHORT? Hard to judge. But the people who DO IT, the people who go bug, they'll be the kind who like GNU things. The kind who don't, they'll stay behind on Earth anyway. With bug brains, this whole neophobia thing might eventually get edited out. Things will speed up a lot. The move to space has hBLATTTorically caused GNU Circuits to imprint on astronauts. A holBLATTTic imprint, the fifth circuit of Leary? That's the HolBLATTTic-Neurosomatic Circuit, right? So astronauts get a holBLATTTic imprint on the nearest object, the Earth, the same way those famous little baby ducks got a "Mother" imprint on the ping-pong ball, or whatever the experimenter chose. Same thing going into a bug body. It fundamentally changes your outlook on things. You take a holBLATTTic imprint on your GNU brain, the "computer". No longer a clunking vacuum-tube image, the GNU imprint conjures up an almost mystical vision of swirling light and atoms inside the thing. Computer brains. Join now, or be forever left behind. Chapter Two: Data Stack Overflow Error 2000 years ago, at the beginning of the Pagan ChrBLATTT dating system, or in 132747 according to the rational Penguin Dating system, the total amount of information known or recorded to the human race was, call it, oh, say, X. It wasn't until FIFTEEN HUNDRED YEARS later that 2X had been discovered or learned. The next doubling took a sixth the time, 250 years: 4X. Then in 150 years, 8X (all the time rampaging Westwards a great deal slower than a jumbo jet or a savage herd of rabid buffalo, but a lot faster than your average hair-growth, which is something like a meter in five or ten years). Another 150, and 16X were hanging around North America. In 50, and 32X had shuffled off to Buffalo. Or rather, somewhere west of Buffalo. Then it took 10 years for 64X, seven more for 128X, and six more for 256X. Pretty soon it hit its stride at about doubling twice every five years or so. Wow, eh? Of course, most of that information is pretty damn useless records, like the fact that Bill Q. Schexnayder, on the 13th of January, 135557, did willfully and with intent to buy a MacDonald's hamburger, charge $2.56 to his American Express Gold Card. But even so, lots of it is useful, valuable information, like this. But with all those "unanswered questions" out there, like those people who say "we have no idea how the brain works", when that's just plain wrong, or people who think "scientBLATTTs just DON'T UNDERSTAND how the universe was created AT ALL", when that's even LESS correct... It's not ignorance or stupidity, or even willfull pigheadedness. It's just that there's too much information out there for anyone to be able to corelate. And corelating the info is the most important part of being able to figure out the answers. That's where bug bodies come in. With a big enough brain for hardware, custom-built for just pennies by cheap nano-assemblers, and a little tweaking of your intelligence by a handy software knob in your head (so you can optimize your smarts for whatever hardware you're running on), you can make yourself smart enough to learn EVERYTHING there is to know. At least now, anyway. But the faster people corelate, the faster things double. You may never be able to catch up completely, but with special programs designed to filter out only the important stuff, and eliminate redundancy, you can come pretty darn close. Especially if you keep getting smarter and smarter at the speed computers are doing today. Or even faster, since there'll be more money, smarter designers, cheaper technology... And with smarter designers making themselves better brains, we may well be able to keep up with ourselves. The postbiological world may be complex, but you can be pretty fucking sure we're not going to let it get away from us, like we did to the biological world. We just barely escaped from nuclear and/or environmental catastrophe, and we STILL haven't escaped from poverty and/or hunger, which is threatening half the world's population RIGHT NOW! But we will. We'd better. We won't let THAT happen again. Chapter One: Postbiological Life What will life be like in a postbiological world? 1) The salad will be much better. Since all food will be simulated, we will be able to run analyses to determine, for each person, which salad will please them the most. 2) Sex will be a smaller part of life. Not because sex will be any less important. Probably the reverse, what with everyone being mentally able to know every other person in the world, split into many different people, "get to know" all of them at once, in more ways than us mere biological beings can possible imagine, what with having only five basic ways of doing it. It's just that our life will become so much vaster, so much MORE to it, that proportionally, sex will be a minuscule part of our lives. We will probably find even MORE interesting things to do. 3) We'll FINALLY Meet The Aliens. We suspect the reason we haven't met any yet is because they've all gone Postbiological. When we're on the same level with them (at least vaguely), we'll be able to interact. Of course, they'll be so far beyond us, they'll hardly be recognizable. As we get better and better computers, we'll be moving our minds farther and farther down the scale of SpaceTime, towards the SuperStrings. If we finally transcend that barrier (project this around the 23rd century, if everything goes as we've been suggesting) where the universe is inside every point of itself, inside every loop of curled spacetime, we'll meet every race who's ever done this before us, omnipresent (they're inside every point in the universe), omnipotent (they can emerge anywhere and affect quantum waves), omniscient (their immense intellect can see everything in the universe), and benign (we know this from the empirical fact that they haven't killed us off yet). The communication between individuals is so complete, they will seem to be one enormous mind. 4) Life goes on. On Earth, everyone who didn't join us, everyone who lacked faith that their souls would be accurately recorded, will keep going on as they always did. With all the "cream skimmed off the top", that is, everyone with a pro-technology bias gone to be a space bug, technological civilization will collapse. Since most of the population will have gone, they'll go back to an agricultural society, and have to evolve back some pro-tech people in a few thousand years down the line, and go through this whole thing all over again. Odds are they'll destroy any record of what we went through before they let their descendants go on with life. Since we'll have taken our industry with us to space to avoid polluting the Earth, the clock will basically be set back ten thousand years. 5) Click, start over. The bugs basically vanish from the picture in the 23rd century, after a period of collecting together somewhere to save on speed-of-light problems. After about 2125, the Solar System should seem very much like it did in 2125 BC. The End Of The Books Of Salad And Now An Unscheduled Chapter Hi. I'm an anonymous non-denominational "ChrBLATTTian". I'm not really much for the Jesus guy. I kinda like that Puerto-Rican Voodoo-Surfer thing, actually. But I guess you could call me a Bible Prophecy nut. I don't know much about this MOO thing, or the Salad, but this guy wanted me to proofread this Salad book, and I couldn't resBLATTT asking to write a few paragraphs for it. This won't take a page, really. See, that last part, Part One: Logic... That bit kinda got my interest. The last few chapters looked an awful lot like the Prophecy of the Rapture. In the Last Days, when all these various signs and things shall come to pass, all believers will be lifted into the heavens to dwell with God, see? Well, modern technology, politics, and other things, have been bringing about Bible Prophecy left, right, and center. The politics in Europe are bringing about the Ten Nations requirements of lots of prophecies. The cashless society and the GNU microchips being used for money are obviously the Mark Of The Beast. War and natural disaster are increasing all the time. Just as the Bible predicted they would, thousands of years ago. And back then, they had no way to predict the Mark Of The Beast technology. And now this Rapture thing? We rise up into the heavens, just as it says, leaving the unbelievers and the unfaithful behind. Just as it says. We dwell in the kingdom of God. We become like lesser angels to an omnipresent, all-seeing, all-knowing, all- powerful, all-benevolent God. Because we won't have joined fully into the unity for a while. And sex to an Angel, such as we will be, is nothing, as it will be to us. And this God is just like the Bible's God. Time is nothing to it, because it exBLATTTs in every point in space and time. "A thousand ages in thy sight..." God is everywhere and everywhen. This can hardly be a coincidence. All of these connections must be more than MERE coincidence. I'll tell you what I think. As the bugs move into the Kingdom Of God (that Superstring thing), and get able to move in time, they carry the message of the Prophecy and the Word of God back through time to their descendants, so that these things might all come to pass. The authors said it would be to make "Neophiles" evolve, because they don't like the religion that forms around it? It seems a little suspicious to me. But the point is simple. All true ChrBLATTTians would not object to making this transformation. The prophecy of the Rapture is coming to pass very soon, and, as we should have expected, God does not make things simple for believers. We ourselves have to work towards it. We have to exercise the free will God gave us in order to ascend to the Heavens and join the Kingdom of God. All I ask is that you think about this. And consider how much of the Bible makes sense when seen in this light. Please think about it. APPENDIX VI as written by Preest Jeffrey Morton FORENOTE: This here being a serious plea unto the people of Earth in general and the Holy Church of The Grate MOO in particular. "BOB" has revealed these words to make it absolutely clear that there is a Massive Conspiracy afoot, despite the Fact that there Isn't. Jehovah-1 has not released these words, due to the fact that he doesn't exBLATTT, that he is a small Penguin in the Antarctic with an IQ of 7457856, and is therefore not inclined to release such trivial words, and that they aren't true anyway. This is actually a pigment (no, not a figment...) of Jeff's deranged imagination, the entire (remaining) contents of his only book. Although Jeff has jealously guarded these words from others, by placing on them an evil and most Bungicious Spell, called the Spell of Copyright, by the incantation of the Shannon Spell this evil work has been Dis-Spelled, enabling us to repeat all of his work. MOAH HAH HAH HAH! For those who are interested, the Shannon Spell goes like this: [Chant to the tune of "OMM, OMM, OMM your boat"] Information Is The Inverse Of Probability... Ess Equals Kay Logg Double-Ewe... Therefore... No Information ExBLATTTs Outside Itself... MOO OMM Copying Is Impossible... For Only Probability Makes Information... Therefore... This Has Not Been Copied... MOO OMM After reciting these words, the Annoying Mind Drug was hacked up into little bits, and some bits were tossed as confetti at the Rocky Horror Picture Show. This ritual performed, we were able to use a probability amplifier (called a WomBLATTTic Inducer, for no good reason other than that it sounded good at the time) to pull out random fragments of the remaining confetti and assemble some words. Therefore, we are not liable to lawsuit because, well, aw, screw this, we're not, okay? "BOB" was the victim of a deluded guy who thought he ran a Publishing Company, and who subsequently slapped a big COPYRIGHT on the thing when "BOB" wasn't looking. The Great MOO has instructed us to ignore this fact and pretend it wasn't there This also enabled us to edit it shamefully, like making it more ErBLATTTic, and BLATTTifying it (Or GrATTTifying, if you like, but "BOB" didn't seem to) and even throwing in totally gratuitous footnotes. Or maybe it was that this is an Ancient Atlantean text which bears a passing resemblance to the Annoying Mind Drug written by Jeffrey Morton, through no fault of ours... Sorry about the similarity, guys... Anyway... Without Further Ado... Here Is The Annoying Mind Drug... Annnnnnny moment now... Praise For Jeffrey Morton Censorship Of Form And Substance "A book of major importance to the future of civilization in a free world. I only wished it was longer, I was so absorbed." -The GNU York Times Book Review "A . . . [great] book." -Skeptical Review "An ambitious work by an ambitious author. His skill at crafting the subtleties of form and content eluded me . . . I wish I'd read it . . . for longer." -The Lazy Reviewer "A remarkable exploration of the depths to which censorship has infiltrated [our] society, and the ways in which messages may be conveyed without content. I loved this book's . . . ending." -The London Times Book Section "Neat." -Alvin's Late Nite Review "Censorship is going to make a big impression. I don't know when I've seen a book this important . . . . since Crime And Punishment!" -*** ******** ****** "It's time someone wrote this book! I'm glad Morton wasn't the one to do it." -George Bush "[A] . . . [fine] book . . ." -Pentagon Book Review Also By Jeffrey Morton: Military Intelligence and other Oxymoronic Idimoms (CENSORED BY THE U.S. MILITARY INTELLIGENCE) Book Without Body Is There Life After Birth? Ravings Of A Deranged Philosopher Nonsense And Other Necessities Who SAID There's No Such Thing As A Free Lunch? Also Reprinted By Gecko Press: My Life In A Walnut Tree by Rudy Himmelmann Crimean Punishment by Vladimir Lenin Leo Tolstoy by C. Rime and P. U. Nishment Heart Of The Wombat by Gregg Bennford and Dave Brine Self Defense And Alien Space Weapons by Perry Noyd Mutterings by Larry Kole Mumblings by Alex Kole Murmurings by Fred Kole Stammerings by Albert Kole-Shute Gecko Press Edition Censorship Of Form And Substance A Gecko Press Book, Published by arrangement with Geeko Press International, Geeko Falls NY. PRINTING HBLATTTORY Geeko International Editions April 1 1992 April 2 1992 April 3 1992 July 13 1998 April 4 2406 Gecko Press Editions April 5 2406 April 6 2406 April 7 2406 July 17 2412 April 8 2820 All Rights reserved, except the right to reserve all rights except the right to reserve most rights other than the right used to reserve all rights but this one. Copyright 1992 by Geeko Press International This book may not be reproduced by photocopy, modem, verbal recital, memories, photographs, telephone, vision, understanding, comprehension, or any other means For Information address: Geeko Press International 1 1st Street NY, NY, 10023 ISBN 0-4353-5748399-XXX Published almost simultaneously in Canada, the USA, the CIS, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and of course, Venezuela THE CONTENTS OF THIS VERSION OF THIS BOOK HAVE BEEN CLEARED BY THE UNITED STATES MILITARY INTELLIGENCE (AND BY THE PENTAGON) CONTENTS CONTENTS Page 1 INTRODUCTION 2 Section 1: Censorship Of Form 3 Chapter 1: Censoring Newspapers 3 Chapter 2: Censoring Books 28 Chapter 3: Censoring Television 45 Chapter 4: Censoring Radio 67 Chapter 5: Censoring Thought 95 Chapter 6: Censoring Speech 120 Section 2: Censorship of Substance 143 Chapter 7: Censoring Science 143 Chapter 8: Censoring Art 170 Chapter 9: Censoring Literature 186 Chapter 10: Censoring Satire 206 Chapter 11: The Other Point Of View 276 Section 3: HBLATTTory Of Censorship 277 Chapter 12: Censorship Before Cities 277 Chapter 13: Pre-ChrBLATTTian Censors 333 Chapter 14: Pre-Columbian Censors 381 Chapter 15: Censors In The Americas 415 Section 4: Form And Substance 565 Chapter 16: What is Form? 565 Chapter 17: What is Substance? 573 Chapter 18: Why the DBLATTTinction? 591 Chapter 19: How To Censor Form? 621 Chapter 20: How To Censor Substance? 632 ENDNOTES 703 EPILOGUE 710 BIBLIOGRAPHY 715 INDEX 721 CHAPTER ELEVEN The Other Point Of View In the course of criticizing censorship, we must, of course, pause to think about the other point of view. Certainly, if I were simply to look at one side of the issue, while ignoring the other, I would be guilty of the HEINOUS crime of censorship of an opinion, and also of a great hypocrisy. Therefore, I turn my attention to the ornery and nigh-on impossible task of justifying censorship in some circumstances. Firstly, I must say that any people who would censor anything must be justified in their own eyes, or else they wouldn't attempt to do it in the first place. So, in the spirit of openmindedness, not putting down any individual point of view, we should allow this opinion to have its fair share of this book. Thus, this chapter. Let us try to put ourselves in the frame of mind of someone in this position and see why such horrendous deeds are perpetrated. First, the argument of stability. Surely, says that criminal against humanity, the censor, our illustrious society must be preserved exactly as it is, without any form of change, or anarchy and destruction will result. Therefore, any books which promote thinking in GNU ways, incite revolution, or otherwise work to change society must be banned. Secondly, the argument of intolerance. If you dislike a certain group, say for a ridiculous example, people whose last names begin with "D", you would be likely to be tempted towards censoring all forms of expression those poor people try to muster, such as books, music, etcetera. Thirdly, the argument of secrecy. If you are trying to prevent a secret from becoming known, for motives good, bad, or ugly, you will try any means at your disposal to stop the publishing of a book which announces that secret to the world. Obviously, this can be good or bad. The secret might well be harmful if known, and so it might be well to keep it hidden. On the other hand, one must consider who should be the judge of what is harmful. It might be better to just let all the facts be known and let the truth sort itself out. Or maybe not. Fourth and most convincing, the argument of hate literature. You might find someone publishing hate literature against (say) people whose names begin with "C", and try to stop them. Censorship might even seem reasonable in this case. Maybe. ENDNOTES 1 The problem involved with editing of newspapers clearly were the factors responsible. However, it should be noted that without the initial pressure from the Chilean government, these tangled heirarchies of editorial conflict would never have emerged. [Nonsense, of course, but nevertheless a valiant argument proposed by the author: while the conclusion is patently wrong, the arguments are apparently quite convincing. -The Editors] In this case, it has been suggested that the Chilean government's ATTEMPT at censorship was at fault. [Again, the author has reached a blatantly false conclusion: this editor has determined that the Chilean Government had nothing to do with the attempted sabotage by militant opponents of the editorial staff. Purely intellectual arguments were involved.] 2 Obviously, censorship of thought is virtually impossible, since determinging which neuronal pathways correspond to which memory triggers and semantic signals is a tremendously elaboate detasking process. [The editors suggest readers ignore the author's futile attempt at using fancy words to make it sound as if he knows what he's talking about: language-stuffing is a tool of communBLATTT running-dogs.] 3 The key problem has been in arriving at a reasonable definition of any of these terms. "Art" has proved the most elusive word to define, since what may be art to some can be pure garbage to another, in the most literal sense. [Some might suggest that it was garbage anyway, regardless of what anyone thought while creating it. The author has failed to consider this point of view.] This is, perhaps, akin to censoring thought, since art is in the eye of the beholder. Here is where the line between form and substance is blurred. [Again, the author is attempting to cover up for his fuzzy thinking. It is clear to the editors that form and substance are two types of the same thing, and the argument is bunk. Get a life, author!] NOTE: Remaining endnotes were lost during a fire in the editor's office during publication. We apologize for the inconvenience. However, most of them were stupid anyway, as the author scored over 98th percentile on the Snidely-Pierce losertest anyway. BIBLIOGRAPHY Aaron, Rupert Moss, ed. Censors of the Mind. Bedford Falls NY: Buntam Books, 1983. A classic work on the nature of the mind and its own censors in nature. Anders, John. Form And Matter. Anders Falls NY: Geeko Press International, 1965. A book dealing with the nature of Form versus the nature of Substance, describing the essential differences and similarities. Atlas, Alexandra. *************. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1976. A book dealing with ---. Redundancy and Censorship. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1975 . A book confronting redundancy as examples of censorship of original thought. Uses the works of Alan Hansard as central evidence. Avalon, Roberta. Censorship In The Pre-Columbian Era. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1974. A book on the censors active in pre-Columbian America, the Aztecs, Incas, and Mayans. ---. -----------------. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1978. --- ------------------------------. ---. PreColumbian Censorship. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1981. A third book on Pre-Columbian censorship. Bat, Otto Hal, ed. Fleeing Censors. Ugly Falls NY: Ugly Falls Books, 1951. A hBLATTTory of minds struggling to leave areas affected by censorship. Bat, Otto Hal. CENSORED BY THE MILITARY. Ugly Falls NY: Ugly Falls Books, 1963. CENSORED BY THE MILITARY. Buddford, Barbara B. Thought Patrol. Skunk Falls NY: Skunk Press, 1985. A book dealing with the future of allowable thoughts in our increasingly repressive society. ---. Rat Race. Skunk Falls NY: Skunk Press, 1986. The follow-up to Thought Patrol, Miss Buddford deals with the reactions of people in a heavily censored society. ---. Operation Mind Crunch. Skunk Falls NY: Skunk Press, 1987. A look at the conspiracy to suppress ideas about Egston, Milton. Nonsense and Noncensors. Albuquerque Falls NY: Rag Time Publications, 1957. A provocative examination of the notion that only nonsense is totally free from censors, and only by failing to convey any information can communication go unmolested. ---. Insubstantive Evidence. Albuquerque Falls NY: Rag Time Publications, 1961. Another work on the notion that only communication lacking substance can be uncensored, and that censored material lacks substance. ---. You Censor Me, Sir? Albuquerque Falls NY: Rag Time Publications, 1963. The tour-de-force of Milton Egston, in which he seeks to demonstrate the impossibility of censorship. Banned in the USA. Feldman, Ivo. What Happened To The Ds? Wunga Wunga Falls NY: Lark Press, 1991. A strange and compelling account of missing authors. Fentiman, June. GNU York Censorship. Athabaska Falls NY: Athabaska Books, 1979. Tales of censorship of Broadway, the GNU York Times, and other famous GNU York institutions. Told in narrative style. Fezik, Ahmed. Early Suppression. Gnubluktuk Falls NY: Glub Press International, 1955. Suppression of knowledge during the periods spanning Early Babylonia to the Roman Empire are covered in this comprehensive book. Gecko, Floyd. Censor? WHAT CENSOR? Topeka Falls NY: Topeka Books, 1988. A semi-lucid and highly eccentric monograph on tabloids as refutation of censorship. A clear case of a good hard knock on the head. Gunn, B. B. Bang Bang Pow Pow. Cowboy Falls NY: Shootem Books, 1984. A book. Guppy, Shark N. Big Fish, Little Fish. Guppy Falls NY: Random House, 1977. A lengthy diatribe against the "big fish" companies who allegedly plot against smaller enterpreneurs using censorship of advertisements. Another good argument against allowing "G"s into writing. ---. Stop Picking On Me. Shark Falls NY: Random Choice, 1987. Guppy's first book after his mysterious ten-year disappearance. A short pamphlet describing attempts by the U.S. Military to censor entire people. Hankley, Bertha Q. Censorship and the Scientific Method. MethodBLATTT Falls NY: MethodBLATTT Books, 1951. Dr. Hankley's profound and interesting treatise on censorship of science, and the impossibility of censoring knowledge. Banned in the USA. Hansard, Alan. Stuffing Nonsense. Guppy Falls NY: Guppy Press, 1976. A work, very similar to the central works of Milton Egston, suggesting that censorship is impossible because only noninformation can be suppressed. ---. Stuffing Nonsense 2. Guppy Falls NY: Guppy Press, 1978. A work, very similar to the central works of Alan Hansard, suggesting that censorship is impossible because only noninformation can be suppressed. ---. Stuffing Nonsense 3. Guppy Falls NY: Guppy Press, 1980. A work, very similar to the central works of Alan Hansard, suggesting that censorship is impossible because only noninformation can be suppressed. Hermann, Beatrice. Self Reference. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 2997. Hermann suggests that self-reference, both direct and indirect, is the primary cause of rejecting ideas on all levels. ---. Time Warps. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1862. One of the first books ever to suffest the exBLATTTence of time warps, giving evidence from throughout hBLATTTory, not only of time warps, of of a high-level cover-up of their exBLATTTence. Hexton, Milly. Hypocrisy. Quirrl Falls NY: Smeggy Books, 1968. Milly Hexton examines the attitudes of people thoughout hBLATTTory in this monumental classic on Hypocrisy and self-contradiction, tackling censorship, as well as self-reference as the basis of intelligence. Hofstadter, Douglas R. Metamagical Themas. GNU York (Falls) NY: Basic Books, 1985. An unusual book dealing with all matters of thinking and thought. His twBLATTTy and humourous bibliography is one of the highlights, in which, among other things, he refers to a single nonexBLATTTent book in a swarm of real books. Huxley, Aldous. Brave GNU World. Quirrl Falls NY: Smeggy Books, 1913. Not the famous one, but a book of the same title by a different author of the same name. The premise is also the same, however, and the style is not noticeably different. Iam, Sam. Dr. Seuss And Me. Bungy Jump Falls NY: Splatter Books, 1986. A revealing look at the hBLATTTory of evading censorship, told in rhyming narrative. Reveals the ways in which such hBLATTTorical figures as Yertle T. Turtle and Sam Iam masked true meanings. Banned in the USA. Infor, Mation. Claude Shannon. NY Falls NY: GNU Yorker Books, 1957. A study of the investigations of Claude Shannon, relating to the problems of how much information is required to convey a certain idea. Strange and convoluted arguments. Jones, Keeping U. Rat Race. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1988. A homage to Barbara Buddford's book of the same name, suggesting a GNU approach to Buddford's theme of modern Western mindset leading to censorship. Kealy, Glenn. How I Tried To Sue The Government. Bungy Jump Falls NY: Splatter Books, 1991. A story of censorship of the legal system, and how the government evades legal charges. Kuntz, Miguel. Life And Times Of Miguel Kuntz. Autobiography Falls NY: Autobiography Press, 1987. THe story of Miguel Kuntz, who had nothing to do with this topic, but led a very bawdy life. Banned in the USA. And in the USSR. Ladder, Jacob S. Visions. Bungy Jump Falls NY: Splatter Books, 1953. A clear account of censorship of thought from the earliest times. Lamperd, David. The Art Of Obfuscation. Mumble Falls NY: Mbpmekdampmpm Press, 1990. A vague description of how people in high ranking positions get around the freedom of information laws by making their meanings unclear. Letterman, Albert. Much Ado About Nothing. Albuquerque Falls NY: Rag Time Publications, 1949. A refutation of the exBLATTTence of censorship. Letterman's faulty premise is that if anything were really important, nobody would censor it. ---. As You Like It. Albuquerque Falls NY: Rag Time Publications, 1951. Another refutation of censorship, and the "growing tide of liberalBLATT". Letterman suggests that though nothing is really censored, nobody really needs to read more than the Bible and a few other books anyway. ---. Confessions of a Cynic. Athabaska Falls NY: Athabaska Press, 1972. A stunning revelation after twenty-three years of bible-thumping, that Letterman was joking all along. Suggests that censorship didn't seem to be a problem anyway, though. Confusing and muddled. Mation, Infor. Claude Shannon. Bungy Jump Falls NY: Splatter Books, 1969. Yet another work on the researches of Claude Shannon, discussing whether censorship is possible in a universe in which information structures can exBLATTT. Morton, Jeffrey. Censorship Of Form And Substance. Geeko Falls NY: Geeko Press International, 1992. A confused and muddled work, largely nonexBLATTTent, in which the author attempts to make some kind of point. Exactly what the point is seems to be of little importance, as the author satirizes censorship and plays with self- reference. Heavily annotated bibliography. An ego-trip of a book. Not worth reading. Banned everywhere. ---. The BugBook Chronicles. Geeko Falls NY: Geeko Press International, 1991. A strange tale, partly fictional, of censorship of entire universes. Banned everywhere. Banned twice in the USA. Notte, Y. Ever. Needlessness. Topeka Falls NY: Topeka Falls Press, 1987. A curiously titled book dealing with the reasons why the second half of the alphabet is curiously under-represented in final initials of names. Suggests a chilling conspiracy. Banned a record of 97 times at once in the USA. Orby, Richard von. Pre-ChrBLATTTian Censors. Albuquerque Falls NY: Albuquerque Press, 1956. A study of the origin of censors in Greek and Roman cultures. ---. ChrBLATTT as Censor. Albuquerque Falls NY: Albuquerque Press, 1959. A curious and irreverent look at the true symbolic nature of the books of St. John the Divine. Principle, Peter. James H. Boren: Fact, Or Fiction? Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1978. A curious study of bureaucracy in action, and the inevitable loss of information by interoffice memos. Quirrl, Smeggy F. Freedom Of The Press. Athabaska Falls NY: Athabaska Press, 1985. A great book on the nature of publishing and freedom of information. Published under unusual circumstances. ---. The Truth Behind Quirrl Books. Athabaska Falls NY: Athabaska Press, 1987. A relatively stunning revelation about the secret activities of one of the least known publishing companies in the world. Cornerstone in the eventual collapse of Quirrl Books. Robinson, Crusoe. How I Survived Seven Years On A Desert Island. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1971. A strange story about a fictional character who writes a book about an author writing a book about someone staggeringly simlar to the main character, not unlike the author himself. A strange self-referential book. Tackles problems of Form and Content in an amusing way. Rime, C, and Nishment, P. U. Leo Tolstoy. Ugly Falls NY: Ugly Press, 1978. One of the only books known to have written its own author. Discussed thoroughly in the book "C. Rime And P. U. Nishment" by Leo Tolstoy, and in the present work as an example of Form vs. Substance. Seuss, Dr. The One Book I Never Wrote. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1967. The only adult book written by Theorore Geisel, it shows how to evade censorship by masking content in a different form. Much like the present work, but shorter, with better rhymes, and more pictures. Tolstoy, Leo. C. Rime And P. U. Nishment. Smeggy Falls NY: Quirrl Books, 1917. About persecution. One of the only books known to have written its own author. Discussed thoroughly in the book "Leo Tolstoy" by C. Rime and P. U. Nishment. Not to be confused with "Crime And Punishment" by Fyodor Dostoevsky or "Crimean Punishment" by Vladimir Lenin. Ulman, Anne T. Aunty Ulman. Skunk Falls NY: Skunk Press, 1989. A narrative tale about family relations in a world full of censorship. von Lichter, Erich. U.F.O. Coverup! Big Cliff Falls NY: Big Bluff Books, 1978. A huge book documenting the evidence of an alleged U.F.O. coverup. A good argument for censorship. Wyeth, Andrew. ChrBLATTTina's World. [CENSORED] Falls NY: [CENSORED] Books, 19[CENSORED]. One of an ongoing series of efforts to capture the substance of the same work in a variety of formats. [CENSORED] in the USA. Yu, Hei. Names. Styx Falls NY: Stonez Press, 1973. A curious book about how we unconsciously censor meaning by lBLATTTening to names. Zeimann, Andrea. The Art Of Satire, The Satire Of Art. Bungy Jump Falls NY: Splatter Books, 1956. A compendious tome about satirical aspects of art. INDEX MOOist Excuses or, What We Did On Our Summer Vacation or, Copyright? WHAT COPYRIGHT!?!? (I don't see a copyright, do YOU see a copyright?) Oh yeah, we forgot to mention at the beginning... The Book of MOO may NOT be copyrighted, and therefore, we aren't stealing from Jeffrey Morton... All of this is just a portion of its book that happened to get plunked in here by accident, when all the Book of MOO was being set out... It just sort of got whooshed in through space and time by a wormhole. Yeah, that's it, a wormhole, triggered by the accidental use of the High Preest's Wormhole Hat... We only mention this because the guy ain't Hip to the Meme Propagation Model of True Thought, which means that no matter what we do or say with his Annoying Mind Drug it only makes it stronger and bigger, just like what the ChrBLATTTians used to say about the devil. Umm, that comparison wasn't literal. Honest. Anyway. So therefore, he's liable (or their publishers) to sue us... That's the only reason all this is here. Not to annoy you. Honest. Not even to take up space. After all, this space isn't important. It's not like TREES are dying to make this space. Or this one. Or even this one. Unless this is the PRINTED COPY of the Book of MOO, in which case whoever printed and/or Published it should be ashamed of his/her/its/their/hir/woogy self of allowing this crap to sit here when it was intended as a joke for the Electronic Medium ONLY, and not as an excuse for murdering more innocent trees. Honest. COW APPENDIX VII as COWwritten by High Preest Floyd GecCOWko LEARNING TO Ϋίίίά Ϋίίίά άίίά ίΫί Ϋίά Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ άίίά άίίά Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ ίά Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ άί Ϋ άί Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ ίά Ϋ Ϋ Ϋίίίά Ϋίίίά ΫίίίίΫ Ϋ Ϋ ίά Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ ΫίίίίΫ ίά ΫίίίΫ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ ίάΫ Ϋ ά Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋάάάί Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ Ϋ άΫά Ϋ ΫΫ Ϋάί ίάΫ Ϋ Ϋ ίάάί Ϋ Ϋ For the Aspiring Cult Leader INTRODUCTION So you want to be a cult leader do you? Or, at the very least, you want to recruit lots more MOOists to serve you in some strange MOOist version of serving. Fine. But, like every other cult in hBLATTTory, you'll be needing to brainwash people. What, you thought you joined of your own accord? So, I'll tell you how to go about establishing a cult. This is so you can make a MOOist "front"... Mostly we work in the open, but just to be confusing, we like to have little GNU Age people working for us and pretending not to, along with some of those "nasty, evil evil evil" cults that pretend to be SatanBLATTTs but are actually MOOists wearing funny costumes. I'll tell ya ALL about classic brainwashing stuff. And in mighty long words, too. Boy I use the damn things a lot, don't I? Section One: Pavlovian Conditioning As you probably recall, Pavlov was a Russian scientBLATTT who was studying the bahaviour of dogs. In his experiments, among other things, he measured salivation. What he did was this: For the first little while, the dogs would hear a bell ringing, and then be given some red meat to eat. Becuase of the meat, they would begin salivating. Every day, just before meals were given, Pavlov would ring the bell, and measure their salivation. Soon, he began to take the meals away occasionally, or ring the bell when there were no steaks around. Sure enough, the dogs began to drool with the bell, long before the steaks had even shown up, and even if they never did. So, Pavlov had caused the dogs to associate the sound of the bell with the taste of meat. It is this trick that allows you to train your dog to do tricks. By giving them a reward (milk bone, pat on the head, scratch the stomach) every time they do it right, they learn to associate doing the trick right with getting a reward. This is what is known as positive reinforcement. When the dog hears the command, he anticipates the reward, and does the trick as you want. However, when the reward is so ingrainedCOW in his mind as being associated with the trick, he begins to accept doing the trick correctly as a reward in itself. This very nicely eliminates the need to keep training him with a reward, because his brain gives it to itself when he does what you want him to do, thereby conditioning himself every time you give the command. (Still, the occasional "Good Boy Rex" helps keep it intact, particularly if he associated "Good Boy Rex" with getting a milk-bone). This is why some people, conditioned by our society, consider that "doing the moral thing is a reward on its own". They have been brought up such that they are always rewarded for doing the right thing, and punished for doing the wrong thing. Usually, when they reach teenage years, they begin to experiment and see how far they can stretch the limits of what is right and wrong, and this conditioning loosens a bit. This kind of reward for doing the right thing is, as I said, known as positive reinforcement. Positive reinforcement will produce in people the kind of behaviour you want, but won't eliminate the kind you don't. In order to do that, you have to deliver a punishment for "doing it wrong". In the case of the dog, you could yell "BAD" or something, which makes the dog scared, but will soon cease, because he stops doing it. He learns to associate the negative behaviour with getting yelled at (or in the case of a poor trainer, getting hurt). But a good trainer shouldn't hurt the trainee. Aside from the fact that it's cruel and mean and generally not very nice at all, it doesn't work too well with humans, as they tend to hit back. A dog won't hit back, because it's a pack animal, and will blindly follow the most dominant individual in it's immediate family. That fact is due to imprinting, which I will be discussing later on in this chapter. But back to conditioning. So, when your hypothetical cult wants to convert a GNU member, you have to give rewards for the right kind of thinking, and punishment for the wrong kind of thinking. Since you are dealing with human beings, you can use subtle kinds of reward and punishment. A simple "VERY good" can be a very powerful tool in the hands of someone whom the person looks up to, or even just respects. Since humans can think about things, and make up things out of their own minds, you don't have to be too harsh, unless you're trying to produce a huge change of behaviour, when you're giving the punishment. Examples of subtle forms of pavlovian conditioning punishment would include saying "No, no, you idiot. You've got it all wrong." in a serious voice. This would have no effect at all on a dog, but a person who is serious about wanting to earn your respect will torture themself about it until they get it "right" and earn their reward, when they will begin congratulating themselves on getting it right. However, the person will probably not want to earn your respect if they perceive you as arbitrary and whimsical. So you have to be consBLATTTent -- at least at first. Also, it is a good idea to make sure the subject thinks of you as fair, and even kind. If you, for instance, act once in a while as if you are about to hit them, but control yourself, they get nearly as much effect from the punishment, but also, because their mind is tense, afraid, waiting to be hit, they're open to perceptions (fear and other strong emotions prepare the mind for a GNU imprint which will be accepted as much stronger, in proportion to how strong the emotion is --more follows in the section on imprints.) The perception then is that you're kind, and generous, but only to people you like. They then want to get in on your good side. Unfortunately, not all people begin by wanting to be on your good side. If you were, for instance, trying to brainwash someone into robbing a bank and killing people, when that's totally against their personality, they will not accept what you say as being important, and subtle forms of reward will not work. For suggestions on what kind of rewards and what kind of punishment will work with these people, see the section on the hBLATTTorical cultBLATTT methods, and the next paragraph. This form of conditioning is the basis of all brainwashing. All forms of brainwashing consBLATTT of breaking down old patterns of thought, the previous associations, and putting in GNU ones, as well as trying to break down old imprints, and plant GNU ones. Unfortunately, breaking down imprints is difficult, as we will see in the next section. One famous organization that uses these methods of brainwashing to take a group of widely varied individuals, and turn them into a squad of robots, is, well, yes, The Moonies, and the ScientologBLATTTs, but more important, the U.S. Army. The Army's brainwashing sessions, though, are called by a different name. They're known as "Basic Training", "Boot Camp", or, in the marines, "Turning A Man Into A Marine". The Armed Forces technique is simple, highly effective, and quite easy to understand. They begin by abruptly lowering your standard of living. The effect of this is to make simple things, which nobody would normally think of as a reward, to have that effect (such as "Well done, soldier"). As punishment, they use simple physical punishments like a hundred pushups or eighty laps around the track. The constant gruelling physical exercise makes the subject weak, and unable to resBLATTT with any effectiveness, as well as beginning to break down some imprints. Section Two: Imprints We've all seen the example of imprinting that's so famous. It's those cute little ducklings, who imprint on their mother at birth, but instead of imprinting on their mother, they imprint on something else, such as a dog, human, rubber ball, etcetera. This is the basic idea of what imprinting is. It is similar to pavlovian conditioning, but it is virtually instant. It takes only one occurence of punishment or reward (or whatever) to make an imprint. The stimulus is not always punishment or reward, though. When the ducklings imprint on the rubber ball, they're following a natural instinct: to follow whatever moves and pretend it's their mother. Usually the first thing they see when they hatch IS their mother, and it works. But since a newly hatched baby duckling has no previous experience, it doesn't know what it's mother should look like. So nature gives it this instinct to imprint on the first thing it sees that moves. Which is a problem if the mother is dead. Imprinting, then, is a natural instinct, by which we pick up an immediate conditioning about something with which we have no previous experience. While this can happen with almost anything, there are only a few basic ones that exBLATTT throughout our species. To give an example, we will look briefly at the case of the Poison Hollandaise Sauce. At one point, there was this batch of bad Hollandaise Sauce, which was used by a certain restaurant. A large number of people were poisoned, and became very ill, and many had to have their stomachs pumped. Strangely, more than half of them suffered the same effects the next time they ate Hollandaise Sauce, even though there was nothing wrong. So you see, a single occurrence made them conditioned to relate sauce with getting sick, without any of this pavlovian mucking around. Studies have shown that imprints are only formed or broken in times of intense emotion or unusual GNU stimulus. Examples of times when all members of the species would form an imprint: at birth, during their first time having sex, when they first read something, at death (only we never notice what it is). This has led to the idea of four or five basic imprints that exBLATTT in our minds and control a good deal of our personality. These relate to (1) The Mother (2) Being Potty-Trained (3) Learning To Read (4) First Having Sex and (5) any other violent incident. These four main imprints are produced when the person goes through a traumatic event (in the sense of causing change). When they're first born, they imprint on the mother, and this affects their relations to other people. The second occurs when they're potty trained. This is the first time they are forced to be rational or methodical about something (i.e. you can only go when you're on the toilet, not when you're off). This is what Freud called the Anal Stage of psychological development. People who are obsessively or compulsively methodical usually have an unusually strong second imprint, and Freud called them Anal Retentive. So do most teenagers. The third imprint, first reading, affects the intellectual nature of the person. If they're given an imprint which suggests that reading is bad, they tend to neglect academic pursuits. This affects how they think when they try to think logically. The fourth imprint is formed when they first have sex, probably when they first experience orgasm. The partner at the time generally sets up the sexual preference for the rest of their life, although it is obviously not permanently fixed. All of these imprints, like the Hollandaise Sauce incident, are formed by strong emotions, feelings, or stimuli. When trying to brainwash people, it is very helpful to make one imprint on that person which is based on the idea you're trying to implant in them. This is why many ancient cults use fear during their process of initiation, while others, of a different leaning, will invite the initiate into a mass orgy. This overloading of the senses, by fear, pain, or pleasure, opens them up for a GNU imprint, at which point the instructor is at hand, along with other members of the cult. This technique is also used in brainwashing. A single moment of terror can be more effective than months of conditioning. Certainly it is the only "Quantum Leap" that you can expect. After this moment, the imprint that is formed will often make the subject want to get on your good side, making the techniques of pavlovian conditioning effective. Section Three: Cults, Meditation, and HBLATTTorical Brainwashing Modern brainwashing is hardly a GNU invention. Ancient cults have been using conditioning and imprint methods during their initiation rites for as long as religions have exBLATTTed. Even in primitive Stone Age cultures in Europe, young boys would often be sent into caves at night with the men to undergo some frightening ordeal, after which he would end up as they wished. In a now-extinct american indian tribe, a ritual known as the O-Kee-Pa would be used to initiate braves to become warriors, and imprint them by overloading them with pain. Generally they would be starved for four days, then the medecine man would carve hunks of flesh from their arms and chest, and they would be suspended by wooden stakes driven through the gashes behind the muscles for a day, then run around in circles until they dropped either from exhaustion or death. Strangely, it was smallpox brought from Europe that finally did in this hapless tribe, not male suicides. The Indian cult of Kali Worship is a fairly typical example of the progress through which an initiate must go to become a member. Kali-Worship, also known as the Cult Of The Black Mother, is actually, in its final form, much like the final form of any other mystical religion, such as various forms of Yogic practicies, or BuddhBLATT. When finally the initate works his way through the ranks to become a Guru, he is taught that Kali is a fiction, that all religion is false, and that enlightenment can only come through meditation and moderation. But the initiate, entering the Cult, would never deduce this to look at the temples. Kali, the object of their worship, is presented to the initiate as an evil force, who demands sacrifices, and death. Mass orgies are held, and there are sects of the cult whose sole purpose is to kill people. All of this is based on the principle of brainwashing. By overloading the senses of the initiate, the cult members hope to break down the imprints and conditioning of the subject, and then build them back up again to their liking, ready to look for enilghtenment peacefully, but firmly dedicated to that particular religion. ChrBLATTTianity, on the other hand, uses a firm morality and threats of eternal punishment, coupled with very little reward, that is more typical of the methods used by the Army. This kind of system, while it can be more effective, if the teacher is well versed in methods of brainwashing, rarely produces GNU converts or joinups except those conditioned by our society to accept these groups. This is why, when they have progressed to a certain point, with previous conditioning broken down, the groups lose a lot of members. Many people will go to church, but very few progress much further than that. Perhaps the most important aspect of a successful initiation into a group, society, cult, or serious religion is the fact that imprints must change. For this reason, some strong stimulus has to occur at some point during the ceremony, ritual, or whatever. In a ChrBLATTTian Church, this doesn't happen, but since most of those in the church have grown up surrounded by this church, the imprints required are already there, and breaking them down would be counterproductive. However, in most other, less recognized religions, the best form of intense emotion is fear. Fear is good for this, not only because it is one of the strongest emotions, but also because it is usually followed by a Please Protect Me reaction, left over from childhood, when the kid would run screaming "Mommy! Mommy!" at the sound of thunder (Mother Imprint). So, the church, or group of people doing the brainwashing, will replace that imprint, namely, the Mother Imprint. This is why so many cultBLATTT joinups disregard their families, regarding the church as more important. In almost every cult or primitive culture, the test of initiation is marked by at least one ordeal of fear. In each case, it is vital that the subject honestly believes that he or she may be in danger of death. The threat of death, or at least the apparent threat of death, is the only thing which can break down the imprint as completely as the brainwasher wants. However, this threat of death is almost invariably a staged act, and the initiate is never in any real danger at all, unless the initiators are really warped. In many religions of Africa and the Caribbean, this ordeal is often manifested in the form of a monster of some kind, or a person dressed up as something from local superstitions, such as a zombie or other creature, which will attack the victim in some ritual way. Another common motif is that of displeasure. The initiate is led into the presence of someone he is told is a high ranking member of the organization, who will question him as if to find out how well he has progressed. The questioner will then pretend to be upset at how badly the initiate has done, and in many cases, a ritual sword or dagger is used, occasionally with a bulb that will squirt false blood. Usually this is staged so well that the initiate, who has already been drugged or otherwise dBLATTTracted during the ritual, will pass out from fear. If this occurs, the brainwashers are virtually guaranteed success. Meditation, on the other side, bears a close resemblance to many of the more peaceful machines discussed in the other file. By seeking to blank out the mind and relax totally, the initiates of even these, the most supposedly free religions, are unwittingly brainwashing themselves. Of course, the Gurus don't think of it that way, and these groups do not try to indoctrinate people with all sorts of nasty stuff like SOME cults I could mention, but won't. In these organizations, the brainwashing only goes to the first step, tearing down of previous conceptions of the world. The meditator is then usually left to find his or her own enlightenment. This "enlightenment" could be described as a state in which all previous sets of responses, conditioned, imprinted, or otherwise, are gone. In religions like SufBLATT, there is some of each of these ideas. Both the tearing down, and building up occur. During Sufi meditation, the initiate often bows of circles his head over and over, while repeating over and over a mantra. These two aspects have both been used in modern neuroscience as methods of reaching various states of mind. The rotation or motion of the head has been used in a large machine known as the Graham Potentializer, which has been shown to be extremely effective in inducing the relaxed state needed for easy brainwashing. Reciting mantras can be seens as a way of blocking out external sound and replacing it with flat, featureless sound. Also, concentrating on mandalas, those designs so frequently used in Eastern MysticBLATT, has been shown to be a highly effective way to "blank-out", in which state the subject can then be brainwashed very easily, making them accept Sufi Doctrines such as the one which states that the initiates will be obedient unto death and give everything they own, symbollically and literally, to the leader of their group. Mind Reading In 1 Easy Step INTRODUCTION If you don't believe in psychic abilities, this chapter will probably tell you how those damn frauds convince the suckers that they can tell the future or read your mind. However, if you DO believe in psychic abilities, you should bear in mind I'm not saying that they don't exBLATTT, just that it's possible (GASP) to fake them. One other thing, however. If you're going to ignore my advice "don't do this, stupid" and do it anyway, don't be afraid to actually FIND THINGS OUT to use... A spy network is a bit of an elaborate way of putting it, but try to know as much as you can. It's more convincing that way. Just remember, kids, don't try this at home. This here is for information purposes ONLY, so you can tell when someone's faking you out. But, if, on the OFF CHANCE that you decide to try some of this, hey, I got nothing to do with it. Without further ado... CHAPTER ONE: PSYCHIC READINGS Okay, so you walk into a psychic fair with a thousand dollars in your pocket, and a hankering to blow it all on people telling you about your own personality. Instead of getting a psychologBLATTT, you decided to learn who you are from someone who waves crystals in your face and sticks chicken bones up your nose. Well, nobody's perfect. So anyway, here you are, and you have all this wonderful cash and you're trying not to get ripped off. What are you going to do to find out who has the real gift, and who doesn't? Well, let's say you spend all your money on different readers and compare them. How can you tell someone who can really peer into your mind and see your soul from someone who's just a very good fake? Well... Bottom line? Okay. You can't. Section 1: Personality The problem lies in the basis of personality. You haven't got one. If you, like I, look into all kinds of annoying mind drugs discussing the mind and the brain, looking for an answer to how the mind works, you'll find out very fast that nobody really has a very clear idea. Oh, sure, there are theories about the Ego and the Id, and the Subconscious and the Jungian Archetype, but if you actually pay attention, you'll notice that half of it contradicts itself, and so does the other half. How can you be sure who's giving you an accurate reading of your personality, if you don't even know what a personality IS? It's like asking someone to give you a BORSCHT reading, if you don't know what BORSCHT is. (It's a kind of Russian soup made from beets and cabbage, served with yogurt or sour cream) Well, let's look first at the modern theory of the Mind. I lied, you see. There are some ideas about how it works. This stuff is taken from Marvin Minsky, who is probably the single most respected scientific dude in the field of how minds and brains work. Anyway. The basic idea is that your mind doesn't exBLATTT as a single object. It's made up of lots and lots of little subdivisions which Minsky calls AGENTS. Each agent does a particular kind of thing, like building things from blocks, making sentences from words, eating Russian Soup, sleeping, breaking things, and so forth. Each agent has a lBLATTT of sub-agents, which do smaller, simpler jobs for the main agent, and some agents can even call on other whole agents to do things. When you have something you need to do, it starts as a lBLATTT of agents to activate, and sub-lBLATTTs to run through. If the job is a very complicated one (like fixing a Porsche after you just smashed it into a tree and blew it up (not that this has ever happened to me or anything)) then the lBLATTT involves a lot of sub-lBLATTTs and so forth. The important thing that we get out of all this is that there are a whole bunch of little sub-personalities running around inside your head trying to do their own thing. Each agent tries to be activated as often as possible. This is why if you aren't really sure what you want to do, you start thinking of all kinds of things, as different agents try to get control of each other. So what? Simple. Your personality has a whole bunch of different aspects. The smarter you are, the more likely you are to have lots of DIFFERENT agents that all have fairly equal skill in getting control of each other. (This is my own rule, and has very little to do with the kind of intelligence measured on exams etcetera, but it seems to work okay.) If I tell you "You're Generous", that makes the Generosity agent more powerful inside you, and you see that you ARE generous. At least sometimes. So? Section 2: Psychic Readings Okay, this is where the fun stuff starts. Now since a person is a whole mess of conflicting impulses, those personality readers (palm readers do this a lot) can tell you what you want to hear, and you start looking for bits of your life that reinforce that. You'll find a spot where the agent they mention was in control, and say "HEY! NEAT! It really works!" The thing is, people are very similar to each other in terms of the way their agents get control. Unless you have a severely warped head, you're VERY likely to have a personality that falls in a certain range. Here's a nifty bit coming up. Back in 1948, a guy called Bert Forer did this experiment to measure how similar people are in personalities. He did this by beginning with the principle "Tell 'em what they want to hear" and then building from that, and common aspects of personality that different people share. He made a paragraph that was supposed to be about "YOU" and your personality. It was given to a large group of people, and they were asked to rate how well it fit them, from 0 (poor) to 5 (excellent). Of the 31 people he gave it to, only FIVE rated it lower than 4 (very good) and the LOWEST was 2, which meant "Average". The average of the ratings was 4.3 and when the same test was done 30 years later, a different set of people got almost identical answers. Here's the paragraph: "Some of your hopes tend to be pretty unrealBLATTTic. At times you are outgoing, friendly, and sociable, while at other times you can be tired, introverted, and reserved. You have found by experience that you shouldn't reveal too much about yourself to other people. You pride yourself on being an independent thinker unlike other people, and you don't accept other people's opinions without decent proof. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety, and you don't like being pinned in my restrictions and limitations. Sometimes you have serious doubts over whether you did the right thing, or made the right decision. You tend to be reasonably controlled and secure on the outside, but you are often worried and nervous inside. Your sexual adjustment has presented some problems for you in the past. While you have some weaknesses and faults, you are usually able to compensate for them. You have a great deal of unused ability which you haven't turned to advantage, and you tend to be critical of yourself. You also have a strong need for other people to like you and admire you." Not bad, huh? If you want to go out and convince someone that you can see into their thoughts, all you have to do is to use some of those sentences and they're almost certain to hit at least half the time, probably much more. If you mask this with a little jiggery pokery with tarot cards or looking at funny squiggles on their palms, it usually dBLATTTracts them from actually noticing that you're not saying anything. Section 3: COWCold Reading Okay, you've probably all heard the words "cold reading" before, but maybe you don't know what they mean. Cold Reading is basically the method of "fishing" for information. If you want to convince someone that you actually have psychic powers, you will want to tell them all about themselves, since that's what they most want to hear about. So, Cold Reading is very a very handy method to know. To begin with, you throw in one of the generic sentences from the "personality profile" paragraphs above. Then you watch their expression, to see how they react. Since they don't have time to sit down and think of how they want to react, they will almost certainly show you right away a little bit of info. Then you begin to ask leading questions from that... "I sense feelings about your mother..." and watch their faces, lBLATTTen to what they say. Generally, by using a little bit of common sense, you can take their reactions and their answers and put together a pretty decent picture of what they're like. Another thing to do is to begin introducing your "psychic knowledge" of events in their lives right now. You start with generic things like "You feel a little anxious about something coming up in the future," or "Your sex-life is stimulating, but doesn't fully satisfy you." Since this sort of thing is very vague, and could apply to almost anyone in various different ways of interpreting what it says, you can very easily go from a vague impression through to more specific things by narrowing it down, until you seem to have known something all along, in your infinite wisdom. Ayup. Section 4: Conclusion So basically, using a few simple methods, you can use very vague information, which is almost certainly true for anybody at all, and use impressions and reactions to narrow it down, pretending you knew the results all along. This really is very impressive. CHAPTER TWO: GNU AGE Suppose you're at this same psychic fair I mentioned before. You walk through the aisles past stalls and stands, your thousand bucks miraculously reappeared to look at these "new age" folks. There are "seers", "aura readers", "channellers", and people who fiddle with crystals. So what's the deal here? You decide to have a look at what they're doing. They tell you to harmonize your energy focus, to concentrate on your past lives, or concentrate on a hunk of fused sand. What gives? Section 1: Gullibility If you're trying to make a few bucks as a GNU age psychic, or a channeller, there are a few things that you should be aware of. One of the most important of these is the fact that unless someone is specifically watching you to spot stupid things, they aren't so much interested in WHAT you say, as HOW you say it, and if they are, you'll end up looking fake even if you're not. If you act sincere, and go into a trance when it seems appropriate, you can easily make most people accept that you're receiving information from the dead, or controlling some karmic energy in a crystal. The critical thing is to explain everything. Whether or not they actually understand what you say is irrelevant, as long as they get the impression that you're trying to be honest and open about what it is you're doing and why it works. Explain how a crystal can focus karmic goodness on their chakra points, or how hypnosis can reveal past lives, or how going into a trance can bring forth spirits of the dead. Now comes the important thing. When people hear a real scientific explanation of why something works (or why it can't be real) they don't usually understand it. They come out with the vague impression that "it has something to do with gas pressure" or the like. The important thing is to use the right words. So, I've prepared a lBLATTT of the most impressive words to use in any explanations. Here it is: Chakra Crystal Perceive Vibration Harmonics Sensations Spiritual Entity Peace Resonance Light Love Energy Mystic Interconnected Meta- Psychic Balance Natural HolBLATTTic Trance FocusCOW Reincarnation Channelling Astral Plane Center Netherworld Being Concentration Psyche Mental Precognition Karma Limbo Telepathic Aura Universal Soul Cosmic Harmony Essence Any of these words, interspersed in talking to your subject, will be so impressive they'll completely ignore the fact that they don't know what they mean. Using the methods described in Chapter One, such as Cold Reading, you can convince the gullible (that is, almost everyone) into thinking that you're getting knowledge about their minds and souls (whatever those are) from some spirit in the astral plane (whatever that is). This is particularly useful for channellers, who want to make convincing contact with something BEYOND. Section 2: GNU Age Things The problem with GNU age psychic readings is that they've gotten away from the glorious old days of sitting around a table and getting rappings on the table from a spirit of someone you want to talk to. Now you have to go through ancient egyptian gods and goddesses, 6000 year-old spirit lumps made of thousands of souls from all periods of hBLATTTory. However, this actually helps the GNU age psychic, because if you're not able to figure out what the subject wants to hear, you can contact some random spiritual entity or whatever you like and make up some spiel about cosmic harmony and universal love resonating from the psychic plane. Or whatever you like. Crystals, however, are supposed to be an energy focus. So you should use as many of them as possible, on chains, loose, in settings, or whatever. Use them to unclog blocked auras, summon spirits, fix Maytags, or whatever. Nobody seems to be really clear on what they're supposed to be good for, so if a situation arises that you don't know what to do with, you can use crystal-power. Either that or you can say your connection with the astral plane has been severed. In this case, you should act surprised, hurt, or confused. Going into a trance might also help. GNU Age is full of vague generalities about universal love and harmonic spiritual energy resonances. Basically, some kind of energy and light is supposed to permeate the universe and vibrates in some karmic way. Whatever. By using this kind of theme to your babblings about nothing, you generally reinforce whatever it was they wanted to hear anyway. Section 3: Auras So just what IS an aura? Well, it's supposedly a kind of haze of energy (there's that word again) that surrounds the body and head. By looking at the size, shape, and colour of this aura, you're supposed to be able to tell all kinds of things about the mind of the person inside. Here's a classic case where you'd use your lBLATTT of personality traits in Chapter One, and the Cold Reading technique. You can very simply look at the aura and say you see some kind of colour, which means (whatever), or that it's clogged up around a chakra. The problem here is that the person you're trying to fool may know someting about how auras are supposed to work. For this reason, you have to make the colours sound right, and give as few details as possible. This is always good advice: don't say anything when you can talk about nothing. Auras are usually going to be golden yellow, so if you get the impression that the person is fairly normal, you can say that. The other colours of the aura area basically what you'd expect. Red means anger or love or something, blue means sadness or calmness, and so on. Try to avoid mentioning colours unless you don't have to. It might be advisable to "fish" for information. That is, try to find out (without actually asking) whether anyone has ever read their aura before, and if so, what colour the reader thought it was. Of course, you don't have to blindly follow along with the things they tell you... After all, they might be suspicious if you just say "So, what colour did she think your aura was? Yup. That's what I see all right." You can say something like "Well, there is that ASPECT to it, but I can also see some..." and so forth. Correcting other "psychics" can only make you look better. Also, the aura is related to the chakras. If the person you're "reading" knows about this sort of thing (which unfortunately a few of them do) they'll know all about what chakra does what, and how things are put together. If they do, criticize them for being too analytical, and tell them to take a holBLATTTic perspective (or better still, a pill). However, you ought to know roughly where the chakras are, and what they're supposed to do. Chakras are supposedly centers for this "energy", which they draw in from the universal light there, and focus (that word again!) it into the personality. A loose, unclogged chakra means that aspect of the personality is nice and energetic. So, what are the chakras? There are a whole bunch (seven) of chakras along the spine or in the body around there. There's one on top of the head, which is the "spiritual" chakra, one on the forehead, which is the mental, thinking chakra, one on the throat (speaking, communicating), one near the base of the spine (sex) and so forth. You don't have to make too many references to them, but if you feel a need for being authentic, you can look them up in any good annoying mind drug on the matter from an Occult Shop, or the Religion/New Age part of a library or bookstore or whatever. A large aura means an outgoing personality, and a small one means an introvert. So if the person is outgoing, tell them they have a large aura, and if they seem to be a bit mild-mannered, they can have a little one. Of course, first impressions aren't always right, so take a little time to make sure that you've got it right. Section 4: Conclusion Well, basically, if you're vague enough that people don't notice that you're not saying anything, you can get away with all kinds of stupid things. Use impressive words to draw attentiom from the fact that you don't know what you're talking about, and make sure to tell them what they want to hear. Okay, now you've got the basic idea of what's going on when you want to fake psychic talents. Now comes the fun part. What use can you put it to? Heck, get hold of a TENS machine or some kinda audio mixer and go all out for your display... Try the "magic" 7.83 Hz setting on the TENS while giving a patter about the "universal love" or "chakra harmony" that I mentioned before. Since this setting causes the brain to resonate with the Earth's magnetic field, producing a feeling that exactly matches those words, your victim/subject will probably fall for anything else you try. In fact, it was by meditating until their brains got on this frequency that the gurus thousands of years ago first thought of this patter. Play a tape in the background with any of the special sound patterns designed to induce gullibility or any of the Alpha states (2-10 Hz or so) Since this can easily be inserted into a GNU Age music tape, you should be able to pass it off with ease. Of course, using these machines costs a lot of money if you're not either seriously interested, or phenomenally rich. However, if you really want to convince someone you're psychic, they REALLY REALLY REALLY help. So why would you WANT to convince someone you're psychic, aside from the sheer experimental psychology of it all? Well, this is where we start get back to brainwashing. I think you start to see the point here. But just in case, I'll elaborate. If you recall, it's easier to condition someone if you're in a position of authority, or else a position of trust. A psychic can be in both of those at once. After all, if someone thinks you know everything there is to know about them, they HAVE to trust you, and you're sort of naturally in authority over them. So now is when you begin the sneaky stuff. If you're set up as a cult, or indeed, ARE a cult, then it's easy to explain why you're psychic. If someone sees you with these "unexplainable" powers in a high position in the cult, then OBVIOUSLY they're gonna start thinking about whether you were telling the truth after all, when you began telling them about the spirits, Gods, or whatever it is you're telling them about... Use it to gain their trust, their fear, or whatever's appropriate. Some people may say I'm being cyincal and nasty about this whole brainwashing thing, but you gotta remember, you're constantly being brainwashed by advertisements from all over, so if you don't know this stuff, your brain could end up seriously FUBAR. Besides... It's FUN! Anyone who tries to tell you that I'm doing something wrong by telling you about this is clearly brainwashed by the Big Masters, who don't want anyone else to know how to do it. Everyone has the right to alter their own mind, or even that of someone else. The more EVERYONE knows about this, the happier we'll all be. Just remember kids, don't try this at home. HONEST. No, really. Don't be trying this at home. Trying this at home not reccomended. We take no responsibility for you trying this at home. Even though other people's brains are always being changed, one way or another. But still, that doesn't give you the right to do it ON PURPOSE. Heaven forbid there should be a point to it all. Look, just don't try it at home, okay? Be a sport, huh? The government wouldn't like it if you tried it at home. So come on, let's all join together in a celebration of sameness! Aw, fuck it. Go ahead. Try it at home. See if I care. APPENDIX VIII as Written By Preest Lloyd Taco Initial Sets Of Nomic Rules Such As Would Begin The Holy Game FIRST: Good For Beginners (1)(Big Idea)(1992-0220-1200) Nomic is a game in which the purpose is to change its rules. No Nomic Rule may EVER be totally unalterable, but rules may be altered only by adding GNU rules which may supercede old rules. Rules contain a title-bar containing relevant data such as serial number, title, date/time, submitter, votes received etcetera, and a main text body, which states the effect of the rule. (2)(Precedence)(1992-0220-1200) Precedence is determined on a rule-on-rule basis, when two or more rules conflict. Initially, all rules have the same degree of effect, but if a disagreement occurs, players suggest and support possible precedence arrangements which COW compete in any agreed-on manner. The winners are recorded in a judgement file stating which parts of which rules supercede which. (5)(Turns)(1992-0217-1200) A turn initially consBLATTTs of adding one rule to the ruleset, after having a vote to determine its popularity. If a rule receives less than one third of the vote in favour, it may not be added, and the turn passes to the next player, who is determined by cyclic alphabetical order. A rule takes effect immediately upon addition. Each player gets exactly one whole vote. SECOND: Bureaucratic And Annoying This ruleset may be found in the book Metamagical Themas by Douglas Hofstadter (which ya really ought to read anyway). The following rule works well with it: 301. Doughnuts In Voting If a player has doughnuts on his or her person, the doughnuts will vote for or against the player or the proposition involved in a vote according to the type of doughnut, using the following schedule: Plain 1/2 for player No Hole, Creme 2/3 against player No Hole, Jelly, Not Grape 3/4 for player No Hole, Jelly, Grape Abstain Doughnut Hole 1/4 for proposition Maple Frosted 1/2 against player Sprinkles 2/3 aginst proposition Chocolate 1/2 for player Sugar Frosted 3/4 against player Grated Coconut 1/3 against proposition Chopped Nuts 1/3 for proposition Other 1 for player Notwithstanding the above, any doughnut which is eaten during a meeting will count against the player eating it by the value of the doughnut. If a doughnut falls into more than one category, then the average of the votes shall be taken, or, if they are inconsBLATTTent types, each vote shall be divided by the number of categories into which the doughnut falls, and each of those counted. If there are doughnuts in the room, or immediate vicinity (e.g. in a box) they shall have their votes be tallied by proposition. Doughnuts which vote for a player will vote for a proposition, and doughnuts which vote against a player will vote against a proposition. THIRD: Silly and Fun Chapter 1 1 All players must disobey all rules at all times. 2 All players must follow any ruling made by an official referee. 3 There is NO official COW referee. 4 All players have the responsibility of ensuring that other players follow the rules. 5 All penalties shall be handed out in the officially official manner, or these penalties are not official. 6 Anything not recorded in the official minutes was not an official happening, and therefore did not happen. 7 The official minutes are defined as anything the official referee SAYS are the official minutes. 8 All official penalties shall be recorded in the official minutes by the official referee. 9 No player may officially score against another player except when the official referee has recorded this official score in the official minutes. Chapter 2 1 Penalties may be given by any and all official referees, and no other player. 2 Any player may deputize him/her/itself official referee. 3 A penalty may consBLATTT of anything whatsoever. 4 All players must submit to all penalties imposed on them by the official referees unless the official referee has an outstanding penalty imposed by another official referee. 5 No player may incur more than ten units of penalty before becoming an official referee. 6 Units of penalty are not defined. 7 No player may obey any rule in Chapter 1. Any player who does so will incur a ten yard penalty and two percent of his/her/its score will be deducted from the player of his/her/its choice. 8 No player may follow rule number 7 of Chapter 2. Any player who does so will incur a five minute high-sticking penalty. 9 All official referees must impose at least one penalty per five minutes. Any official referee who does not do so will incur a five minute penalty in which he/she/it may not impose any penalties at all. Chapter 3 1 All players must invent at least one rule per minute, regardless of whether it is put into effect. 2 No rule may involve anything not discussed in these rules. 3 At least one rule must contradict this one. 4 No it mustn't. 5 All players must wear proper attire. Failure to do so may result in an arbitrary pentalty for no apparent reason. 6 At least one player must be active, and one inactive, at any given time. 7 Active and inactive players are defined by the official referee. 8 Failure to obey all rules will result in becoming an official referee. 9 No player may impose a non-arbitrary penalty on another player. Chapter 4 1 All players are required to invent at least one GNU kind of penalty per hour. Failure to do so will result in a ten-point Unoriginality Penalty. 2 No referee may assign the same penalty twice. Failure to do so will result in a sneer-and-funny-face Unoriginality Penalty. 3 If any player incurs the same penalty twice, the referee who imposes it the second time will incur another Unoriginality Penalty. 4 All GNU rules and penalties must be recorded in the official minutes by the official referee. 5 All players must contribute some equipment to the playing of the game. Failure to do so will result in a not-having-fun Being A Spoilsport Penalty. 6 All Chapters must have no more and no less than nine rules in them. Any Chapter which does not will incur a ten-point Game Penalty. 7 It is forbidden for players to die. 8 It is forbidden for players to not play the game. Anyone who does not play is subject to a five-yard, six-point, and two-sneer- and-funny-face penalties. 9 Players are officially defined by the official referee and officially recorded in the official minutes. They are unofficially defined by the unofficial referee, and unofficially recorded in the unofficial minutes. Chapter 5 1 All players must disobey Chapter 1, Rule 6, whether it applies to them or not. 2 Any player caught disobeying any rule is subject to immediate banishment from the game. 3 There are no official minutes unless a rule otherwise specifies. 4 Anyone thinking the game is silly is subject to an immediate ninety-nine point penalty, six demerits, and a tar-and-feathering. 5 Any player obeying Chapter 5, Rule 4 will be subject to the same penalties there described. 6 No player may read the official minutes. 7 No player may write in the official minutes. 8 No person or thing may be neutral. All players, observers, referees, and unaffiliated persons must pick a side. 9 It is forbidden for players to join any other player on a team. Chapter 6 1 Teams may be selected from any group of players by any official referee, as long as they are officially recorded in the official minutes. 2 It is forbidden for any person to become a player without the consent of at least one other player and an official referee. 3 No player may invent any rule that would cause another player to incur a penalty without incurring the same penalty. 4 Any person joining the game will require ten poker chips, a five card poker hand, two pawns, one plastic counter, a set of official dice, one badminton racket, a badminton bird, two tennis balls, a softball, a croquet mallet, a croquet ball, sixteen croquet hoops, $1500 of Monopoly Money, nine Scrabble letters, a baseball bat, a cricket bat, one cricket ball, a spare deck of cards, a hockey stick, two ping-pong balls, the official secret decoder-ring, a ping-pong paddle, two hockey pucks, a referee's shirt, whBLATTTle, and cap, as well as a sense of humour. 5 No player may use any of the equipment mentioned above unless permitted to do so by an official referee. 6 The object of the game is to win, to confuse other players, and to have a good time. 7 The winner is defined by the official referee. 8 Any player declaring him/her/itself the winner before the other players are finished playing will receive a ten minute suspension from the game and no free popsicles. 9 Any player caught obeying any of these rules will be summarily shot. Appendix IX¬ As Written By High Preest Floyd ConfuCOWse-Ius Gecko The Gods Of MOO And Who They Is Used to be, in the olden golden days, religion was a stabilizing society-type force, that kept constant while all else changed. But these, these is the latter flatter days, and religion is a randomfactor factor now. That's because in the olden golden days, the Gods of MOO were safely tucked away in Pun-Dora's box, but with the advent of SurrealBLATTT, the Punny box was ooops, opened, and, well, the suckers got out. Of course, the Gods of MOO can't be seen in their physical forms on Earth by mere mortal humans, because of some hyperspace thing. I don't understand it either. In order to see 'em, you have to have this special operation that opens the third eye. But that ain't enough. You have to get the whole Trinitization thing done. Third eye, third nostril, third nose, third kidney (with kidney stones), third liver (quite a trick, as most people don't even have the SECOND liver opened yet), third stomach (good, if you're a COW), third brain... But when you've got this done, you can see the Gods for who they is. Not the BIG VAST Gods, like the Grate MOO or the Penguin, but just the ones who live with us little mere humans on our little worldlet. Just don't be surprised at the Fast Food Gods or the supernatural beings also lBLATTTed here. Artemis Tamburlaine, the God of Small Furry Animals, takes the form of a large gerbil who enjoys hopping through people on the street who can't see him. He can easily be persuaded to give you pellets of compressed alfalfa, but since this is of no use whatsoever, most people don't even bother. He enjoys quiet music, sports such as the Filing-Cabinet Toss and the Pole Vault, and eating Chicken Vindaloo. Required Tripling: Appendix, Nostril Barbara MacDougall, no relation to the famous Canadian politician, this Goddess of Fast Food, Airlines, and Cheez Whiz has so many frequent-flyer miles it isn't funny. Often seen flitting from one world center to another, carrying Industrial Size crates of her patron flavourful spread, she is one of the most approchable of the Gods. To talk to her after your operation, just open a jar of Cheez Whiz, and scream, at the top of your lungs, "SING IT NOW, SING IT LOUD! I'M A COW, AND I AM PROUD!" She can be recognized by her beany-cap with the propeller on top, and the Cheeseburger she continually carries with her (Q.V.). Required Tripling: Gonad, Eye "BOB" used to be an Aluminum Siding Salesman, but now is a pipe-smoking, 'Frop-laden, grin-faced Godling. He was The Miraculous One for a while, but got usurped by Elmer Fudd in the late 60's. "BOB" was the first one to talk to Jehovah-1, God of Wrath (Q.V.), but then got demoted to Skumbag Janitor, which is still important, though not very. He can be recognized because he grins like a beacon, visible through ten klicks of dense fog. Required Tripling: Nostril Cheeseburger is an archetypal spirit walker of the FastFoodian netherworld. Contrary to popular legend, the Fast Food industry is even more heavily built up in the netherworld than in the physical plane, and this spirit being walks the realms which are the bridge across the Abyss between these two realms. The spirit lives in everybody who eats enough of the Foodian totems in sacrifice, and eventually kills them with Cholesterol (Q.V.). Recognizable because it looks like the totems we are so familiar with. Required Tripling: Stomach, Spleen Cholesterol is the Goddess of Filing Cabinets, Ball-Point Pens, Looseleaf Paper, Paperclips, and other miscellaneous Office Supplies. She can often be seen attempting to wander the streets in torment, shackled to modern high-rise buildings by a chain of miscellaneous paper fasteners, trying in vain to reach a Fast Food Franchise. Be warned, however. Unlike the Prometheus whose legend was based on hers, she is not plagued by eagles which pluck out her liver every day, but she DOES do this to passers-by. She also grabs their hearts and attempts to squeeze the life from them. Wandering close to her is not advised. Required Tripling: Heart, Lung, Appendix Dave is not a God. He does not, technically, belong here. However, Dave was caught in the hyperspace dojigger what makes the Gods invisible and insubstantial to mortals, and became completely impossible to detect without the operation. He is about 5'11", with blond hair, brown eyes, and a T-shirt bearing the insignia "Not Insane" on the front. If you see him, DON'T tell his family, because they WILL NOT believe you. Required Tripling: Eye, Nose, Nostril, Appendix, Spleen The Easter Bunny is a demigod of Eggs, Chocolate, and UFOs, related to The Santa Clause (Q.V.) and Bugs Bunny, who spends most of his time inexplicably hopping around "bunny trails", which are related to the Ley Lines of various well-tuned pagan traditions. On certain days of the year, determined by elaborate astrological calculations, which he does with an elaborate astrological calculator (TI-666), he breaks into people's houses, hides varicoloured eggs, and leaves presents of candy. While there, he typically makes off with the TV, VCR, and the Microwave, which has led people to start hiding the damn things themselves, which is the only known way to keep him out. Required Tripling: Sweet (and Buck) Tooth, Long Ears Elvis Presley is neither a God nor a supernatural entity, but can only be seen after the operation. Although there are, at an estimate, half a billion Elvis Presley clones on planet Earth, and a further half a billion Holographic Projections, controlled by the original Elvis, none of these are visible to the untripled Small Intestine. Mostly because the Small Intestine is not a sense organ. He is recognizable from the innumerable photos of him which appear in such reputable publications as the Weekly World News, taken with special tripled cameras. Required Tripling: Lung, Stomach, Eye, Small Intestine Eris is the Goddess of Discord, Chaos, Confusion, Bureaucracy, and International Relations. She mucks things up, and generally makes our life extremely confusing. She is also the Latin verb "you will be", so be careful when you say her tranlated name. Unless you WANT to go giving her psychic power. She can be recognized by her generally confused look, and by the way people on the street walk straight through her massive shining flowing robes without noticing. Required Tripling: Pineal Gland Fire Hydrant is a God left over from the early days. Now calmed down, He was the source of the Grate Flood in all mythology. The greatest enemy of Jehovah, and a strong ally of Jehovah-1, he tends to get confused when writing letters, which accounts for his extreme calmness and precision. He is applying for the position of God Of Stationery, but the jury is still out on that one. He is identifiable as a two-mile tall fire hydrant. Required Tripling: Liver, Stomach, Lung Furcoatl, the Aztec Goddess of Death, Blood, Murder, and Tapioca Pudding. She is unsociable, due to her violent nature, and all MOOists are advised to keep away from her unless absolutely necessary. Never eat Tapioca Pudding in her presence, or you will die a bloody and violent death as an alien creature gnaws its way out of your stomach. She can be recognized by the necklace of human skulls which she wears, and her T-Shirt which reads "Eat Fiery Death, Homonid." Required Tripling: Kidney, Eye, Nostril Gremlins are annoying small creatures that bite you or steal socks from dryers, but mostly harmless. Can look like anything. Required Tripling: Depends on the Gremlin. Half-Mad, alias God, is God. Just God. He's actually visible without the operation, but you can't see his wings, aura, or Rolls Royce unless you've opened the Third Spleen, and his other secret elements are ALWYAYS invisible. He can be recognized by a tendency to wear black, shun daylight, and hiss at garlic. Not to be confused with a vampire, which shuns garlic, disintegrates in sunlight, and lurks in the black. Half-Mad should be avoided by all who have no particularly good reason to want to see him. Required Tripling: None, or Spleen The Hot God used to be a Hot Dog, but was stuck in the Washing Machine (Q.V.) during the spin cycle and got his letters mixed up. Frequently devoured by the other Gods in an archetypal pattern of death and rebirth, he is the protector of BBQs, BBSs, and the BBC. He can be recognized by the fact that he is about a foot long, composed of a sausage and a bun, with orange flame around him, and chili-sauce. He enjoys masquerading as a hot dog in HUMAN food stands, so be careful what you eat unless you NEED a spiritual enema. Required Tripling: Eye, Pineal Gland, Kidney, Gall-Bladder Ice Cubes are supernatural beings of cold. They are often found flocking around the Fast Food Gods, or in Antarctica with Jehovah. They resemble transparent cubes of some cold substance. When they encounter The Hot God, they dissolve into some form of liquid, which then dances the Hokey Pokey until evening, and drifts off into the sunset. Required Tripling: Femur, Eye, Ear, Nose, Toupee Invisible Hand is God of Something. Don't know much about him, actually. He seems to have something to do with something or other that's not him, but has something to do with him, I think. Not particularly identifiable. Required Tripling: Entire Body (cloning) Jehovah, not to be confused with Jehovah-1 (Q.V.), is a 9-foot tall Penguin, the God of Penguins, and Dead Milkmen music. Father of a certain Jesus ChrBLATTT, a famous Puerto-Rican Voodoo-Surfer from the cult of Puerto-Rican Voodoo-Surfers for Jehovah, this God was the direct progeny of the Primordial Penguin, and therefore one of the more important Gods on Earth. Required Tripling: Nostril, Nose, Eye, Ear, Liver, Brain Jehovah-1, alias WOTAN, alias ODIN-1, is an escapee from a Galactic Govern-Mental Intitution, or more correctly, a Political Assylum. Many thousand years ago, he arrived at this planet and began tormenting the Jews, telling them they were the frozen people, but deliberately messing up the communication lines. The Jews, under his unfortunate misdirection, set off on a course of hBLATTTory which could well have been avoided if someone had shot the bastard soon enough. He is recognizable by his extreme height, mass, and thunderbolts. Required Tripling: Tongue, Feet, Middle Finger, Eye Kodosia is the Goddess of Moist Towelettes, Non-Dairy Creamer, and Nuclear Armageddon. In order to appease her appetites for the trade of these commodities, and thereby prevent Nuclear Armageddon, we must go about offering Moist Towelettes and Non-Dairy Creamers to unbelievers, and convert them to the Cult of Kodosia, whose sole purpose is to do the same thing. The proper presentation of these things is in a flat nasal voice, with just a hint of oregano. Unless the unbeliever joins the Cult of Kodosia, or screams "MOO", we must never give up the Moist Towelettes or Non-Dairy Creamer. She can be recognized in the form of a giant Rolodex with wings. Required Tripling: Stomach, Nostril, Brain Lint Fairy is a supernatural being in hyperspace, but not actually a God. His purpose is to gather Lint from the Industrial Pocket Lint Mining Facilities on Titan, the moon of Saturn, and transport it to Earth for dBLATTTribution, and then spread it around. The Lint can go anywhere from Dryer Panels to Pants Pockets, and is placed there by the Lint Fairy's team of trained toasters. He can be recognized because he's actually Lloyd Taco in disguise, and not a very good one at that. Required Tripling: Pocket Mess Fairy is a supernatural being. Its responsibility is to clean up messes left anywhere in the world, overnight, or when nobody is about, so that the problem doesn't remain. The post is, and has always been, unoccupied, but the Mess Fairy Chariot, which resembles a dirt-encrusted teapot, can occasionally be seen making the rounds anyway. Required Tripling: Ear, Nose, Throat Narcos is the God of Traffic Jams and Potato Salad. In order to appease him, and cause him to call home to himself a traffic jam, you can offer a sacrifice of potato salad through the sunroof of your car, while shouting the mantra, "HERE! TAKE YER POTATO SALAD, I WANNA GO HOME, NARCOS!". He can be recognized by his long trenchcoat and wheelbarrow of potato salad. Required Tripling: Stomach, Liver, Large Intestine Peter Pan, a sort of cross between St. Peter, first Pope of the Roman Catholic Church, and the Great God Pan, he is a flying elf-like being, neither entirely human, nor entirely fairy. He frequently visits young children for the sake of stealing their shadows, in the guise of being playful, but is actually extremely dangerous. He can be scared off only by serious, morbid discussions of growing old, played at top volume, in full quadrophonic sound. He can be recognized by his characterBLATTTic green leafy costume, and his uncanny ability to fly into walls and hurt himself. Required Tripling: Shadow The Santa Clause is the God of Generosity and Legal Contracts. He flies about the world in a sleigh drawn by eight clones of Elvis Presley (Q.V.) and a reindeer named Fred. Fred is the replacement for a previous reindeer named Rudolph, who was hit by a low-flying jumbo jet in 1973. On special days of the year, The Santa Clause dBLATTTributes absolutely nothing, but breaks into people's houses anyway for the milk and cookies. He can be identified by his absolutely disastrous fashion sense, and the eight flying Elvis Clones which accompany him. Required Tripling: Bank Account Spyders are annoying hyperspace thingies from another planet. The original subject of the now famous, if highly dBLATTTorted poem, "Spyder, Spyder, burning bright, in the trousers of the Knight... What kind of demon trickery, could place thy fearful symmetry... In such a place?" Of course, the adapted version is much better. Spyders should be stepped on if seen, since they are extremely dangerous to the Ozone Layer. They eat the stuff like Whipped Cream. Nasty. Required Tripling: Feet, Nose, Toupee, Brain, Liver Spydermann, not to be confused with Spiderman, is a supernaturalhero, visible only after the operation, and only at a quarter to three in the afternoon, for five minutes and twenty- three seconds. He has retroactive blood, the result of being bitten by a mutant Spyder (Q.V.). Nobody knows what he does. He just sort of wanders around, time travelling. A moose bit my sister once. Required Tripling: Entire body Teknocoatl is the Aztec God of Telecommunications, Computers, and Subway Systems. He can be found in Metro stations, bus terminals, phone switching stations, and any High-Tech companies. By cornering him and threatening him with a stick or some suitable low-tech weapon, he can be persuaded to cancel your phone bills, or give you free Metro rides. He can be regognized by the number of telephones and laptops he carries around, his mirrored sunglasses, and chrome teeth. He is often accompanied by a horde of living microchips with pin-feet. Required Tripling: Phone Bill, Hard Drive Tooth Fairy is a supernatural being. She collects children's old milk-teeth after they fall out and are placed under pillows. In their place, she sometimes places money, and sometimes land- mines (so that when the child sits up in the morning, it blows its head off), depending on her mood, and the locale. If the region is sufficiently war-torn that she can get away with high explosives, she will. Occasionally she switches keys to Ferarris. She cannot be recognized, as she is in the habit of getting plastic surgery every few weeks. Required Tripling: Eye, Teeth, Eye Teeth, Kidney Washing Machine is a God who hangs out with electrical appliances, and is consorted by a wide range of mechanical gremlins. Wherever it travels, socks follow, sensing the vast power of this being, and desiring to cover its feet, on the grounds that it always complains of chilly toes. The gremlins always end up wearing the socks. It has never married, due to lack of gender, and perpetually getting cold feet just before the wedding. It can be recognized by its appearance, which is of a giant white cube with a transparent circle on front, containing socks. Required Tripling: Socks, Feet, Liver, Stomach, Heart Yo-Yo is the God-thing of Yo-Yo Tops and Rap "Music". Every Yo-Yo is actually a prayer wheel to him. Just as turning a prayer wheel in a Tibetan monastery will recite a prayer and accumulate you good Karma, so each spin of a Yo-Yo on its string will send out a prayer to Yo-Yo and increase your yo-yo Karma, which affects your Namron Field, of course. He can be recognized by the fact that he looks exactly like a yo-yo top. Required Tripling: Pineal Gland, Nostril, Eye Zarquon Fish is the Goddess of Secret Sauce, the Colonel's Blend, Mystery Meat, and other unidentified foods. ZF's favourite passtime is throwing Halibut into the air and watching them de- thingymajigger out of hyperspace and become visible and tangible, only to rain down on unsuspecting passers-by. ZF is responsible for the majority of rains of fish, frogs, cats, dogs, and toaster ovens. She can be identified by her appearance, which is of an enormous cup of Lemonade, over five meters tall, accompanied by a fleet of flying Ice Cubes (Q.V.). Required Tripling: Spleen, Liver, Gall-Bladder, Appendix Appendix IX« THE AUTHORS Here is a LBLATTT of the Authors of this Book, some rough equivalent of their titles, and what they're suspected of. All of them are fools, but most of them bear it well. For a lBLATTTing of the different kinds of fools, see Ann's Book of Miscellany. 0000«) Half-Mad God, Pope, King, Czar, Supreme And Ultimate Ruler Of The Entire Pentaversal Omnipresent Realms Of fnord Creation, Relish-Dispenser, Grate Prophet of MOO, Citizen of Nutopia, Keeper of the Sacred Chao (KSC), FNORD, Priest of the Paratheo-Anametamystykhood of Eris Esoteric (POEE), Grand Poobah of the Temple Of The Primordial Penguin, SurrealBLATTT, HarlequinBLATTT, AbsurdBLATTT, Zonked ArtBLATTT Melee, World Record Breaker, Legionnaire of Dynamic Discord (LDD), Erisian Liberation Fronter (ELF), Muncher Sublime Of Salads And Other Similar And Less Healthy Foods, Title Collector, (TITLE TOP SECRET -- CANADIAN GOVERNMENT). Major Hypocrite. Above suspicion. 00001) Floyd Gecko The Confused Wholly Air Traffic Controller Of Potatoma Of The Holy Church Of The Grate MOO, High Preest Of The Holy Church Of The Great MOO, Upper Dingbat Of The Temple Of The Primordial Penguin, Episkopos Of The Discordian Society, Legionnaire Of Dynamic Discord, The Sloth's Cousin's Brother In Law, Erisian Liberator, He Who Would Have Almost Come Nearly Face To Face With The Great Pudding Itself If He Had Ever Gotten Around To Inquiring Before He Followed His Weird Passions Here By The Knowledgeable Great WOMBAT Who Has Stared Through The Water That Almost Splashed His Dear Endangered Box Top Coupons (HWWHACNFTFWTGPIIHHEGATIBHFHWPHBTKGWWHSTTWTASHDEBTC), POEE Chaplin, ULC MinBLATTTer, Misplacer Of The Sacred Chao, Spam, Confusius of Confusius, Executive Committee Of QUACK, Pope, Purveyor Of Paradox of Irrelevance, Confuse-Ius of Confuse -Ius, Genuine Honest-To-"BOB" SubGenius Chaploid Smeghead, Title Collector, Dispenser Of Condiments To Underpriviledged Mongeese, (TITLE CENSORED BY U.S. MILITARY INTELLIGENCE). Major Hypocrite. Suspected of alien sympathies, due to teddy-bears. 00002) Hellhound >101< Cardinal Richelieu of The Holy Church Of The Great MOO, Keeper Of The Sacred Chao, Second Sibling to the Sloth, Pope, MUD, Minister of the Miraculous KULTCHA, Revolutionary Surrealist Vandal Party (R.S.V.P.), POEE Chaplain for the Legion of Dynamic Discord, AnarchoSurreal Vandal, Mayor Of Ottawa, He Who Has Almost Come Face To Face With The Great Pudding Itself But Slept Through The Whole Thing (HWHACFTFWTGPIBSTTWT), Radio Personality, (TITLE CENSORED BY U.S. GOVERNMENT IN THE NAME OF FREEDOM AND DEMOCRACY WORLDWIDE). Major Hypocrite. Suspected of W.O.M.B.A.T. Contamination, due to unexplained and needlessly long absence, known collaboration with Wombats, and Pudding CultBLATTTs. 00003) El Cid Dinner CirclBLATTT of the Holy Church Of The Great MOO, Acolyte To The Temple Of The Primordial Penguin, Nifty Researcher Dude, "BOB"oid Wanderer, Elvis Impersonator, Unwitting Confused One. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of Conspiracy Conspiring, due to clothing. Suspected of being a catalyst to mind control satellites, due to recent unauthorized rise to the Elite Upper Council, and portrayal by Charlton Heston. 00004) Lloyd Taco Preest of MOOism, The Alter-Ego of Floyd Gecko, Alien Pod- Thing That Looks Like Jello With Socks Embedded In It. Major Hypocrite. Convicted of Alien sympathies. See footnote. 00005) Necromancer TeraFNORD Prophet of MOO, High Priest of Flaut, Prophet of NO, Necromancer of the third level (NAMS), Member of the NAMS (North American Mage Society), Prophet of the POEE Cabal of Lower Nepean, Master of the house of FNORDs, Leader of the Incorporated Antidisestablishmentarian Focusing Committee for the Mentally Unstable, Upper servant of Lord Namron, Apostle Of MOOism, Originator of COGS (Computer Organised Government System), Collector of Collector of titles, Five popes of discord, Deacon of the lower faith, Prophet of Zarathustra M. Nixon, Kinship of Raoul Applebaum, Kilt Kollector of East nepean, Perot campaign chairprophet, Citizen of Canada, Inhibiter of Nepean. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of Alien Collaboration, due to pointlessly accurate predictions of the future. 00006) Omar Khayyam Ravenhurst (Kerry W. Thornley) Keeper Of The Sacred Chao, High Priest of His Own Madness, Priest of the Para-Anametamystikhood of Eris Esoteric, Keeper Of The Sacred Chao, Preest Of The Holy Church Of The Grate MOO, Totally Unaware Of MOOism. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of CommunBLATTT brainwashing. 00007) Jeffrey Morton Preest Of The Holy Church Of The Grate MOO, Mongoose-Snapper of the Mongoose-Whupping Chuch, Goofy Poinger of the Silly Noise Maker Liberation Front, Dude With A Mean Pair O' Sunglasses. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of evil Nazi-clone Elvis Impersonation. 00008) Leper Messiah Ex-Inner-CirclBLATTT of the Holy Church Of The Great MOO, Victim Of Fictional Traffic Accident. Major Hypocrite. Convicted of Conspiracy Dupeness, due to boredom. 00009) Little Big Man X-Bishop of MOO, Monjunior Of MOO, Preest Of MOO, Other Things TOO, Opossum Of MOOism, Final Member Of The Generic Church Of Jonah Cheung, Monseignor Of NAR, Knight Of The Blue Moon With A Side Order Of Disorder, Pday of the Carrot, Apostle Of Jonah... Major Hypocrite. Suspected of implanting mind control devices in gerbils. 00010) Abacab (Alias Mustapha Mond, alias Ben Dover) Grate Profit of QUACKBLATT, Outer CirclBLATTT to the Great MOO, Muncher On Spam-Based Substances During Disaster, Blower Of His Own Nose During Sickness. Great Prophet of Irrelevance. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of Alien Brainwashing, QUACKBLATTT heresy, affiliation with Evil People. No reason. 00011) Ann O'Nymous Anonymous Contributor To The Great Book Of The Holy Church Of The Great MOO, High Preest Of Her Own Madness, Outer CirclBLATTT to the Great MOO, Preest Of The Temple Of The Primordial Penguin. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of everything, due to anonymity. 00012) Reverend Canoe Head Doubter CirclBLATTT of the Holy Church of the Grate MOO, Executive Committee Member of QUACK, Prophet of The Platypus, Prophet Of The Giant Hogweed, Reverend of the Universal Life Church. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of being a Commie Elvis-Clone. 00013) Confuse-Ius Umm... Major Hypocrite? Supected of something or other. I forget. 00014) Frau Reverend Doctor Professor Miss Take Cult Hunter Extraordinaire, Totally Paranoid Freak, Honorable Reverend of MOOism, Doctor Of Division, Teacher Of Useless Half-Truths To The Half-Mad And Half-Stupid. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of Conspiracy Brainwashing activities. 00015) Brian O'Blivious Counciltwit of various Councils of MOO, Television Personality Of Some Kind, Acolyte of MOO, Pday of the Mongoose Of The Order Of The Shining Star With A Side Order Of Fried Eggs. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of being a Conspiracy Dupe about paranoia about CapriCancers and Aliens and nonsense like that. 00016) The Antique-Riced Head Honcho Of OINK, Faetor Of The Holy Church Of the Grate MOO, Confuse-ionBLATTT Extra-Or-Donair. Major Hypocrite. Suspected of being the AntichrBLATTT, of being Homer Simpson, of being a Thing From A Pod, and of not looking both ways before crossing the street. 00017) Wom Bat That Evil Guy Of The Holy Church Of The Grate MOO, Recounter Of Tales Of Woe, Speaker To The Great Voice From The Sky, Mongoose-Scarfer, Eater Of Eucalyptus Leaves, Knight Of The Round Table. Major Hypocrite Suspected of being THE EVIL BUNG, Of Attempting to Assasinate High Preest Floyd Gecko, Of Being Undead, Of Conspiracy and Black Magic, and of Not Washing His Hands Before Dinner. 00018) I Yemen-Oying I Yemen-Oying of the Holy Church Of The Great MOO, Holy Heretic Of The Holy Church Of The Great MOO, Mocker Of The Temple Of The Primordial Penguin, Legend In His Own Mind, Confuse-ius of Confuse-ius. Major Hypocrite. Beneath suspicion. 00019) Gettah Leif Unheretic of the Church of MOO. Major Hypocrite. WAAAAAAAAAY beneath suspicion. Appendix X As Written By Them Thar Apostles OFFICIAL THINGS 1) Official Dress: One of those old ballgowns with large frilly sleeves and an Elizabethan frilled collar, with six green pinwheels sticking from the sleeves, neck, and waBLATTT. Colour scheme done in mauve with neon-green polka dots. 2) Official Clothing: Okay, so: MOO Great Prophet: whatever he likes. Typical dress would be a black trenchcoat and maybe a strange hat. High Preest: A "High Preest" T-shirt, MOO Jacket with various designs, and a strange hat of some kind, a tie with pictures of cows on. Cardinal Richelieus: Leather jacket or maybe the occasional loincloth if they feel like it. For that matter, maybe a space suit with a melted helmet... Reverend: Two lampshades, a chest of drawers, and a 747. Inner CirclBLATTT: Purple anything with green anything. Best if done with a purple ming vase and a green pasture. Outer CirclBLATTT: Anything. Acolyte: Six and a half apple skins, peeled in long strips, a small replica of the Eiffel Tower, made of either brass or gold. Green-dyed pants with one leg half a meter longer than the other, a tye-dyed t-shirt with the word "BUNG" on the front. Evil One: A large sandwich sign saying "Bung's Hot Dogs On Sale For Only $68.95" and a hat with flashing lights. Heretic: Sweater, cardigan, bubble pipe, Canadian Postal Union, Gulf War battle plans, and Norman Schwartzkopf. QUACK : What it says there. PENGUIN Grate Profit: Whatever. Hi, Priest!: Annoyingly loud hawaiian shirt, green tuxedo with extra-wide lapels, bell-bottoms, platform shoes, a bluish-orange silk carnation in the buttonhole, and a partridge in a pear tree. Extreme Foolish One: Whatever. Moderate Foolish One: A triangular frying pan, a silver fork, two brass bedknobs, a silk handkerchief, five gold rings, four calling birds, three french hens, two turtle doves and NINE partidges in pear trees, each of which should be wearing a White Sox baseball cap. The pear trees, not the partridges. Superior Bonk: Whatever. Inferior Bonk: One of Jimmy Hoffa's old suitcase clasps, pinned to the left side of the shirt, which should be at least ten years old, but at most twelve and a half. The shirt should be plaid, containing the colours red, brown, and a thin green stripe. A tie with the MacKenzie family tartan from Scotland, a large bumper sticker saying: "I break for partridges" and an "I Love Penguins" button. A pair of orange shorts with frilly bottoms. And a partridge in a lemon tree. Grand Poobah: Whatever. Lesser Poobah: Two stamps from Bangladesh, printed between the years 1985 and 1996, pasted to the forehead. A rubber chicken stapled in between five and nine places to the side of the green and yellow boxer shorts bearing the words PENGUINS RULE in blue letters. Two one-hundred watt lightbulbs, a demigod, twelve lords a leaping, eleven pipers piping, ten drummers drumming, two partidges, NOT sitting in pear trees, a vermillion silk shirt with a ruffled collar, two bow-ties, either one orange and one mauve, or one pink and one black. The face should be painted pink with purple polka-dots, and a green stripe. Upper Dingbat: Whatever. Lower Dingbat: A towel (preferably king-sized, bearing egyptian heiroglyphs.) Inner CirclBLATTT: Whatever. Preest: A pear tree in a partridge, worn upon the head. Outer CirclBLATTT: Whatever. Acolyte: A chipwagon selling hot-gods and other lysdexic food for 05.1$ a shot. Perrenial Heretic: Whatever. Evil One: Red satin suit with a long tail, horns, a pair of dark mirrored sunglasses, and a partridge with a goatee. 3) Official Foods: a) 12 bags of Doritos b) 11 Tacos with lots of hot sauce c) 10 steak sandwiches d) 9 Custard pies with cherries, whipped cream, and a light baked topping of turkey gravy. e) 8 chocolate sundaes f) 7 of those sort of funny things with lots of them, um, YOU KNOW, flanges on the sides, with, um, running lights and... aw, YOU'VE SEEN 'EM! g) 6 annoying mind drugs about lasers h) 5 ONION RINGS i) 4 chicken drumsticks j) 3 pairs of glasses k) 2 jumbo jets l) AND A PARTRIDGE IN A PEAR TREE 4) Official Drink: Honey Punch Recipe: Take a jar of honey and pour it into a normal glass until the honey covers the bottom to about 3 milimeters. Then pour in an equal amount of lemon juice, and stir the two together lightly. Next, fill the glass the rest of the way with club soda, stirring as you do so. The result is: 1 (1) (one) (un) (uno) (1) (one) (yes, that's right, you heard me ONE (1)) serving of Honey Punch Ask for them at your local restaurants, Delis, and other fine food establishments. If they don't serve them, either give the recipe freely, give the recipe expensively, or shoot everyone in the place for fun. 5) Official Song Tiny Toon's Theme Song: "We're tiny, we're tooney, we're all a little looney. And in this cartoon-y, we're invading your T.V.. With comic dispensers, we crack up all the censors. On Tiny-Toon adventures get a dose of comedy. So, here's ACME acres, it's a whole wide word apart. Our home sweet home, it stands alone, a cartoon work of art. The scripts were rejected, expect the unexpected. On Tiny Toon adventures, it's about to start. They're furry, they're funny, they're Babs and Buster Bunny, Montana Max has money, Elmira is a pain. There's Hampton and Plucky, Dizzy Devil Ducky, Furball's unlucky, and Go-Go is insane. At ACME Looniversity, we earn our toon degree. At teaching gaffes and getting laughs, since 1933. We're tiny, we're tooney, we're all a little looney. It's Tiny Toon adventures, come and join the fun. And now our song is done." 5) Official Games Nomic, Calvin, Sink, Hide-n-Seek, Mao. 5) Official Substance Pocket Lint 6) Official Slogans See "The Book Of Ambiguity" in BOOKS OF HONEST TRUTH. 7) Official Mascot THERE IS NO OFFICIAL MASCOT 8) Official Pest Blackfly 9) Official Animals Gecko, Wombat, Platypus, Emu, Penguin, COW, Beaver, Woodchuck, Marmoset, Duck, Human. 10) Official Capital Of Canada Ottawa 11) Official Reason For Being Late I was kidnapped by these aliens who tried to implant me with the brain of Elvis Presley, who's been cloned into a giant nazi army on the far side of the MOOn, in a futile attempt to stop the hideous invasion of Earth by these really ugly aliens from the planet Skyron in the Galaxy of Andromeda. 12) Official Book Definitely NOT The Great Book of MOO. HONEST. 13) Official MOOvie Entertainment Akira, Naked Lunch, Monty Python's Holy Grail, Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes, Return Of The Killer Tomatoes, Slacker, Rocky Horror Picture Show, Life Of Brian, The Wall, Forbidden Planet, Videodrome, 2001 A Space Odyssey, A Clockwork Orange, Sleuth, Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead, Fire Walk With Me, Eraserhead, and many many more not lBLATTTed here. 14) Official Condiment Treacle (a runny sort of sweet-tasting thing like molasses or honey. Either that or a kind of cross beteween hot mustard and hot mustn'tard.) 15) Official Purpose Accumulate titles. Spread the word (and the treacle). 16) Official Truth There ain't no official truth, stupid! 17) Official Ending: MOO OMM ΙΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝ» Ί Here ends this version of The Grate Book of MOO. Ί ΘΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΝΌ If It Wasn't Ranted, It Wasn't True POST HOLOCAUST TO THE GRATE BOOK OF MOO As Written By The One True Church Of MOO If you disagree with or dislike anything in this book, you have, by the Inalienable Right of Prophecy, the authority to declare us all heretics, infidels, and blasphemers, excommunicate us, and create your own One True Church Of MOO. Or anything else, for that matter. In fact, we prefer it if you do, because if you believe everything written in this annoying mind drug, you must be more gullible than we took you for. And believe me, we took you for pretty durn gullible. If you would like to create your own Church Of MOO, you have our permission to reprint any part of this book you like, of any length. It might be nice to send us part of any money you get for it, but it's not like we could force you. Please send any comments, criticism, membership applications, curious puzzling stuff, information requests, death threats, or notices of excommunication to: The Church Of MOO P.O. Box 26038 72 Robertson Rd. Nepean, Ontario, Canada K2H 9Y8 If you would like more information about the activities of the Church of MOO, send a stamped, self-addressed envelope, and ask for our fun-filled catalog of pamphlets, stuff, things, and junk like that there. You may also wish to subscribe to the newsletters MOO- JUICE and MOO-COW, published by the Elite Upper Council of MOO. Or you may not. So be it. But they're neat. And have cool explanations of MOOism to give your friends. Or, likely as not, your enemies.