Back to the Present:
Report from the 42nd Century: Part 2
| freeways. The worldwide Total Damage
Survey (TDS, q.v.) carried out between 2915 and 2934 (on which the
ensuing and on-going re-construction of the planet has been based) produced many shocking
statistics, but none more than the total number of cubic meters of concrete found
throughout the world in road surfaces dating from the pre-Total Collapse era. As
preliminary figures began to come in, researchers were, as one can imagine, skeptical. The
entire survey of freeways (which is what the Neo-barbarians called their massive roadways)
was re-done. No error was found in the figures. The total of cubic meters of concrete is
one of those numbers so large as to be meaningless: 3.7 x 1015. To try to
reduce that to something almost imaginable: Broken up, the concrete would fill the entire
Pacific Ocean. It was only with the development of concrete-eating nanodes in 3804 that a
method became available to harmlessly reduce the Barbarians' rubble to its constituent
elements. See autobahn, and also to eisenhowerize. Freuodo, Sigmund. 1749?-1832? The dominant politician of his era, Freuodo is credited with uniting Europa (q.v.) through a clever political stratagem known as libidism (q.v.). As a youth, he was inspired to go on a personal quest for enlightenment with his chum, Bilbo Baggins (about whom nothing further is known), which took him across Asia. A popular poster of the day reproduced a photograph which Bilbo took of the 16-year-old Freuodo swimming across the Yangtze River toward a smiling Ho Chi Minh (q.v.). Though none of his writings survive, it is known that his book, Masturbation and Monotheism, with its insightful analysis of the exploitation of the working classes by the mogul, D. Rockefeller Trump, laid the foundation for his later political successes. Details of how he rose from the presidency of Trinidad and Tobago to become Prime Minister of Andorra (and hence, all of Europa) have been lost. See Vaginal Envy, and also Thumb-sucking.  Isaac "Fig" Newton (dates unkown). Prominent 20th
century sociologist whose most famous theory is summarized in the well-known phrase,
"All is relative." After surviving a difficult childhood (legend has it that his
father, Abraham Newton, angered at some childish misbehavior, was about to stab young Fig,
but was rendered unconscious by a falling apple), Newton studied various primitive
societies in situ. Fragments of his pioneering research in the Trobriand Islands,
Love Among the Cannibals, survive. His insightful breakthrough came back home in
Perth at a Newton family reunion when, contemplating the large, diverse gathering, he was
heard to pronounce in a mead-enhanced voice: "All is relatives!" In popular
usage, the "s" is dropped, but the meaning of universal humanity is still clear
to us all even after the passage of 22 centuries.Japantoyko. Inspired by the success of the original World Park (see Europa), the World Government is now focused on the construction of World Park II, spreading over the islands just off the east coast of Asia, once the headquarters of Japan, Inc. As of the date of our publication, all island inhabitants have now been happily resettled in central Africa and park development, following the successful, environmentally sensitive model of World Park I, is well underway. See europa; also Fujimanjaro. Krishnianity. Minor religion, the birth of whose founder in present-day Bangladesh forms the basis of the world calendar. Little is known about the religion and even less about its founder. The meaning of the religion's prevalent symbol, the Krishnian "T" (characterized by an slight upward extension of the vertical line in the letter "T") has escaped several centuries of scholarly inquiry, though evidence exists that the mother of the central deity, known as Vee Em, had a prominent birthmark in that shape on her left breast. Some sociologists believe the present-day vulgar gesture of opprobrium (middle finger extended from a closed fist) is a degeneration through inversion of the ancient Krishnian "sign of the 'T'". Most of the luxurious temples built by adherents were either razed or wholly defaced during the Plague Years (q.v.) by Krishnians angered to find themselves labeled as DGGC's (Deviate Greed-gene Carriers, q.v.). Why they turned on their own houses of worship with such ferocity remains a mystery. Good taste prohibits us from going into details here concerning their mutilation of the genitals of their newborn males. See Primitive Religions; bibel; Pappery; Cannibalism. Lennon, Wolfgang Amadeus. Composer. 1847?-1890? While only one complete work survives, the globally famous and wildly over-played "The Magic Pepper," we have sufficient fragments to confirm that Lennon was the greatest composer known in the pre-Total Collapse world. A brass marker was recently discovered in the ruins of Manhattanbronx bearing the name "Lennon" and which was first thought to be some kind of tribute or memorial. But because of the spurious names on the plaque ("John" and "Dakota," for example) and the 20th century birth-death dates, we now know it has no connection with the composer of such immortal arias as "Blue Suede Flutes" and "Temple of the Rising Sin" in "The Magic Pepper." See also Hildegard von Wagner and Hoagy Beethoven. Leonardo Dacaprio. Outstanding architect and inventor of the 6th century. His most famous structure was the "parthinun" near Athens. This structure, a residence for the O'Hara family, was renowned for the grace and pleasing proportions of its colonnaded facade and it primitive form of air conditioning (the famous "Elgin freeze"). Dacaprio, a visionary, is also credited with developing a number of maritime inventions, culminating in the "Titanic," the ship in which Cris Magellan (q.v) first circumnavigated Bermuda. See golden mean, and skyscrapings. lewinskism. System of philosophy based on the ideas of Myron Lewinksy, 17th century psychologist who came to prominence through his research in that hotbed of radical urbanism known as Silversprings (q.v.). Lewinskism was based on the insight that our insatiable oral needs can only be met by lengthy and repeated acts of fellatio (the male bias here is of course typical of the ancients' patriarchal behavior). Only one bit of lewinskian jargon has survived, but the meaning of the injunction, "Droptrou!", continues to elude our best sociological and linguistic analysts. See also morninggloryhole, and Salem Trials. mass media. The "mass media" theory was developed around 1820 by one Marshall M. Einstein, a Canadian astrophysicist who for unknown reasons took a mid-life interest in communication theory. Scholars still puzzle over the connection between his two most famous pronouncements, "E = mc3" and "The mass of the media message is a mess." Physicists have contributed to the confusion by maintaining that the famous formula as we have it actually contains a typo and should read: E = mc3.1416. See Avogadronov, and Sir Wm. Hersheybar. opera. A degenerate form of music theater, involving a three-piece orchestra and one solo voice, having its origins in a cannibalistic Krishnian festival characterized by the eating and drinking of parts of a god to extended musical accompaniment. Though extremely popular for some eight centuries (see Lennon, W.A.), only one fragment has survived, a two-minute excerpt (in, unfortunately, that grating, reductive recorded mode called "digital" by the ancients) from an opera called Tahmmie, by Ptown Shend. Though the text of the fragment implies a profound reverence for magic and a game involving a small metallic ball, it is thought that operas were primarily secular. See Mikey Jagger, and Hans Paper-Sachs. petroleum. A once naturally occurring organic source of energy on which the entire pre-Total Collapse economy depended. As only one sample remains--the famous two-ounce bottle in the Baffin Bay Museum of Technology, little is understood about the make-up of the substance, nor about just how it was used. One theory holds that "petroleum" was ingested for centuries by humans at the least sign of a headache or any other minor ailment. No other theory has been put forward that even begins to explain how the vast reserves of the substance were so completely exhausted. See panacea; the humble oil miracle; and famous man-made wastelands of the world. prisons.
Misbehavior in the ancient world was punished in a number of ways. Enforced exposure to "television"
(q.v.) was perhaps the most common; this punishment was known as "prime-time."
More serious penalties included repeated readings from and memorization of long passages
of the WSJ (see Krishnianity), circumcision (a
physical mutilation about which nothing further is known), and--the most
severe--"imprisonment." Imprisonment consisted of confining a person's physical
(i.e., four-dimensional) body within a locked space called a "prison" for a
number of hours. Given the primitives' penchant for movement (see cars,
and freeways), one can imagine what dread this punishment aroused. One
such edifice has survived, the much-studied Dodge May Hall in Agra, India. Recidivists
unaffected by any of these measures could be subjected to the most serious penalty of all:
capitalist punishment, which required the individual to work at the same job for a minimum
of three years. From our hexadimensional perspective, of course, the whole business is
baffling. See Al Catraz, and Arch I. Pelago-Siberia.republican. A term of derision which, in the immediate years following the Total Collapse, was so powerful and insulting that generations of children grew up having their mouths washed out with soap if they dared say the awful word. Now, of course, it has weakened considerably, to the present harmless meaning of "dunderhead" or "greedy oaf." Pre-Total Collapse, according to the best scholarly thinking, a "republican" was a member of a religion which worshipped a pyramid-like structure on top of which was a human eye. Scholars believe it was the hoarding, by "republicans," of pieces of paper on which this symbol appeared which was one of the primary causes of the Total Collapse. It is also commonly accepted that a proper "republican" strove for an oedipal family relationship. A number of restrooms survived the Collapse on whose walls we may still read the inscription, "Mother-fucking Republicans." See raygunomics, and gaiacide. restareas. Governmentally approved areas for sexual relief located at numerous convenient sites along freeways (q.v.) in the 17th century. Almost our entire knowledge of pre-Total Collapse sexual mores and behavior comes from the graffiti in one such "restarea," which miraculously was intact as late as 3357 when pioneering archeologists dared to enter the "hot" area of Central Texas. The level of homosexual comment in the graffiti caused scholars no end of difficulty, because the academic community had long held that one of the most puzzling characteristic of the Old World was its barbaric, animalistic belief that compulsive and exclusive heterosexuality was normative for human society. See primitive troilism, and manichean gender heresy. |