I thought I'd check out the winter olympics by watching some ski jumping.

Then I ended up watching the bobsleigh, downhill, freestyle skiing and luge as well.

It's a slippery slope.

Imagine that it's 1925 and I am a clever, experienced mechanical engineer. I look around at the "tech" world of the time and notice some disturbing things:

- the rising power of literally fascist CEOs like Henry Ford
- What began as an inefficient, quirky novelty toy for rich people, the automobile, has become "normal" and started to dominate public space
- rising levels of fossil pollution
- the rising monopoly power of Oil companies
- dangerous levels of stock-market speculation
- brutal exploitation of people and environmental destruction in mining and rubber producing (mostly colonial) regions
- the use of debt to get less wealthy consumers to buy cars
- scores of innocent pedestrians injured or killed by automobiles
- urban planning that increasingly favors more expensive cars over other users of the streets
- declining sense of importance of shared forms of transportation like trolleys and trains

As an engineer, I look at all those rising issues and then I say:

"What we need is an Open Source Model-T Ford with some slightly better safety features."

In retrospect, that would seem like a pretty inadequate response.

Your Spiders Wrapped is in.

This year you ate 0 spiders.

This places you in the top 80% of spider eaters.

"We wish to honor the first earthling into space," said the aliens, "by inviting them to join us on our journey across the cosmos."

The earth representative frowned. "You must mean Yuri Gagarin? Unfortunately, he is long dead."

"A minor detail, given our technology," the aliens replied, "and no, we do not refer to the human."

The air grew bright and hot. Colors swirled. A dog appeared.

Said the aliens, "Come with us, Laika. Join us on our journey."

The dog barked happily.

#microfiction

Tonight you will be visited by three ghosts.

Happy Christmas All!