Back to the Bigger Picture

I hope you enjoyed that last brief dip down into the world of the mundane and practical. Today we're going back to look at a phenomenon of grand scale and then we're going to tie it back down to earthly experience. I am referring to

BLACK HOLES!

Yes, Black Holes, those Einsteinian entities that roam around the Cosmos gobbling up planets, stars, and even entire galaxies like huge extraterrestrial Pac Mans. (They even make that "wokka-wokka-wokka" sound if you listen closely enough, which of course you can't, becuase if you got close enough to hear it the thing would eat you - it's a defense mechanism.)







(Artist's conception, not actual photograph)







There's not really a question anymore whether these things exist or not - of course they do. There's so much evidence to support their existence that there are actually 12-year-olds who have detected them with their homemade backyard telescopes. So this entry isn't about whether they exist or not, or even if they prefer to eat red supergiants or white dwarfs (most of them like the red ones best - they taste like M&Ms; that's a bonus secret, no extra charge). Today's secret is about the lesser known black holes, the small ones that hang around right here on earth instead of way out in space.

"But there aren't any black holes on earth" you say. Ooooooh, so now look who knows everything! Aren't you clever. But you're wrong, there *are* back holes right down here on earth. Fortunately the little ones aren't nearly as hungry as their big brothers - they don't tend to eat everything around them.

The defining characteristc of a black hole is that nothing can get away from it - matter and light get sucked right in, and even the laws of mathematics and logic break down once caught in its grasp. Now I think you see what I'm getting at here, and it's something you've always suspected: Earthly Black Holes exist right behind the eyeballs of politicians and similar political hacks! And the more successful the politician/hack, the stronger the black hole!

Just think about the last statement you heard from a U.S. presidential candidate (you can't avoid them if you're in the U.S.A, and you can check the web if you're not). It wasn't illuminating at all, and it made no sense whatsoever. That's because the black hole devoured all the light and logic! These mini-black holes snuck into the heads of those candidates and now you'll never hear anything remotely useful out of any of them! They're sneaky little suckers.

If you're not convinced yet of the truth in this dissertation, just watch Fox News for 10 minutes - there's a higher concentration of black holes there than anywhere else on earth. Enough said.

So keep your eyeballs peeled for little Pac-Man-looking things sneaking around in the dark, and listen for that telltale "wokka-wokka" - little black holes are trying to sneak into your head. If they get in, you'll never make a coherent statement again. But on the plus side, you'll have a nice future in politics!