Tag Archives: Kuiper Belt

Usual Rubbish

Lost in found.


That looks like my first pair of Chuck Taylors. Always wondered what happened to them. And there’s that bike that got stolen when I was twelve. And some pocket lint that looks very familiar.

Oh, hi, friends of Big Green. Glad this is getting out to you. WiFi is a little unreliable out here in the midst of the Kuiper Belt… all these particles and planetoids cause a boatload of interference, as you might well imagine. Yes, we did manage to navigate our way through the black hole that had parked itself next to that annoying Goldilocks Planet our label talked us into playing. (We now know why the Gliesians call the black hole “Papa Bear”). The advice we’d been given took us right into the old vortex. Turns out it’s just a transdimensional expressway back to the Kuiper Belt. Bit of good luck, that.

So, yeah… we’re here for the final leg of our somewhat anti-climactic ENTER THE MIND: THE ULTIMATE BIG GREEN EXPERIENCE interstellar tour 2010. Why anti-climactic? No climax… Why else? We’ve gone something like 60 gazillion miles in the last seven weeks and what the hell do we have to show, eh? No cash, no kudos, no nothing. Bloody flop.  Still, we’re indefatigable (except for the man-sized tuber, who hasn’t been out of his terrarium since three stops ago). So we’ve already spent a couple of days on Pluto, the big brass buckle of the Kuiper Belt, jamming out to a frozen house, making the icicles shake, rattle, and crack. (No rolling on Pluto. They have a code, you know.)

There are three things you need to know about this Kuiper Belt place. The first is that it’s bloody cold. I think you might have guessed. Marvin (my personal robot assistant) has tanked out his battery half a dozen times since we got here. The second is that this place is like the solar system’s lost and found. Apparently everything that gets lost on Earth (and everywhere else in Sol’s neighborhood) ends up here. For instance, there are literally billions of odd socks floating around and between the asteroids. Explains a lot. That stuff they call “dark matter”? Socks. Just socks. I think it’s just centrifugal force, spinning everything out to the rim. Now you know.

The third thing is that… some of these venues are so small, it’s almost impossible to perform. Right now, I’m straddling two of these Kuiper Belt objects, my keys parked on a third, playing to an audience perched on dozens more within earshot. Keee-razy.

Usual Rubbish

Rabbit hole.


Well, I haven’t seen it. What kind of belt is it? Nothing of the kind. What am I, your valet? Damn it, man – use your eyes! Oh…. the Kuiper Belt. Right… nope, haven’t seen it.

Then there’s that third reason. A little known fact about the “Goldilocks Planet”: it lives right next door to the mother of all black holes (I believe that’s referred to as the “Three Bears Neutron Star”). Before we took off, we asked the Gliseans how best to navigate back in the direction of our home system. They gave us what was, for them, some pretty typical advise – go left, but not too far left; then take a right turn at the asteroid… not the BIG asteroid, not the LITTLE one, the JUST RIGHT one… and so on. Marvin (my personal robot assistant) took all this down in his memory banks, then plugged himself into our spacecraft’s navigational computer and passed the directions along. (It may have been my imagination, but he always seems to have a self-satisfied smirk when he hooks up with that terminal. Nevertheless…)

Okay, so we follow these asinine directions, and we find ourselves being drawn off course by some unseen force… a mysterious power beyond the understanding of man or machine. Mitch Macaphee called it … “gravity”. Yes, the black hole just to the right (not too far!) of the Goldilocks Planet was drawing us in relentlessly. Next thing, everything goes dark. It’s like driving through the Holland Tunnel. All the way to Holland. Need I draw you a picture?

So, okay, we’re supposed to be at a gig in the Kuiper Belt by Tuesday of next week. Care to start a pool on whether or not we make it? I’m betting no. Cover me?