Tag Archives: Marvin

Usual Rubbish

Ison the prize.

Okay, well, THAT didn’t go so well, did it? Right. Don’t panic. One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three … arrrrrgghhh.

Is Smith frying yet?It’s been a couple of weeks, so I don’t know if you recall our harebrained plan to get to the various extraterrestrial venues in our interstellar tour to support Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick (selling quite briskly on Aldebaran, I hear). Right, well… we have that rent-a-wreck rocket (or “wreck-it”) that will get us part of the way to Aldebaran and points west-southwest, but it doesn’t quite have the horsepower to escape our solar system. If we tried, at this time of year, we would get caught in the gravitational pull of the sun. Then the only pleasure we’d get out of this trip would be to watch Smith fry…

Okay, I’ve wandered a bit. Fact is, the only solution we could think up in the absence of our mad science advisor Mitch Macaphee is to launch ourselves into extended orbit around the Earth and hitch a ride on the comet ISON when it emerged from its close encounter with the sun. We would, I don’t know, throw a grappling hook onto it as it passed and it would pull us clear of the solar system, at which time the low-rent engines in the rent-a-wreck-it could handle getting us to the next star system. Simple, right?

Big GreenNot so right. Only trouble with this plan was … it could never work. Aside from that, it was sound. So we took off last week, using the Cheney Hammer Mill courtyard as a makeshift launch pad, and spent a good bit of fuel climbing up into extended orbit around the Earth ( or the “Oyt”, if you’re from East Chootica ), Marvin (my personal robot assistant) at the controls. Steady hand, indeed.

Now, 3 out of 5 astrophysicists supposed that ISON would make it around the sun in one piece. Wouldn’t you know that the other two had it right? So we’re hovering at the rendezvous point, and around the left side of the sun comes this charred looking ice chunk, tumbling along, no bigger than the average medicine ball. Try getting a grappling hook into THAT sucker.

Okay, so… NOW what do we do? Any astrophysicists out there? Methods for counteracting the sun’s gravity? Email them to us ASAP. Like, I don’t know, yesterday, perhaps.

Usual Rubbish

That’s strange.

I think that’s the last of it. Packed tight, top to bottom. Nice job, lads. Okay … pop the nose cone back on. Time to light this candle!

Nothing to see here, right, Marvin?Oh, howdy. Yup, we’re getting ready to embark on our upcoming interstellar tour in support of our album, Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick, which as been a absolute drug on the market down here on earth, but is selling much more briskly in outer spaaaaaaaaaace. Seems like extraterrestrials are totally ready for satirical country-western, mock-pop, found sound records like ours. Who knew?

Now if they only adopted some kind of currency that is convertible into our own. Right now they’re paying us in photons. No, really. Every month, we get a box full of light in lieu of a royalty check. Try taking that to Chase Bank. I can’t even get mortgage backed securities in exchange for that stuff. Still, it’s worth something on Aldebaran, and that’s all that counts … if you live on Aldebaran. (We usually resort to doing all our shopping out there, as it happens.)

Big GreenSome of you are probably wondering whether it’s safe for us to venture beyond the protective atmosphere of mother earth in such a ramshackle looking spacecraft. I totally get that. The thing is, we have assurances from Marvin (my personal robot assistant) that if anything goes badly wrong in the icy vacuum of space, he will be responsible for the consequences. Knowing how risk-averse Marvin has always been, that fills me with confidence. My bandmates look a little nervous, sure, particularly after hearing about the comet ISON, which is in the process of rounding the sun as we speak.

Will we escape ISON’s enormous coma of deadly gasses? Are they indeed deadly as I just claimed just a few key strokes ago? Answers to these and other questions await our liftoff in FIVE …. FOUR … THREE … TWO … days.

Usual Rubbish

What to bring?

I don’t know. Do we really need a hibachi? We’re all vegetarians, except for Marvin, who only eats electricity and petroleum distillates. Well… okay, then.

Big GreenHi, friend of Big Green. What are they doing now? It’s called getting ready for an interstellar tour, as yet unnamed, to support extraterrestrial sales of our most recent album, Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick. It took us long enough, but we did secure adequate transport for the seemingly impossible journey ahead of us. (Carl Sagan would say it is simply impossible, but he is not available to comment. Ergo … it’s possible.) Some over-the-road hauler dragged the missile here from the Moon, where its (asshole) owner left it for our retrieval. Jesus H. Christ, the company brought the craft all the way from Neptune, but apparently thought the moon was close enough.

The accommodations on board, mind you, are a tad spare. Spartan, you might say. Ever read a book by one of the original NASA astronauts? Yeah, it’s kind of like that. A bit like a t.v. submarine, only with rocket engines instead of propellers and no periscope. I’m no Wilt Chamberlain, and I have to duck down low to get under the rafters. And the cockpit is full of retro-looking levers and switches. One of the toggles is marked, “Kill” – not sure Wait, it does have a periscope!what that does. I wonder … if you switch it back and forth, does something, somewhere, cease to exist and then come back to life again? Important question.

On a rack in the control room is about a dozen pressure suits that look like something out of a 1960s sci-fi movie. You know – the ones with accordion-like joints and white crash helmets with visors. I’m guessing that means there is no artificial atmosphere in this beast, but I’m counting on someone with some technical knowledge to determine that for us. Marvin (my personal robot assistant) has been serving as a surrogate mad scientist while Mitch Macaphee continues to enjoy his hammock in Madagascar (if that is where he truly is, the bounder!).

We need all the help we can get. Now, where did I pack my packing list? Hmmmmm….