Adam Fletchers – The Zig

How much does the moon weigh?

// August 11th, 2008 // oddities

Blind Pilots – The Story I heard

At the weekend we went to Raglan, NZ’s most famous surf spot. In the water I’m capable of little more than drowning, flailing, at a push. So we opted to watch the surfers, and walk for hours along the miles and miles of black sand beaches. I drove the whole weekend, and on the way back had two close encounters with mother nature. The first was an eagle, or hawk or something, I’m not a bird watcher. It was sitting on the carcass of a cat, or fox or something, I’m not a zoologist. The carcass was on the other side of the road, I had to little more than slow down and observe the scene. But it was on a curve which meant I came in close contact with the hawk. What surprised me was that the hawk didn’t even flinch, it felt like the modern day equivalent of a wild west duel. Back them the odds were a little bit more evenly dispersed, 50/50 between participants. In this duel I fancied my chances, supported by a few tons of steel, hidden behind a windscreen, traveling at 90km/hr. If I had been so inclined, I felt confident my chances of reliving the hawk of its dinner, and further adding to the roadkill count were pretty good. Worth a bet at least. Luckily, for the hawk, I’d already eaten.

The hawk sat firm on his carcass and stared my straight in the eyes as I passed. A harsh stare that said “come on then fancyman, you just try and take my dinner”. Mother nature is scary, I’m glad I live indoors and work in IT where there are no animals, beyond mice but they’re powered by USB.

The second was just a few minutes later, two ducks came waddling out of the side of the road very abruptly. Perhaps they had somewhere important to go (maybe church being a Sunday), or they had never been told about the need to look left, then right, then left again. Out they came brazen as you like. I broke sharply, scared the crap out of the front one who waddled a little bit faster (I guess ducks can’t run as such, they’re legs being just matchsticks wrapped in a cape) and opened up a narrow gap for me to steer our fisher price rental car through. The rear view mirrors confirmed the only scars I left on the ducks were mental. My reaction to this was probably not the normal one (fucking ducks), instead I thought “I know nothing about ducks”. Granted I’ve moved to countries I know even less about (in fact the last two). But still, I know almost nothing, other than that they like bread, which bonds us in yeasty kinship. Perhaps that’s why I like ducks, or because they make a cute sound that never really changes even when they try to get angry. It just repeats the same word

“quack, quack, quack” nope not quack, listen closer, “quack..qruack..qruaek…qreak…qread…bread…bread…bread”.

“bread”, “bread” They’re just something comedic about them, a punchline to one of natures unwritten jokes. The gimps of the pond.

If I’d hit the front duck, would I have widowed the duck behind? Do ducks mate for life? Are there male and female ducks? Would they relived at not being mashed up my rubber wheels, rush home for we’re still alive celebration sex? Do ducks even have sex? How long do ducks live? How many children can one duck have?

Perhaps its because I was talking to Annett about education, and she was saying that she’s jealous that a friend of hers is starting their phd. I was telling her my theory that all education gets easier the higher the level, and that achieving a phd is in reality probably not harder than getting my GCSE grade C in science, which I found extremely difficult. This is because with each level up you specialize more and more, and always on a topic you pick that you’re really interested in. So I would do mine on crowdsourcing, communities, entrepreneurship, e-business or something in this area, my areas of expertise. GCSE’s were a mixed bag, 99% of which I had absolutely no interest in (eg everything but Business Studies). I’m not dumb, I spend all my time trying to learn new things, its just they are normally personality disorders affecting the Japanese, or the difficulty of being a peruvian miner, not the sort of knowledge I’m likely to need. But learning something you’ve no interest in is like pulling teeth – possible, but not fun.

In a world crashing ever further towards specialisation (thanks to the internet making it ever easier to connect with people/provide access to the things we are interested in) how soon is it before only a few freaky people like florian who are interested in ducks and guinea pigs and understand how that stuff works. We’ve been buying furniture recently, and putting it together is a pain….for Annett. I don’t even pretend I’ll do it, I have no idea how that stuff works, I thought screwdrivers were cocktails?! I just go to the other side of the flat so I don’t have to witness my own demasculination and wait to be called for the monkey tasks like bashing things, where I use the saucepan to push in screws, as I’m not manly enough to own a hammer.

No big deal you’ll probably say, as long as someone knows and we have wikipedia we’ll all be fine. But then what about children? Children are a total blank canvas, their only constant interests are breaking things, making their parents lives miserable and there own bodily functions. That means when I have kids they’ll ask all sort of difficult questions like “how much does the moon weigh” “how much wood would a woodcutter cut, if a woodcutter could cut wood?”. What can I do in those situations other than lie “as much as a raccoon, holding a cheese roll, sitting on an elephant and………12″. Or ‘I’m not sure but did I tell you that two people in Japan were hospitalized last year with Truman show disorder, the belief that they are the stars of a Truman show like reality show?’. Surely there’s only so many times I can say “erm….go ask your mother?” before they put the little brats in care, or in the hands of an all-rounder of a father, one that knows what a noun is.

And what about the duck that escaped the wrath of my tyre by a mere fraction, is he now wondering ‘what do I actually know about humans? Do they mate for life? What will I tell my ducklings when I ask me how much the moon weighs? No I suspect it’s just thinking ‘bread’, ‘bread’, ‘bread’.

Lucky duck.

Possibly related, hopefully entertaining other posts:

• Cleaning by Distraction
• Traffic.
• Thats my name, don’t wear it out.
• Don’t even doubt it
• The Great Korean Wall of China