21C Weirdness in blog format.

[The Wizard Joseph]

March 11th 2011, and every day since.

Fukushima

I remember the first time I was ever truly afraid of the rain. It was in 2011 and the Fukushima incident had just happened. Not one but three Chernobyl scale nuclear meltdowns right on the coast of the Pacific Ocean. At the time there was still information coming in from the nuclear tracking stations, before they shut them down.

A huge plume of tritium and God knows what else was traveling East from Japan across the Pacific Ocean. This began on 3/11/11, the day after my birthday. I had more than just YouTube to go on. There was a nuclear scientist named Arnie Gundersen, who first got up on YouTube drunk as a skunk, and basically announced that we were all doomed. Of course he didn't say it in those words. He used technical terms like detonation and deflagration, but the look on his face, the terror in his eyes, told me everything I needed to know. The rest I could look up on Wikipedia.

The 20th century had seen its share of nuclear horror. Back then the Terrors were just becoming known. The parched survivors at Hiroshima drank the Black Rain. The Russians tried to encase Chernobyl in lead dropped from the air. The Black Rain caused a horrible rotting disease from the inside out. There was nothing any doctor could do to save them. The lead dropped on Chernobyl became a radioactive substance known as thermium. Fucking radioactive lead! 10000 Russian Heroes got much more than lifetime doses of radiation trying to clean it up a few shovels full at a Time.

Now in the 21st century everything was supposed to be safe. We had named and tamed the Terrors and knew exactly what we were doing. Everything is fine citizen. Carry on. The world is under Control.

Except that it is not under control. Fukushima was the Meltdown of two nuclear reactors that used uranium and one MOX fuel plutonium reactor. I had to look up what MOX fuel was. When the rods in a reactor are "spent" it means that they are too hot to safely use in the reactor anymore. Too full of "daughter products" like plutonium. MOX fuel is produced by grinding up spent rods, encasing them along with fresh uranium into a new rod. These rods do not last as long as straight uranium rods, but they allow us to use calming phrases like "nuclear cycle" to describe what we're doing with the incredibly deadly waste. This waste had now been blown sky-high. It was also seeping into the Pacific like a horrible bag of poisonous tea.

And now drop by drop I was watching the rainfall. It was not thick and black like the rain at Hiroshima, but in a way it was all the more terrifying because it looked so normal. That to me is the terror of the 21st Century. Everything looks normal on the surface, but just under it there is a terrible, terrible destruction. The powers-that-be are fighting very hard to keep that semblance of normalcy. To keep people calm. To keep workers productive and the economy functioning as expected.

"The solution to pollution is dilution" I once heard it said. In a way cans of tuna fish have become very much like MOX fuel. We simply dilute the problem and then consume it again in a more palatable form. The 21st century will be defined by this great illusion of normalcy. I know better. To this day I don't go out in the rain if I can help it. Every glass of water I drink is somewhat suspect. I can never go back to the innocence of a simple glass of water ever again. The 21st century took that from me. I expect it will take much more before it ends, but I will not live to see it end.

[altered]

I do hope this keeps going. I don't think I'm old enough to properly contribute to this, but TWJs post triggered the bile production apparatus and there's some churning to spew in OKM as a result.

[The Wizard Joseph]

I do hope this keeps going. I don't think I'm old enough to properly contribute to this, but TWJs post triggered the bile production apparatus and there's some churning to spew in OKM as a result.

Glad to have inspired something. Let it out nullified!

[Fujikoma]

April 18th, 2019

What I remember of the past century is irrelevant, it is consigned to the very same, merciless jaws of fate as the current century, but, it must be studied. We must learn from the past, watch it, or we will get kicked in the ass by God himself for our hubris. Fate has a funny way of making you a person who deserves to be punished, and then, punishing the shit out of you, and after all these years, I can see, it is just.

I have had a lot of experiences, sadly, nothing as glorious as drive in movie theaters. I have come to understand that, what is currently happening with the sudden influx of information about people, is not a failing of those individuals, but rather, a greater unveiling of the horrible apes everyone else is. Glad you aren't them? You shouldn't be, because you ARE them, and it's only a matter of time before your number is called.

I like to think of this as an 'adjustment' phase, assuming we survive all the other dick-fuckery we caused trying to kill us, as well as this. This hearkens back to the Garden of Eden, when Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowlege, and suddenly, it became obvious their junk was hanging out... they covered it with leaves. When God showed up, and saw them wearing leaves, he was like, "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING YOU MOTHERFUCKERS!", and thus, at least, metaphorically, they were cast down to earth. To live, to sin, to die, which they could have avoided if they'd had a lick of sense and thought, you know, maybe listening to a talking snake is a BAD idea. But they couldn't. That's how fate works, it puts a boot to your ass to get you in the door, for a game you're destined to lose, surrounded by screeching monkeys who will murder you if you take off your mask.

Trust me, don't take that thing off. I got an especially bad deal in that, I don't really have a good mask. But before I derail myself, the turn of the century and the dawn of the age of information. There's a lot you really, would rather not know about, everything. And know it's at your fingertips with the blazing speed of a sling-shotted rogue black-hole, ready to crush your puny, mortal mind. You can't resist, though, can you? You already know ignorance is bliss but you HAVE to know. You have to know EVERYTHING. This is ok, this is how you're built, this is what you're meant to be, yet your reaction is, probably giving some Lovecraftian fiend a heart attack from laughter.

There are things you cannot unsee, and you will see them. You will see indisputable proof that all of your heros were actually villains, you will rebel. You will, if your mind allows it, eventually, realize, you are also a villain. Your conscience will beat you over the head with a preserved tube of meat, and there's only so much you can take, naturally, before you decide, "I'm ok with it". This is the adjustment phase. It might be harder than, you know, actually doing something about it.

So, get used to being naked, folks, it only goes downhill from here.