**************************************************************************** ### # # ### ##### ## # # # ## ## # # ### ##### ## ### ### # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #### ### # # # # # # # # # ## # #### ### # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # ### # ## # # # ## ## ## ### # # # # # ### ____________________________________________________________________________ # # ### #### # # #### # # ### #### ##### # # ##### #### # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # #### ### ### ##### # # #### ##### # # ##### ### # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # # ### ### # # # # #### # # ### # # # ##### ##### #### *******NUMBERS 391 TO 395*****************************BY DANIEL BOWEN******* *****Please note, some of the quoted addresses within this file may no***** ***longer be correct. Please email info@toxiccustard.com for information.*** "Great Ocean Toxic Custard" ...... ..... .. .. ..... Toxic Custard Workshop Files .. .. .. .. .. .... Number 391, 13/4/98 By Daniel Bowen .. ..... ........ .. http://www.toxiccustard.com THE YEAR 2031 - Part 12 The swirling gases and assorted other muck in the atmosphere on Venus meant that not a lot could be seen from the landing craft, other than a really nice pattern of gases. A steady barrage of various objects had been hitting the ship with some force on the way down, but thankfully the super strong Corduroy(tm) outer protective shell had been designed to withstand that kind of force. At least, that's what the scientists had planned. They hadn't really known how much force the craft would need to withstand, other than "a lot". They also knew that management was going to be pretty annoyed at having spent all that money if it didn't work. But Ralph and Chuck got down to the surface okay and things seemed to be quieter down there. NASA Mission Control were kept busy. They were monitoring the craft's internal sensors, which were monitoring Ralph and Chuck, who were monitoring the scientific instruments that were monitoring the Venusian atmosphere outside. And of course the population of Earth was monitoring all of this, with their multi-channel big screen digital TVs. This was a lot of monitoring for the general public to watch. Fortunately to keep them interested, the cream of the world's graphic designers and advertising people had worked out ways making even the broadcast of the dullest, most boring study of minuscule dust and gas particles more exciting than the latest Hollywood blockbuster. The monitors outside the craft indicated what the scientists already knew - most of the atmosphere was carbon dioxide, which made it not at all healthy for humans to breathe. Besides which, it was hotter than a February day in Darwin out there, around 450 degrees. Despite these obvious problems, the boffins had designed some pretty impressive protective suits for Ralph and Chuck to wear, and it seemed like a shame to come all this way and not get out to have a look around. So, after a few hours grabbing samples of things by remote control, Ralph and Chuck prepared to go out for a bit of a walk on the surface of Venus. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - DIARY EXCERPT - Tue 8/4/98 - Melbourne to Apollo Bay The Great Ocean Road goes for a couple of hundred kilometres total, and most of it weaves its way along the mountainside right next to the sea. It makes for spectacular views, and necessitates some very very very careful driving. The road is clearly marked, but if you weren't paying attention for a few seconds, you could very easily go over the side into the sea. In fact, the weekend before we went, someone had done exactly that. It's a bit of a challenge - they should make car stickers that say something like "I negotiated the Great Ocean Road and lived to tell the tale", or at the very least give you some Good Driver Points for managing it. In fact a little certificate, a handshake and a rebate on the car insurance premium wouldn't go astray either. Where we did stop was at a few scenic lookouts, to get out and gawp at some of the amazing scenery. Who would believe that the simple combination of ocean, beach or cliff face, road and mountain could be so picturesque? We'd take some snapshots, breathe the fantastically fresh air, and continue down the seemingly increasingly windy (and I mean with lots of winding, not lots of wind) road. DIARY EXCERPT - Thu 9/4/98 - Warrnambool to Melbourne This morning, I had my first car accident. Nothing serious, nobody hurt, though I did get a bit of a cut to my head, which still hurts. It was in the motel carpark. I was packing the boot and hit my head on the lid. (My sister nearly freaked when I was telling her that story.) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - For the full story of our Great Ocean Road trip last week, including loads of picturesque... ummm... pictures, see http://www.toxiccustard.com/diary/1998/04.html#7/4/98 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Don't forget to inflict your PC with the Toxic Custard Screensaver! (slightly improved over last week) http://www.toxiccustard.com/misc/download/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Got comments, questions or abuse? Hit that Reply button right now! If you don't want to receive this mail, then DO NOT REPLY to this message. Why? Because it won't do any good whatsoever, that's why. Instead, send a message to request@toxiccustard.com with the subject "remove". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- Copyright (c) 1998 Daniel Bowen. Excerpts may be distributed for non- profit purposes provided no modifications are made and this copyright notice is included. -- Daniel Bowen, Custard Communications Pty Ltd, Melbourne, Australia ---------- E-mail: dbowen@custard.net.au ------- TCWF information: info@toxiccustard.com Waste your time here---> http://www.toxiccustard.com <---Waste your time here ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Biggest Toxic Custard in the world!" ...... ..... .. .. ..... Toxic Custard Workshop Files :: :: :: .. :: ::.. Number 392, 20/4/98 By Daniel Bowen :: ::... ::.::.:: :: http://www.toxiccustard.com TOXIC CUSTARD GUIDE TO AUSTRALIA http://www.toxiccustard.com/australia/ Pat in Canada wrote: OK, I just got an email from a co-worker about a scam going on in Australia (Sydney, apparently, to be exact). The nature of the scam is this: They get you drunk and steal your kidneys. You wake up in a tub full of ice and there's a note that says "Don't move, call 000". The message also says this scam has been getting a lot of news coverage. Is this in fact true? Well, I gotta tell you, this happened to me. No! No, it didn't. This hasn't happened to me, it hasn't happened to any of my friends or relatives, and in fact, I've never heard of it happening. Not once. I mean... why would anybody steal your kidneys anyway? It's not like they're going to be able to sell them in a pub or something. "Hey mate... Pssst... Wanna buy a couple of kidneys? Great for transplants." Or would it be for some weird cannibal cult? Or just a kind of quite sophisticated and terribly amusing practical joke? But hey, at least whoever made the story up got the emergency phone number right. If any Sydneysiders who have lost kidneys in this way are out there and have lived to tell the tale, please get in touch. Neil Gerace in Australia wrote: A long time ago, on a TV far, far away, I saw an episode of "Australia, You're Standing in It" in which it was said that Melbourne has the world's largest furniture showroom. Is this true, and if so, please put a photo in the Files so the whole world can see it. Ah yes... "Australia, You're Standing In It" was a truly classic show. Through their skilful marketing of Chunky Custard, they may have even influenced the name of this humble journal. They were probably referring to the Saba showroom, which was well known during the early-80s for being pretty massive. Their adverts featured Dave and Mabel, a couple of parrots who greeted showroom visitors from a cage. I never actually visited them, or the unmemorable bloke who presented their ads, so I'm not in a position to judge whether or not it was the world's largest furniture showroom. I seem to remember that once on Hey Hey It's Saturday (back when it was a morning show) they kidnapped Dave and Mabel. Or did I dream it? Saba has passed on to that great franchise in the sky. I have a feeling that the building is still there, and is now used by Harvey Norman or some other big superstore chain. From memory, it's either on the Frankston Road in Dandenong, or the Dandenong Road in Frankston. Either way it's on the outskirts of Melbourne. If I'm ever heading down that way, I'll be sure to take a camera. Anonymous wrote: How did Mt. Shadwell, north of Mortlake get its name? From time to time, questions get asked here that I am in no way equipped to answer. This is one of them. In this situation, I normally reach for a book on my bookshelf, which has a bunch of useful Australian information in it, including some stuff on various places, and how they got their names. But I can't find the book. And I don't know. So I can't answer. If I find the answer later, or someone lets me know, I'll post it here. I promise. And as far as name origins go, I really really really want to know about the origins of Wanke Crescent in the Melbourne suburb of Dandenong. See loads more questions, and ask your own! http://www.toxiccustard.com/australia/ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - DIARY - Wed 15/4/98 - First day A pretty good first day at the new job... Small company, about 10 people. From the looks of it, no inter-departmental rivalry, no office politics, no stupid and unchangeable company policies. All very friendly people. Everybody goes home at 5:30 - they lock the place up. Got a desk, a chair, PC and software the first day, was actually productive and coding. It's in Brighton - Bay Street - quite nice, a few good lunch spots, a few cheap scummy ones too, local bank and PO, all conveniences. Good contract rate, interesting work. Commute is a 10 minute drive or 25 minute tram/train ride. What, you may be wondering, is the bad side? Two words: No e-mail. I may need to start practising my powers of persuasion by doing some Internet Evangelism on the boss! - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - It's got skateboarding dinosaurs! It's got bungee-jumping sharks! It's got the Whitman's Blimp!! It's the Toxic Custard Screensaver! http://www.toxiccustard.com/misc/download/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Got comments, questions or abuse? Hit that Reply button right now! If you don't want to receive this mail, then DO NOT REPLY to this message. Why? Because it won't do any good whatsoever, that's why. Instead, send a message to request@toxiccustard.com with the subject "remove". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- Copyright (c) 1998 Daniel Bowen. Excerpts may be distributed for non- profit purposes provided no modifications are made and this copyright notice is included. -- Daniel Bowen, Custard Communications Pty Ltd, Melbourne, Australia ---------- E-mail: dbowen@custard.net.au ------- TCWF information: info@toxiccustard.com Waste your time here---> http://www.toxiccustard.com <---Waste your time here ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Strolling on Toxic Custard" ***** ***** * * ***** Number 393, 27/4/98 * * * * * **** Written by Daniel Bowen *OXIC *****USTARD *****ORKSHOP *ILES http://www.toxiccustard.com --------------------------------------------------------------------- I was thinking... if you had one leg, you could steal the single shoes out on display at shoe shops. Of course, if you were spotted, it would be a bugger to run away. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - THE YEAR 2031 - Part 13 Everyone had waited for this moment. Okay, so the landing of humans on any planet was a pretty big event, but as far as space missions to weird and wonderful planets, the moment when the astronauts actually stepped out for a stroll was perhaps the hugest, most massively complex and impressive operation imaginable. The TV producers had to line up sponsors, they had to make sure all their broadcast equipment was working to the fullest capacity, and make sure everybody back on Earth within shouting distance of a television knew what was about to happen. Oh yeah, the astronaut people themselves had some preparation too. A stroll on the surface of Venus, with its 450-odd degree temperature, meant a tad more protection than sun-block. The NASA boffins would have preferred Ralph and Chuck to move about the planet in suits so thick and big they might as well have stayed in the rocket. But as usual the publicity people had won that battle, and something far more photogenic, and hopefully almost as protective, had been designed. But "rest assured", they'd said, "it has a really dynamic stripe design on it. It will really look great on camera." "Oh good", the scientists had replied. So, at about 8pm, just after a commercial break, Ralph and Chuck put on their suits, manoeuvred their way through some air-locky things, and stepped out onto the waiting planet to go for a walk. As per usual, the world gasped, as caught on the helmetcam, the view of a new planet was beamed into their livingrooms. It was pretty plain, and pretty dull, but nobody cared: it was new, that was all that mattered. Ralph and Chuck planted a flag, picked up a few bits of dirt, and began to walk around, as a second camera mounted on the side of the ship tracked their progress. Then Ralph tripped over something. "Shit", he exclaimed, his surprise echoed instantly back to the watching population of Earth, which included his far from amused mother. The telecast producer made a note to take a copy of the footage for the Funniest Videos show. Ralph would have wanted to rub his knee, but the suit was so padded that he'd hardly felt a thing when he hit the ground. The human body took more impact getting into bed than it did tripping over in one of these suits. So instead he looked back at what he'd tripped over. He squinted through the dust. It was square. A square block, sticking out of the ground. "That's odd", said Ralph, to nobody in particular. Eight billion nobodies in particular back on Earth looked at the helmetcam shot of the block, and agreed. "We're the first two to have landed here. Other, unmanned craft have come before, but didn't land anywhere near here. And this looks man made." Chuck came to look. Being a little challenged in the intellectual capacity area, he didn't feel he could add much at this point, except perhaps the occasional nod of agreement. "Yeah", he said. They decided to see if they could dig around the object to get a better look. After a few minutes of scrabbling around in the dirt, Ralph decided this was better left to the ship's cleaning robots. The cleaning robots were industrial strength, capable of working day and night in the most horrendous conditions - they'd been designed for cleaning student dorms. So a little Venusian dirt and dust wouldn't stress them one little bit. Ralph and Chuck walked around for a bit while the two cleaning robots went about their work, generating a cloud of dust and throwing small rocks in all directions around them. When they were finished, Ralph and Chuck made their way back through the small piles of rubble to look. It was a box. What appeared to be a metal box. The top was badly corroded, but the bottom half was intact, more or less. The top was no particular colour other than perhaps a shade known as "in severe need of a respray". But the bottom was undoubtedly, unmistakably, green. More in a week or two... for previous episodes, point your Web browser to http://www.toxiccustard.com/features/2031/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Got comments, questions or abuse? Hit that Reply button right now! If you don't want to receive this mail, then DO NOT REPLY to this message. Why? Because it won't do any good whatsoever, that's why. Instead, send a message to request@toxiccustard.com with the subject "remove". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- Copyright (c) 1998 Daniel Bowen. Excerpts may be distributed for non- profit purposes provided no modifications are made and this copyright notice is included. -- Daniel Bowen, Custard Communications Pty Ltd, Melbourne, Australia ---------- E-mail: dbowen@custard.net.au ------- TCWF information: info@toxiccustard.com Waste your time here---> http://www.toxiccustard.com <---Waste your time here ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Tubthumping Toxic Custard" ***** **** * * *** http://www.toxiccustard.com * * * * * * Number 394, 4th May 1998 * * * * * *** Written by Daniel Bowen *OXIC***USTARD*****ORKSHOP*ILES DIARY - Sun 3/5/98 - To do - May People who follow my diary regularly may be wondering why the entries in the last few weeks have been so few and far between. I've been wondering why too, and the conclusion I've come to is that my life is not as funny now as it sometimes has been. That's not to say I'm not having a good time, or not laughing and joking with my friends on a regular basis (like when we watched The Life Of Brian on Good Friday again this year). Perhaps being now in a reasonably sensible job (lack of e-mail aside) I'm just not suffering enough? Next time do I need to take a crap job, and in any other way I can find, increase my suffering in the name of comedy? I write this diary primarily for amusement. Yours and mine. It's not so much a record of my life as a chance for me to describe some of the things that happen to me in a highly amusing manner. At least, I write it hoping it will be highly amusing. Sometimes it doesn't turn out that way. So what have I been up to? Not quite the things I've planned to be up to, that's for sure. At the start of April, when I knew I'd have a couple of weeks off work for recreation and general lazing, I wrote a list of things to do. "To do - April ", I optimistically called it. It wasn't too over the top. Not the kind of list that would have kept a taskforce of two dozen highly skilled workaholics busy for two years. Only about a dozen items, each of which would take between a few minutes and few hours to complete. My theory was that if I had a list of things to do, each time I found myself with a little spare time, I could look at the list and do one or more of them. I'm sure that a few years ago when I used to write such a list, I'd find myself polishing it off without too much effort. Well, it's now the thirty-fourth of April, AKA the fourth of May, and I'm just now remembering that it never really did work after all. Then, as now, the items sit on the list. A couple of them get ticked off, and I get really ticked off because I never seem to get around to doing the others. Now, maybe if I just cross out "April", and put "May"... More from the diary... http://www.toxiccustard.com/diary/ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - TOXIC CUSTARD GUIDE TO AUSTRALIA Douglas, in the USA wrote: [There is] an odd-sounding song by your countrymen that has made an appearance here. The "group" is called "Chumbawamba". The "song" is called "Tubthumper." As a cultural export, I'm not exactly sure it does Australia proud. - Douglas, USA I hate to disappoint you Douglas, but while there are plenty of oddball Australian bands (TISM especially springs to mind), Chumbawamba isn't one of them. They're from Leeds, in England. Heck, they don't even sound Australian! And actually, I quite like Tubthumping. They've used it for a Rugby commercial here. Bryan Evans wrote: Do you have any exposure to Hanson in Australia? If not, I'll be moving there in a week. If so, what safeguards do you use against them? Sometimes it's to our disadvantage that Australia is so plugged into the rest of the western world. Practically every musical act you've ever hated, in fact, every bit of western culture that you've ever hated, that has made it big somewhere else, has probably made it big in Australia too. One can only conclude that there is a portion of the population (teenage girls, in the case of Hanson) that likes it. So if you're looking to run away from the likes of Hanson, Michael Bolton, Celine Dion or that bloody Barbie Girl song, you won't entirely escape them by coming here. Perhaps becoming a hermit and going to live in a soundproofed cave somewhere is a better bet? Dave in Australia wrote: Why don't Victorians play Rugby Union instead of the blousy game of Aussie Rules? Pardon? Blousy? It's probably worth pointing out that a couple of weeks ago, somebody got killed playing a game of Aussie Rules. Now, I know that Rugby has its fair share of fatalities too, but in my book, any game that involves a bunch of blokes with no protection outside a flimsy pair of shorts and a mouthguard piling on top of each other to try and gain possession of a football is not blousy. It's also probably worth pointing out that in Rugby League, the new team Melbourne Storm is leading the competition. So any more blouse jokes about Victorians, and me and the lads will be heading up or over to wherever you are Davey mate, to teach you a few things about blouses! Now NFL - that's blousy! With all that protective gear, they might as well not bother. And those shoulderpads are so eighties! For more questions and answers, and to ask your own questions, head to http://www.toxiccustard.com/australia/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Got comments, questions or abuse? Hit that Reply button right now! If you don't want to receive this mail, then DO NOT REPLY to this message. Why? Because it won't do any good whatsoever, that's why. Instead, send a message to request@toxiccustard.com with the subject "remove". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- Copyright (c) 1998 Daniel Bowen. Excerpts may be distributed for non- profit purposes provided no modifications are made and this copyright notice is included. -- Daniel Bowen, Custard Communications Pty Ltd, Melbourne, Australia ---------- E-mail: dbowen@custard.net.au ------- TCWF information: info@toxiccustard.com Waste your time here---> http://www.toxiccustard.com <---Waste your time here RIP Tosh ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Really very extremely late Toxic Custard" Sorry about the very late delivery of this issue... that's the way computers go sometimes - not everything works exactly to plan... ===== TOXIC CUSTARD WORKSHOP FILES ===== Waste your time here! ===== ===== Number 395, 11/5/98 ============== http://www.toxiccustard.com ===== Written by Daniel Bowen ====================================== Hey! Hey you! Is your Web browser doing nothing? Do you love and adore the Toxic Custard web site? Then vote for it on the Global Internet Homepages Top 100 Chart Thingy! http://www.worldcharts.com/hvote.html?add=[1153] (If you hate Toxic Custard, then vote against it!) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - DIARY - Sun 10/5/98 - Not bloody Karen Liddell again?!? Networking - the people kind, not the computer kind - can be a real pain. I should point out here that I'm not going to offer you shares in some company you've never heard of. I'm not going to invite you to join in a pyramid scheme. And I'm not going to ask you to become an agent in your local area for some crap product that I claim has performed miracles for me. Honest. I've come to the conclusion that the type of networking I really don't like is when somebody is trying to make money directly out of doing it. The type of networking that sees Amway reps pulling you into a corner and offering you a "great business opportunity", and another variety is those endless spam e-mails, most of which seem to involve bloody Karen Liddell, the 35 year old mom, wife and part-time accountant with a great pyramid scheme for you to join. Another one I got earlier this year was a letter through the mail from somewhere in the US, addressed to me personally, and asking politely if I wanted to be included in a Who's Who list of the computer industry. I wondered where they got my name and address, something I still don't know. But it said that all I had to do was fill in my details and send it back, and I could get listed. So I thought "what the hell", filled it in and sent it back, and then forgot about it. A couple of months later, there was a phone call. An American voice was on the other end, explaining that Who's Who wanted to make an appointment to do a telephone interview to work out if I qualified to be in their guide. After she'd finished struggling to get the concept of what timezone I was in, we made an appointment for the following day. I made a note of it in my diary, and then forgot about it. The next day, the phone rang, and sure enough it was Whatsername, the woman they'd said would call. She asked questions about what I do and what I was planning to do in the computer industry - mostly the sort of questions that were answered on the original form anyway. She then did a telephonic song and dance about how marvellous their Who's Who is, and what great networking opportunities it offers for those privileged and very special people who managed to crawl their ways into it. By this point, I was getting a very bad feeling about this. It wasn't helped when she said that I had indeed been judged one of those privileged and very special people who could get into the guide, and, as if it was a Nobel Prize For Computing, offered her congratulations. Then she went on to explain what you get with membership into Who's Who - and by the time she'd talked about the special book of annointed people and the plaque to put on the wall, it had clicked. These people were not getting the smartarses of the computing world together out of the goodness of their hearts. All this wanky plaque and book stuff was going to cost some serious moula. Sure enough: "The basic membership costs $951..." So at that point, I brought the conversation to an emergency stop, trying (barely successfully) to find the good nature to be polite about my reasons for not wanting to shell out something over $1400 ('cos you can bet she was quoting US dollars) for a glorified hyperlink. We hung up and then I forgot about it. Though thinking about it now, I wonder - does the Real Who's Who have some sort of trademark protection? 'Cos if it was me, I'd be suing these guys' arses off. But now to the good news. Almost a year ago, one of my diary entries (30/5/97) rabbitted on about the possibilities of setting up an equivalent of the Kevin Bacon Game database for ordinary (ie non-movie star) people, to see if the links between different people could be worked out. With a little help from a friend, I've discovered that somebody's done it: it's at www.sixdegrees.com. Okay, so they do make money off advertising on the web pages, but that's fair enough. And they've actually done quite a good job of it. So, anybody reading this, jump to their page and tap your details in. Feel free to put a link to me as an acquaintance or a business contact or friend or something. They don't have to know the truth! DIARY - Mon 11/5/98 - 3 sleeps to go! Yay, only 3 sleeps until the Paul Kelly concert! I'm seriously looking forward to this one. At last I seem to have found a musician who not only plays music I enjoy listening to, but writes songs I can really identify with. There's a lot of music that I like, but most of it seems to involve really great music with lyrics that I can't understand, or if I understand what the words are, I certainly don't understand what the words mean. For details of Paul Kelly's coming Aus and USA concerts, see http://www.amws.com.au/pk/tour-dates.html - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - THE YEAR 2031 - Part 14 The media back home on Earth were going crazy with this. What could this mysterious green(ish) box they had found on Venus be? What did it mean? And most importantly, was it alien? An alien craft? An alien robot? The remains of the corpse from a race of alien robots? Ralph and Chuck had no idea. But they thought it looked vaguely familiar. A box, a bit more than a metre tall. Mostly green, with a slot along one side about ten centimetres high near the top. There was some writing, too. Or at least, it looked like writing. The population of Earth had come a long way in terms of technology, but by 2031, with the Unix 2038 bug only just around the corner, they hadn't quite managed to develop anything like the Babelfish. It would have come in handy for Ralph and Chuck, staring at these incomprehensible patterns on the side of the box next to the slot. Near the bottom of the box was more "writing". It was tiny, hardly noticeable, but at least there seemed to be more words than on the side. Ralph took detailed pictures of all the markings and transmitted them back to Earth, where suddenly anybody who was anybody in the world of codes, symbols, ancient languages and linguistics found themselves either hunted down by NASA to join a research team into the markings, or hunted down by the media and asked to speculate on what the research team might discover. While endless numbers of research scientists with very nerdy haircuts stretched their brains and supercomputers to the limit working on the markings, Ralph and Chuck kept exploring. They didn't find much else of interest in the surrounding area though, and after a hard day's slog, they were ready to return to Penis I for a rest. Of course, neither of them could sleep - being the first men on Venus with evidence mounting that there was life was about as exciting as the night before little kids get back to school after the Easter break when they're wondering what all their friends have been up to. But even as they lay in their hammocks, staring out the window, the teams of scientists had an answer for them. They believed that their supercomputers, using advanced interpretation algorithms and databases which included all known human language, had correctly interpreted the markings on the box. The publicity people were ecstatic. This was more than they could possibly have hoped for. Evidence that there was life - and intelligent life at that - on Venus. The scientists had all looked at the preliminary studies. Most of them agreed - it all made sense. The box structure correlated with what they thought the markings meant. And yes, it really did point to there being intelligent, literate, civilised, even advanced life on Venus. As soon as they were reasonably sure, they announced it to the world. The bulletins blared over Earth, every media outlet using a sound grab of one of NASA's computers using voice synthesis to read the interpretation. It was not, of course, a literal translation, but the scientists believed they had extrapolated the probable logical translation of the writing on the top of the box, which was: DO NOT LITTER. More in a week or two... for previous episodes, point your Web browser to http://www.toxiccustard.com/features/2031/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ What's that? You've got comments, questions or abuse? Then be a good little Vegemite and reply right now! If you don't want to receive this mail, and you're wondering why you still are, it's probably because you haven't yet sent mail to request@toxiccustard.com with the subject "remove". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ -- Copyright (c) 1998 Daniel Bowen. Excerpts may be distributed for non- profit purposes provided no modifications are made and this copyright notice is included. -- Daniel Bowen, Custard Communications Pty Ltd, Melbourne, Australia ---------- E-mail: dbowen@custard.net.au ------- TCWF information: info@toxiccustard.com Waste your time here---> http://www.toxiccustard.com <---Waste your time here ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Toxic Custard Workshop Files - http://www.toxiccustard.com - is Copyright (c) 1998 Daniel Bowen, Melbourne, Australia. Excerpts may be distributed without charge provided no modifications are made and this notice is appended. For subscription and back-issue information, send email to info@toxiccustard.com