Blade Runner & Buzz

impossible songs

Endless Flight.

Ever been on a flight and thought that horrible thought “There’s something not quite right here” or “What’s that squeaking sound? That’s not normal” or worst of all “why is the plane shuddering like that?” These were some of the unwanted notions that crossed my mind flying up from Bristol tonight, however I didn’t panic or even sweat, I just had a bad feeling that thankfully was completely unfounded and irrational as we ploughed into 150mph headwinds at 27000ft. Of course if the “vague notion that is God” had wanted us to fly he’d have given us rubber bands and propellers on our heads, doesn't help either, but it would have been an interesting evolutionary step.

Blade Runner.

Why are so many people fixated with Blade Runner and the Rick Deckard character? It’s a film about chain smoking robots and set in a dingy, dripping LA that probably looks a lot like the current LA and that has only taken 25 years. So why are there no Replicants out on the streets by now, driving cabs, directing traffic and flipping burgers? The answer is that it is pointless to develop robots to do really basic human tasks (as opposed to repetitive factory work) when cheap, desperate and exploited labour pours into the West and the US on a daily basis to plug the gaps. Cyber punk, science fiction, science fact and the wider world’s free market economy have failed to deliver the new reality that was promised and the bright and shining robots have not risen up to free mankind from the slavery of hard labour and polishing car windscreens.

Buzz gets easy bucks.

When Buzz Aldrin came back from the moon on Apollo 11 he filed an expenses claim for $33.31. Hard to imagine quite what it was for but if I was the clerk who processed it I’d have framed the form and paid him myself.