'We know from yesterday's calculations that the sun is only
three centimetres in diameter. And therefore the moon, being smaller to the
eye, must be smaller still in centimetres. Parsons! What do you calculate the
moon's diameter to be?'
I look up. Personally I don't give a toss about anything in
the sky that's got a diameter. I'm more interested in the diameter of the
wheels on my self-driver. Dad bought me one last twelfth, when they came down
in price, in exchange for me supervising the self-mowing of the lawn. Old
braindead that he is, he's always concerned that the self-mower is going to
sail off the edge of the section and crash into a passing self-driver.
But it's a task. Tasks are good for growing boys,
supposedly. I think Dad's forgotten I'm already sixteen, and around 240
centimetres tall. I'm probably not going
to grow anymore.
Which reminds me, they've raised the school basketball hoops
at school to four metres. Basketball hoops have a nice diameter. Must SuperSkype
Jomz and tell him he hasn't a hope of hitting the hoop now.
Something else to do when Ranter's finished ranting on. I
mean, does anyone need to know that the sun isn't
a big ball of flame in the sky like the old braindeads used to think? Or that
the moon is just a little glob of yellow spit, hardly worth thinking about?
I read somewhere that men were supposed to have walked on
it. Amazing what people used to think they knew about the Un-verse.
[Originally intended for a National Flash Fiction Day competition, but apparently never sent! Plainly my secretary wasn't doing his job properly.]
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