Working at home involves frequent calls and Golfy and I have noticed that if I make a call to him it takes significantly longer to connect than if he makes a call to me...
... I pointed out that this was entirely natural advising that ****cester is much larger than the branch in the Hundred Acre Wood. Therefore it was entirely natural that a call from the Wood would take longer to reach ****cester than vice versa. Golfy replied that this was bollocks.
My reposte was as follows; it takes eight minutes for the light from the sun to reach the earth. If you shine a torch at the sun you can hardly expect the light to reach the sun in the same amount of time. After all, the torch is significantly weaker than the sun and it has to flow against the huge amount of light coming from the sun. For some reason Golfy didnt quite agree with this logic....
.... I tried another tack. It is a bit like trying to paddle a canoe up a waterfall. So, from the perspective of an Amazon Indian who is wearing nothing but red ochre, a piece of vine round his waist and a gourd over the end of his penis he will entirely understand why it take longer for a call to reach ****cester than it does for a call from ****cester to reach me. the reason it takes longer is because canoes aren't any good at going up waterfalls*.
Therefore my argument was much better as it was truly international in nature and could be understood by even the most non technological of cultures. To disagree would definitely be, at the very least, insulting to the noble inhabitants of the Amazon Basin.
There is probably a moral to this story. Then again I have a deep suspicion that if there is it is probably best left unexamined because I am developing a strong feeling that it is not what you say, it is more the way that you say it.
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* well canoes are, but only if they have a 40 HP Evinrude strapped to the transom. These are very rare in the deepest Amazon
If, and it's a BIG if... But if I had a torch which was roughly as powerful as the sun (give or take a few gazillion watts) then there is a very slim possibility that it could give off enough light for me to be able to see where you're coming from! As it is, your musings appear to be in a very deep and dark mine and they don't hold a candle to the theory. In fact, now I mention it, a word of advice. Don't hold a candle anywhere near a tribesman covered in ochre and a sliver of string. The Ochre is likely to be highly flammable and if he farts, you're done for.
ReplyDeleteAn awesome and inspiring post, which is ultimately still bollox! ;-)