9/22/04

Tetris as Godgame (prima-fractal)

You rush to open inboxes and scan for feedback to your posts, but you’re greeted with a digital void. A long string of zeros with no binary counterpart to be seen. Not a 1.

There is some disappointment in the first stage of the afterlife – it will pass as you settle into the hot bath of nirvana. It takes some getting used to. You do realize you’re living in a fractal, don’t you? Endgame – after death in Tetris – a level 17 premonition. You got a high score – as high as your hero. You equated his level of experience and appreciation and utilization of life with level 17. 10 you called “average” – everyman. You got past a fuller life then 50% of human beings. 15 was the celebrity mark. It symbolized an elite, an extraordinary person. 17 was your hero, a spellbinding orator, a connoisseur of sex drugs and rock ‘n roll, a man praised and vilified, who died young but wise - a man who came closer than anyone to the secret. You tied with him. You used the force. As the blocks fell faster and faster the game became frantic, until you grew satisfied with your performance, let go, and went with the flow. Surprisingly, the flow took you further than you imagined it would, and you hung on in productive and artful block-clearing activity, but as the end seemed more and more inevitable, you met it with peace. You closed your eyes in a sort of self-administered euthanasia, still going through the keyboard-manipulating motions but delegating the playing to the tired drones under the cerebral cortex. When you opened your eyes, the black screen of death was the view, filling the blank and sealing fate. Now here you are – writing about it. The first thing the dead do is write a short bio with all relevant information. The rest – well, you’ll find out. First, sleep. It’s been a long day. Evening flourish of the mortal microcosm.

The Twin Gears of Cringe and Cling

Donating. Actually doing something - an interaction - over the web - financial transaction, christmas shopping, or sort of gesturing to chri...