The History Of The Universe In Three

It Looks Perverted And Wasteful To Us, But Then One Thing That Empires Are Not About Is The Efficient Use Of Resources And The Spread Of Happiness; Both Are Typically Accomplished Despite The Economic Short-circuiting - Corruption And Favoritism, Mostly- Endemic To The System.

My Greatest Enemies Are Women And The Sea. These Things I Hate. Women Because They Are Weak And Stupid And Live In The Shadow Of Men And Are Nothing Compared To Them, And The Sea Because It Has Always Frustrated Me, Destroying What I Have Built, Washing Away What I Have Left, Wiping Clean The Marks I Have Made.

Stories Set In The Culture In Which Things Went Wrong Tended To Start With Humans Losing Or Forgetting Or Deliberately Leaving Behind Their Terminal. It Was A Conventional Opening, The Equivalent Of Straying Off The Path In The Wild Woods In One Age, Or A Car Breaking Down At Night On A Lonely Road In Another.

In Theory, I Work An Eight-hour Day And A Five-day Week Which Means I Can Socialise With My Pals Who Mostly Have Normal Jobs Like Teaching And Computer Programming.

I Am Not Being Obtuse. You Are Being Paranoid.