Einstein's Unification Theory

Gentlemen! My mind is on fire! So many concepts to unify! Please find enclosed my first submission to your magazine entitled:


The Unification Theory of Bicycle-Photograffiti Appearances ( a working title).

I have long been a fan of graffiti. Imagine my surprise when I saw, appearing on various walls around our city, a series of graffiti depicting the famous photograph of myself on a bicycle. Is it really me? I wondered, at first. Many people commented that it looked more like a photo of a lady. When I looked hard at it I realised that this was true. It was an elderly lady wearing my trousers and my cardigan, her hair blown back in the wind, a shadow on her upper lip cast by the sun overhead, smiling joyfully as she sped toward the camera. On a carpark wall her message seemed to be: Get out of your cars you slackers, ride a bike like me! If I can do it so can you! On the other hand I knew very well that the photograph was of myself. Was I not wearing my own trousers and my own cardigan? My hair was blown back by the wind and my moustache was in full view for all to see. My message was clear: Yes people! I thought of the Law of Relativity while riding my bicycle!

So here we have a bicyclical instance of the unification of gender, of graffiti, of photography and to a certain extent, of message. Let us now call the bicycle BB. Let us call the message M.

Several weeks later the bicycle graffiti photographs were expunged by the city council workers, which was a shame as they had been quite popular. What then of BB? What of M? What indeed of P and G and the other G? ( which are what you think they are ).

This is where my attempt at a scientific unification meets the cutting edge of philosophy. What had we left after the council had done their work? Nothing. Zero. Equality. Unification of everything: man, woman, photograph, smile, moustache, trousers, cardigan, graffiti, bicycle, message. Thus I have come up with a working formula, BB =PGG= M= 0.

Of course I do not expect the general community to understaaaand it. Oh damn! Thee backspac butto is stuc ag !!! has a min of its own ....AEEEEEEEE

Mysterious Encounter - Part 3

Here we are now, I say to Pliny. This is the third poem, which I wrote a week later on the 20th of June 2009. Pliny? Are you listening?

Yes, says Pliny. I am listening.

I read aloud:

The Continuing Adventure of Old Mr Sherlock Holmes.

I saw him again last night
In the same dark place,
But I had misremembered Toby,
Who was brown, with a black face.
The old man was the same
Slow, twisted and lame.
I spoke to him this time: Hello! Perhaps too loud.
He turned towards me,
Straining to see,
And bowed.



Hah! says Pliny, that still doesn't prove.......

Wait, I reply. There is a second part.

A second part! Are you by any chance stringing me along?

No, certainly not. There is a second part, with a separate title. Pay attention, because it contains a revelation:

Old Mr. Holmes Muses by the Fire.

You know Toby old chap,
Sometimes I think I see
On winter evenings,
Walking,
The woman, and even he.
Tonight I was almost sure
I heard her voice
Say Good evening Holmes, to me.
I strained my eyes
But nothing palpable
Could I see.
And you Toby,
Seemed to be
Sniffing around the wrong tree.

Remarkable! says Pliny. I am impressed. This does indeed seem to prove that he was Sherlock Holmes. But who is the woman?

Pliny! I say, crossly, haven't you understood anything?

A Platonic Bicycle

Hello friends! Le Bon David here. We had an avalanche of responses after the VeloDrone's story last week. Now those responses have created a further controversy. You demanded to know how Plato could have owned a bicycle. Well, I caught up with Plato yesteday and put the question to him:

Le Bon David: May I say, sir, that it is an honour to meet you. You are a man I have long admired.

Plato: The honor is mine, sir. I have been a keen reader of Velosophy since it's inception.

Le Bon David: Very kind words, sir, very kind. Now let us get straight to the point. Have you or have you not at any time owned an actual bicycle?

Plato: First, my friend, I must make it clear that just as all my ideas come from the wise and venerable Socrates, so the bicycle, such as it was, belonged to him.

Le Bon David: Pray, continue.

Plato: Therefore when I say I had a bicycle, I mean to say that Socrates had a bicycle. And when I say that the bicycle caught fire, I mean to say that Socrates' bicycle caught fire. And when I say that it was hardly ideal, I mean to repeat a little witticism coined by Socrates himself.

Le Bon David: I see. Then the question is, was Socrates' bicycle a real bicycle?

Plato: No, it was an ideal bicycle. That is, he conceived of the bicycle by philosophical means. For as you know there were no actual bicycles in ancient Greece. We had wheels on our chariots and carts, but we had not invented steering, nor the pedal, nor had we thought of placing one wheel behind the other, until one day when something happened deep inside Socrates' cave.

Le Bon David: Intriguing! What was that?

Plato: A large log placed somewhat precariously on the top of the fire suddenly collapsed and fell to the floor of the cave where it continued burning, with the result that there were now two fires burning side by side. Now as you know, Socrates used to sit near the entrance of the cave, dreaming up ideal objects and imagining what they would look like.

Le Bon David: Did he indeed? I should have thought that would be somewhat unproductive.

Plato: No, no. He had, in fact just dreamed up an ideal sort of wheel. When the fire suddenly divided into two fires, all the other people in the cave........

Le Bon David: Other people in the cave?

Plato: Yes, yes, prisoners remember? In the allegory they represent the general public, who do not know how to philosophise.

Le Bon David: Ah yes, I do remember.

Plato: So, the other people in the cave, who were sitting looking at the shadows thrown up on the wall by the objects that were passing in front of the fire behind them .....are you with me?

Le Bon David: No, what objects are these?

Plato: You would have to ask Socrates. But I believe he used to try and demonstrate his ideas using his fingers as puppets. I know he used to do an awfully realistic rabbit.

Le Bon David: So what happened that day?

Plato: Well! The people were looking at Socrates' finger wheel, not being particularly excited by it, when all at once they saw the shadows of two wheels one in front of the other, and they began shouting at once. Look Socrates! You've made a bicycle! And that was the beginning of it.

Le Bon David: The idea caught fire, so to speak!

Plato: Yes, my friend, I believe you have understood me perfectly.

Easter Story 6

What is the colour of that sky? wondered Pliny, standing aft on the Dolphin Princess looking across the darkening Port River towards the red horizon and the black outline of the mangroves.
But it wasn't red. It was orange. No, it wasn't orange. And it definitely wasn't mandarin. That she knew because she had just eaten a warm chicken salad garnished with mandarin segments from a tin.

The breeze was not quite warm and mild. There were collections of black sticks floating on the gleaming water. They may have been seagulls. They were seagulls. Once the Dolphin Princess had passed them they turned white against the black water. A sunset trick.

The colour of the sky was, she realised, the colour of fire. And the colour of fire was the colour that the sky was, just then. So it should be, she thought. The sun is a ball of fire. She was glad she had thought that.

Now she could go back inside.