Science

That was an excellent show, David, said the VeloDrone, on his return from the Royal Institution. You would have enjoyed it. He waved a small red and black cardboard packet under the nose of his friend.

What's that? said Le Bon David, peering at the packet.

Hee hee! It's a condom. And guess how much liquid it can hold without bursting?

Vello! Don't be so vulgar! Where on earth have you been?

I've been to a cabaret at the Royal Intitution. It was called Pre-Coital, The Science of Dating. Our last free ticket for the Fringe. It was my turn to go, wasn't it?

Yes it was. And by the sound of it, I am the lucky one. But tell me, Science and Dating. What has one got to do with the other?

Exactly! What has one person got to do with the other? It was science, with plenty of singing and dancing and comedy thrown in.

That doesn't sound like science!

But it was. I learned the odds of meeting my perfect mate. I learned about the biology and evolution of physical attraction. I learned about pheromones and emotions, and had a lesson in condom physics and sperm counts.

Hence the condom.

Indeed. It holds a litre without breaking. Would you like me to show you?

No, Vello, I wouldn't.

Smartie at Home

it's raining
i'm eating a smartie
at home

the rain came
as we left
the art gallery

we were at
an exhibition called
before and after science

it was part
of the festival of arts
it was crap
let me explain

it was basically just stuff
that artists had put there
hoping you'd see
what it meant

it's raining
i'm eating a smartie
at home

i suppose you're thinking
she takes a long time to eat one smartie.
but there's something you don't know
i've eaten six
and there's something else you don't know
they aren't real

at least i've taken the trouble to explain
and i've taken the trouble
to make it a poem
even though.......( you can finish it )

NanoString Bicycle

People! Remember me? It is I, Salvador Dali. The only difference between myself and a madman is: I am not mad. Ah yes, you remember me now!

It was I who painted the fourth dimension, in the shape of eight cubes. It was I who depicted the bending of light in the form of a spoon. Science, my friends, follows Dali, and Dali follows no one at all.

Surrealism may be dead. But Dali is not dead. Dali moves with the times. Dali moves before the times. The times follow Dali.

Enter my space. It is dark. What have we here? In a dark interactive tunnel you find a brilliant piece of work, by Dali. It is his new NanoString bicycle. The bicycle is blue and green and violet. These colours symbolise.....NOTHING!!! they are merely the colours Dali has chosen today. Symbolism is dead, but things must have a colour.

The NanoString bicycle is made of nano particles. They are miniscule. They are absorbed immediately into your skin. The bicycle becomes a part of you and you become the bicycle. You pedal down the dark tunnel, towards a screen at the end. You see your self riding towards you, and you are ALARMED! Momentarily. But you have forgotten your new nano qualities. You ride straight through the screen.

Crash! A million stars! Receding, receding....... You ride through dark matter, and dark energy sucks hungrily at your pedals....... you are going to vanish inside a BLACK HOLE. PANIC!!! But no. Here is the beauty and inventiveness of Dali's bicycle. The bicycle has remained attached to the tunnel by a series of nano strings, blue and green and violet. Yes! They did symbolise something afer all. They draw you back from certain extinction.The beautiful strings.

I, Dali, invented this.