The Writer's Life 10/15 - Matters

In an article in today's NY Post, Larry Getlen addresses potential advances in technology that rival science fiction. A Chinese company has become proficient in the 3-D printing of houses. It has created ten homes in 24 hours at a cost of $5000 each. Detractors wonder, if the practice becomes widespread, what it will do to the construction industry... Another development is Augmented Reality, with which video gamers are already familiar. The intention is to make helmets that make complicated tasks easy. The drawbacks would be the potential for hacking... Scientists are working on a cannon that would blast a craft into space, eliminating the need for costly fuel. It would be used only for cargo transportation, as the rate of acceleration would be fatal to humans. The downside - what if rogue nations or terrorists got hold of one?... Programmable Matter seems something out of Star Trek. One example - a bucket of goo that, at voice command, would transform into a tool such as a wrench or hammer. Naysayers imagine bad actors hacking into it in the middle of the night, commanding the goo to be naughty. 

From the Post's Weird But True column, in my own words: Sign of the times: Northern Michigan University has begun a four-year program on the science and business of growing and selling pot. To show how much society has changed in this regard, here's something that happened in 1967 while I was a freshman at Western Michigan. My buddy Bruce, who was on a football scholarship, smoked a joint in his room, so naive about the stuff he didn't realize the aroma would travel beyond his cinder block walls. He didn't get busted, as he came down to the TV room and sat beside me, exaggerating the effects, smiling broadly. Mike, a nice red-haired kid who lived across the hall, did not fare well. Dorm staff assumed he was the source of the odor, entered his room, and held a flashlight to his eyes, searching for symptoms of drug use, scaring the bejesus out of him. If I recall correctly, Bruce eventually became one of the prime suspects, but there was no evidence to pin the rap on him or anyone else. I don't remember if he had more of the stuff and had to dispose of it. That's the way it was, Fall 1967. Bruce is now a doctor, an internist, in the Detroit suburbs. I lost track of Mike after freshman year.

My thanks to the teenage boy whose mom allowed him to select Stephen King's It, the only sale of the afternoon. At least it wasn't a total loss, as I scored a favorable parking spot upon my return home. I won't have to move the car until after Thursday's session.

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