Do Not Install In Radiant Heat Ceilings

After Oliver Fontaine died, two friends of mine, Deena Ramos and James "Hardhat" White, had tattoos put on their skin.

Deena's tattoo was a 12-inch tall female Klingon warrior with an honourific message about Oliver written in the Klingon language (Deena at one time spoke fluent Klingon (a fictional language associated with the TV series "Star Trek" and its spinoffs), taught at the Klingon language school and was featured in the New York Times magazine in her Klingon garb).

Hardhat's tattoo was a spewing raised manhole (or confined space entry chimney, perhaps) with "In Memory of Oliver" written in English.

If I remember correctly, Jay Hereford took over some of Oliver's duties at work.  Jay is one of the most laidback people I know, transitioning from one position in life to another like he already knew what's coming next.

We all have fond memories of one sort or another.  Memories of my coworkers like Jay, Deena and Hardhat, as well as Joyce Battle, Dennis "Catdaddy" McPhearson, Janet Burns and many others, made the sewer flow monitoring business well worth working in and recalling.  Moments like the time Alan Petroff pointed out to me the influence of ocean tide inflow on a sewer outfall (in Dania or Hollywood, Florida?).

With those thoughts floating in my head, I headed out to the local fishing spots on the Flint River today.

Since the Flint is a public waterway, I can't expect to conduct experiments in complete privacy, can I?

Sometime after 13:00 I was working with some colleagues to see if a Livescribe electronic pen could communicate with an electronic fishing rod leaned against a tree and send signals to a group of fish with organic circuits in their bodies.

Just as I was about to reverify our lab results, a couple of kids on an ATV drove up and panicked the fish, which darted away and swam upstream automatically.

After the kids drove by, I packed up my fishing gear and followed the fish upstream to the collection point.

I don't know what was happening but the fish seemed to get close to the collection box and then dart away at the last minute, as if their tiny fish brains were telling the fish that although they were strongly attracted to the entryway of the box they should not swim into the box because it was unnatural.  That's not what they were supposed to do, my scientist friends told me.

That's why I always insist on proving technology in the field rather than claiming success in the lab.

After watching the fish for a few seconds, I decided to abort the test.  I activated a circuit in the fish that caused the organic circuitry to dissolve into the surrounding fish tissue (or "self-destruct," in popular vocabulary), carried my fishing gear to the car and grabbed a bite to eat from Amber at the Sonic drive-thru.  I would have preferred a butterscotch shake and burger from Inez's old place, Mountain View Restaurant, but the doors have long since been locked and the windows papered over, another local eatery lost to franchised fast-food chains.

At least while I conducted today's experiment, I chomped on a cigar and drank a beer in the midday sun while watching natural nature in all its midspring naturalness.  A brief moment of peace in the great outdoors, despite the loud sounds of traffic on the nearby highway.

Have you ever watched someone roped off with carabiners and surfing the surface of a large sewer flow, feet planted on a 2x4, a makeshift surfboard?  Have you ever watched soap suds from an upstream "one-hour Martinizing" dry cleaning business clean the crud off your waders while you're measuring the depth and peak speed of the flow through the sewer pipe?  Or choke on an illegal dump of flammable liquids from a local smash repair shop, carefully exiting the chamber full of toxic fumes and hoping not to cause a spark that would ignite the gases and send you up into the sky like a living cannonball at a circus?

Life is about seeing all there is to see in this moment, not just sitting in an office all day and wondering what's out there.

Time for this ol' fellow to ponder the inside of his eyelids and take a nap!