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alarmed, bullied, and drugged into compliance and semisomnambulance
unnecessarily. It could be that they're being cooped up in homes and
classrooms too much, she says, and not allowed to run off their energies in
parks and playgrounds. Really? My word! I mean, how these people do it?
do
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According to Professor Alderson, the mania for finding maladjusted kids
everywhere is driven by money. (Surprise.) Psychologists want the work and
lower the diagnosis threshold accordingly. Not surprisingly, the professionals
on the other side disagree. A spokeswoman for the National Autism
Society found it " . . . disappointing that reputable diagnosis is being
questioned." Just imagine
questioning the need to drug millions of children. Whatever next?
* * *
Pioneer 10 Signing Off
Bulletin Board, "Science General" section, March 15, 2003
(http://www.jamesphogan.com/bb/content/031503.shtml)
A friend of mine in Florida who runs an auto-repair shop does a steady
business fitting replacement engines into older cars for something like $2,000
a time. It seems that a lot of people don't trust today's overpriced,
overelaborate computerized offerings and prefer to stay with the simpler, more
solidly engineered designs of times gone by. Another friend tells me she won't
buy toasters anymore because they don't last unless she finds an old one in a
yard sale.
Pioneer 10
, the unmanned space probe launched in 1972 to observe the outer planets, sent
its last message back to NASA on January 22, which took 11 hours and 20
minutes to arrive. Originally designed for 21 months endurance, the probe
ended up performing what has been described as one of the most scientifically
rich exploration missions ever undertaken. It's amazing what can be done when
engineering is left to engineers, without government bureaucrats and lawyers
muscling in on it. Full story at
News in Science
(http://abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s793584.htm). Thanks to Dave Schilling
for sending me the link.
Providing it doesn't run into something else on the way, Pioneer 10
's next encounter will be with the red giant star Aldebaran in the
constellation of Taurus, two million years from now.
The Falcon
Myriam lay at that halfway stage of knowing that she was waking up and not
wanting to; that sleep was receding and would deliver her inexorably to
another day of life that she would rather not have to face.
These were the moments when the afterimages of dreams that would quickly fade
still lingered. The dream had been another of those she had been having lately
that left her in a strangely mixed state of feeling a glow of well-being from
the release she had briefly known, yet at the same time, troubled. There had
been a town by water where boats were moored, and little shops and restaurants
facing it across a quay. It was a colorful town, where people shared their
thoughts with one another and smiled openly without fear. Then Myriam had
found herself with a group of them inside a room somewhere. She had wanted to
be one of them but she couldn't comprehend freedom from fear. There was a
young man with black hair and pale-blue eyes, in his early twenties,
maybe just a few years older than herself. She had wanted to be with him
because he made her feel secure. But he gave a porcelain figurine as a gift to
another girl, with fair hair, dressed in green, and when Myriam was alone she
had thrown it on the floor and then tried to hide the pieces. It troubled her
that such a side to her could exist and be beyond her ability to control, even
in a dream. She felt as if she had glimpsed a hidden part of herself that she
didn't want to know.
Sounds from the world beyond filtered through her cocoon to peel the last
shreds of sleep away. Air entering through the ceiling vent, accompanied by
the judder of vibrations in the ducting; water flowing in pipes behind the
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wall, telling of others in the building already showering and bathing; early
traffic on the street, punctuated by a public-address speaker babbling
unintelligibly in the distance. She tensed.
It could come at any moment. Perhaps she had just a few more precious minutes
yet . . . ?
As if cued by her thought, strident wake-up music burst forth from the videcon
commanding the room.
Myriam forced her eyes to open. They felt as if they had been glued. On the
screen high in the far corner, a troupe of showgirls in spangle panties and
military-style tops were parading through a routine with toy rifles against a
backdrop of clips showing tanks and slow-goose-stepping guards. She left it on
to shake herself fully into wakefulness. At least the light and the colors
were a distraction from the drabness and utilitarian furnishings of the room.
Myriam sat up and shivered. It was winter, and the heating was only just
coming on with the morning power ration. The lamp across the street was still
on, making an orange blur on the thin window blind.
She tottered across to the closet, groped for a clean work tunic, and made her
way through to the bathroom. A voice from the videcon behind was reminding her
that this was another National Maximum
Effort Day. Working together they would make it the best ever.
* * *
Leisha and Greg were already eating at the corner table when Myriam arrived
downstairs in the apartment house's shared kitchen. She crossed over to the
refrigerator and unlocked her personal compartment inside. There was
dried-egg-and-batter mix that would have made a pancake, but the thought
wasn't appetizing. She settled for the remains of some canned fruit with
crackers and a pâté of cheese spread, and spooned coffee granules from the
communal tin into a mug. As Myriam pulled a stool out from under the side bar,
Dolores came in and went to the refrigerator in her turn. There were no words
of greeting. The room with its stained and faded wallpaper, scratched
appliances, and plain, greasy tiles behind the stove reflected the
listlessness of its occupants.
Footsteps creaked on the stairs outside, padded their way along the bare floor
of the hallway, and were cut short by the sound of the front door opening and
closing. Leisha raised an inquiring eyebrow at Greg over a spoonful of soup
heated from the night before. "Is Stefanie still seeing her visitor?"
"Sounds like it."
Nobody knew his name. He had been coming and going intermittently for the last
few weeks. Stefanie said he worked around the city on telecom installations.
"It wouldn't be surprised if that's a shell job," Dolores said. "I think he's
DoS."
"What makes you say that?" Leisha asked. Her tone conveyed that the thought
was not new.
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