67: Police Patrol: 2000 A.D. Mack Reynolds

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Voted the most popular science fiction author by the readers of Galaxy and If

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gellaho: The Book Cage - Episode 65: Police Patrol: 2000 A.D.; Imagine the far-off year of 2000. Your hero is Tad Boleslaw. "Tad Boleslaw?" you say, incredulous. "Yes, Tad Boleslaw," I reply. There is universal pay, but it's defined as credit from the government, but it's also stocks somehow? Or psuedo-dollars. Look, it's not well-defined. Zoroastrianism has come from way downtown to become the American religion. In the great tradition of Steele, I bring you Mack Reynolds' Police Patrol: 2000 A.D.. A confounding vision of policing in the future/the past. This Friday, 5pm eastern, find out how that Tad Boleslaw and Jim Kelly (not the Quarterback) fight crime in the year 2000!
gellaho
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Shit a hard bitten cop in the Zoroastrian futurepast sounds pretty neat.; Even if he does have a name like someone trying to order KFC in pig latin.
FancyShark in a White Suit: He's got the endorsement of Galaxy and If readers
gellaho: Mack does want to tell you a lot about himself. Not much about the book
Derpbat: I can't wait to hear how he squares Zoroastrianism considering monarchy to not just be the default state of mankind but to actually be divinely ordained with America.
Derpbat: Man, I'm going to have to divide my time from gaming for this one.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I'm betting his take on Zoroastrianism is "Christianity treated like Greek Mythology but with different names"
Space Action Flippant Sausage: You always hope they go Full Taiping Rebellion and do something bonkers but they hardly ever do.
FancyShark in a White Suit: And if they try, it ends up being a lecture
Derpbat: Zoroastrians have crossed my desk a lot lately for some reason.; Like, not a lot, a lot.
gellaho: Lazier. Replace every colloquial use of "God" or "Jesus" with "Zoroaster."
Derpbat: That's... about what I expected, actually.; Hurray! My expectations were not subverted!
FancyShark in a White Suit: Dang. That was my first guess and I thought "no, that's too easy"
Derpbat: I bet he met someone who was a Zoroastrian and he wanted to impress them.; But without learning more than one thing about the religion.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Or he thought Zoroaster sounded more future-y
gellaho: Really should be doing intensive research for these $1.95 books
Derpbat: It does kind sound of futury.; It's even more futuristic as 'Zarathustra'.; Which... come to think of it, is probably where he got the idea from. 2001 A Space Odyssey.
gellaho: Excuse me, $1.50
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Kneel before Zoroaster, puny Earth man!"
Derpbat: Excuse me, that was...wow, that's a depressingly large amount of money for a 1.50 in the 70s to be worth now.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Gellaho shells out for the good stuff
Derpbat: Gellaho is way too good to us.
gellaho: I'm pretty sure I spent less than 1.50
Derpbat: But it's not a good comparison, because he actually got this book published. By a major publisher.; Which means today this book would sell for like 16 bucks.
gellaho: Not really. These guys would publish anything
Derpbat: That's some small relief, I suppose.
gellaho: I have two bookshelves to prove it
Derpbat: Waiiiiiiiit.; What's that last book on his list of credits?; The Day After Tomorrow?; Is this; Nah.
gellaho: Nah indeed
FancyShark in a White Suit: I don't think it's the one you're thinking of. But the dude was prolific
FancyShark in a White Suit: Gaze upon him; He's ready for some football
gellaho: What a weird thing to get caught up on
FancyShark in a White Suit: @gellaho , the description I found of the book is that it contains "fix-ups" of four of his short stories. Whether that means he mashed them all into one narrative or this is a short story collection remains to be seen.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Goddammit Cheryl, where is my cherry flavored smoking tobacco?"
gellaho: Too bad he didn't make it to his favorite year
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Cheryl, if that meatloaf has spinach in it, the commies have already won!"
gellaho: Although, if he did, he would have been checks notes old as fuck
Derpbat: Yeah! We shouldn't have capitalism! We should have post-capitalism!; What... what is that?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Zoroastrian capitalism, its exactly the same as regular but with stars on its hat.
Derpbat: I love it.; @FancyShark in a White Suit; "Cheryl, if that meatloaf has spinach in it, the commies have already won!"
gellaho: Weird thing for this guy to say
Ozzie: I think they mean post- in the same way you'd use post-scarcity, but it read more like post-apocalypse.
gellaho: Reads more like parody
Derpbat: A lot of these authors did make it to 2000.; Like, Clark made it to 2008; and he was born... huh. Also in 1917.; Must have been a good year for science fiction authors?
gellaho: I guess Dallas should feel terrible then
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Imagine how disappointed some of these guys must have been with the actual year 2000.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Saving this one
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Not even ONE robot uprising.
Derpbat: Also, I think a lot of these guys probably expected the Soviets to win.
FancyShark in a White Suit: You can't rebel if the overlords are supporting you
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Well we all think we want something we really shouldn't sometimes.
Derpbat: Huh. A few scifi authors were born in 1917. I was joking.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Then again maybe its six of one half a dozen of the other, historically speaking.
gellaho: Spoiler alert, maybe. But my man Mack's vision for this book is "People's Capitalism"; This fusion makes about as much sense as can be expected
Derpbat: I mean, he thinks Zoroastrianism is the worship of Zoroaster and also fancy stars.; I'm going to say he may just like how it sounds.; It does have a ring to it.
gellaho: Do you think that's what the star on the helmet is?
Derpbat: I choose to assume so, yes.
gellaho: You should check out a sheriff's badge sometime
Derpbat: I picture those in my mind as five points.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: NGL I know maybe three things about Zoroastrianism so I cant say for certain they arent into astrology.
Derpbat: Huh, apparently all this time I've been wrong.; Hurray!
FancyShark in a White Suit: I like that, according to the cover artist, police in the future have their uniforms made by their parents out of old laundry bags
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Ahura Mazda favors you because Mercury is in retrograde!"
Derpbat: Wait, maybe I've been mandela effected.
gellaho: They are hideous aren't they?; It's really hard to tell that Tad Boleslaw is a hunk; Because he's supposed to be
Derpbat: Which one is he meant to be?
FancyShark in a White Suit: Gotta be the guy at the front
gellaho: Indeed
Derpbat: But he's the least hunky! (edited)
FancyShark in a White Suit: No action hero from a pulp scifi novel has facial hair
Space Action Flippant Sausage: With the occasional half tire and plenty of duct tape
Derpbat: I do see the logic in that.; The facial hair does indicate he dies like five minutes in.; Giving the lead character some much needed pathos.
gellaho: The pontoon police vehicle
FancyShark in a White Suit: Facial hair means "three days from retirement", "gruff but lovable commander", "homeless", or "evil", depending on style
gellaho: However that's supposed to work
FancyShark in a White Suit: I hope it's a hovercopter
gellaho: Coming up on the hour, it's Police Patrol: 2000 A.D. Get your gyro-jets ready for the preview.
FancyShark in a White Suit: <cue saxophone music>
gellaho: Your move, creep
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Who wants some future Zoroastrian bacon?
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: It's the helmets from starship troopers
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Excuse me, futurepast
FancyShark in a White Suit: "You kids quit being space cops and wash your hands! It's time for dinner!"
gellaho: Up until when?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Life Alert really expanded their user base and functionality.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Yes, the best way to improve police is to make them patrol so far away they can't see anything happen until you're being murdered and call in
Space Action Flippant Sausage: In the futurepast you also have to be on the lookout for sky crime.
gellaho: Jim Kelly was a real uggo
FancyShark in a White Suit: Huge slam on Irish monkeys
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Hey Tad, you still partnered with that Old World Monkey?"
Brexdan McMoran: ATTENTION CITIZENS: LAY DOWN YOUR BOOKS & PREPARE TO BE ARRESTED FOR THOUGHTCRIME
FancyShark in a White Suit: Women love men who are squarely handsome
gellaho: Oh, yeah, gimme that wide mouth
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Oh wow. That is... What? Irish monkey, huh. Is that... Is that even racist?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Kermit the frog in a Thor wig he was.
FancyShark in a White Suit: The author is saying that Tad is a lousy lover
Space Action Flippant Sausage: St. Padraig drove the monkeys out of Ireland, they dont talk about that in Catholic school.
Brexdan McMoran: Mack Boleslaw: The Gyro Jets-ecutioner
gellaho: "In addition to being hideous, Jim was also a moron"
FancyShark in a White Suit: Kelly often strung together random words
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Stick up romp" oh cool we are getting futurepast slang.
Brexdan McMoran: Why do future cops always look like dorks?
FancyShark in a White Suit: Because they are written by dorks
gellaho: "Patrol, we have an APB on one funky customer, over"
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Most present cops look like dorks too.
FancyShark in a White Suit: For the same reason
Brexdan McMoran: Look, the force is stretched thin now that cities themselves have stories, like in...counts...four different sci-fi universes.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: The hell are you talking about, having cop lights on helmets as well as the car itself is just fantastic.
Brexdan McMoran: Wait...let me think. Rai. Futurama. Coruscant. 2099. This one. What am I missing?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Funker ass crimos need a blasting, Tad."
FancyShark in a White Suit: Dredd? Or is he not a cop?
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Holy Zoroaster Batman!
Brexdan McMoran: Zoroastrian would be a cool state religion. Zoroastrians are dope.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: The one from Foundation?
gellaho: Brendan wants state mandated religion, got it
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Oh wait is "funker" implying they criminalized funk music?!
Brexdan McMoran: This is wild because these people use FUNK the way our primitive society says FUCK.
FancyShark in a White Suit: George Clinton hurt them
gellaho: You are some real drivel-happy funkers
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO REMAIN UNFUNKY! JIVE CAN AND WILL BE HELD AGAINST YOU IN A COURT OF LAW!"
Brexdan McMoran: NOOOO don't put words in my mouth, only if it's the "RIGHT" religion! (mine)
FancyShark in a White Suit: Nihilistic Funkers! The scourge of tomorrow!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Knees bent, arm out to one side" is a classic Sci fi cop shooting pose.
Brexdan McMoran: Suddenly a Screamer lurched out of the alley. Boleslaw pointed his weapon at Kelly. "Get in there, Kelly. Prove to me you have what it takes to survive in this force."
gellaho: "To reiterate, Jim Kelly is an ugly dumbass"
FancyShark in a White Suit: "He unnecessarily smelled the muzzle"
Brexdan McMoran: BALANCE
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Kelly, you know that smelling the muzzle of a gun is absolutely not like smelling your fingers, right?"
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Hey, I can smell...JUSTICE"
gellaho: Real shade being thrown at these characters
FancyShark in a White Suit: "That will never catch on"
Brexdan McMoran: The boys on the force keep ribbing him about it, but Kelly doesn't mind his reputation as a muzzlesniffer.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Pedostache" Boleslaw wondered if the guys at the precinct liked him
Space Action Flippant Sausage: unprepossessing AND a weak stache game, clearly a criminal.
Brexdan McMoran: "He could have stood to bloat up with ten pounds of fat."
FancyShark in a White Suit: oh dang, it's the criminal
Brexdan McMoran: Tad funking Boleslaw.; I can't funking believe it.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: You son of a barch.
Brexdan McMoran: 🥬 🥣 🥚 🛢️
gellaho: "I'm too old to be called Buddy, but not too old to call myself a junior member of the PPT"
FancyShark in a White Suit: Getting too funking old for this shift
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Kelly handling weapons: https://youtu.be/guyELrUR6Gw&t=35s
gellaho: Remember, Boleslaw is the hunk with the wide mouth
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Buddy Brothers" made me snort so hard I can taste blood.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Ah thank you. That's right. The Aryan Enforcer.; "You're only a CAP precisely because you shot circles around the boys"
Space Action Flippant Sausage: And their police has like a Junior Police Club for middle aged gunmen. Cool.
Brexdan McMoran: In the future, we have dispensed with your so-called "ethnic names." All people are called by that which they love most, but with the first letter changed to a B.
gellaho: "I'm in Tabular Computating, Suburban Hewlett-Packard"
FancyShark in a White Suit: Swing shift means big dance numbers
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: It's good to know the future cops are still dicks to people just walking home
John: Hey everyone, just getting caught up. Why does this guy keep repeating himself? "I'm a CAP. I'm in the City Auxiliary Police." "He was small. He needed 10 pounds." "He shouldn't have a mustache. He didn't have enough hair on his upper lip."
FancyShark in a White Suit: Hi, @John !
gellaho: Continue the Ugly Man Parade
Space Action Flippant Sausage: IBM exists in the futurepast, so something went wrong.
gellaho: Well, he did just saw a man in half with a gun
Brexdan McMoran: But don't immediately murder the wannabe cops standing over dead teens.; Strong Bimmerman vibes from this asshole.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Norman Schmidt, pride of the Futurepast Police
Brexdan McMoran: What year was this book written that Mack expected to have megacities in 2000?
gellaho: No crud, but technically technicalities
FancyShark in a White Suit: The 80s, I think
gellaho: 1977
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: I mean China does have megacities.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Ah, I was close
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "By 2000 we wont have invented new slurs and stuff, and will have a more PG slang vibe."
Brexdan McMoran: Man, Mack's white ethnostate future really got behind schedule.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "You are welcome, diminutive citizen"
Derpbat: Look, they know it's not perfect but they're trying.
Brexdan McMoran: Boleslaw; BOLESLAW
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: It's a relief to know I'm not the only one seeing Macho Man Randy Savage.
Brexdan McMoran: Okay, so APPARENTLY
gellaho: Also, keep in mind that Mack was a dirty commie
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Traditional name from the futurepast Irish.
Brexdan McMoran: Bow-leh-swav is a polish name: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boles%C5%82aw_I_the_Brave
FancyShark in a White Suit: Gaze upon him
Brexdan McMoran: Pipe for gravitas
gellaho: "Third generation in the police category," that's how people talk
FancyShark in a White Suit: Said it before, but he's ready for some football
Derpbat: Mack apparently had all sorts of problems, among which is that he was a communist. But I think his worst problem is that that's the picture he deliberately chose to represent himself.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "CHERYL! Where are my goddamn sock garters!?"
Derpbat: Not just to his readers.
Brexdan McMoran: Mack, it was not three generations from when you wrote this and when it takes place.
Derpbat: But to everyone.
Brexdan McMoran: So now we have to assume the futurestate began in 1978, and an adult cop was placed in the police categry.
gellaho: What spins with you?
Brexdan McMoran: He looks like he just spotted the gunman.
FancyShark in a White Suit: The first generation police category
Derpbat: Have we gotten to the Zoroastrian stuff yet?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: I could really hate this made up slang.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Not yet
Brexdan McMoran: Baby, ALL of this book is Zoroastrian slang!
John: Police category, less than generously haired subsection.
Brexdan McMoran: The only zoroastrian I ever met was Australian, I'm surprised you don't know this.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: So far just an invocation of Zoroaster as an exclamation.
Derpbat: I wish I could decide if I know enough to know that's true or not true.
gellaho: Don't expect anything more than that
FancyShark in a White Suit: Mack could write dialogue that would make the narc in a PSA say "Jesus, you're white"
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: This slang is easier to understand from context than a clockwork orange, but somehow more irritating.
Brexdan McMoran: Don't you all just "splung another prawn on the barbie category" whenever you want to praise the not-evil lucifer?
FancyShark in a White Suit: It's more square
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: I can't wait to see James Acaster dressed as Zorro.
gellaho: Central City, Asian-War, I refuse to be specific about anything
FancyShark in a White Suit: All of Asia. At once.
Derpbat: Yes, but we stopped praising Ahura Mazda after most of us got converted to Islam when we realized our Emperors had deliberately destroyed the infrastructure our civilization depended on out of spite.
Brexdan McMoran: wait is it...the Asian War hero or the Asian war hero?; that hyphen solves nothing.
Derpbat: That hyphen confuses and upsets me.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Trick question. There were no heroes
gellaho: His name is Charles Brothers
FancyShark in a White Suit: Vacuum-transport?
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Kinda disappointed they still make pipes outta briarwood and not space lumber.
Derpbat: I assume just by how incredibly white this book is that he means the former, but; Oh.
gellaho: I think you can figure out his ehtnicity
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Brothers was in a land war in Asia, one of the classic blunders.
Brexdan McMoran: Angra is the lucifer, Ahura is the YHWH
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: It's that tube thing Elon Musk claims to have imvented.
Derpbat: Man, that sucks as a war hero name.; Even by real life standards.; I expect my fictional war hero names to be at least 3% cooler.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: The police being suspicious of anyone not in a car tracks, at least.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Whats this guy doing WALKING like a CRIMINAL when he could ride public transportation with the chronic masturbators?!"
Brexdan McMoran: I assume nothing! A great many GI categories came home with Asian-love wives after the Siam Invasion of 1979.
gellaho: Those funkers always looking for some flogging
FancyShark in a White Suit: Did Mack try to think up a veteran's name and stop at "Charlie"?
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: lardy shoulders
Derpbat: Fix of trank is adorable.
Brexdan McMoran: Oh God, what if he is Vietnamese and Charlie IS Mack's name for an Asian person?
Fatamatician: The Curator: This place is full of Young Funkers
Derpbat: I want a fix of trank.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: It sounds like another character name, this was Detective Lardy Shoulders who had too much hair and sucked also.
Brexdan McMoran: Hey, you can't make up everything except the drugs.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: I love when they make soma a street name for a drug, its so literate and proves nobody who wrote it did drugs.
FancyShark in a White Suit: This sounds too plausible. We need to stop Mack.
Brexdan McMoran: I say let the hyperviolent felons take all the tranqs and soma they want.
gellaho: I have several questions about how you can fit a jet and rockets into a pistol, but sure
Derpbat: We all know how people use heavy duty tranquilizers to get high.
Brexdan McMoran: Gyro jet rocket pistol
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "I arrested this punk, he had a vial of soma, a gram of ambrosia, and a litre of the mead of poetry!"
FancyShark in a White Suit: It's a very unwieldy gun
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Too much funking flogging going on.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: 'prepatory to leaving' is such an odd phrase.
Brexdan McMoran: that's too many things!
Derpbat: Jim Kelly.; I know that name.; That sounds so familiar to me.
Brexdan McMoran: It's a weapon AND a means of transport AND a sandwich
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Oh cool, gyro jet weapons used to be really popular in sci fi.
Fatamatician: The Curator: The Black Samurai
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Its like a gun that fires rockets but lamer than a 40k bolter.
Derpbat: Yeah, that was it.
Brexdan McMoran: Well it looks like I'm the asshole: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyrojet
FancyShark in a White Suit: I was just picturing a gun with tiny rockets that fire to drive the hammer of the firing mechanism
Derpbat: Gyro guns: When your bullets need to cost more than your rifle.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Huh I had no idea they were real.
Fatamatician: The Curator: Tad "Coal" Boleslaw
Derpbat: Such a brilliant idea.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: I just used to laugh at how stupid they were in Battletech manuals.
Fatamatician: The Curator: It was a mining nickname
Derpbat: Only technically.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I guarantee this is not what Mack was talking about
Derpbat: Gyrojets would be useless police weapons, because they're less dangerous the closer you are to the gun.
gellaho: Here's your first glimpse of the unwieldy economy Mack is going to try to explain
Ramb$ne Gracie, dead of cuteness: AND TORGUE GUNS USE THEM BECAUSE THEY'RE BADASS! MEEEDLYMEEDLESCREOW! 🎸 💥
Derpbat: No one in their right mind would use them for anything but sniping.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Or wait, I could be wrong
Derpbat: And they cost easily five dollars each.; In 1970s money.
gellaho: And this is a fictional book about a fake future
Brexdan McMoran: what kind of aliens?; Holy shit, the Reagan years must have been wild.
FancyShark in a White Suit: So there's high crime because there are so many criminals. Got it.
Derpbat: I assume the ones we lost the Asian War to.
Brexdan McMoran: There's only so many criminals because it's illegal to be poor.
Derpbat: We ended up giving them half the planet, and
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Look I don't know why you're confused, it's aliens who couldn't apply for Inalienable Basic.
Brexdan McMoran: Asian-war
Derpbat: Wait, no, that's a better book.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Like, xenomorph aliens or immigrant aliens? That is important.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: This is... UBI?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Its right there in the name. In-ALIENable.
Derpbat: Kind of.
Brexdan McMoran: Sorry, buddy, aliens don't qualify for planetary basic income.
gellaho: In Brothers' apartment, they encounter knitting!?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Lil green men need not apply, everyone knows moon men dont have civil rights.
Derpbat: Knitting?!
FancyShark in a White Suit: I know which one I'm hoping for
Brexdan McMoran: ULTRA-TEXTILES
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Seems like a lot of problems would be solved If they did.
Brexdan McMoran: Tell that to the Republicans.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "She was not ugly". Mack really paints a picture.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Of course, tell us how attractive this non main character woman is.
Brexdan McMoran: So many people knit though, in this, 2022, the year of the Meta-Omega-Textiles
gellaho: Not unattractive, but dumpy
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: This is weird. Does Mack not understand the concept of hobbies?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: We hunger to know how hot she is or is not.
Derpbat: Look, President Al van Whiteguy promised in his 1996 election platform that the aliens would not go on the inalienable basic income.
FancyShark in a White Suit: hahaha, I love how much Mack hates his characters
Brexdan McMoran: Her clothes can't be out of date, she knitted them last week.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: And is she frumpy? HOOOHBOYYOUBET!
Derpbat: I don't know what you want from the police of this fine Zoroaster worshipping city.
gellaho: Tadeusz
Brexdan McMoran: "She was funkable, but like...you wouldn't TRY to funk her. She knits. that's weird."
Derpbat: But that's not the America we live in.; Apparently.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Because you seem poor"
Brexdan McMoran: Did Poland get nuked? Was there a mass immigration?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Shit I see why people call him Tad.
Fatamatician: The Curator: Like instant mashed potatoes, but with really good gravy
Derpbat: I know some people named Tad.
gellaho: Very exciting
Derpbat: I wonder if that is short for Tadeusz.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: With a z?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Any surnamed "Boleslaw?"
Brexdan McMoran: How many gyrojet rocket guns do they own?
Derpbat: Just Tad.; It's weird because it's not like there's an English name they could have used for that.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Like Taditha
Brexdan McMoran: In the futures, Poles are allowed to work in government!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Dont insult the good English name of Taddicles.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Rock me Boleslaw, Tadeusz!
Derpbat: We really shouldn't be.
gellaho: Just in case you didn't get Brothers' whole deal, here comes Mack to whack you over the head
Brexdan McMoran: They just have to wear red and white uniforms and a badge that says NOT FOREIGNER
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "deadly" gyrojet rocket pistol.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Oh good, a recognizable slur
Derpbat: Well, that took a turn.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Shit.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Good thing he didn't accidentally give them the non lethal gyrojet pistol.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Cant say "Fuck" but can drop a G-bomb; Fucked up, Mack.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Funked up
Brexdan McMoran: Well I guess now we know Charbuddy isn't Vietnamese.
Derpbat: This may be a good fictional book in a fictional future but I refuse to give him any passes now.; Because that seems like a thing he could have taken the time to not do.
gellaho: I can't believe that vigilante that gunned a guy in half would say something something like
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Guys I think these futurepast Zoroastrians who had an Asian-war might be racist a bit.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: He's violent, heavily armed and racist. no wonder the cops love him.
Derpbat: Yeah, it's too real now.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Is this the face of a man who would write racisms?
Derpbat: That's my point.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: So this guy is an Asian War veteran, and Mack will drop a slur, but not even specify which Asians he's slurring?
Derpbat: I mean.; It is specific.; It's specific to the Vietnamese.
Brexdan McMoran: It's a great book if you go back in time to 1977 then forward to the dystopian 2000 then back to the 1977 that could have birthed it. You have to Zag where our reality Zbigniews
FancyShark in a White Suit: Asians. From the country of Asia.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "HEY CHERYL! Whats a good word for those guys who live over in Asia?"
gellaho: Wizard!
Derpbat: Federal Enforcement Assistance Administration
Brexdan McMoran: All Asians. It was the Asian-war. Look, this really isn't complicated, 33% of the planet deserves to live in squalor for being slightly less than human.; Like what do i have to explain to you?
Derpbat: In the 1970s. Invented Dick Tracy watches.; I love it.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Fuck you, Mack. Nobody will ever yell "WIZARD!" to mean "Cool!"
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Yeah, I know how the technology works, asshole. You don't have to Jim-splain it."
Derpbat: Mack, you won me back.; More Dick Tracy watches.; Less of whatever that was.
Fatamatician: The Curator: WIZARD!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Jim Kelly might be slightly racist himself to his Polish-German partner.; Unless Tad gets to do some exposition dumping.
gellaho: She was afraid, but like afeared of being afraid
FancyShark in a White Suit: "You mean piss?"
gellaho: I don't think the Irish monkey would do that
FancyShark in a White Suit: "I think she had cats. I smelled piss. Maybe that's the fear you smelled."
Derpbat: This is a version of the year 2000 where cops are genuinely confused when people fear them.
gellaho: But nevermind all that, we're about to spend a lot of time with small time criminal Red Moran
FancyShark in a White Suit: Complicated clocks. THE FUTURE!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Living-cum-bedroom.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: There's a room I'd hesitate to sleep in.
Derpbat: Wow, he almost got the way we use our phone screens right.; That's pretty impressive.
gellaho: Cash and credit are two separate concepts
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Is the bedroom or the cum the living part?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Rex Moran, Living Cum!
Derpbat: One pseudo dollar.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Depends on how long since he cleaned
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also do they have two different welfare currencies?
Fatamatician: The Curator: Tiny houses think they get so much in, but never offer the full living-cum-bedroom experience
gellaho: Mack Reynolds is really going to try and make shares, dividends, cash, and credit all one thing; He will not succeed
FancyShark in a White Suit: Just say Euro, Mack. We'll know what you mean.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Oh fuck, they have free-to-play monetisation with multiple currencies!
Derpbat: BUT IF YOU DIE IN THE FREE TO PLAY GAME OF THE FUTURE, YOU DIE IN REAL LIFE.
gellaho: I'd like some credit bucks from my dividend debit, please
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Goddammit Rex, if you dont put more time in at the dick sucking factory category, you'll never afford that horse armor DLC."
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: a pseudo-dollar is just a bit coin.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Dividends..........
gellaho: I'd like to know what congressman decided he needed to futurize "dollar"
Fatamatician: The Curator: He is gonna make it Pseudo-rain
Space Action Flippant Sausage: And skipped over Neo-Dollar.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Do you need to own electro-stocks to get dividends?
Derpbat: I assume this means the US collapsed hard.; You never add an adjective to your country's currency for good reasons.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Fun Bucks are the work of the devil
gellaho: Your credit dividend loans
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also we wont even stop making pennies even tho they cost 5x more than they are worth.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Same to you! Oh, wait, that's my name."
Derpbat: You mean pseudo-pennies.
gellaho: No insurance though
Brexdan McMoran: It's cool how much of this he absolutely lands while also making all the characters like a B&W episode of dragnet.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: To be fair this is still an improvement over the current welfare state.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Bitch, if he's being charged interest, the fuck do you care?
Derpbat: I think he's paid to pretend to care.
Brexdan McMoran: He's got tap to pay phone tech but also a twitchy irishman has the goods on Norm Schmidt: GERMAN, see?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: fuck you, give Rex Moran his goddam money.
Derpbat: That's how you know this is optimistic science fiction.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Who cares what he wants it for!
Derpbat: Or Mack wants it to be.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: I mean yeah, someone actually spoke to him instead of being locked behind hours of paperwork
Brexdan McMoran: Just NFTs man
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Obviously its for funking.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: It all comes back to funking doesn't it?
Derpbat: Yeah, Rex Moran should be allowed to get Rex Moran into as much debt as Rex Moran wants.
FancyShark in a White Suit: You can't stop the funk
Derpbat: He's got a Rex Moran lifestyle to uphold.
gellaho: Ye old ultra-market
FancyShark in a White Suit: Thank god he squared his shoulders or he could have hurt something
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Mack is really into these backhanded descriptions like "Not unpleasant to look at"
Derpbat: Thank God his broken nose doesn't make his face unpleasant.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Mack is so non-commital on these appearances
gellaho: Rex's next brilliant plan: a stick up with a $0.77 toy
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Although I guess the government fucking you around and being patronising about welfare payments is pretty realistic.
Derpbat: Rex Moran's face is how he gets the funk to happen.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also how often in future war do you get into hand to hand combat to break your nose?
Derpbat: Wait.; That escalated quickly.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Hahhhhh Rex Moran is gonna rob an ultra-liquor store with a fake gun.
gellaho: The fuck is a library booster
FancyShark in a White Suit: Because this plan works out great for little kids with squirt guns
Derpbat: He didn't get another advance on his credit and his next move is pretend armed robbery?
FancyShark in a White Suit: Someone who fucking loves libraries
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: I dunno, future microfilm viewer?
Derpbat: What does he do if he doesn't get the right sauce with his mcnuggets?
Brexdan McMoran: I'm a fan of UBI because it does a way with a fuckton of bureaucracy and also doesn't displace the bureaucrats into the gutter to starve. But interest-based advancements sounds exactly like how we'd immediately screw it up.
FancyShark in a White Suit: They stand outside and scream themselves hoarse whenever they see someone check out a novel
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Jihad.
gellaho: Time to rob an old man with a recently deceased relative
Brexdan McMoran: I'm not anti-book I'm pro-screen. Pray the rosary to end reading
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Yells "I'm pickle Riiiick!"
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Jerry Jerome? The porn director?"
Derpbat: I don't know if it's practical because inflationary pressures would eventually render it nonsensical, but I agree that it's worth exploring.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Oh Mr. Vassilis runs a gyro stand, I can feel Mack struggling to find a way to tell us.
Brexdan McMoran: Only Greeks can be aristocrats.
Derpbat: And I am impressed that Mack thought about it as much as he did.; In the 1970s.
gellaho: The john-fuzz
FancyShark in a White Suit: <throws garbage>; "Get lost, techie! Books for liiiiiiiiiife!"
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Vassilis, Space Aristocrat, with Cyber Monocle, Turbo Top Hat and Jet Cane!
Brexdan McMoran: Well, that's why you need to pair it with modern monetary theory and just delete the excess. The bonus is no more taxes.
Brexdan McMoran: Gyro-JET rocket stand
Derpbat: Worth an exploration but ideally before we roll it out full-scale.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Shitter cops are the worst cops.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Luxury Hover Yacht and Poor Pit sold separately
Brexdan McMoran: He's rich, but he's not like...owns a rancor rich.
Derpbat: Rex, don't do it, you have so much funk to give.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: He has a time-share rancor.
FancyShark in a White Suit: The guys at the club always remind him of that
Derpbat: You'll never be able to funk it up in prison.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Youll never take Rex Moran alive, shitter police!
Derpbat: This universe is way, way too white for that.
gellaho: The plan was a cropper
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Well, Vassilis. Are these real blood diamonds or did you just use them to shave? Ahahaha"
Brexdan McMoran: https://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/come+a+cropper; TheFreeDictionary.com
Brexdan McMoran: This is some paleofuture for sure.
gellaho: Maybe I should have thought this plan through more
Derpbat: I'm not sure you can read between the lines correctly, buddy, you're planning a robbery with a toy gun you brought with your own credit card on a monitored line.; You ain't Moriarty.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "This worthy was a stiffish type"
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Rex Moran gets denied a loan, robs Greek Dracula.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Escape sanctum?
gellaho: A butler and stamps!? What luxury
FancyShark in a White Suit: That feels like an oxymoron
Derpbat: Sounds vaguely metabaronish.
Brexdan McMoran: Rex Moran is hijacking this book and sailing it to Panama.
Derpbat: Also, I like how this plan didn't even have a chance to get implemented because he immediately hit the fail clause.
Brexdan McMoran: I laughed for a solid half-minute.
FancyShark in a White Suit: A philatelist? You can tell that by-; oh, stamps. Right
Derpbat: It's like the last time I went on a date.
gellaho: Goggling at the romp
Brexdan McMoran: In the year 2000, people mailed letters.
gellaho: You don't say
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "You LIED TO MY BUTLER?! DASTARD!"
FancyShark in a White Suit: You Don't Know Jerome was an early first draft of You Don't Know Jack
Brexdan McMoran: I want the stamp, see?
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: It's the British version, like Where's Wally / Waldo.
gellaho: Rex Moran seductively rattles a gun
Derpbat: I admire his insistence on trying the plan anyway, even though there is another person there, the one thing that would cause his plan to fail.; That's determination.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Here's a hint: I'm NOT happy to see you"
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Is that a cock in your pocket or are you robbing me?"
Brexdan McMoran: It's actually called "Oi! You Lot, Where's Jerry, Eh? Wot? Come Off It, Then!"
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: it's his penis-cum-pistol
Derpbat: Also you broke into his house and the only way he will have access to his wealth is by using the secured line to communicate with the authorities.; Rex, you idiot.
gellaho: I have to take the vacuum tube to the lobby, like a peasant
FancyShark in a White Suit: Which means another phone call to get the old man's dividends
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Ahura Mazdas Mighty Mullet you are a rich motherfucker."
Brexdan McMoran: "Phone up the government and instruct them to transfer pseudo-$15m to Rex--uh, I mean RALPH O'Moran"
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: That's the chav version. The posh version is "I say, are you acquainted with my dear chum Jerome?"
Brexdan McMoran: hol up
gellaho: $42,000, a kingly sum
Derpbat: He's buying a real gun.; This
Brexdan McMoran: The city only got built so large because it's a series of pneumatic Prime tubes?
Derpbat: I don't.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Yeah, @Derpbat . This way, they can't trace the gun to him.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Amesha Spentai's Shapely Shivs! You shall deposit this money to my accounts forthwith!"
gellaho: Might as well do this up brown
gellaho: With some film, the most expensive thing in all the land
FancyShark in a White Suit: That implies it could be said in a way that isn't conversational
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Yeah I mean you don't want to be all down lavender.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: A Polaroid camera, the photography tool of the gods.
Brexdan McMoran: I would like to amend my vote to one of confidence.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: 'do this up brown' means he got the sepia-toned film.
Brexdan McMoran: He committed no crime until he reached the nucleus, then he ordered up the means to victory.
Derpbat: I mean, at this point sheer chutzpah should pull him through.
gellaho: And some sports rope
Brexdan McMoran: That sounds like a sexual threat.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Sports rope is just regular rope with taurine and salt.
Brexdan McMoran: GO REX GO
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Operator, I want to talk to a length of rope"
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Yeah I mean, this is like John Dillinger using a soap gun to escape from prison.
Derpbat: I don't like where this is heading. I love it.
Brexdan McMoran: The people's hero, the dillinger of 2000AD
gellaho
Derpbat: Rex, you are my hero.
Brexdan McMoran: AHHHH SCOOPED
Derpbat: Fight the power! By not actually doing any harm!
Brexdan McMoran: I was laughing too much to write it. I can't believe how awesome Rex Moran is.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "It's cured!"
Derpbat: Mack is a literary genius.
FancyShark in a White Suit
Derpbat: I love this character.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: He's not happy, but he'll still cum.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "CHERYL! I wrote the word "Erect"! Does that do it for you?"
Derpbat: In a just world, Rex Moran would be the star of a series of made for TV movies.
FancyShark in a White Suit: This is one of the best episodes of Columbo
Brexdan McMoran: Rex Moran is the most I have ever loved a book party character
gellaho: Better not leave any evidence. But, I will steal this extremely secure card
Brexdan McMoran: He cannot fail. He is God's beloved idiot.
gellaho: That couldn't possibly get back to me
Brexdan McMoran: I am losing it.
Derpbat: Oh my God I can't stop laughing
gellaho: You young cloddy
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Ohhh so this is what "failing upwards" looks like in real time.
FancyShark in a White Suit: We're going to find out the cops have been watching this the whole time from the next room
Brexdan McMoran: Rex's real target is THE SYSTEM
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Angra Mainyu's black balls, you daring rascal! You shan't evade justice!"
gellaho: I wonder what this call could be about
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Don't be shoddy you young cloddy.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "helio-jet"
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Cloddy has to be a Scots insult.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: POWERED BY HELIOS HIMSELF!
Derpbat: I like how only now does Mack remember his original plan for where the characters were.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: I am now reading all of this in a Scottish accent.
Derpbat: And when they worked.
Brexdan McMoran: What a cloddy.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Oh no. The sergeant sounds troubled. We should stop and get them an ice cream cake."
Derpbat: And he is utterly unwilling to go back and edit.
Brexdan McMoran: Oh God, Rex you absolute legend.
gellaho: Those mining engineers, and their vast thousands of dollars
Brexdan McMoran: He stole from the government.
Derpbat: Rex I love you
Brexdan McMoran: This is like what you do if you get a terminal illness.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: The straight dope indeed.
Derpbat: I really hope Mack realizes that Rex is now the actual hero of his book.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Wait this implies he's gonna kill him.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Mining engineers really do live in the lap of luxury
gellaho: "Yeah, I want these elevators to go fast enough to injure the elderly"
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: I mean, Errol Musk was a mining engineer.
Derpbat: Mining engineers assembled the complex system of incredibly ridiculous vacuum tubes that underpin their entire civilization.; I'm pretty sure this makes them Gods.
FancyShark in a White Suit: And now he's dead
gellaho: And he's doing this because he was woken up by his alarm
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: anyone can just say it's a police matter and get the elevator to crush them to the floor
FancyShark in a White Suit: Okay, now Rex is my hero too; He's going full Postal because of his alarm
Derpbat: One of us! One of us! One of us!
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Oh were it only so.
FancyShark in a White Suit: He's dead to me and that's enough
gellaho: The year 2000, by way of 1850
FancyShark in a White Suit: Again, "escape sanctum" doesn't work
Derpbat: Did the concept of an 'escape sanctum' ever get explained?
FancyShark in a White Suit: I think it's a panic room?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: It's a panic room fit for someone who is too rich to panic.
Derpbat: That relies on a sense of the word escape that no one has used in centuries.; Which makes it absolutely perfect here.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: peasants build panic rooms, mining engineers build escape sanctums.
gellaho: And now I want to know what senator decided we needed to pluralize
Derpbat: Maybe in the Asian war we conquered the rest of the western hemisphere?
FancyShark in a White Suit: I think that means South America has been assimilated
Derpbat: Sorry, sorry.; The Asian-war.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: I assume it also launches out of the building as a rocket powered egg if T.A.D. launches are detected.
FancyShark in a White Suit: He lost a cleaning lady that way
Derpbat: This just means I'm disappointed that Rex didn't decide that was how he was going to cover his tracks.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: after the asian-war, asia is now East America.
Derpbat: "I'm leaving. By the way, PROTOCOL 54-TANGO-5! ESCAPE ROOM, ENGAGE!"
FancyShark in a White Suit: "LEAVE NO EVIDENCE!"
Derpbat: The police turn up, and Vassilis is in low earth orbit.
gellaho: Rex Moran: criminal genius
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Better call the Fire Department to get him down."
Derpbat: Oh, Rex.; I love you.; You stupid, stupid, stupid man.
Brexdan McMoran: By this guy.
Derpbat: The... police realize that that doesn't stop him using the gun, right?
FancyShark in a White Suit: Why would he use a gun? He has money!
gellaho: "The easily traceable criminal seemed very intelligent"
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Honestly, so far he's just not bothering with too much elaborate planning because it seems like it's not at all necessary. Because these cops are just... useless.
Derpbat: I assume because guns are the funkiest things around.; But all he needs to do is fire the gun, and then throw it out, or just... put it down.; And then it doesn't matter if they can trace him.
Brexdan McMoran: Money is the rich man's gun.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "He seemed like he had a good education when he stole my money"
Derpbat: This is a bad plan.; I return to my previous statement that I think Rex Moran is the hero of this novel.
gellaho: "Old duffer" meaning "pervert"
Derpbat: And Boleslaw and the Irish guy are the incompetent cartoon villains.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: But it doesn't look like he needs a good one.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: I love how the cops are already baffled by this crime.
Derpbat: I meant the police plan.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Oh right, sorry.
Derpbat: Rex Moran doesn't need any plan.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Oh my god, Rex is Harold Howard and he's in Future Mayberry
Derpbat: If they catch him, it will be entirely by deus ex machina at this point.
gellaho: Rex slowly walks away
Brexdan McMoran: Rex Moran is going to use the gun to implicate someone else and then fake his death. He is a criminal genius. A Fantomas of Stupidworld.
Derpbat: I can't wait to see Mack write his way out of this one.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Wipe down your prints? Nah, Rex Moran doesn't leave prints
Brexdan McMoran: This may be the bestbook we've ever done.
Derpbat: The police didn't even think to look for prints.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: The only trail he leaves is the furrows left by his massive brass balls.
gellaho: Trying to sell a brand new piece of jewelry at the pawn shop
FancyShark in a White Suit: This is easily the most hotdog book
Derpbat: They're relying on the tracking system that is what allowed this incredibly ridiculous crime to happen in the first place.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Modern setting? Sure.
FancyShark in a White Suit: The moral is going to be "nothing takes the place of good old fashioned police work"; And "guns"
gellaho: "You know, not Uncommon or Rare Europe."
Derpbat: The most hot dog moral of all.; So, we have the United States of the Americas, CommonEurope, and 'Asia'.
FancyShark in a White Suit: hahaha, he called Paris "common". Suck it, French
Derpbat: Just... 'Asia'.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "The americas" implies that by 2000s we've annexed South America as well.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: So it's basically 1984's three continent system.
gellaho: I can't believe the pawn shop didn't give me the MSRP for this
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Which.........fair. We more or less own it anyway.
Derpbat: Hang on, it worked?; Oh my god, it worked.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "No, shut up. I'm Mack and I have original ideas!"
Derpbat: @Brexdan McMoran I LOVE THIS MAN.
Derpbat: I mean, he had at least one.
Brexdan McMoran: But Brave New World's drug market.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: And Starship Troopers helmets.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Goddammit man do you not realize that when I held an old man at gunpoint for this ring it cost him nearly two thousand futurepastbucks?!" he argues with the unwilling fence.
Derpbat: There is absolutely no way this should have worked. Rex Moran is Ivan the fooling his way through this world.
gellaho: And here's Tad
Derpbat: "Yes, you just missed him, I gave him two hundred dollars, and I realize I should have asked more questions."
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Attempt? Noooooooooo.........."
Derpbat: "So many more questions."
FancyShark in a White Suit: "He wasn't stupid. They were police."; Those thoughts have nothing to do with each other
Derpbat: At least one of them is a lie, too.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: The conversation goes: "Where is this from?" "Not-America." "So it can't be traced in America?" "Uhh... Definitely not." "Then I will absolutetly not verify your claim, kind stranger with incredibly suspect jewellery."
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "No.........and certainly not this ring in my hand."
Derpbat: Also, maybe you shouldn't make it possible for people to just immediately get diamonds for 2000 dollars just by pressing a few buttons on a video screen.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rex is over in the corner looking at watches
gellaho: "He was breathing heavily and selling an obviously stolen ring. Like a gentleman"
gellaho
Derpbat: Maybe that's not a great setup for your economy.; Wait.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "A gentleman who desperately needed to pawn something"
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Good thing these electronic transfers aren't recorded anywhere
Derpbat: You buy... you buy diamond jewelry without even checking an id?
gellaho: I'm sure Rex is going to be fine
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "It's almost like you pigs don't appreciate the value of anonymous transactions!"
Derpbat: ...wait, but he has universal credit card of Vasilis.; Also, a gun.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I love that Mack set up this entire future society just to show why it can't work
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Rex Moran, one step ahead of the law!
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: ...oh shit, do you think he put the 300 on Vasillis' card?
Derpbat: I'm pretty sure that those are the only two things a reasonably bright border collie would need to escape this.
gellaho: A job well done. Time to eat
FancyShark in a White Suit: This is turning into the Bingo of bookreads
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: all pseudo-dollar transactions are recorded on the bricklink.
gellaho: Sea-booze
Derpbat: I am actually assuming that by now Mack has realized he fucked this up and he's desperately looking for ways to save the society he invented.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: sea-booze is just fermented krill juice.; With extra plankton.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I tried to blow myself to a good repast at a cafeteria once. Now I have to inform people door to door
Brexdan McMoran: He looked like his fortune was obtained immorally; I thought him a gentleman of the upper crust.
Derpbat: Just desperately throwing ideas at the wall because he's a smart futurist and he should be able to come up with why everything he just invented is falling apart the moment he tries to use it in a story.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: did mack learn anything about Zoroastrianism besides the name?
Derpbat: No.; I asked.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Nope
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Obviously not.
gellaho: Can't a man just enjoy his stolen sea insects in peace?
Derpbat: I think they're right and he just thought Zoroaster was a futuristic sounding name.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Mack appears to belive Zoroastrians worship Zoroaster.
Brexdan McMoran: Underrated.
Derpbat: Which is true, but he didn't learn enough to know that it's even cooler when you actually use his actual name. Which is Zarathustra.
Derpbat: Oh, hey, they caught him.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: speaking of chicken and sea booze, I'm gonna go get beer and tacos, brb.
Derpbat: Kind of.
FancyShark in a White Suit: hahahahaha
Derpbat: ...wait, they're not in the room, are they.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Rex don't answer to anyone while he feasts.
Derpbat: They used.
FancyShark in a White Suit: His response to "you're under arrest" is "go away"
Derpbat: I love him so much.; And these are the worst cops in fiction.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "REX MORAN! WE KNOW YOU EXIST! TURN YOURSELF IN!"
gellaho: "I can't believe they were able to check all three pawn shops in walking distance so quickly!"
Derpbat: Just. They are the least good at their jobs possible.; Their next step will be to help him rob a hot dog vendor.
gellaho: They found him almost immediately, but sure
FancyShark in a White Suit: What foul luck indeed
Brexdan McMoran: I hate that the parts of this Mack gets right are all the dystopian bits.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Who could possibly have guessed that the old man would call the cops immediately!?
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Wait, Rex Moran isn't actually a criminal genius?
Derpbat: I mean, they didn't find him. They called him on his watch and told the armed criminal to hand himself in. I'm pretty sure that the good cops would have turned up to arrest him.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: I am heartbroken.
Brexdan McMoran: Like they have a low-emissions version of prime that's a public utility, but beef is no longer viable.
Brexdan McMoran: Maybe he was counting on old people being unable to use technology.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Safe gamble
Derpbat: I admire their incredibly strong respect for the concept of personal rights and civic responsibility, but there's a reason there's more to police work than just yelling into a bullhorn the name of criminals and telling them to go home.
Brexdan McMoran: Vassilis calls the cops but holds the phone under his chin so they can't see or understand him.
gellaho: It's been like a half hour, my man
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rex has been living large
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Everyone in this book talks like a 1920s posh goober as well.
Derpbat: He's been very busy in half an hour, but alright.; I'm sure Boleslaw and the monkey will turn me around.
gellaho: It's certainly falling apart for Rex Moran
Derpbat: What.
gellaho: He walked to the nearest pawn shop and then went to eat
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Jesus "CRIMES AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT!"
FancyShark in a White Suit: hahahahahaha
Derpbat: That escalated quickly.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "I've got some scars since that pic was taken. I'm safe."
Brexdan McMoran: He has a gun, so you guys rush him.
Brexdan McMoran: DIDN'T I SAY
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: You don't get to play the victim here, americas.
Brexdan McMoran: You do not touch Uncle Sam's wallet.
gellaho: People's Capitalism
Derpbat: THE CRIMINAL IS ARMED AND DANGEROUS. EVERYONE IS EXPECTED TO ASSIST IN BRINGING HIM IN BY ORDERING THEIR OWN FIREARMS TO THEIR HOMES AND FIRING AT HIM WHEN YOU SEE HIM.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: God hearing "Peoples Capitalism" makes my nuts retreat into my body.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I like the idea that the police can turn any manhunt into a Running Man
Derpbat: It has its charms.
Brexdan McMoran: I wish you knew how funny it is that this isn't a joke in America.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "All citizens are reminded that firing wildly into crowds is not only their right but their civic duty!"
gellaho: Chum-pal tummy
Derpbat: I like the idea that they've got so little crime in the future that the moment there is even a single bit of crime in this world, the entire force of the state comes in to clamp down on it
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: The People's Capitalism is what The Rock changed his finishing move to during his heel turn
FancyShark in a White Suit: I'm worried. I read that this book allowed Mack to "fix up" four of his short stories. Which means there's a chance Rex's journey is going to end very soon and we're going to follow some new criminal
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Golly gee whiz, you're that bad guy on the screen!"
Brexdan McMoran: Chump...uh, chum-pal.
Derpbat: Right up until I remember that in the beginning of this book apparently there's literal mugging gangs on the street.; Just roaming around needing to be killed by wandering passersby.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Get that gun off my tummy!
Brexdan McMoran: But also every single subway stop has a passel of revolver-armed muggers.
Derpbat: Mack, buddy, did you let an editor read through this?
gellaho: Stealing a car is complicated
gellaho
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Editors are thieves!"
gellaho: I feel like you guys should be used to this by now; They are never edited
Derpbat: Look, everyone knows Statler and Waldorf are going to hate the show, too.; They still show them in the box.
Brexdan McMoran: In paleo2000, a gun to the tummy is called a "You'mdone!" because Scottish and Welsh colonization affected everything in The United Americas
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Maximum speed"; He's then injected with all the drugs
Space Action Flippant Sausage: It's nice he didnt jack that guys credit card. Rex Moran is a man of the people.
Brexdan McMoran: But I don't expect you cloddies to know that.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Don't ever say Rex Moran isn't the funkest dude in town.
Derpbat: There is so much interesting about this world that if this was a show I'd want to see the bible.
Brexdan McMoran: He only sticks it to the man.; Absolute legend.
Derpbat: But it's not, so I suspect that most of what's interesting about this world is that Mack forgets things and then writes them in five minutes later.
Brexdan McMoran: The phrase is overused, but I deliberately choose it here: Rex Moran is the funking best.
gellaho: Well, it's been an hour. Time to clock out
Space Action Flippant Sausage: He's the Robin Hood of the futurepast.
Brexdan McMoran: Stage 2 of Rex's plan is to use the money to buy soma-trank slowballs and shoot them at both of this world's cops in a gyrojet rocket dart
Derpbat: Like, let's give Mack credit here. He came up with a fairly realistic implementation of the UBI.; He came up with Rex Moran.
Brexdan McMoran: With america unprotected, he then introduces himself at the White House gates as The Vice President.
Derpbat: He learned how to properly spell Tadeusz.; I'm sure there's more I can give him credit for.
gellaho: Are you jazzing me?
Brexdan McMoran: On jest Police Category.
Derpbat: His evil plan is, as Vice President, he's going to kill the President.; And thus become the President.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "No, sir. We are ska-ing you."
FancyShark in a White Suit: RICHAAAARRRRRDD!
Brexdan McMoran: The bastard! Then he'll rule Asiamericas
Derpbat: AND ONLY BOLESLAW AND THE MONKEY CAN STOP HIM.
gellaho: Gotta wonder who's applying for a mobile home in this system
Derpbat: So, the police in the pseudo-cities of The United States of the Americas will, in the middle of pursuing an armed and dangerous criminal, clock out and just give the next shift their notes? It's not entirely unreasonable, I guess, but
gellaho: It also doesn't square up with the fact that every character so far lives in a "mini-apartment"
Derpbat: My dudes, you were kind of pursuing an armed and dangerous criminal.; Wait. 'mobile towns'.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Lol, lmao. Mack thinks America would be out of the grip of the military-industrial complex by 2000.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Second Shift's problem now
Derpbat: I choose to assume that the towns are literally mobile.; The USA devoted its former defense budget to breeding giant turtles.; And now everyone lives on them.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: God if only.; I am very pro-giant turtle.; Like even if we could only get them car sized.
gellaho: He seems to have forgotten the Asian-war
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: We end up with Sunnyvale Trailer Parks all over the Americas.
Derpbat: I think it's a winning election issue, but the immobile town lobby is always fighting against it!
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: They had to reorganize their economy after starting a land war in Asia.
gellaho: Ersatz guzzle
FancyShark in a White Suit: Precious bottles. They have little bows and bonnets and big, adorable eyes.
Derpbat: I mean, polish vodka is great, I suppose. I'm a schnapps man, myself. But... I'm not entirely sure I would describe vodka as precious.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Poland must be in one of the less common Europes.
Derpbat: Is potato.
gellaho: Getting blitzed for the DossierComplete. An awkward name to be sure
Brexdan McMoran: Man, I miss when sci-fi writers were communist-socialist hybrids instead of technolibertarians.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Livingroom-cum-bedroom
Derpbat: It was less charming when the communists actually were busy enslaving 50% of Europe.
Brexdan McMoran: Hot take: the worst vodka isn't far afield of the best vodka because they're all distilled and filtered to a certain threshold.
Derpbat: But looking back, we didn't know how good we had it.
Brexdan McMoran: It's not like rum or whiskey or tequila where I would prefer you keep it in a barrel until I am dead.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Wait, he throws the dishes and utensils in the disposal?
gellaho: Every sci-fi writer thinks 20 years is 200
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Welp its about time for Blades, gonna get a drink and mosey over to do some Rex Moran shit of my own, later yalls.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "I'm back," he said.; "I missed you," said the cum.
Derpbat: The worst vodka isn't that far from the best vodka because vodka is intended almost entirely to get you drunk and 90% of it is distilling and bottling.
Brexdan McMoran: True, but it gets a lot more cool when you remove the authoritarian element and make it a voluntary participation.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Later, @Space Action Flippant Sausage !
Derpbat: It's not like a brandy or whiskey or something where there's an actual cultural cachet to it.
Brexdan McMoran: You'll be missed, unless we track the transceiver on your phone and alert the citizen constabulary!
Derpbat: Vodka's audience is people who want to get drunk.
Brexdan McMoran: Buddy is gonna kill our beloved Rex, isn't he, that wannabe cop motherfunker
gellaho: Dundundun
Brexdan McMoran: Charles Brothers: bloodlust psycho killer
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: All my drinks got a lot better once I started using gin instead of vodka.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Okay, fine. The discharge was bloody. There. You happy?"
Derpbat: He wasn't so much discharged as he murdered his CO.; And everyone else in his battalion.; And threatened to murder us if we didn't let him come from Asia.
gellaho: Dundundun
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: God I wish I had gin.
Derpbat: See? SEE?
FancyShark in a White Suit: That's so Charlie!
Derpbat: MURDER.
Brexdan McMoran: Gin is just vodka with its own bitters.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: But what a difference those make.
Brexdan McMoran: I hate being right.
FancyShark in a White Suit: So Rex is just forgotten at this point?
Derpbat: Rex is the second shift's problem.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Oh right
Derpbat: And Boleslaw and the monkey gave them all the note they had.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Lieutenant said no OT, union rules.
Derpbat: AND he was declared an enemy of the state for... not murdering an old man?
gellaho: Ah, the famously hard-to-get grains
Brexdan McMoran: Did you know cops will often pick up someone at end of shift so they can pick up wicked overtime just filing paperwork on a bullshit arrest without dealing with the street?
Derpbat: @FancyShark in a White Suit Are you sure he's a communist?
Brexdan McMoran: I say this because God has given them an easy OT, but he actually has a gun, so our heroes go home.
Derpbat: Because I'm pretty sure an actual communist would be more positive about the socialist future of people's capitalism.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I am not. I only skimmed his wikipedia page and focused on his hilarious picture
Derpbat: Rather than just saying 'oh, yeah, we have no barley or wheat or anything to make vodka.'; 'Just seaweed'.
Brexdan McMoran: For stealing fed money.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I wonder what the bread situation is like.
FancyShark in a White Suit: He could still be focusing on the evils of any capitalism at all
Derpbat: Man, the retrofuture is really different.
gellaho: He's written like 80 of these futures
FancyShark in a White Suit: That's true
gellaho: Plus, you know, they don't all have to be political diatribes
Brexdan McMoran: TGIFrday's rules: You can order all the bread you want, but it's too big to be delivered to any common-domain vacuum tube
gellaho: Not everyone is Ayn Rand
Derpbat: That's fair, just kind of weird that he keeps coming back to how everything is sea weed.
FancyShark in a White Suit: This is also true
Brexdan McMoran: I think Max's plan is to stay ahead of Tad so long that his stolen money becomes integral to the economy again.
gellaho: Rex Moran is hungry
Brexdan McMoran: The telecom heist method.; Hungry for the COMMON MAN'S JUSTICE
Derpbat: They did solve one problem we have now.
Brexdan McMoran: traffic control stop
Derpbat: No cash means it's very hard for the perp to steal and launder his stolen goods.
Brexdan McMoran: No more pesky Italia--wait, what was your take?
Brexdan McMoran: Counterpoint: crypto
gellaho: In 23 years: No more waiters! Who could imagine the luxury of a Chili's?
Derpbat: I don't think anyone was ever pessimistic enough to imagine crypto until we did.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Self driving cars of the future past work pretty good compared to ours.
Brexdan McMoran: Late in the game to bring in robots.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Necrowaiters are for Denny's
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Ostentatious Swank is a sick band name.
Brexdan McMoran: If they have serverbots I think having a butler really is a rich fink flex.
Derpbat: ...did he think automats were going to survive the swine flu?
Brexdan McMoran: It's like owning a lawn in Scottsdale.
Derpbat: That's really kind of cool.
gellaho: They don't have fucking fruit or grains?
gellaho: Everyone got scurvy or what
Derpbat: What?
Brexdan McMoran: I will say this forever. All of web 3.0 thus far is inventing artificial scarcity to sell it back to ourselves except where it's bots making shit for bots.
Derpbat: What else are you doing with grapes?
FancyShark in a White Suit: "It's half a turnip, sprinkled with orphan tears and braised in dust"
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I kind of want to try the chicken doctor.
Brexdan McMoran: I had to go through like three authentications the other day to apply to a job via my work address, my lastpass, and the actual job application site. The future UI sssssucks for humans.
Derpbat: 'Central Production: The biggest morons in the world'.
Brexdan McMoran: Your choices are grated prawns or Dr. Chicken.
Derpbat: Are we sure we assimilated them, and Venezuela didn't somehow conquer all of us?
gellaho: Seems like a mistake to put the thumbprint on the credit card
Derpbat: And then instead of Hugo Chavez, they were ruled by Captain Crunch?
Brexdan McMoran: The year is 2000. Grapes have been outlawed. Biff Tannen is President.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: NFTs are a solution in want of a problem.
Brexdan McMoran: Can we hand it to Mack for absolutely nailing the smartphone ecosystem though?
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rex takes out a keychain full of thumbs
Derpbat: That was the other thing!; Yeah, that was #4 on my list.; He's gotten smartphones pretty well.
gellaho: No crypto talk in my book readings
Derpbat: Better than Clarke did.
gellaho: Mack Reynolds loves cum
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: An upscale french bistro is the ideal space to commit identity theft.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Go see if the cum cashier can break a bukkake
Brexdan McMoran: The Frenchman couldn't describe him because he disdains everyone too much to regard them.
gellaho: Rex Moran: criminal mastermind and leaver of evidence
Derpbat: ...Rex is still going on?; I LOVE THIS MAN.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rex cannot be stopped
Brexdan McMoran: "Very well zen, 'ow to describe zis man? 'E was as though poverty itself 'ad sprung to life from the slums of Paris...'e was a less noble Jean Valjean. Through his heart blew a hollow wind."
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "monsieur, we do not allow our patrons to forge identification during the salad course."
Derpbat: Man, Javert would have these guy's badges.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "M'seur will refrain from defying the state before the receipt"
gellaho: It's certainly convenient that he can rent a hotel room without paying for it or leaving any information whatsoever
Derpbat: I wonder if Mack is on some sort of drugs that cause short term memory problems.
FancyShark in a White Suit: hahaha, what is the point of any of these systems?
Derpbat: I mean, he was an author in the 1970s, so the sky's the limit.
Derpbat: Allowed him to turn four unsuccessful short stories into one salable novel.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Man, I wish I lived in this world. Crime would be so easy.
FancyShark in a White Suit: All technology in these old sci-fi books works on the honor system
Derpbat: Apparently.
gellaho: And order room service? What is this
Derpbat: What.; What just happened?; Are... are his scars that revolting?; Despite them not being mentioned in his description?
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Although, to be fair, this is essentially what Anna Sorokin did.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Wait I thought he said there was no whisky.
FancyShark in a White Suit: He just left a restaurant without paying so he could order more expensive food in a place with fewer exits
Derpbat: He's just so scarred that no one can recognize him.; HE IS IVAN THE FOOL.
Derpbat: No, there's no wine.
FancyShark in a White Suit: That was pages ago
Derpbat: Because grapes aren't allowed to be turned into beverages.
gellaho: Rex considers ordering a mopsy
gellaho
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Okay so, people complain when somebody orders "a beer" at a bar. But most bartenders know that it means whatever's cheapest on tap. But "a Scotch" is a step beyond.
Derpbat: The single dumbest sentence I have ever read.; I took political science at uni, and that's still the single dumbest sentence I have ever read, and I love that someone wrote it.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Prostitution works on a barter system. Thanks, Mack
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Rex, just jerk it to some pseudo-porn.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Mack just invented onlyfans, i think?
gellaho: Every country has had its name changed. Except Iran
FancyShark in a White Suit: If you've had a bite, you've had your fill of caviar
Derpbat: I guess that's technically a name change? I think in 1977 it was still called Persia.
gellaho: No grain, but you can get a pound of caviar
Derpbat: Oh. Huh, they made us stop doing that in 1935.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Okay, Mack, we get it. The future is fish and seaweed; What the hell are chopped eggs?
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: He built himself the finest pillow fort to smoke out while waiting for his meal.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: These country names imply varying rarities of Europes and various complexities of Soviets.
Derpbat: Also, Asia.; I am so glad we don't know what he's done to Africa.; I hope we make it through this entire book without finding out.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Hopefully, for their sakes, it's just gone
gellaho: The next morning, the gorging continues
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: There's no joke I can make that I wouldn't feel bad about.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Second shift sucks
Derpbat: That wasn't a joke, that was just an observation. I genuinely do not want to know.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rex was in a room with one, maybe two exits tops, and the police didn't find him and his CONSTANT use of the stolen card
gellaho: No idea why this stolen card is still working
FancyShark in a White Suit: Honor system. Gotta be
gellaho: It also seems like he would have already burned through that $42,000; Excuse me, p-$42,000
FancyShark in a White Suit: Paintings and sports equipment; Okay, calling boats "floaters" is actually genius
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Paintings you can order from Pneumatic Amazon can't be that expensive.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Some assembly required"
Derpbat: Is he planning to sell those paintings to other pawnshops.
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Okay so I have to authenticate via my bank's account if I order a ten euro kebab, but these guys sell yachts on faith?
gellaho: Anyway, I guess Tad's back on the grind
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "this is an awfully modern canvas for being one of the Dutch Masters".
FancyShark in a White Suit: "I don't have it. That means I didn't steal it anymore."; "I guess that checks out."
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: What did he want sports equipment for?
gellaho: No idea what the point of any of this was
Derpbat: I'm so confused.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rex splurged like a kid that stole their parents' credit card
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: He definitely planned to use it for sex stuff.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: So really. He had lots of guns. They should have been more specific.
FancyShark in a White Suit: After he considered the mopsy
gellaho: Marvin Ruhling
Derpbat: Second shift is just the worst.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "It was an obscene gesture, but Boleslaw let it slide"
gellaho: And the bank man
FancyShark in a White Suit: Moran is targeted for death by the bankers of America; Americas, sorry
gellaho: Twist
Derpbat: What.
FancyShark in a White Suit: HAHAHAHAHAHA
Derpbat: What.
FancyShark in a White Suit: He was testing the system!
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: ...fuck. This.
Derpbat: @Brexdan McMoran You win.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rex is a consultant!; Mack, you fucking coward!
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: You'd think they'd do this kind of pen-test before such a wide rollout.
Derpbat: Yes.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "why didn't we think of that before we made them mandatory?"
gellaho: It makes no sense with him trying to trick the bank into giving him more money, but whatever
FancyShark in a White Suit: Wait, it was a BET?!
Derpbat: WHAT.
FancyShark in a White Suit: HAHAHA
Derpbat: Second shift is the worst.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rex is playing so many games with our hearts
gellaho: Sharpies wizard jimmying
FancyShark in a White Suit: This is like if a white hat hacker stole Swiss bank accounts from the UN to show that they need better security training
gellaho: That's our hunky Tad
FancyShark in a White Suit: hahaha, Tad will die a virgin
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: What happened with the Asian-war vet?
FancyShark in a White Suit: He might be the connecting narrative; or just something Mack forgot
gellaho: Damn you, Amazon!
gellaho: Tad just stumbling back into the plot at the mall
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Why do women wear makeup? They're much prettier without it" - Mack
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: "Also, broads just need to smile more, mopsy!"
gellaho: Robo-female can not consume intoxicants
gellaho
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Father is the clown doll on my bookshelf"
Brexdan McMoran: Okay, last I recall was the fingerprint photo bafflegab at the french foyer, catch me up, Mr. Shark.
gellaho: Dumpy, indeed
Derpbat: IT WAS ALL A CON.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rex was doing it all as a bet with the bank; To test their security and the cops; He bet he could go 24 hours without being caught
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Rex was a white hat pentester.
Derpbat: And he got away with it because second shift is the worst.; Literally the worst.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Second shift didn't catch him as he sat in a hotel and ordered everything he could off Amazon
Brexdan McMoran: hahahaha, MY MAN
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: He revealed security flaws we all pointed out in seconds.
Brexdan McMoran: REX FUNKIN MORAN
gellaho: Mack thinking WWI was a century before 2000 helps me understand his concept of time
Brexdan McMoran: Truly a legend
FancyShark in a White Suit: AND HE GOT TO GO FREE!
gellaho: Well, Narcs get to do that
Brexdan McMoran: God, I love you, you magnificent Moran.; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoogqyipXbc
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Sam's bar serves dark beer despite the fact that grain is banned.
FancyShark in a White Suit: It's made with tires
Brexdan McMoran: Stupid enough to be a cop, crazy enough to be a crook.
gellaho: Jesus Christ, Mack get it together
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Mack is circling the well of existential despair hard.
gellaho: "The old west predates the US, right?"
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: The bartender handed him a crude sketch of a pint.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Tad, you couldn't capture a man testing if you'd capture him for doing everything illegal
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "just once I wish someone would ask me to stand and deliver"
Brexdan McMoran: Buddy, in 2000 women were not this demure. Did Mack miss second-wave women's lib?
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I think he missed several waves.
FancyShark in a White Suit: This isn't the face of a feminist?
Brexdan McMoran: Like nobody can predict the future, but it's weird to think the pill had just come out, NOW was kicking ass, the ERA was on the slate...
gellaho: Just some polite bar talk
Brexdan McMoran: and he's over here writing Donna Reed.
gellaho: Dude was born in 1917
Brexdan McMoran: he was a futurist by trade!
FancyShark in a White Suit: So four hundred years ago?
gellaho: Exactly
Brexdan McMoran: ...sidebar: I would throw you all into a fire to get with It's a Wonderful Life Donna Reed.; Ride or die babe right there.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Yeah, that's fair. I might do the same; But I'd apologize first
Brexdan McMoran: On paper I agree with what Tad's saying, but he sure knows how to frame it like a Fox News talking head.
gellaho: Mack takes a minute to annoyingly complain about how unrealistic movies are
Brexdan McMoran: or maybe off-paper.
gellaho: In case you weren't sure that Mack was a nerd
Brexdan McMoran: Like OBVIOUSLY murder and molestation are bad, but can we get more distinction here?; Is he saying this stems from Sex Deviant Homosexualists?
gellaho: He was a sixty year old man in 1977. I'd adjust your expectations accordingly
FancyShark in a White Suit: That means he was in WW2 or claiming he was in WW
Brexdan McMoran: They circled the wagons at the mountain meadows massacre but that was sorta by proxy for the mormons.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Did he plan this scene just so he could rattle off all his favorite slurs?
Brexdan McMoran: He was gonna call up one of these dames who liked sex.
FancyShark in a White Suit: And yell at the damn kids
FancyShark in a White Suit: A mopsy
Brexdan McMoran: German is actually a slur for Austrian.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Oh right, Rex considered ordering a prostitute but decided not to
gellaho: Damn, we missed the dress up montage
FancyShark in a White Suit: "She was almost erotic, but still looked like a corpse covered in despair"
gellaho: Uh, oh Tad. Run!
FancyShark in a White Suit: Cheese it!
Brexdan McMoran: Mack writes like the sexual revolution hadn't JUST happened.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: An unchaperoned woman calling upon a single man? Think of the scandal!
gellaho: This is a recipe for a stabbing
FancyShark in a White Suit: C'mon, Brendan. It's the year 2000. Women's lib is ancient history, like Asia
gellaho: I'm sure the fifty year old sci-fi writer was really into the flower people
FancyShark in a White Suit: Filthy hippy
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: It's so easy to stalk people in the future past.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Moran proved it!
Brexdan McMoran: A sad end for the 5000-year heritage of women having names; Again, he nailed it. He called googlestalking a date to make sure he's not a creep.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Names are for men and boats
Brexdan McMoran: But all boats are women!
gellaho: It's sort of a count down for one of these two to stab the other
FancyShark in a White Suit: Holy shit! Loophole!; This is leading up to a Crying Game reveal
Brexdan McMoran: "You're not unpleasant, in a dumpy sort of way. Also, your eyes look goggle-fishy because you wear old lady cheaters."
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Take me now"
Brexdan McMoran: That would be such a succulent end to Tad bitching about the queers in a bar on p.
gellaho: This is for all the sexy Amish fetishists out there
FancyShark in a White Suit: "At once"
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: She showed him her punch-card.
Brexdan McMoran: Tad, unable to count that high, rejected her as impure.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Bride of Lucifer!"
gellaho: Hot
gellaho: Well, that was pointless
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Which he'd done many, many times"; Glad you're starting to think better of the woman you're actively groping, Tad
Brexdan McMoran: Okay, lady, what's the problem?
FancyShark in a White Suit: "I'm not your type," he said, not stopping
gellaho: No, he stopped
Brexdan McMoran: "I've been with eight men, and after tonight, I'll have been with eight," she sneered.
FancyShark in a White Suit: oh, thank god
gellaho: That's why it was pointless
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Lying back of thinking of England worked so well for her before.
gellaho: Tilly: Expert Hacker and Stalker
FancyShark in a White Suit: Ohhh, my bad. I missed the line about him being disappointed
Brexdan McMoran: "What spins with you?" he asked her. "You're starfish class."
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: She was really only with Rex Moran in eight different moustaches.
Brexdan McMoran: The year is 2000. America's abrahamic faith has been replaced by Zoroastrianism.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Via Ctrl+F
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "I've got nothing against your dad. He causally throws out racial slurs, we have so much in common."
Brexdan McMoran: Tad was a toddler when this book was written.
FancyShark in a White Suit: And now he's taller
Brexdan McMoran: At some point the country collectively converted in the '80s.; What a weird decade it must have been.
gellaho: Taddler, please
Brexdan McMoran: Is this like when Russia had to collectively go atheist overnight?
gellaho: Warning: unpleasant
Brexdan McMoran: JFC; wait
FancyShark in a White Suit: I WAS JOKING
Brexdan McMoran: AFM; Ahura funking Mazda!
Brexdan McMoran: Tsk, funking tsk, ladies.
FancyShark in a White Suit: oh, right. Funk you, Mack
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: Oh wow, shit. I peaced out at the pentest reveal, and now I regret checking back in. Yeah I'm out, this is hateful.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Sorry, @Manyxe, Snow Wizard . This is the gamble of bookreads
Brexdan McMoran: This book has one female character and she's all the male ideas of women stacked atop each other like cordwood
gellaho: The end of the dreamteam
FancyShark in a White Suit: At least you met Rex Moran; "You will investigate only tiny scams"
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: ...truthfully, I'm still gonna check in as long as I'm still awake. There's something fascinating about the wrongness.
Brexdan McMoran: The VirginWhoreVictim wandered off into the night?
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: This is some solid phrasing.
gellaho: It's only 23 years, Mack
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Sherlock Holmes? Sounds Asia-ish"
Brexdan McMoran: But books are illegal!; Sidebar: revisit your HS reading list. I reread Fahrenheit 451 and was openly weeping on a plane.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Yeah. The mechanical deathhound is so rad
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I've been meaning to give Robertson Davies another shot.
Brexdan McMoran: Norm Schmidt stubbornly refused to convert to Zoroastrianism. Kelly discreetly reported him to Overmind.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: You know what bunco means but not Sherlock?
gellaho: No thank you; i do think this reaction is kind of funny, Steele had way worse shit in it
Brexdan McMoran: Steele was a sleazy world
FancyShark in a White Suit: Steele did have Ice; Although this world has Rex Moran
gellaho: Do you like exposition dumps? I don't. So here you go
gellaho
Brexdan McMoran: This is like finding the Viking Blood Angel in your pulp rocket serial.; Scuse me, your gyrojet rocket serial.
FancyShark in a White Suit: This is like the Reluctant Sorceror but with less lips
Brexdan McMoran: Wait, did he write this a year before we went off the gold standard?; six years later; My dude invented e-currency
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Dense with future funking finances.
gellaho: Lips ahoy
FancyShark in a White Suit: Liiiiiiips
gellaho: He's investigating fraud now, I've skipped a lot of it because who could care
Brexdan McMoran: Blockchain bux
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: It's like the author really struggles to say anything nice about any character.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Need to cool down after Rex
Brexdan McMoran: Phidias Porras!; Tad Coleslaw, how ya spinning?
gellaho: Tad talking like a robotic communist now
FancyShark in a White Suit: Kiss; KIIIISSSS
Brexdan McMoran: SEARCH ME
gellaho: What kind of curd are you playing?
Brexdan McMoran: Tad found no stock in Rosy's orifices. What he did find...was love.
FancyShark in a White Suit: And Future Syphilis
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I haven't had my curd pulled in ages.
Brexdan McMoran: pseudo-Syph!
FancyShark in a White Suit: "You sometimes go heeled, like a filthy cobbler"
gellaho: Really can't decide if this is communism or not
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Phidias was quite fastidious
FancyShark in a White Suit: Avatar: The Last Pretzel Bender
Brexdan McMoran: First off, it's a pretzel lasher
gellaho: Stutes
Brexdan McMoran: I am in awe of this book's vision technologically if not socially.; Name a better book we've done that isn't Steele, and honestly, Steele was more wrong ten years later.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Most insidious
Brexdan McMoran: Steele is ten conversations about the state of man couched in act I of robocop.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Time Blender was pretty damn insane, but not as fun as Steele
Brexdan McMoran: If you blew me up and then made a perfect copy of me minus the flaws of being human, you would not catch me crying except with joy.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: I'm going to end up trying to find a copy of Time Blender, I fucking love that book.
Brexdan McMoran: "I can run a two-minute mile and delay orgasm for hoouuuuurrrrrs!" he screamed from the rooftops before also leaping from them.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: It thoroughly blended my brain.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Psychodrome was pretty good
gellaho: Except for the other people's brains getting shoved in there
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I want to find a copy of time blender and confront Michael Dorn with it at a star trek convention
FancyShark in a White Suit: Just throw it on the table. "WELL?!"
Brexdan McMoran: Michael Dorn. Peter David. PSI-BLENDER. August, 202
gellaho: Rosy goes to gamble
Brexdan McMoran: How far in are we, gellaho? Is this a two-parter?; Because let me tell you, I nominate Mack for the new Hawke
gellaho: I mean, absolutely not
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Pop Rasch has a set of dracula teeth from spirit Halloween
Brexdan McMoran: He must have more books.
gellaho: A metric fuck ton; But Hawke remains undefeated
FancyShark in a White Suit: A lot of short stories too
gellaho: But we are awkwardly 114 page into a 181 page book
FancyShark in a White Suit: ahh
Brexdan McMoran: Hawke is a wonderful dude. I genuinely love him. But have you met my homeslice Rex Moran?
FancyShark in a White Suit: I don't think we're going to top Rex Moran, but let's tear through the rest of this
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: And we still haven't got a plot.
gellaho: Indeed
Brexdan McMoran: Tad fucks, that's the pitch.; Tad really went through some grizzled cop stuff between stories
gellaho: Indeed, so probably a two parter, and I might cram one of Peter David's Worf children's books in there
Brexdan McMoran: Goddamn, Rex Moran, you amazing man.
gellaho: Because this book might get boring
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Thank you I was concerned it was just me confused about that.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Oh god there are books about Alexander?
Brexdan McMoran: well let's go a little further and see if we ramp it or put it aside to extend our joy.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: FUCK YEAH!
Brexdan McMoran: I KNEW IT
gellaho: This guy writes so weird
gellaho: No, they are about Worf entering Starfleet Academy; They're really short and shitty
FancyShark in a White Suit: There are two undercover cops listening to this while frantically checking their codephrase books
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Funk your Romping Caper Rosy.
gellaho: This book is incomprehensible at this point
Brexdan McMoran: Martin Zogbaum!; Pop Rasch!; Rosy Porras!; Tad Boleslaw!
FancyShark in a White Suit: Someone put a wallet under Brendan's tongue
gellaho: A pre-"Last Resort" Papa Roach
Brexdan McMoran: It's like someone made the League of Evil Little Rascals
gellaho: I cropped this, but whatever; Thanks, phone
FancyShark in a White Suit: Thank you. I've been trying to come up with a joke for that all night; And by "all night" I mean a few minutes ago when he was first mentioned
gellaho: This writing is so bad
gellaho: "negligently, negatively"; I don't even know how to describe it, it's just so weird
FancyShark in a White Suit: Mad Libs
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: All I could come up with was 'a rash you get from drinking too much soda'
Brexdan McMoran: The book overexplains the romp but lets you twist on a taw
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: You already mentioned the false teeth, mack.
gellaho: They have mind control now? Or is that just a turn of phrase?
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: State mandated lobotomies.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Officer Corky doesn't complain
gellaho: Legitimately, no idea what's going on
gellaho: Fucking blow guns, sure; WHY NOT
FancyShark in a White Suit: Don't be a funker, dude
gellaho: This isn't as insanity-inducing as Photon: In Search of MOM, but it's getting there
Brexdan McMoran: Say, Pap, how much is the take?; Take, whaddaya call a take? In my day we said it wuz a SCORE! Ah, to Zoroastrian hell with it, I'll see you at 8 at the holothromble ambulatory skizzwox
Brexdan McMoran: Cripes! I get it. They don't get it, but I get it. And I think it's reprehensible.
gellaho: No security? Sure, why not
Brexdan McMoran: Okay, but in what way is that NOT a pipe?; Pop is meant to be our POV character.
gellaho: Let me translate: "a long room banked with computers, computers, computers, and computers"
Brexdan McMoran: Here in the mainframe room, we send each number to its destination, depending on whether it needs to be added or subtracted
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Multiplication is on the next floor"
gellaho: I don't know what it is with lips. But it's a thing
Brexdan McMoran: Hacker cracker
gellaho: Gismo
gellaho: gismo
Brexdan McMoran: Pop wiped sweat from his brow as he typed the invasive message into the computer: DO U WANT 2 PLY A GAME LOL
FancyShark in a White Suit: Mack must have shit his pants when he saw 200
Brexdan McMoran: CALCULATE THE SQUARE ROOT OF LUV; QUERY: WHAT IS MATRIX
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: The fact that stuff is still punch card based explains a lot.
gellaho: So, @FancyShark in a White Suit said earlier this week that this was a collection of stories. It definitely seems like that
FancyShark in a White Suit: I was afraid of that; It does explain the lack of central plot
Brexdan McMoran: The Erotic Escapades of Boleslaw and Kelly
gellaho: Especially considering he was calling it a DossierComplete and now says Crime Dossier
Brexdan McMoran: Well it's not his fault this guy's only dossier entries are crime.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I like that a fraud investigation is turning into an armed standoff
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: I wish.
gellaho: Anyway, I've had too much to drink to understand what's happening anymore. So TO BE CONTINUED
Brexdan McMoran: FAIR STOP
gellaho: We will continue on page 120
Brexdan McMoran: I like a cliffhanger.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Thank you, @gellaho !; Especially for Rex Moran!
Brexdan McMoran: they will charge in there with guns instead of just 🍨 at the door; Goddamn, Rex Moran.
FancyShark in a White Suit: He's the man
Brexdan McMoran: He's Mister Moran!
gellaho: We will finish the final 60 pages will read WORF'S FIRST ADVENTURE, given time
Brexdan McMoran: Rex Moran, you incredible, stupid man, you made it. You made it homefree.; I was crying with gigglypants; GO REX GO; LET'S GO MORAN; GET A BRAIN MORANS
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Why is he holding a string of Xmas lights 🤣
FancyShark in a White Suit: One more time, because this song @Brexdan McMoran shared is too, too perfect; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoogqyipXbc; Epic riffing tonight, everyone!
gellaho: Until next week, this has been The Book Cage
FancyShark in a White Suit: Funk on, everyone
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: This book was dense with madness, well done everyone!; @gellaho I don't know where you find all this comedy gold but I'm thankful you share your hoard.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: This book was madness. Thank you for this.
Brexdan McMoran: Truly our best riff and our best book; A double record holder. Thanks to @gellaho among men.; Rex Moran is whitehat hacking in paradise.
Derpbat: I'm looking back and I'm glad it all worked out for Rex Moran.
gellaho: The Book Cage - Episode 65: Police Patrol: 2000 A.D. Cont'd; This week, we return for the continuing and disjointed adventures of Tad Boleslaw. He's already finished his investigation of the prank committed by Rex Moran. Now, he investigates a gambling ring and fraud! What else will our hero(?) investigate? Blackmail? Nuclear weapons? Racist vigilantes? The answer to all these questions are yes. Mack Reynolds continues to recycle his work, this Friday 5pm eastern.; With the possible addition of Peter David's Star Trek (R): The Next Generation ™️: Starfleet Academy ™️ #1: Worf's First Adventure, time permitting.
gellaho
gellaho: Coming up on the hour, it's the end of Police Patrol: 2000 A.D. Here are the first few paragraphs of Chapter 17
gellaho: Real awkward first sentence there
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "In the dill"?!; Like.....dill pickles?
Ozzie: I'll fully cop to writing long sentences that carry a lot of narrative duty, but that goes on for too many words to end that confusingly.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Rosy's Vlasic addiction got him in deep shit
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Got the stork on my back something fierce today, Rex."
FancyShark in a White Suit: "I hear ya, man. Last night was a blur. Woke up in a puddle of bread & butter chips."
che jakesy, sports revolutionary: I just had a stroke trying to read that
FancyShark in a White Suit: dangit, something just came up at work. I'll catch up with you all once it's done. Don't get in the dill!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: In Zoroastrian futurepast, dill gets into you.
Brexdan McMoran: It's five o'clock somewhere and that is RIGHT HERE, let's gooooo
Brexdan McMoran: Less of a run-on than a heist.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Got a tall glass of watermelon kool aid and a freshly baked frozen pizza, time to fight some books.; And no Blades tonight so I can do all the book fighting.
gellaho: Are these things related? Presumably
Brexdan McMoran: That sounds dope, but is it as dope as this bit of meta-nonfiction? https://photos.app.goo.gl/cBHG738oyMy68ZuZ8
gellaho: I have also scanned ahead, and if you had any doubts that this was 4 stories Mack Reynolds tried to combine via racist vigilante wraparound, wonder no further
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: The rat out of frame gnawing at you is particularly apt.; No I won't explain myself I thought that was hilarious.
gellaho: People at the park!? Impossible! Best start moistening my liiiips
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Mommy, why is that man moistening his lips? Don't look, sweetie, he's on the dill."
Brexdan McMoran: Okay, I don't know why this got cropped but here: https://discord.com/channels/679999969536638977/689900392808841314/1000146896448393347; There is, in fact, a rat living on my floor.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: The line between unwelcome houseguest and smol friend is very thin. Just sayin.
Brexdan McMoran: I like rats. Rats are cool.; Until the rat situation has pickled, I am in the dill.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Martin Zogbaum had rosy cheeks and scratched at his picked rasch.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Rosy Porras is the pre mutation name of a really bad Batman villain.
Derpbat: A rat left to its own devices is a rat not causing trouble.; The problem is they're very rarely just left to themselves.
gellaho: In the dill returns
Space Action Flippant Sausage: This is drug slang. These people are drug dealers.; Not very good ones because they are still using punch cards.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: I am going to think of the next clearly high strung person I see as 'too jittery in the dill' including myself.
gellaho: Not a great showing from Boleslaw
Brexdan McMoran: In the future, computers will do amazing things and only get bigger and require entire teams of men to insert the punchcards for their fantastic calculatrations!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Boleslaw Vs PIckelhaub
Derpbat: Funk you!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Which I have decided is Rosy's supervillain name.
Brexdan McMoran: I'm making potato salad right now. I should have used some quick pickled red onion and called it Rosy Porras.; ...not too late.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: You dont have time to shoot a cop Rosy? Shame.
Derpbat: Boleslaw: Heroically failing.
gellaho: Another good sign that Reynolds is combining shorts is that the lingo changes. For example, "autocab" is now "hovercab"
gellaho: As is the fact that this entire section has been out of Boleslaw's perspective, and his personality has changed
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "No you see a hovercab and an autocab are two different conveyances, and I havent even gotten to the autohovercab."
Derpbat: Maybe you should have taken your own hovering vehicle to the crime rather than relying upon someone else.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: And worn your laser proof crime shorts.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Not Pop Rasch, he seemed so trustworthy!
gellaho: Bringing up sharp at the cab park. Whatever the fuck that means
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: He stabbed himself while jogging?
Derpbat: Also, I genuinely can't work out what an autocab was supposed to be anyway. Like, it's auto as opposed to what? Are there manual cabs out there?
Brexdan McMoran: Maybe they're different, like one is self-driving, and the other is a 2000AD pedicab flintstone-hovered by a Russian teenager working in San Diego for the summer, you don't know, none of us knows.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Man, "brought himself up sharp" is such an old timey phrase Mack, you need to cut out anything that could be applied to horses.
Derpbat: I guess it's because they drive themselves but auto doesn't make that clear. At least hover cab is a descriptive term that provides information.
gellaho: He's dialing a location in the hovercab, so it's the same thing
Brexdan McMoran: I love this book's language play but also, this is some shamanic draemspeak.; d'oh.
gellaho: He's bizarrely kept "dialing" for everything; A calm and composed frisking!? The indignity!
gellaho
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Clearly the futurepast has a rotary phone for dialing coordinates.
Derpbat: We will use rotary phones in the year 2000!
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: After the Asia War, the touch tone phone is lost technology.
gellaho: Not that small. Seems like something you should have noticed
Brexdan McMoran: Maybe the cab is a transformer and it's only self-driving in autobot form
Derpbat: That's a very large sub miniature tracking device.; Maybe while we were invading Asia we should have picked up some Soviet bugs.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Should've gone with the sub-sub-miniature model.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Rosy, my dude. You are not real. Anyone who smokes would have smoked on their way to the crime rendezvous and discovered the transmitter.
gellaho: Gasp! Not the luggage!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Rosy is no Rex Moran.
Derpbat: Who knew cops majored in stealth?; You're lucky they didn't put a grenade in your pocket, my dude.
gellaho: Rosy decides to rope a B-list actor into this mess
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "HOLY SHIT ITS SANDY DUNCAN!"
Derpbat: It's the Muppet Show! With our very special guest... A wanted criminal!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "What are you doing at this filthy tenement, Sandy?!"
gellaho: Rosy has devolved into an animal.; And-say it with me-DILL!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "That no-good Rosy Porras stole my priceless pickle collection!"
Derpbat: Man, dill pickles getting a rough rap here.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Still.......still trying to make pickle based slang a thing, huh?" Said Dave.
gellaho: That's some good living oozing... and pickles
Brexdan McMoran: Sandy Duncan fucks. Dave Shriner fucks, but it's depressing.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Pickle romp" sounds like a very British euphemism for a sex act.
gellaho: Rosy insists on "in the dill"
gellaho: No pickle
Brexdan McMoran: Well, you called it.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Rosy hates pickled romp
gellaho: You want a what now?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also I think I'm tuning in to this slang because pickling makes things sour, and when something goes badly people say it "went sour"
Derpbat: A shuttle rocket to Miami sounds like one of the worst ways to get to Miami.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: I'm either becoming brain damaged or qualified to write a sci fi novel.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "Why not just another flight instead of a shuttle rocket seat? It's so much safer."
Brexdan McMoran: Worse yet, when it finally ends, you're in Miami.
gellaho: Get the Night Expediter to get me out of the dill
Derpbat: Even if we had the technology to make flying into orbit for a commute practical, there's no reason we'd do it from the Midwest to Miami.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Night Expediter is the worst superhero name I've ever heard.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Fuck you, you arent Darth Porras, you and your pickle slang can funk right out of my apartment."
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Just wait until Dillman shows up
Derpbat: I'm starting to get the feeling that these aren't very good people.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Then you'll be in it
Derpbat: Just a hint, though.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Its also a not great Stephen King movie.
gellaho: Shriner seems more intrigued than intimidated
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: I think it's kind of awesome, you could go all film noir 'Night Expediter will get you out of the dill, for the right price'
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Guns make Dave horny.
Derpbat: Weird, wasn't it established that you could just have a gun magically turn up in your flat just by pressing buttons and scaring a rich guy?
gellaho: "Actors do makeup right? Eh, whatever. I'm sure it's fine"
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Just don't call during the day, he gets pissed if you wake him up.
Derpbat: If you like guns so much, Dave, why don't you just...have a gun.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Dave Shriner: Makeover Master
Space Action Flippant Sausage: The end result is just a clown faced guy with two grapefruit in his shirt.
Derpbat: @Brexdan McMoran I miss Rex.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: We all miss Rex.
Derpbat: Now there was a criminal.
gellaho: You gonna explain why his face is natural for disguise or?
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Nah that's self evident
gellaho: A fake criminal
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Rosy, the only pores you have is in your surname."
Rachel, Pretty Gay: It's cause his face is cold, cold
Brexdan McMoran: Yeah, but then every shot fired with it would be traced to you, so I assume this is a gun worth using, i.e. a ghost that Rosy shouldn't have. Look, all I know is Rex Moran could talk the devil into making Hell a paradise, just so everyone marvels at why he would ever escape.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: His makeup kit consists entirely of one pair of Groucho Marx glasses.
Brexdan McMoran: Actors: famous for their makeup skills.
gellaho: The banking section of the bank
Derpbat: Even in the seventies I'm pretty sure databank was one word.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: I spend most of my time in the lawn bowling section but to each their own
Derpbat: And also we didn't call them that.
Brexdan McMoran: Rosy's face is such a blank template it can only appear in passive voice.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Its the sporting goods part of the bank you really have to watch out for.
gellaho: Weirdest Expression Description goes to
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Is... That a word?
Derpbat: What's funny is that within five years of this book being written the microcomputer revolution had begun and all of this would become a period piece.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: I've never figured out what face do that youd describe as a moue.
Derpbat: No.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: But it is apparently a thing.
Derpbat: I think it's very pursed lips.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Apparently it's a pout
gellaho: Cloddies suckin on trank
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Duck face?
Rachel, Pretty Gay: which he's doing with his plump lips; As opposed to his other, thinner lips
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Moue looks like a typo but apparently my autocorrect recognized it.
Derpbat: What is the Tri-D, anyway?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "You're not unintelligent." has to be one of the most backhanded compliments you can get in sci fi.
Derpbat: A television, I assume, but the way it's capitalized throws me.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: 3D tv, I think?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: It's the future!
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: That was such a breakthrough when they came out.
gellaho: Rosy is losing his damn mind while Dave is making kissy-faces
Derpbat: Man, I hope it's proper 3D tv with little holographic figures I can pick up and make scream.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Dave hands rosy a copy of the Communist Manifesto and lectures him about how capital alienates people from the product of their labor.
Derpbat: None of this "they're coming out of the screen!" business, I want holograms and nothing but.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also "stute"?; The funk is a stute?
Derpbat: It's a word I refuse to look up.; But it is real.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Someone who's astute.; I guess?
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Trank sucking addiction is a serious disease and I don't care for how this cloddy stute is trivializing it.
Derpbat: I think it's a clever person.; Yeah.
gellaho: Rosy's brilliant plan falls apart immediately
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Okay I'm really bad at character names
Derpbat: Okay, funk you, Boleslaw.
Brexdan McMoran: In the future there will be metal detectors at select airports!
Rachel, Pretty Gay: But Tad Boleslaw had to be a result of this chucklefuck looking around at a buffet
gellaho: I hope you enjoyed the Rosy Porras adventure
Brexdan McMoran: Who here even remembers travel before 9/11? it was a time, let me tell you.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "also you used an obviously fake name like 'phidias'".
gellaho: This takes place in 2000, so
Derpbat: The United States of the Americas, clamping down on our freedoms!
gellaho: It's accurate
Rachel, Pretty Gay: I remember not getting groped
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Like an elephant in a shot glass.
Brexdan McMoran: It is worth noting that the gun was not illegal, it merely tipped Rosy's presence on the jump rocket.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Sadly those days have passed
gellaho: Sci-fi is tasked with searching for the future. Mack Reynolds predicted Cheers
Derpbat: Where everybody knows your ridiculous name!; And they're always glad you came!
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Just bribe him by buying a few of his Bunco Pops
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "What spins?" is asking for someone to reply "You, sitting on one of these! 🖕 "
Derpbat: You wanna go where the people know, everyone's a slave of the people's capitalist world order. You wanna go where everyone knows your name.
Brexdan McMoran: Searching for a POLICE ROCKSTAR for FLEXIBLE HOURS at super-chill FUTURE with NO GUNS.
gellaho: Reynolds didn't know how to transition to the next story, so Boleslaw is suspended for... reasons
Rachel, Pretty Gay: What!
Brexdan McMoran: as long as your arrest rates remain high, YOU determine your BUNCO
Derpbat: It is nice to know that after what I assume they call The Moran Incident they shut down second squadron.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "But......I'm not even a loose cannon!"
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: You're a loose cannon, Boleslaw,; Damnit
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "The mayor isnt even AWARE of your ass!"
Derpbat: Boleslaw, no!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "I mean, I'm not going to quit but I AM going to write a letter to my union rep."
gellaho: He's also lost his pay, been put under pseudo house arrest, and must wait for a mysterious message
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Turn in your badge and pickle
Derpbat: He wasn't even five years from retirement!
gellaho: Because Mack Reynolds has a story to tell, dammit
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "We dont have to keep paying you because UBI."
Rachel, Pretty Gay: What in the holy jumping Zoroaster!
gellaho: AND DON'T YOU ASK HIM TO GIVE YOU ANY INFORMATION
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Look, its the futurepast, Tad. Nobody needs to file paperwork anymore, so I, your superior, know nothing."
Derpbat: I'm pretty sure even in our time period the police can't just do this. Congratulations, Mack, you're inventing a new dystopia every time you laboriously touch type.; The best part of science fiction!
gellaho: Judging by this, Mack had a Private Investigator story lying around. And he figured this was the only way to go
Derpbat: I bet he added this whole section because he needed Boleslaw in his apartment for the next story.; And he had no idea; Oh Jesus fuck I was right.; Funk you, Mack.; Funk. You.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "CHERYL! WHATS A GOOD WAY TO DESCRIBE AN ATTRACTIVE WOMAN? CLEVER LITTLE WHAT?! GREAT THANKS HON!"
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: It's suddenly the mecha futuristic Maltese Falcon.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: I like the implication that the commissioner can just be like "hey that guy is wearing the same shirt as me. Fire him, no pay, don't tell him why. Also, put him on house arrest so I can hit on his girlfriend."
gellaho: Boleslaw now hates gadgets
gellaho: Despite, you know, this
Space Action Flippant Sausage: OOOH look at mister FANCYslaw.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: You looked twice? Is inexplicably switching to second person part of the future dystopia?
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I think I used to have a world of warcraft character with those shoulder pads.
Derpbat: I bet at the end it's revealed that these are all separate iterations of the city and of Boleslaw.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Boneslaw knew this dame was trouble just by the way she occupied his comfort chair.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Is this what it means to be in the dill?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Tad, my grandfather made liquor from old boots and rotting potatoes, and he liked it. But he'd have shanked a man for a box in his house that would dispense whatever booze he wanted whenever he wanted.
gellaho: I don't know, lady, but you saying that is approaching the limit
Derpbat: Your grandfather?
Fatamatician: The Curator: That is a Space balls helmet
Derpbat: I'd shank a man for that.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: I'm a big fan of women with short hair drinking with me in my apartment
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Mercy-meo!
Derpbat: I think I'd shank three men, a woman, and maybe a pony.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: But if one of them says mercy-meo, she has ten seconds to get the fuck out
Derpbat: Also, she's now a cat?
Rachel, Pretty Gay: ten seconds, lyra
Derpbat: I guess?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Shes also real judgy about bottles for some reason.
gellaho: Mack Reynolds continues to misunderstand what "suggestively" means
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Hey, sugar tits. You're a clever little trick, hows about you drink this and we pickle romp?" he said with a look at his watch.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: What are you suggesting, tad botatosalad? Are you passive aggressively implying she should leave?
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "are you... trying to get me to fuck your watch?"
gellaho: Mack, your currency is pseudo-dollars
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Leave or put my watch in your ass" is such a classic noir setup.
Derpbat: She's the president's daughter, and she's here to tell you her brother is being kidnapped by a weird cult in New York, and only you are a bad enough dude to save the president's son and help him ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK
Brexdan McMoran: The most unbelievable thing in this novel is there isn't a police union that will make any situation like this harder than it's worth. There are cops walking around getting OT after shooting unarmed guys.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: stealing it
Derpbat: You know a trope I've never understood?; Jobs where they won't tell you the details until you agree.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Nadine. Nadine Frommer." "Okay and where are you........from.....er."
Derpbat: That's not a thing that happens outside of the military, and it's not really a thing that happens there these days.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: "I can't tell you the job."; "Then how will I know what to do?"
gellaho: Mack forgets a lot, but will never stop saying cum
Derpbat: Because most people would, you know, say 'no'.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Wow, that room has three different uses.
Brexdan McMoran: He looks like the one unfunkable furry at the convention whose fursona is Potato Bug
gellaho: I guess the future guns got lost between chapters
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Geeze what kind of guy needs a .38 with no recoil? What is it, a submachine gun?!
Derpbat: Out of everything I've seen, that revolver caliber is the least realistic.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Continuity is in the dill.
gellaho: Hoverlimo, Mack. Come on!
Derpbat: Just call it a Smith and Wesson.; Or a special. Or anything but that.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Smorth and Wesleyson; Cos its the futurepast.,
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: They're safe as long as they don't piss off Jackie Chan.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Smith and Westron
Brexdan McMoran
Derpbat: Man, I want to see a recoilless 380.
gellaho: Mack, what
gellaho: You know, one of the "rearing-to-the-sky" buildings
Brexdan McMoran: It's pronounced KYOOM, as in "This is my athletic sock-cum-cumrag."
gellaho: You know the ones what sky-rear
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Futurepast architecture is horse based.
Derpbat: Is... Is this building presenting itself in submission to some alpha building?
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: The building reared to the sky as if scraping it.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Everyone lives in buildings like that big ass horse statue in Denver.
Brexdan McMoran: "Which apartment is yours?"
gellaho: Sure, everybody knows the science secretary
Brexdan McMoran: "The eerie glowing eye, just past the forelock."
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Also, he has a farm.
Derpbat: Hey, the USA got a whole cabinet department of scientific research!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Old MacDonald had a lab, eyieeyioh!"
gellaho: Vocotypers
Derpbat: And then abandoned capitalism, which explains why our technology is a schizoid mess.
Rachel, Pretty Gay: Well, technically he's the secretary of creationist science
Derpbat: Good work, Mack, you've done it again.
gellaho: Excuse me, they follow People's Capitalism
Derpbat: Another fine dystopia.
gellaho: An economic system that makes no sense
Rachel, Pretty Gay: look shut up and take my variable basic stock
Derpbat: I keep forgetting that because trying to keep it in mind makes this whistling sound come out of the kettle I keep my Conservativism.
gellaho: This last sentence got me good
Brexdan McMoran: Zoroastrian creation myths should be taught in schools so kids get BOTH sides.
Derpbat: I'm like one more bad economic decision from calling Mack a hippie.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Do you think MacDonald is a weird like Jack Parsons is a weird or like Tesla is a weird?
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: This is also how I refer to my anime tattoo.
gellaho: Thanks for telling me this mop looked like an auto-stylo. Because I know what those look like
gellaho
Derpbat: We should be telling the kids how Ahura Mazda crafted the universe from nothingness by igniting the eternal flame and Ahriman seeks to cast it into the abyss as its existence roused him from his deathless, lifeless slumber.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "A......Mop? Is that what you're really gonna call that? Oookay."
Derpbat: And all of the existence of mankind and life at large is an endless struggle between the truth of life and the falsehood of death.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also MOPS DONT DETECT THINGS, MACK.
Brexdan McMoran: In Ry'leh, Ahriman lies sleeping.
Derpbat: How else will they be prepared for life?
Brexdan McMoran: I need this to be a movie. I love this paleofuture world.
Derpbat: Zoroastrianism has a weird myth cycle even before we get to its main character.
Brexdan McMoran: Hovercars but "HOLD on," said the cop. "Yiz is tellin' me youse can DETECT radio waves??"
Derpbat: I assume Mack doesn't understand the existence of radios.
Brexdan McMoran: Sweep for bugs, mop for bugs...what spins?
gellaho: I hope you were expecting SPECTRE-esque nuke shenanigans
gellaho
Derpbat: I wasn't.; But I'm down for it.
Brexdan McMoran: hahaha this is the Black Hand. This is truly an alternate timeline.
Derpbat: Sure, let's go.
che jakesy, sports revolutionary: EXTORTION INC; Lol; HOME OF THE INSURANCE MONEY
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Extortion INC as opposed to Extortion LLC.
Brexdan McMoran: Heavens, don't let our ally Israel get nukes.
che jakesy, sports revolutionary: Yeah you gotta make your extortion company a C Corp apparently
Space Action Flippant Sausage: OH GOD NOT INDIA AND PAKISTAN!
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Wait all those countries still exist? what happened to the various rarities of Europe?
Brexdan McMoran: and our counterintuitive "ally" against our un-enemy India, Pakistan
Derpbat: An economical way to build a miniature nuke?
gellaho: Even in this book's timeline India had nukes so this list doesn't really make any sense
Brexdan McMoran: South Asia and the middle east are unchanged because they don't have nukes.
Space Action Flippant Sausage
gellaho: I guess the idea is that they are designs for itty-bitty nukes
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I guess the Asian-war wasn't nuclear, at least.
Brexdan McMoran: Putin's boasting about having those.
gellaho: Also, nuclear weapons have been outlawed. Because that's enforceable; Somehow
Derpbat: You know the appropriate thing to do for this threat is to go back to bed.; Because either they can't pull it off, or they won't, or they will even if you pay them.
Brexdan McMoran: I'm having a hard time fitting this into the Steele universe now.
gellaho: Also important to note that Tad Boleslaw has become Sherlock Holmes
Brexdan McMoran: unless this is how it starts.
Derpbat: Right?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Too bad the US has already genetically engineered Ukrainians that can withstand radiation.
gellaho: He's able to psychically deduce how good someone is on a typewriter by reading the type
Derpbat: He's been three different detective archetypes in this short already m; Why not go all in?
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: These people thought the best way to handle this was to hire Tad Boneslaw, drunken future PI
Space Action Flippant Sausage: The "drunken" part is just marketing tho, he's kinda too lame to be an alcoholic.
che jakesy, sports revolutionary: Pretty good for a guy who was named after the first thing the author saw on the KFC menu
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: i'm no printologist, but I'm pretty sure something can't be printed on an old-fashioned platen press and typed on an electric typewriter.
gellaho: "I need your skills, street cop-cum-vice cop. Only you can solve this international mystery"
Derpbat: I can't believe Mack thought combining all these short stories together would make sense as a way to edit them.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Gee, thanks for getting me basically fired without like..........asking first."
Derpbat: Because I am now intensely, deeply aware of his flaws and theirs.
gellaho: Convenient
Brexdan McMoran: Phages, we call 'em
Derpbat: I admire his confidence.
Brexdan McMoran: Screamers, coloquially
Space Action Flippant Sausage: FUCK YOU TAD YOU DID NOT JUST ADMIT TO BEING A PRINTING NERD!
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Haha, his hobby as a kid was printing. I bet he got beat up a lot
Derpbat: This guy let an armed bandit enemy of the state go because his shift was over.; And now he's the greatest detective ever.
gellaho: Tad's turning into a cat now
Space Action Flippant Sausage: God it makes so much sense a kid named Tad who loves fonts and shit grew up to be a cop.
Brexdan McMoran: I hope to God Rex Moran gets called in to help him infiltrate the system.
Derpbat: ... This would be the perfect job for him.; Like, no joke.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Those bombs are kinda........low cost.; Like a normal one today costs like 28 mil.
Brexdan McMoran: "Rex Moran, I may want to take you in more than anything...but goddammit I respect you too much."
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: But they said they weren't building the bombs, just giving the plans to governments.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: I can see why they wanna make the change to the minis.; Thats like twice the nukes.
gellaho: "Jesus, Tad, nobody cares how they duplicated the paper"
gellaho
Derpbat: I mean, the problem is really getting your hands on the fissile materials.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Old-fashioned is really getting a workout as a descriptor
Derpbat: You can do it with enough time and smoke detectors.; But then you need to purify it and it's a whole thing.
gellaho: Tad refuses the call
Derpbat: ... Hahaha; This was their only idea?; Jesus they suck.
che jakesy, sports revolutionary: They'll have to call in their second option, fire chief Hal TashedPotatoes
Derpbat: He came up with a government in 2000 that was worse than our actual governments in 2000.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: What do you expect from the dystopian Zoroastrian Peoples Capitalist government tho?
gellaho: Time to get blitzed
che jakesy, sports revolutionary: Now that's a real guzzle, said the real human person who gets invited to parties
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Oh mack, this is wayyyy too late in the book for this Heroes Journey shit.; You do Refusing the Call at the beginning.
gellaho: An erect Mack has impregnated his carpet
Derpbat: Holy jumping Zoroaster.
che jakesy, sports revolutionary: Hahahaha this is so shitty
Derpbat: Someone was watching Batman!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: That carpet gonna give birth to a bottle of slivovitz.
gellaho: "Dear EXTORTION, INC.; I have already done so. Dipshits"
FancyShark in a White Suit: It's a fiendish game of mental chess
Brexdan McMoran: MacDonald knows the manager
Derpbat: Man, everyone involved in this on every level is the dumbest possible iteration of themselves.; We've found the basal universe.
FancyShark in a White Suit: What have I missed?
Brexdan McMoran: When you try to double down but don't realize the dealer folded.
Derpbat: Nothing, and yet somehow even less than that?
Brexdan McMoran: I don't care if I mixed my card games up.
gellaho: Detective roofies
Derpbat: Boleslaw had like five different personality changes.; Then he became every PI in literary history at once.
gellaho: Tad Boleslaw is Sherlock Holmes investigating nuclear extortion
Derpbat: And then he decided not to save the world.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I'd try summarizing but the best I can do is 🤷‍♂️
Derpbat: And now he's not allowed to get drunk.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: He's too much of a pussy to drink it all anyway.
Brexdan McMoran: An entire society calling hard liquor guzzle feels like world-building for a more dystopian future than this one.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Someone needs to tell Tad the best way to deal with a trap is to spring it.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Wow. So the writer's just throwing every idea on the page
Space Action Flippant Sausage: So chug that drugged booze.
gellaho: Aw, Man. You're going to put impregnate in there and not use "cum" this time?
gellaho: He's attempting to combine like 4 short stories he had
Space Action Flippant Sausage: And badly.
gellaho: The Rex Moran one seemed like the longest and now he's just trying to reach 180 pages
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Like that shit with Rosy just never did anything.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Later, his shirt gave birth to a healthy, three pound flask
FancyShark in a White Suit: That tracks
Derpbat: The evidence would suggest that by the time he'd reached this one he'd run out of ideas.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I'm trying to keep up with all the contradictions he's introducing into his world building but I can't type that fast.
FancyShark in a White Suit: The best part of him screwing up tying these stories together is that he supposedly improved on them from their original publications
gellaho: "My only idea was calling a street cop"
Space Action Flippant Sausage: He jizzed so hard when he finished Rex Moran he just plum forgot he could do any real writing.
FancyShark in a White Suit: To be fair, didn't we all?; Don't answer that
Derpbat: The most important thing you need to know is the bad guys invented 10 million dollar nuclear bombs and are threatening to give them to a list of countries, some of which already had nuclear bombs when he wrote this story.; And in exchange, they only want ten million dollars.; Which any sensible government would look at, and then just throw the paper in the bin.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Seems reasonable in the year 2000
gellaho: Tad begins jumping to conclusions
Derpbat: But these guys went and hired a street cop.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Wait.........Tad are you still woozy from the roofies?
Derpbat: @FancyShark in a White Suit A street cop whose firing they arranged specifically so they could hire him for a job he is not qualified for and has no training in how to perform.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Sure, cops are allowed to do crime solving on the side. That's legal
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Cos none of that shit made sense.
Brexdan McMoran: I'm particularly fond of not being able to find a reason to sideline Boleslaw even though he was revising them.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: The dame is always in on it in this kind of story, that's how Tad knew.
gellaho: Tad decides this is the work of one person... because
Brexdan McMoran: Rex Moran, Superthief, I treasure you. I know you're watching out for us all, you red-hat.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Nadine thinks that if you sign something in the name of a committee then you cant be lying.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: bad-os is the worst linux distribution
Derpbat: Rex Moran is busy fucking his way through Europe.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I suspect Boleslaw is the thread that ties these together
Derpbat: You'd think so, but I'm pretty sure Mack just changed people's names.; Because one iteration of Boleslaw has nothing in common with the next.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also it doesnt take a criminal genius to set up a typewriter, Tad.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Which means Mack thought this up at a barbeque
Derpbat: I have never used a typewriter and I'm pretty sure I could set one up in three or fewer tries.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: I'm relatively sure my aged mother could manage it and she can't use Microsoft Office.
Derpbat: And having done so once, I think that would probably mean I could set up every typewriter that has ever existed.
gellaho: Only two people had access to these plans, sure
Brexdan McMoran: We had a typewriter until like...1991, what is Mack on that they've vanished?; My mom tried to give it to me two weeks ago. I would have taken it if I had anywhere in a Manhattan apt to put it.
gellaho: Considering they were xeroxing things five years prior, seems like almost anyone could
Derpbat: We're still xeroxing now.
FancyShark in a White Suit: We changed dollars to pseudo-dollars and updated the idioms accordingly
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Shit Tad got drunk and figured out it was Nadine?!
Derpbat: All that's changed is we don't call it xeroxing.
Brexdan McMoran: fun fact: my great grandpa invented the magic margin; That's the "ding!" and automatic return at the end of the typewriter.; I have Royal blood.
gellaho: Ooh, fancy boy
Derpbat: Praise him with great praise!
Brexdan McMoran: Royal Typewriter blood, anyway.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Yes?
Derpbat: ...wait.
gellaho: Can't stand the horselaugh
Derpbat: He's calling it Xeroxing
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: That's dope as fuck dude! I loved my old typewriter.
Derpbat: Is there a copyright notice at the front of the book?; Because I'm pretty sure you needed that even in the distant world of 197X.
Brexdan McMoran: I'm gonna get one eventually. I think mechanical keyboards are just my happy medium.
Derpbat: My understanding is the primary problem with typewriters is the ink.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Switzerland: not part of the established Common Europe
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Jesus........Tad solved this by accusing one of the three people he's met in person since it came up, he's read the script.
Derpbat: I'm thinking of buying one of those e-ink computers.; Just for writing.; But the keyboards always suck.
gellaho: And that's the end of that story
FancyShark in a White Suit: I had a teacher that suffered head trauma and fucked up some part of the brain that helped govern speech and writing ability. He'd come up with weird words like Mack
gellaho: Did she get caught?; Who knows
Derpbat: Well, that was a pointless interlude.; Well done, Mack.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Congrats on filling up...some pages
gellaho: Fuck you, next chapter. Status Quo
Derpbat: I'd say we knew you had it in you. But we didn't, and you don't.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Hand operated printing press in the YEAR 2000!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: In my headcanon Tad does a sweet flying kick that catches Nadine at the base of her spine and she spends six years learning to walk again and sues the police.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I assume the shares are a dollar a piece
Derpbat: What's funny to me is that Mack is obviously a huge fan of the police, and yet took no time to learn anything about them.
gellaho: "You know, the racist vigilante? Weirdly small time considering what you just did, but them's the breaks"
Brexdan McMoran: Get yourself an Alphasmart. eink uses more power with more changes. LCD is lowest power option. I've been running my Alphasmart 3000 off the same batteries for years. However, the keyboard DOES suck, so either get the Neo2 or pay me to upgrade the 3K to mechanical.
Derpbat: Investigating financial crimes has been a specialized department for... forever?; Like, literally?; Since the dawn of human history?
FancyShark in a White Suit: At least since money
Derpbat: One of the most famous stories of scientific progress in our civilization is based around that fact?
Brexdan McMoran: The secretary is the butler of the bureacracy.
Derpbat: I didn't even think of the alphasmart.
gellaho: The secretary of the Secretary
Space Action Flippant Sausage: You know, this Buddy guy..........he might be dangerous, having killed like six guys or so in the last couple months.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Oh good, Buddy Brothers is back. I could tell Mack was itching to use some more slurs.
Brexdan McMoran: Tad Boleslaw dialed up the Buzzfeed. A few simple questions rapidly told him which Friend he was.
FancyShark in a White Suit: It's not like he stole a credit card
Derpbat: But they were muggers and also not white people.; So who cares?; Not the police department!
Brexdan McMoran: It's the whole reason we have writing!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Cops only care about property crime anyway.
Brexdan McMoran: Goddammit
gellaho: This is the Tad that just figured out a nuclear extortion from a sheet of paper
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Tad is such a cop.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Tad puts in as much work as they're willing to pay for
Derpbat: Like, even in the most racist backwater in the most racist part of the south, even in the 1970s, if a single person was running around killing minorities so often that it became a meme, I'm pretty sure the police would stop it.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Eventually
Brexdan McMoran: Bernie Goetz, Buddy Brothers.
gellaho: The old depilatory
Derpbat: Not like 100% sure. But pretty sure. I
Brexdan McMoran: Oh buddy, no.
Derpbat: Yeah. like, eventually they'd get around to it.
Derpbat: No?
gellaho: I am vetoing this conversation
Derpbat: Oh well.
FancyShark in a White Suit: When there were no victims left
Derpbat: Do... police departments have a dress uniform?; I didn't know that.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Yessir, the ol' rumpler
Space Action Flippant Sausage: My brother used a depliatory cream on his face once and swelled up like a toad.; It was funny as shit.
Brexdan McMoran: Look up sundown towns, and there I lay my conversation down.
Derpbat: Depilatory creams are a terrible idea.
gellaho: Colonel got that tight mouth
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Whhhhhhhhaaaaat? Harsh chemicals that remove hair are BAD?!
FancyShark in a White Suit: oh wait, I was reading "dilapidated cream"
Brexdan McMoran: Probably doesn't even moisten his lips when he makes love to his wife, grim bastard.
Derpbat: General Pershing! That's the topical reference all the kids loved in 1979.
Brexdan McMoran: "Col. Character I made up resemebled Real-Life General." That's the stuff.
gellaho: Wow, indeed
Brexdan McMoran: Sci-fi really gives these parties it's best gems.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Pershing sounds cooler than Smedley Butler but is absolutely not cooler than ol Smedley.
Brexdan McMoran: The military refuses to release info on the guy who was of no value to them.; If the people found out a sociopath were ever allowed to attain officer rank, they would yawn in horror.
gellaho: "Okay, the Pentagon is too old fashioned, I gotta future it up. We're talking about the year 2000!"
FancyShark in a White Suit: Do they have to meet-cute the non-com?
Derpbat: Pershing outranks every military officer in the history of the United States, past present or future, except George Washington.
gellaho: Thanks, professor
Derpbat: This is probably the only interesting Pershing fact.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Boy that says "We are operating a clandestine death squad and don't want you to know, copper."
FancyShark in a White Suit: More sides equals more military!
Derpbat: I guarantee it will be less interesting than that.; I am 100% certain.
Brexdan McMoran: This is my favorite thing today.; I have done this.; Just add one side and call it sci-fi; But he went up THREE
gellaho: Ultra-mation
Brexdan McMoran: in two decades!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Icosahedron is the most sci fi shape tho.
Derpbat: That's how you know he's serious about his science fiction, yeah.
Brexdan McMoran: I love how he got technology so wrong while getting technology's effects so right.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Mack gave a little kid a thesaurus and let them pick the future words
Space Action Flippant Sausage: P..plus ultra?!
Brexdan McMoran: Ne plus ultra.
gellaho: While the Hardys snack, Tadeusz Boleslaw gets hammered
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: For when we surpass exclamations.
Derpbat: We know, Mack.; You hate Russian Vodka.; We went over this at the very beginning of this novel.; For what felt like at the time more than long enough to establish this fact of your character.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: vodka with herbs in it is just gin.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also bison and buffalo are DIFFERENT ANIMALS!; FUCK YOU MACK!
Brexdan McMoran: ...TIL
gellaho: Volkshover
Derpbat: So, did we ever sort out what happened to all the grapes that were banned from being used for things we've used grapes for since the year -10000?
FancyShark in a White Suit: For shoving volks around
Derpbat: Because that's literally the only fact from his wordbuilding I want to know more about.
gellaho: That was 3 stories ago
Derpbat: Ah, right, he's forgotten.
FancyShark in a White Suit: And at least five Tads
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "See, the Volkswagen carrys people, the Volkshover is more like a bulldozer but for one person."
Derpbat: Carry on.
Derpbat: Okay, so I would buy one of those.; Mack, you've done it again! Entirely by accident you
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: no idea but there is no shortage of the stuff we've used grapes for since the year -10000.
gellaho: Mack is back to calling people fat and/or ugly. So there's continuity
Derpbat: oh, fuck, it's just a Volkswagen that hovers, isn't it.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Ahh, now I feel grounded
Derpbat: That realization depressed me more than it should.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "She had this placid, fat look, like some kind of bovine."
FancyShark in a White Suit: I hope all of these descriptions are being narrated out loud by Tad wherever he goes
gellaho: "I drink right before getting in my uniform"
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Just call the poor woman a cow like you know you wanna, Mack.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Tad then hit PLAY on the boombox
Derpbat: I'll say this for Mack. A lot of sci fi authors back in the day thought women who weren't beautiful were less than human.; But he has the guts to say it.
gellaho: Just the wrinkliest 50 year old you ever did see
gellaho
FancyShark in a White Suit: He was more raisin than man
Derpbat: Mack met someone who did farmwork or manual labor once.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Oh shit there was the Asian-war and now an Asian War!
Derpbat: And that forever scarred his soul.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: TWO wars! TWO Asian!
Derpbat: You'd think after the first one we'd have learned better.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Asian War 2: Sorry, We Forgot Some Stuff!
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Probably was some land mass we hadnt mostly covered in UXO yet.
Derpbat: Also, he was writing this in the late 70s, and it's set in the year 2000, so I guess he thought we had a really busy twenty or so years.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also Mack..........you can just say Vietnam.; We know what you mean.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I think we should be happy Mack knows Vietnam is an Asian country
gellaho: If you hadn't guessed already, Buddy Brothers did a massacre in the war
FancyShark in a White Suit: well, impressed
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: I promised myself I wouldn't make any more Princess Bride references when the Asian-War came up again.
Brexdan McMoran: Everything's automated now, people are unnecessary, housewives are busy. (and thicc)
FancyShark in a White Suit: Yep, genocide sure is a feisty activity
gellaho: "It's called an allegory"
Derpbat: Oh, Mack.
gellaho: "Asia is a metaphor for Vietnam. That's how it works, right?"
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Ohhhh we were regular hooligans back in Soc Trang, when we burned down that school house full of women and children."
Derpbat: You are entirely unprepared for the story you want to tell.
FancyShark in a White Suit: No, Mack. That's how zooming out on a map works.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Also Tad can't fucking believe his ears.
gellaho: "It somehow didn't affect me, but I am a sociopath"
FancyShark in a White Suit: "Nah, I'm sure the murders he's done since he got home are more casual."
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "I'm pretty sure he's just racist, I mean, he ain't popped that many Vietnamese since he came back."
gellaho: Hey, Reynolds, I would buy the sickness if you attempted to put that in the dialog. At all
Derpbat: "I'd thank her myself, but she's bovine."
FancyShark in a White Suit: Cardin wept deep into the night, cursing Tad's name and staring at the dusty picture on his mantle.
gellaho: "Cheers, Norm. Also, fuck you for suspending me for no reason"
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "I'll give her a good beating for you..........Oh shit you're a cop and I shouldnt have said that."
FancyShark in a White Suit: Norm is somehow the narc of the police
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Norm sucks even for a cop.
gellaho: Wait, what?
Derpbat: I like how what?
gellaho: The fuck happened
FancyShark in a White Suit: bwaaaaa?
Derpbat: ...what?; I think there was another war.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Or we're in Soylent Green territory
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Huh?!; What the fuck kind of Logans Run shit is this?!
Derpbat: @Brexdan McMoran We found the most dystopic thing possible!; It is literally all uphill from here!
Brexdan McMoran: We are solidly in terra alterna
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: We're 90% of the way through the book and we're just mentioning this now?
Brexdan McMoran: Now it's Logan's running!; Which is actually GREAT for the world.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Man Mack, Logans Run is NOT part of the Heroes Journey, you have this just so fucked up.
gellaho: "Left the daughter with him though. Weird."
Derpbat: I sincerely hope he just confused median with mean.; And this will never come up again.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Now hang on. It's been a couple weeks since Tad was suspended. A lot can happen in that time. Like the median age of a nation dropping to 25
Derpbat: "What's a matter, Tad? Don't you remember the GREAT SICKNESS?"
gellaho: Or him leaving the force again
FancyShark in a White Suit: "I spoke Polish to him and he tightened up. Dude was a total freak."
Brexdan McMoran: In 2000, kids, it was actually still socially unacceptable to be a Nazi.
Derpbat: "Blacks, Latin Americans, and Italians."
Brexdan McMoran: Italians the MOST latin americans
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Hey, Tad. Make sure you DONT keep your service weapon while the gunman is possibly stalking you."
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Turn in your gun, but please accept this discount code for a gun on Pneumatic Amazon
Brexdan McMoran: Tad requesting a leave of absence, he totally could have put the nuke extortion adventure DURING this one.
gellaho: Uh oh
FancyShark in a White Suit: Black Like Tad
Derpbat: "Turn in your gun and order a better gun on the pneumatic tubes that power our civilization, which I think our author has forgotten about again."
Space Action Flippant Sausage: haahahahaaha he's gonna fuckin hang out and provoke this guy into shooting him, rad.; Mack understands cops after all.
gellaho: And now, psychic
Derpbat: Tad being psychic is the most plausible personality change so far.
Brexdan McMoran: #CANCELED
FancyShark in a White Suit: I knew Mack would try to wedge football in somehow
gellaho: Turns out Tad's ethnic disguise was pointless as he just stumbles upon the situation
Brexdan McMoran: "Did you watch the kicksandpassball game last night?" asked Jimmy. "It sure did funking SPROK!"
Derpbat: I'm pretty sure if you're going to call someone that, you can just drop an f bomb, Mack.
FancyShark in a White Suit: "He seems okay to me, Godfather"
gellaho: I know you know that's not the phrase, Reynolds
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: Wow I was only gone for a minute and suddenly Tad has ESP? Shit.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Nah the G bomb was basically friendly in 70's America.
Derpbat: 'nailhead'.; Funk you, Mack.
Brexdan McMoran: way to make it awkward, boneslaw
Derpbat: Turn in your SFWA card.; Then, turn in your typewriter.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Okay, I'm really starting to think Mack suffered head trauma
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Either that or this part is him exorcising some demons from Vietnam.
gellaho: "I mean, you were born in 1950, Brothers, so you have to be familiar with this story. But let's pretend"
Derpbat: He didn't serve.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: And that could have been where he got those demons.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Sounds like an interesting story, Mack. You could learn something about plot structure from it.
Derpbat: Apparently he spent most of the fifties in... wow, over a dozen places.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Meatloaves
Derpbat: And then spent most of the 60s in Mexico.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Los Meatloaves
gellaho: Case Closed
FancyShark in a White Suit: Still took the time to throw shade at a character's appearance
Derpbat: As near as his biographical sketch here says, he basically never set foot in the US from 1950 to the day he died.
gellaho: Focus; Really makes you think
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Tad just really doesnt do shit, it would have been a character something if Tad had shot that guy.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Untraceable guns? You idiots had Rex Moran fuck with the system and never mentioned there were untraceable guns?!
Manyxe, Snow Wizard: ...what effect is a moustache supposed to produce?
Derpbat: A moustache is its own effect.
gellaho: The End
Derpbat: It justifies itself.
gellaho: I guess
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "You know.........I think wars might be bad, Tad."
gellaho: Guy gets hit by a car, what more could you ask for?
Derpbat: I mean, I could probably come up with a few things.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Great police work, Tad
Derpbat: But I imagine Tilly's going to go "Wait, you didn't shoot him?"; "Nah, he got hit by a car as he was going to kill a guy."
gellaho: Oh, shit. I might need this
Derpbat: "...that is incredibly unsatisfying."
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "The fuck, pig, shooting guys is like your whole deal?!"
FancyShark in a White Suit: Wait, that was THE End?!; hahahahahaha
Space Action Flippant Sausage: "Little fuzzy" sounds like a disturbing way to refer to Squatch dong.
Derpbat: The Fuzzy books are apparently key parts of the sci fi canon.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: So does H. Beam Piper
Derpbat: Which I refuse to believe or take any steps to verify because every time I've been told this I've also had to look at their covers.; https://www.fantasticfiction.com/p/h-beam-piper/little-fuzzy.htm; Where they get worse as editions are printed.
gellaho: We have defeated Police Patrol: 2000 A.D.
FancyShark in a White Suit: What a bizarre narrative
Derpbat: Also, Zoroaster comes back!
FancyShark in a White Suit: Thank you, @gellaho !
Derpbat: WOOO!
FancyShark in a White Suit: Mostly for Rex Moran!
Derpbat: The chartered Zarathustra Company had it all their way. Their charter was for a Class III uninhabited planet, which Zarathustra was, and it meant they owned the planet lock stock and barrel. They exploited it, developed it and reaped the huge profits from it without interference from the Colonial Government. Then Jack Holloway, a sunstone prospector, appeared on the scene with his family of Fuzzies and the passionate conviction that they were not cute animals but little people.; Read preview >; The... the fuck?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Nope.
Derpbat: Was there some trend in the 1970s about Zoroastrianism?; The fuck?
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Narrative(s)?
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Rex Moran made it kinda worth it.
Derpbat: Apparently someone released an edition of Little Fuzzy with this as the cover.
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Gonna add "Rex Moran" to the list of names for RPG characters.
Derpbat: But usually they look like this.
Shark Puke Fetishist GDC: Also add Little Fuzzy.
Derpbat: But the cover I keep thinking of when someone mentions the goddamned book is the one they used for over a decade.
LyraV Galavador Dali Lama: I'm thinking I'll craft him into a Sim who's also a dashing criminal mastermind.
FancyShark in a White Suit: I hope he had to go around to different publishers, just so he had to say "no one will look at my little fuzzy"
Derpbat: An improvement, because the cover H Beam Piper himself apparently chose
Derpbat: Because I guess he was high?; Very, very, very, very high?
Brexdan McMoran: Or has it conquered our HEARTS?
Derpbat: No. We survived.
gellaho: The Worf book is longer than I remembered, so probably can't do that
Derpbat: Gellaho's right.; We won.
Brexdan McMoran: Ewok vs. Lobster: The Novelization of the Feature Film
Derpbat: Rex Moran could have saved us at any time, but he knew.
gellaho: That concludes Episode 65 of The Book Cage
Derpbat: WooO! We survived!
FancyShark in a White Suit: We did it!
Brexdan McMoran: What a weird capstone
Derpbat: ...oh, holy shit, I may need to actually buy these.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Great work, everyone!
Brexdan McMoran: Rex Moran saw us throiugh like he promised he would.
Derpbat: ...right up until Palin turned up.; Which is, again, not a sentence I saw coming today./; Congrats, Gellaho! It's too early to nominate you for more appreciation day, but we always appreciate it.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Yes. Thank you, always and again, @gellaho
Space Action Flippant Sausage: Much appreciated @gellaho
Derpbat: The actual creator does.; Somehow.
Brexdan McMoran: There's a Harvey Kurtzman estate printing comics?
Derpbat: There's a literary agent representing them.
FancyShark in a White Suit: Have a good night, everyone!
Brexdan McMoran: Well done, bookworms.
Brexdan McMoran: Thanks as always, Gellaho.