Showing posts with label Wasting time. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wasting time. Show all posts

Monday, August 22, 2011

Scene

This works best if you read it as Fry and Laurie. Fry obviously being Howard.

Howard: Morning, Basil.
Basil: Morning, Howard. How are you this fine day?
H: Oh, resplendent.
B: Really? May I inquire as to why you're in such a chipper mood?
H: Certainly. I'm having an existential crisis, you see.
B: Oh, you lucky dog.
H: I know, I know. It's a good one too.
B: Gotten any cards yet?
H: And chocolates and flowers.
B: How delightfull. I'm afraid I haven't had an existential crisis since that near-death experience five years ago.
H: Ah, but that was a two-for-one. You have to value quality alongside quantity.
B: I know. Still, five years of the same outlook on life and existence. It gets a bit tedious, you know.
H: Well, have you tried having an existential crisis about the fact that you're not having any existential crises?
B: I did, but it resolved itself instantly.
H: Oh. Yes, I suppose it would.
B: But never mind that. What is your most recent introspective calamity about?
H: Well, it's to do with the multiverse, you see.
B: Oh, I don't go for that sort of thing.
H: I know you don't. Hence the contextual preface before the explanation.
B: Much appreciated. I'll get you one of those multiverse specific cards that says something witty like:"Get well next universe." Anyway, carry on.
H: Well, I've found myself wondering whether or not my other selves are still alive. In itself not particularly important, but then the following occurred to me: if we assume that all things must happen at all times, does that not mean my continued survival necessitated the death of myself many times over? Have I not, merely by existing, doomed myself millions of times without sparing so much as a thought for the poor sods who have reached their end before mine?
B: Blimey. That's a good one.
H: It is, isn't it?
B: I mean, what do you do about it? There's no direct reason to feel guilty.
H: Precisely. And yet, the seed of guilt is there.
B: Very true. But what if you kill yourself to atone?
H: Ah, but then another me will not have killed himself and all I'll be doing is adding to his burden through my death. And yet if I don't, then I know he did and I carry that burden.
B: All the worse because you're aware of it.
H: Precisely.