For a while, every time I've gone into either Target or Walgreens, the damn shoplifting-sensor things beep (and on the way out as well, natch). While that might have been an amusingly easy way to shoplift were I so inclined, as the clerks just invariably pass me through, if they even notice, it was also just plain annoying. I tried not going in with my cell phone, or keys, or whatever - still beeped. So last night the clerk asked me a seemingly random question - "Do you have any sort of chip on you?" I blinked, as I didn't have my cell phone on me, or anything really.

But while I'm getting lunch today, I look in an my wallet on a whim, and find...well, a chip. A one inch square adhesive pink and metallic chip thingie. I have no recollection of that going into my wallet, nor clue as to what it is. Besides being freaked out a little, I'm kind of curious to see whether I beep again next time I peruse one of those stores of convenience. Also to look up those guys from X-Files, I forget what they were called, the ones that helped Mulder all the time.

You know, I never understood nor liked the idea of all those hidden dimensions in string theory, anyway. As much as I liked the violin string vibrating to create a note being analagous to a string vibrating to create matter, that was kind of poetic.

Stanslov Petrov was a quiet kind of hero a little over twenty years ago