aceindia

Lost some friends, but kept the memories

2004-09-26T06:16:00Z

Country roads, take me home
To the place where I belong

Knock on wood

2004-07-20T20:35:58Z

YAAAAAATTAAAAAAAA

Trouble, get behind me, trouble, let me be

2004-07-17T04:48:01Z

Head manager guy and I were talking today. I've been asking him to call the other stores, try to find out if there's one that will take me. The manager of my first choice store has been gone for a while, unfortunately. I'm a little worried about them not having a position for me, not having any position at all. I'm lucky though, my manager really wants to see me do well in the future, and he's a smooth talker, so I'm confident that if anyone can help me get a job, it's him.

He's been picking on me a little bit though, he says he doesn't want me to go. Just funny little things; "Oh, I talked to them, but they have about twelve specialists lined up, so, no job for you, ha!" and such. The other manager was around, she's always sticking up for me when he jokes, and that's nice.. she said "You better be nice, or he'll never talk to you again", and I threatened "Yeah, when I get back, I'll send Ghiradelli chocolate to everyone but you!" and we all got a laugh out of that.

The head manager though, he paid me just about one of the nicest compliments I've ever heard. We were talking about who would replace me, what I planned on training them to do, etc, and he said he didn't like it. I told him I'm sure my replacement would do a fine job, and he told me... he said it was nice having me there, because it meant he never had to worry about the section of the store I headed. He told me he wouldn't be able to do that with the person who would probably take over when I leave. That sort of thing really leaves an impact.

I guess... I'm surprised at how many people have been looking out for me, helping me along, prodding me... I'm really surprised there are people like that. Even someone so totally undeserving can find selfless people who are willing to do such things.

It's hard to say it, I hate to say it

2004-05-14T03:53:13Z

But it's probably me.

Every dog has his day. Unfortunately I am not a dog. Maybe mine will come anyway, but I won't get my hopes up.

Work started out well today. Then turned sour. A little backstory..

A week ago, our district manager went to visit the other store in town. He discovered (through which means we know not) that the general manager and the operations manager had been aware of an animal being frozen as a way of destroying it. They were both promptly fired on the spot. Amid some chaos, my general manager went to the other store and our merchandising manager took reigns of our store. Now we shall turn back to the main.

Today, to our surprise, the regional coordinator came by for a surprise visit. Turns out, because of the actions of the other store, the stores in this state have been deemed a "hot zone." Which is to say, there will be many, many visits by higher ups.

At any rate, I had two days off. This Tuesday and Wednesday. So of course my department was a mess. It always is after my days off. I have come to accept this. The staff in the department generally fail me in a number of ways. I pick up after them, write notes pointing out specific actions that are not acceptable, etc.. and life goes on.

Today however. Today. Today, I was caught completely unaware as the coordinator came by. Early. Came by early. Early enough that I hadn't time to pick up after the others as I normally do. This was no good. Because of my department, we received the lowest score we ever have.

I know other people didn't keep it clean. I know other people left messes, and didn't do what I've asked them to, time and time again. Again I've gotten in trouble because of it, and all I can say is that it's my fault. It's always my fault. As the head of the department, as the one in charge of the people, as the one who has to make sure that everything is going as it should, it is my fault.

I haven't coerced, threatened and dragged them kicking and screaming into doing the duties they really need to. They never understand that by not doing their work, they make more work for me, and in turn makes more work for them. I've been shouldering their work and mine, and it's really about time to stop. From now on I won't be the understanding head. I'm not here to make friends, I'm here to make things run smoothly. And so I shall.

If the desk isn't kept clean, I will punish. The logs aren't signed off on, I will punish. They will begin to look at me as the ogre I am. I will no longer sympathize with "It got busy, I didn't have time" or "I'll get to it if I have a chance." It's do or suffer. Yes, I think that will work best.

~~~~~~~~

I've heard differeng opinions of where one should stand when they step off the mortal coil. The one with the most toys, the most money, the most wives, etc. A dignified death. A humorous one. One with meaning. I remember hearing varied opinions on suicide. For some reason it always makes me think of the sled in Ethan Frome. Is it a brave act? Is it escapism? Who knows.

Maybe the best way to die is the quiet way. No words need be said if you lived correctly. If I you lived correctly, everyone should know, shouldn't they? You don't need to mention happy memories, regrets, you shouldn't have to apologize or thank. Everything should be known, I think. If I go by what I believe, I don't know if I've lived the right way up to this point. If I died now, would there be anything to say? Or would they know? Maybe I need to change a lot of things.

Las pasturas verdes del cielo

2004-02-19T23:36:45Z

I went on a little excursion to the open space behind the house the other day, and my camera happened to be along with me. So, I decided to make the best of it and take some pictures of my trip. I know Tanuki has professed an affection for sights of the Southwest variety, and maybe some other people might like them, so here they are.

This was the outset of my trip. I'm pretty sure it's the parking lot of the open space, as there is a bumper of a car in the lower right hand corner of the picture. There was a neat bridge hereabouts as well, but I forgot to take a picture of it.

There were quite a few of these cacti (cactusses?) mulling about, but this was the only real group of them I found. They looked to be having a get together, or possibly a party of some sort. I imagined them all doing different things, but I think my favorites are the two in the far left, I imagined them playing baseball.

There were a few little trails you could take up to wherever they were supposed to go. I took the left path, and found myself here after a brisk walk. There was a very clean path with interesting plants and such, and I decided to take a picture to see how far I had gone, and because it seemed a nice view. I had intended to walk up the hill on my way back, but it was getting late when I began my descent, and I decided against it.

I really liked the way this looked when I saw it. The path disappears off to the left, but I couldn't see it from where I was, and it made the whole experience seem a bit mysterious and inviting. Where does it go? What will I find?

Having lost the path about ten minutes before, I pressed forward towards this interesting collection of rocks. They were quite passable, as there were numerous footholds. Before I started up, it seemed as though it was a waterfall of rocks, little ones and big ones all flowing downwards. The big rocks at the top of the "waterfall" proved to be a bit difficult, however, and I had to try to find an alternate route around them.

After getting past the rockfall, the area flattened out a little bit, and I noticed another hill to my left. I entertained ideas of going up that face, but these pictures belie proportion, and the bush was rather large and a bit too daunting to get around.

This picture was taken at roughly the same area as the previous one, looking behind instead of to my left. It's very hard to see in the picture, but Mt. McKinley is waaaaaay far out into the horizon here, and was capped with snow. There were some larger rocks here, and it seemed a good chance to take a break. It was a bit windy as I got higher up, and I found that basking on one of the larger rocks was rather enjoyable.

When I worked myself further up and turned a corner, I noticed this steep hill off to my right. It was definitely too steep to be climbed, as far as I was concerned. It did look rather nice though, and I noticed that there was still some snow lingering about. I noticed some ice and snow in other parts, and it seemed odd to me, snow having last fallen about a week and a half ago, or so.

I think this is my favorite picture of the trip. I took another break on a large rock shelf, and noticed that interesting rock formation off to my side. After thinking at it for a little while, it began to look like another person had stopped to enjoy the view, and stayed so long they turned into rock. Shortly after deciding this, I began my descent.

It was definitely an enjoyable experience, and I fully intend to do it again sometime, when the weather is again agreeable.

And stick some green chile on it while you're at it

2004-01-19T04:19:16Z

Every time someone brings up Nemo and clownfish and how much we sell I can't help but be reminded of that used car salesman in The Grapes Of Wrath. I keep saying "I could sell a million clownfish. All I need is clownfish, I can sell 'em as quick as you can bring 'em in." And I keep getting this mental image of me being in a dusty petstore by route 66 selling clownfish to desperate passers-by.

I never took the time to muse on it until lately, but I have to (or think I have to) destroy quite a few animals on any given day. It's not something I'm particularly happy with. Just the other day we got our regular feeder fish shipment in, and one of our bags of small comet goldfish with approximately 1,000 fish in it came in about two-thirds dead. I asked the boss to get the finquel out of the safe (Ever since some moron threatened to put it in someone's drink, they stick it in there), put the goldfish into a bucket, took it to the back, and put the finquel in.

Finquel, all things considered, is be a better way to go than many other people give their fish. It's an anesthetic, and if too much is given, the fish will just gently go to sleep.

The thing that gets me is how casually I do this nowadays. My rationale being that if the fish are terribly stressed and infection has set in, they're a risk to the system of connected tanks that they might go into. So, by putting 200 someodd fish to sleep, 1000+ will be saved. Supposedly. It's one of those things that I'll never be sure about. They could possibly be all right, I could fish the live ones out, and they'll be fine. But I don't know.

I know I'm expected to do everything I can to make sure the animals are well taken care of. I like to think I do it well, we have yet to have some major meltdown that I was an instrument of. It's usually the vendor's fault, or FedEx's fault, or someone else's fault. Poor shipping conditions will take its toll on fish, they'll stress badly, and illness will set in. The vendor wasn't paying attention, underfed the fish too long, packed them improperly, etc, and they'll come in and I can't put them in our tanks. I can't let them in the tanks with hundreds and hundreds of other fish, if they might infect them in any way.

A customer buys a bunch of fish without thinking, and I'll tell them the mixture, or the amount, or something or other would be detrimental to the fish, that it might kill them, and they reply to me that "It's ok, they're just 99 cent fish." It bothers me so much that an animals life is so worthless to them, but I'm killing hundreds of them. I can tell myself that I'm doing it for the greater good, and I have more to think about than one bag of fish. I have to convince myself a little bit that what I do I do because I have to, and what they do, they do out of ignorance and a willing lack of empathy. I feel bad when I euthanize fish. I don't really want to do it.

I keep coming back to the question of whether or not I have to do it, and whether or not I'm cold hearted. I do think I have to do it, but I don't like it.

Junk Land de

2004-01-11T03:32:00Z

Just because I caaaan

Hey, you got hyper detailed car in my robot!

Hey, you got super articulated robot in my car!

Heeeeeeey...

Two great tastes that go together?

A little post Christmas update at the slight prodding of someone dear to me

2004-01-09T04:48:07Z

And a happy new year, I suppose ^_^; I've been a little busy with work and such (one more raise, woo hoo!). I had a decent enough Christmas, family was passable, extended family was questionable. But to question them would most likely bring about an answer I really wouldn't want to hear.

I got some nice gifts, couple DVDs I had been after and um.. couple other things that I don't recall too well. Got a couple very special gifts, one of them being something to keep me nice and warm and stylish. Did get a hefty sum of money and some gift certificates to book stores, which I promptly put to work a couple days after Christmas.

I used every cent of two gift certificates to buy a bunch of books. As a side rant, when did literature become so prohibitively expensive? Fourteen dollars for Of Mice and Men? I already have it, but I have an older copy by what I assume is a different publisher. It was only five or so dollars when I bought it. A new jacket and different bindings do not a ten dollar increase make. If I were to have picked up the first copy of the books I got, I would have easily spent 60 or so dollars over what I had in gift cards. The only way to get reasonably priced books is to (at least at Barnes and Noble) rift through their "Barnes and Noble" classics, which are easily twelve dollars cheaper on the whole.

But regardless of that, I did manage to come away with a decent haul of books I had been interested in, and had been meaning to get for some time. Mostly by authors I had read before, but had been meaning to read more from. I gooooot

-The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton (I may be one of thirteen people in the world who liked Ethan Frome. Sigh, a copy of Ethan Frome to call my own.)

-To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (An old favorite from High School, I've forgotten most of it by now.)

-The Art of War by Sun Tzu (C'mon, 5 bucks, I'm not made of stone.)

-This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald (I looooved Great Gatsby, and I had been hoping to read some more of his works.)

-One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey (I was just plain curious about this one.)

Down to a Soundless Sea by Thomas Steinbeck (I totally ran out of John Steinbeck books to read. Who knew his son wrote books too?)

And finally, John Steinbeck. Writer a biography by Jackson J. Benson (Time to read a bit up on the man behind the typewriter, I guess.)

All in all an excellent haul. Only thing I went over on was the biography, cost me a pretty penny. Ought to be a good read, though. Still think the prices on some books, especially fine literature, will only mean bad things in the future.
~
Still doing some cleaning from my last post. Mostly just spots here and there. Most of the room is pretty clean at this point. Desk keeps getting slightly cluttered up, but I guess that's to be expected with me.
~
Unrelated to anything else, but I found something that is very precious to me. I don't think it's something anyone else would remember, but I was afraid I'd lost it. Turns out I was stupid/smart enough to keep it someplace special so I wouldn't lose it. I'm just glad it's safe and sound.
~
Oh, I broke down and bought a betta. Figured that since I dealt with fish so often, and offered advice so often, I should at least have an idea of what I'm talking about sometimes. It's a very nice betta, that I named Mr. Betta because I couldn't think of anything else. It's a rather dignified name that I think suits him.
~
I think I found a decent picture hosting site, so maybe I'll put up a picture or two at some point in time. If it works ^_^;
~
That should be about it for now..

P.S. Tanuki, she's younger than I am? C'mon now o.o

Some good ol' fashioned randomness

2003-12-04T02:31:32Z

Things so that I don't forget:

Siamese algae eater != Chinese algae eater - no particular PH.
Ramirez lower PH, less chemicals for survival? Low survival rate.
Carbon pillows in excess will lower PH of reef tank.
Try to add more salt to fresh banks.
Special order clown loach if I remember.
~
There is no single circumstance, I never took a final chance
I made it something you can see and touch forever
I always looked the same from every angle and never cast a shadow
That would change the way you thought about your very being
That what you were seeing would always be the truth
~
I finally broke down and got a digicam. It really is a wonderful thing, and I'm having a lot of fun with it. It's hard to resist just taking random pictures and seeing what they turn out as. As a result, I have many new pictures of my kitties. I think I'd like to take some pictures of the mountain maybe, and some other nice things. But I did already get some gorgeous ones. They're the kind that just make you happy.

My room got torn inside out, I really should pick up some, it's kinda hard to move in and around. I just need to get motivated, I suppose. That and I need to find places for all these little things cluttering up everything. All these little things keep piling up and just not getting done. And I think I'm just about out of gum. Need gum. Yes.

Pizza and quiet

2003-11-03T06:45:55Z

Very very uneventful Halloween, I spent the night handing out candy to children who never came, and played Pokemon. Perhaps they just don't like crunchy snickers, I liked 'em fine though.

Gots me a raise and a promotion at work, forget which day exactly, one of these last few days. I'm officially an "expert" at slinging fish, and I still know more than I'd like to, at this point.

Had something else to mention, can't 'member what. I forgot it already, and this is the only way I remember things, dag nabbit.

The day that was a fun day

2003-10-01T03:38:11Z

I think I had more fun yesterday than I've had in a long long time. Maybe not think, rather know. I haven't laughed quite so much or run around or anything like that in so long. It's nice to swing on swings and be with the best person in the world enjoying life like that. My memory is so bad, I thought I should put this up so I can at least have an idea of what happened. I hope I never forget though.

At the behest of the Tanuki that is dearest to me

2003-07-20T03:36:19Z

It has come to my attention that some people who might have some kind of interest in what I've been up to have been left somewhat in the dark as to my current goings on.

Well, to be truthful, not a whole heck of a lot has happened. I think that the only new dealings have been going on with work. It's really a rich tapestry and all, and I enjoy working with all those animals, for the most part. Not too fond of fish, but I do enjoy taking ferrets out and letting them scratch the crud outta me.

Even beyond that, working at a pet store has given me some interesting insight into the greater workings of the universe, and expanded my horizons, so to speak. Put this to yourself: Did you honestly know that there is a 7:00AM on a Saturday? I'm vaguely aware of the existence of times before, oh, say, 10:00AM, being a 12 year old such as myself. But really, 7:00AM. Saturday. All together like that, it totally blew my mind this morning. I think coming to terms with this fact left me off guard almost all day.

I also enjoy how the food chain of my workplace functions. When I started out, I was a simple cashier, as I completely expected. At the time, we had about.. oh, four people on the aquatics team. There was the specialist, one of my managers who enjoyed working with fish, and two nice fellows.

Shortly after I got there, one of them was transferred to another store. Then we got a new general manager, and the fish manager guy didn't like him and transferred to the same store the first guy did. Then, the new manager forced out the last guy, and he later ended up at said second store. During that period, I was "promoted" to aquatics staff, as I had good hours. The manager trained me before he left and I became the normal night aquatics guy. Now, the important thing was that we still had our aquatics specialist. That has now changed. Today she finally left, and I bear her no grudge, as she was hired for work that she went to college for.

Now, this leaves me and another nice fellow who was hired not too long ago as the sole members of the aquatics staff.

Before I go on, I should say that our general manager, that is, the manager in charge of all the other managers and etcetera, has an interesting way of processing events that go on. My day today started out with me being told that our specialist has left, and that I would be covering for her, which means more hours, but also waking up at an ungodly hour every day until a replacement was found.

I was told this could take a week, or maybe two.

This quickly progressed to him telling me that he would ask our small animal specialist to be the aquatics specialist, as she had 20 years of experience in the aquatics field. This makes sense, as it is a lot harder to field aquatics issues than it is to train someone for small animals.

Not hardly an hour or two later, I was asked if I would be interested in becoming the head aquatics specialist.

Maybe 30 minutes or so later, I was told that there would be specialist training sometime this month, and I was to be there or be square.

So, in the short span of almost 7 months, I have gone from being a lowly cashier to just about aquatics specialist, which is considerably higher on the work hierarchy. Which is a fairly decent jump. Especially considering that when I started there, all I knew was that fish smell bad, and neon tetras have a bad habit of turning on each other.

Now, I can tell you why both of those are, how to set up tanks, how to set up salt tanks, which fish can go with which, and all sorts of odd things about our fine finned friends.

The pinnacle of all this is relishing the fact I can tell a parent that the Nemo their child wants so very badly will cost a minimum of $500 to take care of properly, and grinning inside when they recoil in horror.

Also, I have been enjoying Mega Man Battle Network 3 to some great extent.

Now Mr. Tanuki, I leave it to you to follow suit ^_^

The fish says moo

2003-04-26T20:55:45Z

You learn some interesting things when you begin dealing with animals every day, and in some ways they have a tendency to reflect the goings on of humanity, such as..

We're not the only creatures on earth to enjoy watching other things die, I noted a softshell turtle eating half a fish and letting it swim around for a day or so. Didn't think it'd live that long, but it did.

Could just be me, but I never see fish bleed, mebbe they're like lawyers.

Much like high schoolers, fish will gang up on any fish that seems odd to them, and then proceed to eat them. (Okay, it's also the sickly ones and stuff, but it was more fun this way.

I said be careful, my bowtie is really a camera

2002-10-17T06:57:30Z

Welp, tomorrow shall mark the beginning of a 3 day journey through the untamed southwest. I'll be offline for the next couple weeks, but I'll try to find a way to check email or something. I want someone to get the title T.T I'm looking at you, Jedi

All good things..

2002-09-27T22:24:12Z

As it is with most things, I imagine, it is true for me as well. Once a Krispy Kreme has been erected near you, once you've unpacked and settled, and once you've memorized all the streets going hither and thither, you must move once again. Soon I shall be in the land of the watermelon mountains and neverending blue skies. I shall pluck the seeds from the mountains and plant smaller ones in a garden of my own fashion. I will look up and only see blue. Welcome me kindly, I ask for little but a taste! Mebbe some other stuff if I have time, not sure yet.

P.S. Sorry about our duel, Loial. It woulda been fun ^_^
P.P.S. Oh, Loial, do me a favor and say bye to Uncle and Oneesama if ya see 'em
P.P.S. Hey Miss, can you recommend Cibola Village? Or what apartment place you reside in?

Tada

2002-04-21T04:14:44Z

I live! Quick rundown on life so I don't have to tell people separately.

Went to NY
Got GF
Brought her back
She lives with me
My parents are moving to NM
I am not
GF and I are moving into her mother's house
We are going to continue college here
Been spending a lot of time with her
Haven't been in the chat or online much
Email me so I can keep up, willya?

This space for rent

2002-04-01T02:12:24Z

DanoSempai: yupas test is so... nebulous, though
JediTanuki: as is he ^_^

Days like these

2002-03-10T05:05:57Z

Pocky Yupa: Wien: You pick up Hundred Swords yet?
Wien theStampede: Yupa: i told you I got it aaaaages ago o.o
SeLArisu: he's getting to be an old Yupa, forgetting things :o
Pocky Yupa: Wien: You forget about my memory o.o
Wien theStampede: Yupa: and you forgot about my memory =D
Pocky Yupa: Wien: 'Course I do, you know my memory ^_^
SuprGurl717: Old wise Yupa? o_o
Wien theStampede: whehe =D

Shhh

2002-02-19T09:34:59Z

Silence. Bang bang.

Who am I? Wha chalada johlo

2002-01-11T22:34:33Z

Good lord, I'm me. What does this mean? What doesn't it mean? I have been shown the light, now I fully realize that I am myself, and not something that is not myself. Kinda wished I was a giant robot though. Dag nabbit.

Auh

2001-10-18T00:02:22Z

Ho, great mountain
I see you in the distance
And I realize that my problems are not as great as you
It is only my feelings that make them seem that way
But I cannot help but feel you look smaller today

Muar har har

2001-09-05T02:16:58Z

Disorder
Rating

Paranoid:
High

Schizoid:
Very High

Schizotypal:
High

Antisocial:
High

Borderline:
Low

Histrionic:
Moderate

Narcissistic:
Moderate

Avoidant:
Low

Dependent:
High

Obsessive-Compulsive:
Moderate

Sheep, foe or something slightly worse than foe?

2001-06-11T22:01:54Z

Sheep. You've heard of them. You know of them. You've seen one. In fact, i have little doubt that you've actually pet one in one of those quaint little petting zoos. But, have you ever considered the malevolent evil residing in sheep? That's right, sheep are the tools of evil. Face facts, honestly. You look at a sheep, and they seem nice, cute even. Possibly even worth more than the sum of their shanks. But, no! You look into their dark, uncaring eyes, and you can see the evil lurking within.
Sheep have coerced people to do their bidding since the dawn of time. Using their little "baaas" they have taken control of entire populaces, and forced them to carry out their bidding! Entire populaces, races, turned to dust, thanks to the evil fleeced ones. You wonder what happened to the Atlanteans? It wasn't some technological monstrosity of their own construct...it was sheep! It's been nothing short of sheep driven genocide, for years, and to this day it's gone unchecked.
I'm practically proof positive that sheep have even contributed to modern society's downfalls and current economic pitfalls. I'm sure that Hitler had sheep farms set up around Germany and other areas under their control during World War II. In the same vein, a few other notorious evil doers in history have been known to keep sheep, including: Stalin, Fidel Castro, Vlad the Impaler, Serpentor, Atilla the Hun, and even, Megatron.
Even forerunners of the modern language have thought to warn us of the evil of sheep. Why, in Webster's New World Dictionary, itself it describes:
Fleece -v. To swindle.
With evidence like that, it's no longer difficult to think that sheep are obviously evil. If a word, derived from them, is used to describe stealing, one can no longer stand by and just wonder as to whether sheep are evil. Action MUST be taken!
In cooperation with all the other countries of the world, I suggest an international conference concerning the extermination of all sheep. As a sign of goodwill, steps should be taken to ship all the sheep in the world to France, where each nuclear capable nation can send a personalized warhead of destruction to each region of France, smiting the sheep off the face of the Earth. It's in Revelations people!

I come to tell you a story that I know nothing about

2001-04-10T01:50:57Z

Gather 'round chillen, I gots a story here that needs a'tellin'. Now, back in the day, I lived in one of those (at the time) newfangled "neighborhood" dealies. In this "hood" full of "neighbors" people generally had a house, and chances are, lived in it. Now, back at the time, there was another chile living down the street named Trouble. Coulda been that his parents hated him, not even having known him, or perhaps they just had some karmic desire to make their lives seem a bit more interesting. Either way, it no doubt ended up requiring decades of psychiatric appointments. As it was, this one particular day of the instance of which I'm retelling you, I was asked to cut down a tree. Now, it was well known that Trouble was a hard-core tree leaner. Chances were, if you needed to find him, you'd find him leaning up against some tree, somewhere. It was actually rather notorious around the neighborhood. At any rate, the day in question, I was asked to cut down a tree. Well, I started in on that tree, and I'll be darned if it wasn't one of the most difficult tree cutting tasks I've ever been asked to partake in. Now, I didn't notice it at the time, but apparently there was a strange noise being emitted from said tree. As I noted, I didn't notice it, but one of those "old" people came a running out to see what the commotion was all about. I'll be darned though, if he didn't see what was going on and shout at me, "You there! It looks like you're halving Trouble, cutting up that tree!"

The long road to yesterday

2001-04-09T03:39:10Z

So I was thinking, as a person such as myself is not particularly inclined to do. Now what if, I thought to myself, what if the sky were green? Obviously enough, I replied to myself "Why, then, people wouldn't know where to stop mowing, you half mad half insane madman!" Having promptly shut myself up, I took time to ponder the subject. A ha! I soon realized that if the sky were green, all colors must therefore have been changed as well. Not only would the sky be green, but the rocks blue, and the sun a healthy shade of purple! Well then, that could only mean one thing: Giant robots have taken over the underworld, the very center of our world, and found inside the control panel that controls every aspect of the universe! Verily then, a ragtag team of more giant robots must be waging a war for our sake! Oh, giant robots, godspeed! Protect us with your mighty rocket punches and eye lasers! Kind giant robots, know our plight and realize our hearts are with you! Fight on, for justice, fight on, for the sake of the world!