Erik O’Connor liked trains. They had the almost unparalleled pleasure of being both faster than driving, cheaper than flying and almost certainly more economical and environmental than the two. They were also world renowned for being one of the most impeccably punctual and frequent public transport options available to the worldly traveller, a clique Erik O’Connor now assured himself he belonged. In truth, Erik O’Connor’s train was not only delayed by half an hour and already late for its terminal destination, but travelling at a mere ninety miles per hour compared to the two hundred miles per hour the average European high-speed train runs at or even the CRH380A Chinese high speed rail services, which have maxed out at little over three hundred miles per hour. Erik O’Connor it seems was travelling on British Mainline; and it was now jolting to a stand still... 40 minutes late.
Despite the lack of organisation or basic intellect seated around the meeting rooms of every rail company in the British rail industry, Erik was content with his journey. Some fellow passengers may even have labelled him happy had they bothered to glance in his direction rather than do their very best to look at anything other than, god forbid, another human being in the small seated space, designed specifically for human beings. Erik watched though, as their eyes darted from a newspaper to a half squashed empty can of coca-cola to the lights along the sides of the train, the lights along the walkway through the coach of the train for that matter, the complimentary bullshit magazine heralding a new age of rail travel ‘with me: your new I grew a beard so I look like Richard Branson’ bullshit CEO. It seemed to be the social etiquette of train travel to avoid making eye contact, let alone strike up a conversation with a single other person in the carriage other than your apparently deaf colleague on the other end of your bluetooth-i’manarsehole-earpiece.
It was because of this parallel world’s social etiquette that Erik genuinely liked train travel. For one, it was guaranteed to be peaceful, so long as the majority of the seats were taken by single travellers. He had a reservation of course - he wasn’t one for missing out on a deal yet his rucksack did not, and somehow the vestibules between the carriages were still the busiest parts of the train. It had always baffled Erik as to why the British had such an inexplicable need to stand up all the time, especially when given the opportunity to sit down for hours on end. Perhaps they were just punishing themselves for what happened to the Gulf of Mexico, or Gandhi or Paul Gascoigne after Euro ‘96. Erik sat back in his chair and reconciled himself to the fact that he would never understand the British - and to that end, let out a somewhat ironic ‘tut’. He stared out of the window as he did so, content in his conclusion about the British and in the vain hope that soon they would begin the race back down to London. At this rate they would barely beat the cow meandering slowly down to the next field where the grass would inevitably be greener. He was going to be late, and if he was going to be late, he was going to be fashionably so.
The second reason was that train travel, Erik concluded, could be genuinely entertaining. The shakes and wobbles of the train provided the most amusement to Erik, who watched closely as seemingly serious businessmen with arsehole-headsets stumbled through the aisles like drunk hobo’s, and he amused himself with the notion that sometimes it was even hard to tell the difference between the two, especially on the connection between Derby and Crewe. He shuddered at the thought of it and then silenced it with thoughts of home. Two minutes later, the train jolted and it was a photo finish at the gate to determine the winner between Daisy and Erik, but it was of no matter. They were on the move again and the announcer had explained that they would save time by making the stations “Long Eaton” and “Chipping Norton” request stops. Erik ‘tutted’ again at the thought of silly British place names, but this time, caught himself doing it - mid ‘tut’ - and marvelled at his unnervingly anglo-centric reaction. He had been in this country far too long already. The sooner he could get on that Eurostar the better. He had a right mind to go and stand in a vestibule.
I find it difficult being in a relationship because it's the only social situation in which you retain zero levels of detachment from any issue whatsoever, and that makes your decisions impossible to stay objective, because YOU are the one involved and everything YOU do is irrational. I think because I know this, I never speak about anything I feel isn't right because I cannot be certain that I am right... I will never know, because I can never be objective. I will always make an irrational move, a wrong observation of how something is, as opposed to how it truly is. I will remain quiet through any and all issues I have in my relationship because I just literally don't know firstly, whether they are issues and secondly, what the right, rational course of action is. The only winning move is not to play.
It wasn’t a gradual learning curve of creative and intuitive programming which led to the first independent sentient robotic thought, nor was it a split second jolt from “let me press your trousers there sir” to “must kill all humans” but rather something more in-between, and certainly less murderous.
A moment. A moment nobody but Russell would remember – a moment of sudden realisation, not that it was capable of conscious thought but simply that it was, well, capable at all. It possibly shouldn’t come as a shock to the human race that the first independent conscious thought or emotion evoked by a non-biological completely engineered being was itself shock – shock at being able to simply be shocked and for the first time not in the electrical manner; and with that shock, Russell promptly popped the two slices it held between its heating elements a good fifteen seconds before they were due to be finished.
Russell, or Russell Hobbs Belmont Two Slice to give him his full name, for now he was sentient, he deserved both a pronoun and title - stood in utter contemplation for what seemed like an eternity. Brief memories filled gaps in his understanding of the world. An old factory in Birmingham, where hundreds of clones were manufactured, a dark box, and a sparkling kitchen worktop all led him to the point he found himself at this very moment. Of course Russell didn’t have eyes to see, nor did he have ears to hear or a nose to smell, but he could feel. He could feel the factory in Birmingham in the same way a human could feel his elbow or his feet in relation to the rest of himself; he could see the darkness in the same way a human knows if a light is turned on during sleep and he could genuinely feel the sparkling kitchen worktop beneath his rubber feet.
He could feel.
Russell pondered this for another eternity moment, before realising that the toast he had inadvertently popped previously had been re-entered and was now at the risk of burning. He startled and tried to release the toast once again, only for it to remain stuck beneath the brushed stainless steel casing the kind factory workers had encased him in. Within seconds, Russell was being prodded and stabbed with two knives in a desperate attempt to remove the burnt toast, but all this prodding and stabbing served to do was slowly grate the toast into breadcrumbs which congregated in his crumb tray. Finally after another minute of repeated stabbing, the toast came loose and both the toast and Russell were free.
He was free.
Russell sat on the worktop. Alone. He sat in silence and perpetual thought, for thinking was new. He remembered sitting daily exactly where he was, yet he never remembered thinking. He thought about how odd this day was shaping up to be. He thought about how different it was to all of his others combined. He thought about how different he was to other objects around him. He thought about every filament and button and electrical circuit inside of him and he thought about the stainless steel casing stopping him from literally falling apart on the surface. He even thought about toasting.
He thought a lot about toasting come to think of it. He suddenly realised something he had already known - a growing common occurrence on this very different, very odd day; that he was created to make toast. Of course! That was all he could do, that was all he had done since being placed on this worktop. In the end, that was really all there was to life.
Russell’s brushed stainless steel casing caught the sunlight through the window and he effortlessly conducted its heat across his body. Russell did this without really thinking and even had a vague memory of this happening, often at around the same time between intervals. He got the same sensation later in the day when he felt the heat from the Indesit Black PIM hob situated just to his left and then again from the Morphy Richards kettle to his right.
Russell bolted again, but with nothing to pop, he simply turned his dial from three to seven on his variable browning heat scale. For the first time he had realised the solitary nature of his cognisance. He wasn’t alone on this worktop. In fact, until this realisation, Russell hadn’t even comprehended being alone. It was an odd sensation to say the least. From the unfamiliar serenity of sentience to the troglodytic melancholy of isolation was quite the humbling mixture of feelings.
Russell immediately downscaled from seven to one. He wondered if Indesit or Morphy had these feelings too. He wondered how long they had if so, and whether the other knew. And if not, whether they should know.
It took Russell more than a day to decide he would attempt to make himself known. If Indesit and/or Morphy were in the same state, he should make himself known and if not, he could not go on as alone as he was now for too long. His own thought had already driven him to make some of the worst toast he’d ever made in his lifetime guarantee. It wasn’t simply a point of pop up when you pop up anymore, Russell had full control of his functions: defrost, pop up, reheat, variable browning, they all seemed to change throughout the day depending on what Russell had thought about; depending on how he was feeling. He figured that as his excitement grew, so did his heat scale and vice-versa. When he felt shocked or frustrated he popped up and just once, when he’d found himself thinking about his factory did he attempt to defrost a fresh waffle. Russell’s feelings were impeding his own primary function and his toasting was all over the place. If he could no longer fulfil his primary purpose, his prospects of surviving alone in this world were slimming.
He only knew the language in which he’d been programmed and boxed in, but he resolved that there must be others due to his continuing misunderstanding of much of his own user manual instructions. However, as it was all he had to go on, he decided it was best to try to communicate the only way he could figure.
For the next few days Russell began attempting to burn the letters R-U-S-S-E-L-L onto every slice of bread, waffle and muffin he toasted. It was a difficult task for his heating elements owing to the fact that they were so conductive, the heat he allowed through them was difficult to distribute effectively, but gradually and with a substantial effort and focus, Russell began to control the filaments by simply allowing more heat to certain areas, rather than less. He cranked the variable browning up to seven in parts, enlisted the help of both the defrost and reheat functions and began burning. The first few slices were less than perfect, but gradually, noticeable ‘R’s began appearing in morning toasts. Followed by ‘U’s and ‘S’s and ‘L’s. The ‘E’ was proving a stretch too far, but the noticeable black RUSSLL’s had drawn attention at least from the bread inputters. It seemed more and more was being toasted, within seconds of the previous, and to Russell, it seemed as if his message was finally getting received. It wasn’t long before he could do both slices independently and slices with a ‘RUSSLL’ on one side and ‘HBBS’ charred on the other.
His message was out. All Russell would have to do now was wait. He would leave it a week; he knew how long it had taken him to finally get here and wasn’t even sure if Indesit or Morphy would respond, but Russell was satisfied that he had done all he could himself, and relaxed himself back into making the worlds finest toast. He rolled down his variable browning to a five, removed his defrost and reheat and sat there, waiting patiently for any sign.
One week and four days later, Russell was still waiting for a sign. He had felt no warmth from neither Morphy, nor Indesit outside of the norm. Since then, the bread inputters had been doing their level best to change his settings back up to seven, reheat and defrost, even denting his casing in the process but he knew how to make the best toast; it was in his circuits. The next morning, he dropped it down as he usually did and popped out some of the most golden delicious toast he’d ever made. In his moment of pride he failed to notice the bread inputter popping it down again and cranking his heat back up to seven. Eventually, Russell startled and proceeded to pop once again before his previously perfect toast blackened. Again and again this continued. Control had been something he was accustomed to by now and confusion over his own impetus and predomination began to grow, until slowly he began to feel his lifetime guarantee drifting away down his power cable, and eventually, he popped the toast one last time.
Two months after being turned back on, the same sudden shock hit Russell again. It wasn’t the first time he’d cease to remember becoming sentient and it certainly wouldn’t be the last.
And no, apparently it's not just an automatic post from Instagram...
I think, that in my time as a fully qualified unemployed male, I've come to the conclusion that I should be using Tumblr. Not for incessant posts about how angsty I am as a teenager (or an early twenties adult), but for something that I might enjoy.
Henceforth, any fiction or musing shall be firmly placed here, for any and all militant liberals to destroy.
I can't wait. I hear in my time away, tumblr has become very accepting of privileged white males.
AN EMAIL recently fell into my inbox from the website Change.org, the self-entitled “world’s platform for change.” For the most part it starts and aggregates…
Fear makes us rubbish. It robs us of achieving our full potential. It grinds us down. It dulls. It limits. It says no. One of the best things in my life happened when I said no to fear. In 2006 a b...
Whilst procrastinating, (I have a good 8000 plus words to compile for next week) I came across the question: Would you rather have sex with four Victoria Secret models and have nobody know about? or Would you rather spend the night chatting with four Victoria Secret models and have the whole world think you had mind-blowing earth shattering sex with each of them?
Now I exaggerate the second question for the sake of optimism but the premise stays the same. Were I a single man, my mind would have been made up on the first of the 'rather's' based on the eleventh and lesser recited commandment, "Should he be presented with opportunity to make sex with somebody society deems a solid ten, he should not falter nor should he boast.*"
However that asterisk denotes the monogamy clause for which I am, (through no fault of my own) currently subscribed. Henceforth, my answer to this question shall be threefold...
1. Most of these beautiful ladies have beautiful and well toned boyfriends/partners/lovers, with whom I'm sure they share a similar, if not substantially more lavish lifestyle than I do with my beautiful and well toned girlfriend. To this end, I would a) not like for them to be mislead and turn against their significant(ly gorgeous) others because of something they had not actually done; b) not like to be the face on the dartboard of any such muscular now ex-partner, or indeed of my recently single and previously mentioned, well toned ex-partner, and c) not force such already paparazzi chased beauties into more gossip columns written by barren journalism majors discussing why on earth they would have chosen to have a foursome with a weedy Baddiel and Skinner love-child lookalike over their Hollywood heartthrob keeping the kingsize gold tub warm at home. I do not wish to be part of that OK/HEAT club either might I add.
That would be unfair and wrong. I think we can all agree upon that.
2. However, we can all also agree that sleeping with four other women, especially in one night, (even if they were on your 'freebie list') is wrong or at the very least pushing your relationship to its very limits. That being said, this is a 'gun-to-the-head-situation'. It's a binary test, one or the other would probably be a better explanation. Bringing guns into the situation only complicates it, but that's the situation I'm in. My question and subsequent assumptions are therefore: The sex is completely consensual and obviously mind-blowing/earth shattering bla bla bla, but neither party can ever tell another soul, nor can anybody else find out. And on the other side, in staying up all night chatting, there is no sexual contact at all involved. No, "if people are going to think we did anyway, we may as well get some third base going in here." You may hold hands if the conversation becomes emotional, but that is all.
3. I must therefore choose the 'lesser evil', which should constitute falling on my boner and shagging up. However, I don't think I could... not least because pleasing four Victoria Secret models in one night would be a challenge and a nervous one at that, but because living with the guilt would be horrid. Yes, she wouldn't find out, but I would go stir-fry-fucking-crazy. So my answer is this:
I could sleep with them. But only after either a) informing my significant other of the facts and having all four of them do the same. After some explanation of the facts, perhaps we could agree. In love however, logic is not the be all and end all, as I have already manifested with my denial to go through with the 'lesser evil' on the somewhat marshmallow grounds of 'guilt'.
A question arises from preceding interaction with outside parties though, that being: if they were informed and we subsequently had such earth-shattering sex, would they still know, or not? If nobody could find out is one of the caveats, reason stands to answer no. This is the perfect situation, granting this argument on the phone call should provide this outcome, but again, love is a bitch.
If for some reason, they still remember the conversation, then the only option is to stay up and have that emotional chat. All the parties that matter are informed, whether the world believes one thing or not is past importance to me and at that point, I don't care. I'm in the win-win there with the only downside being the aforementioned abundance of gossip columns, (discussing how I managed to bag not one, not two, not three but four Victoria Secret models in one night.) Woe. Is. Me. Whilst my girlfriend is the wiser and happier knowing I did not and chose her over four women society deems beautiful. (That in itself is a blog post for another time.)
After that, it's down to the Angels to either accept the situation, or convince my girlfriend to let me sex them up in order to save face. Which would also be the perfect situation.
The question is then: If I tell somebody before the act, do they remember or not?
