cellini's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Supernova In retrospect, it was probably a bad idea to introduce a 4 year old to the fact that the sun will eventually go supernova. I hadn't even intended to get on to the subject. We were lying down in bed and I was telling her stories to help her fall asleep. Somehow we got on to the subject of seasons passing. I was explaining that after winter, we'd have spring again, followed by another summer and then fall, then winter again and then it would be Christmas again. So she asks 'then what?' "Well, it all happens again and again and again. Winter, spring, summer, fall, etc. Over and over again forever. Well, not quite forever. Because eventually it will be interrupted when the sun goes supernova, expanding to thousands and thousands of times it's present volume, which will suddenly envelope the Earth in a thick cloud of super-heated, radioactive gas, effectively destroying our planet." Long silence. "What will everybody do?" Ida asked. "Oh, I wouldn't worry about it. It will be a very long time from now and by then we'll have incredible spaceships that we can take to go live on another planet somewhere." "But I don't want to leave! I want to stay here! I like the Earth!" Her voice now had a slightly panicked tone to it. At this point one might easily have pointed out that we will all be surely long since dead by the time that the sun goes supernova a billion years from now or whenever it's supposed to happen. But I had enough sense not to open up that whole can of worms. And besides, remarkable things are being done right now with nanotech research and medicine. Very clever people who follow nanotech closely are now saying that at least some people who are alive right now will live to be 1,000 years old. The technology is maybe 15 years from being mature enough to actually put into our bodies. Tiny nano devices in our bloodstream will repair our cells and even our DNA indefinitely. Something akin to immortality is actually within mankind's reach. But I digress. I just reassured her as much as possible that the sun would not go supernova for a very, very, very long time and that it's so far off that we don't even need to think about it. She fell asleep shortly afterwards while I was telling her a story about Little Bo Peep and the Toy Rocket Ship. I had damn well not get hit by a bus or something on my way home from work today. I really enjoy being alive and I would rather like to live forever. Trish is lobbying ever more obviously for another baby. The other night she was making references to 'when' Ida gets a little sister, rather than 'if.' Man, I don't know. This shitty little house is too damn small as it is. We've got no damned real kitchen or dining room. 2 kids in one bedroom as it is and only 1 bathroom. I just don't feel like I have the money to properly provide for what I have as it stands, let alone introducing another child into the situation. I haven't been to a dentist in about 4 years. I'm right on the edge here and I really think that until the economy improves along with my personal finances, it would be a very bad idea to deliberately have another baby in the house. 2:47 p.m. - 2008-01-03 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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