Monthly Archives: September 2023

Torn

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Alistair,

Short-time-reader, first-time-advice-seeker. So, I’m about to graduate from college, and have had a couple of promising interviews. One is for a market research position with a small start-up. The other is an assistant position for a self-proclaimed prophet hellbent on bringing back the forgotten traditions of a darker time. Both pay about the same, but the latter has better benefits. Which should I go with?

Torn in Two (maybe literally, dependent on job performance)

Torn,

That’s the tricky thing about startups, isn’t it? They demand performance, and quick, because they’re a half step from being tarred and feathered by the free market themselves

While the dark prophet definitely promises better benefits, one has to bear in mind that the thing about prophets is their ‘In for a penny, in for a pound’ nature. He’s already claiming to be in league with enshadowed powers and terrifying nightmares giving him a glimpse through the veil of time; it’s kind of small fry at that point to say you provide dental.

Neither job, statistically, is going to last very long. After you’ve weighed the enjoyability of the work itself, think about your exit strategy. Would you have your mind destroyed through having glimpsed horrors beyond that which man should see and end up slain as a sacrifice to ever-more-demanding remnants of ancient forces; or would you rather have to reenter the job search with a marginally stronger resume? I can’t pretend to tell you which is preferable, as that’s really a personal decision.

Alistair

Flipped Switches

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Alistair,

I live about three miles away from a local nuclear power plant. There’s an energy creature that feeds on the waste energy every night, and then makes its way home. Seems taking a longish walk immediately after is hard on the digestion, because it seems to be (if you pick up what I’m putting down) relieving pressure as it reaches my house. At any rate, the power goes out. Every breaker in the house is flipped and any lightbulbs on at the time blow out instantly. It’s a pain and kind of expensive. What do I do about it?

Flipped Switches in Kentucky

Flipped Switches

First of all, a very sharp ability to note interspecies digestion issues. He’s off-shooting. When raw AC is taken in by a creature made of energy (static), there will be a natural reaction to the reversed flow. In other words, it’s going to have to go somewhere. It’s basic electrobiology, and you don’t need to go out and humiliate the creature for its allergies.

Maybe try LED lights.

Alistair

Daylight Savings

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Alistair,

While recently testing a time travel device, I think I accidentally flipped the schematics; my maiden voyage sent the entire universe forward by one day, rather than myself. Unfortunately, the power demands of a move like that mean that the only way I’ll be able to reverse the move is to hook up to a nearby star. The hitch is that it would take a few billion years to establish the connection. I considered using time travel to skip ahead, but the power demands for that are even more ridiculous. Any advice on fixing the situation?

Daylight Savings in Brussels

Daylight Savings,

So everyone’s lost a day. In the end, nobody’s going to notice. Oh, there may be a schedule slip or a few lost items as people misplaced things in the missing interim, but in the end, it’ll be chalked up to exactly the same thing as it always is: ‘Gee whiz, where did the time go? Seems like just yesterday it was last week.’

Besides, on the scale of all things, people are constantly doing this nonsense. In the end, the universe won’t be ten years off in any direction.

Alistair

Aladdin

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Alistair,

Just found a lamp. Djinni can’t do anything right. Constantly bringing me random things, never what I want. How do I fix this?

Aladdin in Wyoming

Aladdin,

He might not be bringing you what you want, but is he perhaps bringing you what you need? Given that he’s a lamp-bound Djinn, this means he was almost certainly a prisoner of the last Great Djinn War of 563, which means he was born at minimum around 200 AD. This ethereal being is probably over 1800 years old. He has some wisdom to offer . . . Or he is suffering some seriously overdue dementia. Either way, he is giving you stuff that is free. Start an ebay account and make a little money on the side.

Alistair