.

 

The Subway Diary: 26-Dec-97

Craig Roberts Watches Television

Craig Roberts got home from Christmas in the late afternoon, off the Greyhound at Port Authority. He took the A out to Brooklyn.

He walked into his apartment, tired, and turned on the television. On the news, he saw a fire, somewhere in the city. Pictures of firemen, women crying and holding each other. He thought, "Why do fires always happen at night?" The television began to quiver.

"It's the train passing," he thought. The TV kept rattling. "I wonder if it's an earthquake?" Nothing else in the apartment jiggled.

With a burst of static and a loud sound of tearing plastic, the TV gave out a sound like a kicked dog. Craig jumped back in his chair, then rushed to the circuit breaker and turned off the line.

Even without power, the thing hopped on its stand. Its old plastic channel knobs spun by themselves. Scared, Craig edged over to it, holding his body a few feet away. He couldn't see any source for the commotion. Gingerly, he pressed down on the formica top of the TV. The set squealed.

The soft gray of the tube split open, fluidly. The glass didn't shatter. Hundreds of tiny televisions poured onto the floor. Some rolled around, squeaking. Some righted themselves and tuned to the same news station as their mother. While the little tubes spilled out, the parent TV, its screen opened wide, gave off a sigh of smoke, and expired in a hissing pile.

Cued by a deep, metallic laughter, Craig lowered his eyes to see the VCR, sitting on the stand below the dead TV. It jiggled, too, but more gently. Suddenly, with phallic grandeur, a black cigar emerged from its video hole. The end of the cigar began to smoke.

In absolute confusion and fear, Craig surveyed his apartment. Within a minute, all the baby televisions began to cry.


[Top]

Ftrain.com

PEEK

Ftrain.com is the website of Paul Ford and his pseudonyms. It is showing its age. I'm rewriting the code but it's taking some time.

FACEBOOK

There is a Facebook group.

TWITTER

You will regret following me on Twitter here.

EMAIL

Enter your email address:

A TinyLetter Email Newsletter

About the author: I've been running this website from 1997. For a living I write stories and essays, program computers, edit things, and help people launch online publications. (LinkedIn). I wrote a novel. I was an editor at Harper's Magazine for five years; then I was a Contributing Editor; now I am a free agent. I was also on NPR's All Things Considered for a while. I still write for The Morning News, and some other places.

If you have any questions for me, I am very accessible by email. You can email me at ford@ftrain.com and ask me things and I will try to answer. Especially if you want to clarify something or write something critical. I am glad to clarify things so that you can disagree more effectively.

POKE


Syndicate: RSS1.0, RSS2.0
Links: RSS1.0, RSS2.0

Contact

© 1974-2011 Paul Ford

Recent

@20, by Paul Ford. Not any kind of eulogy, thanks. And no header image, either. (October 15)

Recent Offsite Work: Code and Prose. As a hobby I write. (January 14)

Rotary Dial. (August 21)

10 Timeframes. (June 20)

Facebook and Instagram: When Your Favorite App Sells Out. (April 10)

Why I Am Leaving the People of the Red Valley. (April 7)

Welcome to the Company. (September 21)

“Facebook and the Epiphanator: An End to Endings?”. Forgot to tell you about this. (July 20)

“The Age of Mechanical Reproduction”. An essay for TheMorningNews.org. (July 11)

Woods+. People call me a lot and say: What is this new thing? You're a nerd. Explain it immediately. (July 10)

Reading Tonight. Reading! (May 25)

Recorded Entertainment #2, by Paul Ford. (May 18)

Recorded Entertainment #1, by Paul Ford. (May 17)

Nanolaw with Daughter. Why privacy mattered. (May 16)

0h30m w/Photoshop, by Paul Ford. It's immediately clear to me now that I'm writing again that I need to come up with some new forms in order to have fun here—so that I can get a rhythm and know what I'm doing. One thing that works for me are time limits; pencils up, pencils down. So: Fridays, write for 30 minutes; edit for 20 minutes max; and go whip up some images if necessary, like the big crappy hand below that's all meaningful and evocative because it's retro and zoomed-in. Post it, and leave it alone. Can I do that every Friday? Yes! Will I? Maybe! But I crave that simple continuity. For today, for absolutely no reason other than that it came unbidden into my brain, the subject will be Photoshop. (Do we have a process? We have a process. It is 11:39 and...) (May 13)

That Shaggy Feeling. Soon, orphans. (May 12)

Antilunchism, by Paul Ford. Snack trams. (May 11)

Tickler File Forever, by Paul Ford. I'll have no one to blame but future me. (May 10)

Time's Inverted Index, by Paul Ford. (1) When robots write history we can get in trouble with our past selves. (2) Search-generated, "false" chrestomathies and the historical fallacy. (May 9)

Bantha Tracks. (May 5)

More...
Tables of Contents