Hello, past!
Once upon a time there was a being not quite a tapir but somewhat similar to one, that invented something extraordinary: an inflatable parking lot to use during rush hour the day before Christmas. Imagine – just unpack, inflate and park. Inconceivably practical! The tapir was nominated for the annual tapir Nobel prize and lived happily ever after. Oh, and before it died from old age and cirrhosis of the liver caused by extensive drinking, it also invented the human race.
The human race turned out to be quite the bomb and quickly became very popular, especially with children and young teens. It also turned out to have inherited some of its creator’s inventiveness and caused quite a buzz when it discovered Fire, Wheel and subsequently Electricity. Tapirs love electricity. It turns them on in some perverted way, those kinky bastards.
Anyhow, electricity was a handy little thing to say the least. You could use it to cook, heat your humble living quarters, light up the night to avoid being eaten by horrible, carnivorous beasts and to power your Crazy Daisy Moving Lawn Sprinkler ™. The technology developed and evolved and what was first generators fueled by burning disgusting stuff quickly became slick, shiny, highly modernistic and super safe </sponsored ad> nuclear reactors and everything was awesome. Then there were a couple of catastrophes and some people died or were born with seven toes.
“Well, back to the drawing table”, said the human race, and went back to the drawing table (and yes, the table was from IKEA. Jeez…). It soon became clear that to make up for the closing of the nuclear power plants and avoid unnecessary WoW level-capping due to repeated blackouts, something radical had to be done. After some experimenting with alternative power sources, solar power turned out the unquestionable favourite. It didn’t disturb the neighbours with its subtle but oh-so-infuriating engine noise, and it sure as hell didn’t sabotage the river fishing. The progress was slow, but some ten years ago (OK, two years into the future since you’re in the past, loser) it was decided that solar panels were to be installed on every ineffective surface in the world. This included the Sahara desert, and this is also where things are about to get interesting. Why, you ask? Well, why, because of the mummies of course.
And now you ask about the mummies? Seriously? OK, well: “[a] mummy is a deceased human or animal whose skin and organs have been preserved by either intentional or accidental exposure to chemicals, extreme cold, very low humidity, or lack of air, so that the recovered body does not decay further if kept in cool and dry conditions” (Wikipedia, where else?). Ah, so you knew what a mummy is already and what you were really asking was “whatsupwiththosefrigginmummiesdude?” Well, I was just about to tell you. Calm down.
The mummies, of course, were sleeping in their fancy tombs beneath the desert sand, enjoying the natural, convenient and completely free warmth that seeped down through the sand and into their customised postmortem state rooms while they chilled and dreamed of past glory and other things that excite the well preserved dead. So you can imagine what a fuss arose when that same heat source was thoughtlessly blocked by thousands upon thousands of slick, shiny, highly modernistic and super safe </sponsored ad> solar panels. To put it mildly, the conserved corpses awoke, and they were quite cranky. And as all respectable retirees faced with despicable injustice, they got together and climbed out of their chambers and crypts to exact merciless vengeance upon the establishment which had robbed them of their well deserved eternal sleep in a cozy environment.
The mummies marched across the solar panel covered desert until they reached civilisation, and then they kind of ate everybody. Well, or they didn’t exactly eat everybody. They discovered quite quickly that their digestive systems, together with all their other innards, had been left behind in their perfumed jars at home, next to the glasses with their dental prostheses. So after some embarrassingly iffy first attempts to devour the Earth’s population, the mummies settled for ripping their throats out and leaving them to die in growing puddles of their own blood. Some of them collected spines, but you shouldn’t judge every mummy because of that.
Anyways, it turned out that as soon as one of the mummies managed to secure a humanless area of about one square kilometer, it simply lay down in the middle of said area and slept. Some of them dug in, but not all of them. This seems to be a matter of taste amongst mummies and has nothing to do with outside temperature or air pollution. Luckily, even way back when the mummies were being “made”, so to speak, resources were wryly allocated between the population, and thus only a select few had been able to afford the somewhat exclusive and expensive treatment. Thus there weren’t an endless number of mummies, even though that number alone was proving troublesome enough.
So at the end of the day the lion’s share of the world’s continents ended up depopulated and covered in soundly sleeping mummies, and the extensive solar cell project proved quite superfluous since mummies don’t know how to handle a microwave oven and wouldn’t care for dubious gastronomical debaucheries anyhow. So the world ended up rather quiet and restful, even though the occasional Crazy Daisy still disrupted the peace of the undead and caused them to go on a rampage amongst those poor souls who had managed to stay alive by keeping away and not provoking the mummies in any way. I am one of them, as I’m sure you had already gathered by now.
And that brings me to the reason behind me writing this text and using another piece of excellent tapiric invention to send it back in time to you: please, please, please do your best to ensure that silly garden sprinklers that run on electricity don’t become a hit! They’ll just go on and on and on and on ad infinitum and wake the mummies up long after you have all had your throats ripped or your spines stolen or whatever. Having them run on water is more than enough. It is easier to cut the water supply to any given suburb street than cutting the power. Believe me. And I’m tired of crazy dashes over picket fences and through unkempt gardens to turn off one of these stupid flower thingies before it wakes up a morning tired mummy with murderous tendencies. I’ve had just about enough of it. So I implore you, dear sir or madam, to, if nothing else, refrain from buying one of these lawn decorations if they run on electricity. That’s all I ask of you. Just. Don’t. Do. It. Thank you.
P.S. Oh, yeah, if the above didn’t convince you enough: sprinklers with electrical components are also highly hazardous for everyone, including but not limited to children, pets, mailmen, dolphins and cute old ladies with their cats in baskets. So they are just plain stupid. And you are, too, if you buy them. And people will likely sue you. And then you will go to hell – if the mummies don’t eat you first, that is. So. There. I hope you are now irrevocably convinced and stuff. Have a nice life. Bye. D.S.
...these grains of sand 