| "I see," says Sir Irving
Explainer, as he sidles up to you at the bar. He faces the barkeep.
"So your grandfather built a complex set of giant revolving turntables
underneath the cave tunnels. If you don't want someone to leave,
you let that person get out into a tunnel, and then you pull a lever behind
the bar there. The tunnel then slowly rotates one hundred and eighty
degrees, so that it is facing the other direction. The person inside
the tunnel is unaware of the direction change and so, when he walks out
of the tunnel, he is shocked to find himself in the same place he was when
he left. And you can keep doing that, until he acknowledges the error
of his ways -- or until raging madness ensues."
"That's essentially it," says the barkeep. "But you didn't have to explain that to me, I already knew it." "I kind of figured it out just from the words 'tunnel turntable,'" you say. "Just doing my part," says Irving, draining his mead. "Say, did you know the amazonian fruit fly is capable of flying twelve miles an hour for two days without -- " You stuff a bowl of peanuts in his mouth and turn back to the barkeep. |