UFOs, moron!

I saw the idea of believing in UFOs being used as a benchmark of stupidity. Well.. UFO. Okay, fine, what KIND of UFO?

"Unidentified flying object" literally qualifies a shadow that passes by your window that was PROBABLY a bird. In my neighborhood, it can also be an airplane. I can reasonably identify a bird shadow from and airplane shadow, but don't ask me to identify what variety of bird or plane from a shadow rushing over my window. Unidentified. Blurry photo of a balloon? Unidentified. So THAT kind of UFO, obviously. I believe.

This kind? Meteorite? Maybe. Unidentified.

Believing in intelligent life from space? Well, the universe is BIG. I won't even get into my theory on our use of the word universe, but there's approximately a metric SHITLOAD of stars out there, and we're finding more and more evidence of planets that have life potential. And we can't see all planets all that far, in the big picture. Across the near-infinite, the odds of other life are pretty darn good. I reasonably believe.

If you squint real hard, you can see 34638 bajillion possible hiding places for sexy aliens.

Believing that they come HERE? That's a trickier issue in my head. They're gonna be far off. I don't know what kind of engines these hypothetical aliens use, but.. it's still a long way off. And those hypothetical aliens might just now be mastering FIRE. Or have bombed their planet into a ball of radioactive glass billions of years ago. So odds are a little worse here. I'm on the critical side here.

I'm not saying Pacific Rim was ripping off the Beastie boys..

Believing that said visitors have been probing rednecks and inverting cows? Phew... I like to give folks the benefit of the doubt, and if your belief isn't doing anyone any harm, fill your boots, but I believe I'll pass on that tinfoil hat, TYVM.

Being John Mal- er, I mean Morgan Freeman.

Did I ever tell you about the time I channeled the spirit of Morgan Freeman? It was an accident, I swear. On October 5th or so, day 2 of the 2013 VCON, I woke up after about 2 hours of sleep, and had survived the previous day on almost nothing but energy shots.

Think of a regular energy drink, Redbull, Monster, Rockstar, etc.. now remove anything they put in to make it taste remotely palatable. If you're thinking of those B12 “8 hour energy drinks”, in those little bottles, no. Right size, wrong contents. THOSE try to pretend to be healthy. The suckers I had been downing, (and wearing on my bandolier) were just good ole' toxins. Taurine, and all his little buddies.
It might have had something to do with how much sleep I got.

Protip: Bet on black. Or, avoid all of these if you plan to.. you know.. not wreck yourself.

But no worries, this was VCON, and that's my standard operating procedure for VCON. As I sat up, I made an “ohhh” groan. It wasn't my voice.

It was Morgan.

Good morning, Joseph. I was watching you sleep.

Between damage done to my throat, the amount of sleep I didn't have, the alignment of the planets, whatever, I had trapped part of Morgan Freeman's essence within myself. Alone in the room, I spoke.. Yup It was Morgan.

I talked to myself continuously as I got dressed, musing how this happened, and hoping the real Morgan was all right, and not in some kind of coma. Of course, I later learned that he did not die, at least.

Once I had myself put together, I did a practice read of a short story I was going to do a public reading of later in the day. Morgan NAILED it. I seriously considered having Morgan to the reading when the time came, but by early afternoon, Morgan had pretty much left me.

I used to occasionally do a Morgan Freeman impression. It was recognizable, but not great. I can't sound like I did that morning any more, Morgan has returned to his own body, but he left me with a lesson or two-

My Morgan Freeman impression has improved, and I have a second celebrity to think of when I have to slow down a public reading. Johnny Cash could use some time off.

To play with his kitten in heaven, or something, I guess.