Page 61 - Psychoceramics and the Test of Fire

Homeostatopia

the ruins of a “bad hair day,” but it was unavoidable in that rolling
solar cooker in which I’d arrived.
Sauntering over to a couple of men sloshing slurry for adobe
bricklaying, I hooked one thumb in the front pocket of my two-
hundred-dollar jeans and said, “Howdy, gents. Know where I can
find Harold Peña?”
The older one wiped his hands on his overalls and squinted up at
me. “Sure. That’s me. What can I do for you?”
I smiled broadly, even foolishly. “Now, this is a pleasure. I’ve
heard all about you, sir, and, well, as far as what you can do for me,
that’s a very interesting question. In fact, I was going to ask it of
you.”
He matched my candlepower in a broad grin. His looked real.
Maybe it was the eyes. I made a mental note to practice in front of a
mirror. He motioned toward the large kiln-igloo.
“Ask me anything you want. Why don’t you come inside and have
a drink?” He turned toward his coworker. “Take a break, Gridley.
This stuff could use a bit of drying out: I think we overdid the
water.”
I fell in beside him as he turned and headed for the GHQ of
Homeostatopia.
“I’m Gregory Arias, from Diurnal Falls, Idaho,” I averred, as
though my putative hometown, found only on yellowing maps of
abandoned resort towns, would be a nationally-known source of
pride to its native sons. “Just down in your neck of the woods to hit
the casinos. Felt lucky. I’m going back to my own stomping grounds
tonight, but I had to get by here first.”
“Well, I’m honored, Greg. Call me Hal, by the way. Everybody
does. Sometimes I think they’ve got that robot computer in mind;
you know, the one in that movie.”
He chuckled. Mr. Peña was no mechanical man. Far from it.
“Oh, yeah. I think I saw that—can’t think of the name right now.”
Can’t be Philistine enough in this persona! We entered the slightly
cooler gloom of a one-room structure modeled, I would guess, on
some nomadic pastoralist’s idea of a summer palace. My host stepped
down into a lower level of the floor and opened a cabinet built into
the earth. He took out a couple of bottles of beer.
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