Dunwich in Crisis or at a Crossroads or Something or Other that Starts With a C

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Cthulhu

The partisan divide that has attended the upcoming Witch Burning Referendum has ripped away the illusion of civility and civic spirit here in Dunwich.  The latest flashpoint has been a state commission’s report that witch burning as currently practiced, falls afoul of Arkham’s stringent state greenhouse gas emissions standards.  The review has declared that from now on witches will have to be burned using solar power.

An opinion solicited by the First Selectman from the leading solar energy researcher at Miskatonic University, Professor Nehemiah Scrimshaw was obtained by this newspaper and a few of his conclusions were:

  • There are only 0.00035 seconds of usable sunlight in Dunwich per month.
  • In order to fully oxidize an average sized witch in that window of time, a magnifying glass with a diameter of 10,000 miles would be needed and this device would weigh in at 6.9 X 1023 tons and would require an enormous nuclear power plant to power the servo motors to maintain the focusing function correctly.
  • The professor also estimated that it would require forty or fifty years to obtain the needed licenses from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and until the licensing was in effect no witch burnings would be permitted at all.

Parenthetically, the professor remarked that since the mass of the magnifying device would be approximately a hundred times the mass of the Earth the actual means by which the device would be manufactured and tethered to Dunwich was unachievable using current human science and engineering.  But he did say it posed an interesting thought experiment for his current graduate students.

We tried to reach First Selectman Cthulhu for comment but the reporter we sent has gone missing.  Our eye in the sky OCF traffic copter was able to spot the First Selectman as he bee-lined for the state capital in Arkham.  Based on the debris field in his wake it is estimated that not much will remain of the state house or most of the downtown area of Arkham.  But it seems this will put to rest the question of state environmental permitting and also state government in general for that matter.

It is worth noting that the anti-witch burning party has within the hour disbanded its headquarters, erased its Facebook and Twitter pages and from what we can tell left town heading south at a good clip.  And in fact, there was a goodly caravan of pro-witch citizens joining them.  The Town Clerk’s office has described the results of the referendum (which was supposed to occur tomorrow) as completed, audited and certified to have been unanimous to extend witch burning to 24/7/365.  And the other selectmen have hurriedly and unanimously passed an appropriation for fifty tons of the first Selectman’s favorite bath salts.

At press time it was noted that on his return from the state capital the First Selectman detoured to pass through the campus of Miskatonic University and it is now believed that Professor Scrimshaw has retired from active teaching and also, sadly, from breathing.  But he’ll always be remembered for his remarkable lack of a sense of self preservation.

Kudos to Elon Musk for Turning Twitter Around

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Six months into his tenure as “head twit” Musk says:

“Twitter Could Be ‘Cash-Flow Positive’ Within Months“

“Elon Musk said Twitter Inc. has a shot at being cash-flow positive next quarter, and he is optimistic about the company’s future after what he called a difficult past few months.

“I definitely don’t want to count chickens before they hatch,” he added Tuesday about his latest expectations for the company’s financial situation.

Mr. Musk, who acquired Twitter and took over as its chief executive in October, said the company would have gone bankrupt in four months if he hadn’t taken steps to rein in the company’s expenditures. … He also said Twitter faces around $1.5 billion in yearly interest payments on debt borrowed when he took the company private.”

The article says Twitter went from 8,000 employees to less than 2,000.  So he eliminated more that 75% of his employees and now it works better and cheaper than before.  You’ve got to ask if most of those 6,000+ salaries were worse than useless.  How many of them were making Twitter worse.

I’m curious exactly how many were former intelligence agency employees whose real job was spying on the public.

Well, however he did it I commend him for the start he’s made and his future steps to make the company profitable and useful to the general public. And now that I’m a dues paying blue check twit I say let’s get OCF the viral status it so richly deserves.

Well done Elon.

08MAR2023 – Dunwich Complainer – Retail Democracy

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Cthulhu

This week Dunwich will celebrate old style New England democracy at its most authentic.  We’re going to have a referendum.  Back in 1653 the Town Elders codified a law that banned witch burning on every day but Monday.  The intent was that this would provide the maximum time before Sunday for the smell to dissipate.  The puritans were deeply religious folk and they feared to offend the Lord by allowing burnt witch funk to permeate their worship.

Fast forward three hundred some odd years later and Dunwich is a much less pious place.  And witch burning is big business.  Having an inhabitant declared a witch and burned at the stake is the town’s most lucrative revenue stream.  You see, the statute declares that the possessions, real and personal, of the convicted witch are forfeited to the town and can then be sold at auction.  Of course, the successful accuser of the witch stands to gain a 10% commission from the proceeds of the sale, tax free.  So, the trials are stacked up like planes circling Arkham airport.

And that’s the problem.  Whereas the trials are getting banged out day in and day out, the burnings are way, way behind.  The municipal witch pit can only accommodate fifteen burnings a week.  So, there are currently twelve hundred witches cooling their heels waiting for stake time.  Now the witches aren’t complaining.  They’re willing to wait forever to be honest.  But the town budget is a mess.  First Selectman Cthulhu has already spent all the money that the backlog represents on aromatic bath salts.  He’s a big proponent of the long languid soak in a tub.  Although in his case the tub is reworked municipal reservoir.  But suffice it to say that requires an awful lot of bath salts.  And now the bath salt merchandisers refuse to float him any more credit until he squares his accounts.

Well, he’s finally lost his patience and has threatened to eat everyone in town alphabetically unless a referendum repeals the “Monday only” part of the witch burning law right away.  And so, we’re set to vote this week.  We’ve set up the “no electioneering” line 75 feet from the polling area as state law requires but being hundreds of feet tall Cthulhu has threatened to toe the line but lean his head through the gymnasium skylight to watch over the voting and eat anyone who votes no on the petition.  Last we heard; the poll workers say there’s nothing in the handbook to forbid this activity.  This seems a little suspect to me but I know the First Selectman is a fairly persuasive character when up close and personal.

The Dunwich electorate is a feisty group.  Several of our oldest and most religious citizens have openly declared that they will vote no.  To ensure that nothing tragic befalls us the Town Clerk has decided to call in Dominion to provide the ballot reading machines, and in that way, fortify democracy or at least prevent us all from being eaten alphabetically.

Well, I’m a little sad to see the old ways discarded one by one.  It will certainly change the character of the town to have acrid black witch smoke wafting around town twenty-four seven.  It’s been proposed to replace the witch burning pit with a modern natural gas fired witch kiln with a two-hundred-and-fifty-foot stack to send the smoke down wind to Arkham.  With that kind of automation, the danger will be that we may completely depopulate the town in a couple of months.

And I guess that’s the way of progress.  But I’ll miss the days when a man could bring his family to the witch burning pit and get good seats from which to hiss at the old crones and maybe even chuck a rock or two at them.

Well, we have to be realistic and live in the present.