Posthuman Blues

Fear and loathing in Kansas City

I live in a pretty cool apartment building. Best of all, I live on the top floor, where I can take in the madding crowds and occasional car wrecks. Right behind my building is a formidable high-rise called the Sulgrave, which was recently refurbished and equipped with a rooftop light sculpture that looks something like a tube of radioactive toothpaste. The Sulgrave's condominums run in the $400,000 range. Unfortunately, I just don't make that kind of money writing books about alien artifacts and I've never had an opportunity to go inside this place until today, when there was an open house. (Not quite "Architectural Digest" level quality, but close.)

The second condo I entered had a balcony, so I walked outside to check out the view. The door shut behind me. And locked. I pounded on the glass and knocked desperately, hoping some Sulgrave resident would take notice. Ten minutes or so later, I glimpsed a man walk past in the barely visible hallway inside; I started yelling and he rescued me. He thought my story was pretty funny, and made sure the door wouldn't lock from the inside again. Presumably this wasn't part of the open house. I finished my "tour" hastily and made for the coffee shop.

There's a good chance that if I hadn't made a lot of noise, I never would have been seen. I'd still by out there on that balcony, trying to sleep and probably warding off vertiginous nightmares.

Anyway, the day wasn't altogether the queasy waste it could have been. For example, I added an article on the collapse of New Hampshire's "Old Man in the Mountain" to my Mars site and got pretty damned close to finishing Ken MacLeod's "Dark Light."