Feedback is our weekly column of bizarre stories, implausible advertising claims, confusing instructions and more
Traditional error messages
FEEDBACK was mildly puzzled that online and email error messages failed to feature among the 10 milestone achievements of our species (25 October). This prompted a colleague to report how the grand traditions of the analogue equivalent are being maintained and upheld.
The colleague emailed a document to members of the UK鈥檚 House of Lords. One member asked for a paper copy. Our colleague thought he鈥檇 just drop one off at the Lords鈥� entrance to their House. The white-tied (and likely special-forces-trained) guardian there gravely informed him that if his Lordship were not to collect the envelope by 5pm, it would have to be destroyed. Therefore it could not be accepted. No, Sir, not even if you give us signed permission to destroy it. Error 001: potentially undeliverable mail refused.
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Why not, the grand attendant asked, go through the security checks at the plebeians鈥� entrance to the Houses of Parliament and take the document to the keeper of the lordly pigeonholes? Because, the policeman there insisted, no document could be thus delivered unless it had been X-rayed by the post room, down the alley by the Red Lion pub. No, X-raying it at the plebs鈥� entrance would not do. Error 002: wrong kind of X-ray.
Rushing to the post room the colleague encountered a man in a purple shirt who kindly agreed to pass on the document. Er鈥� he鈥檇 seen the Lord Bishop speaking in the House, but couldn鈥檛 recall his diocese鈥� thank you, Coventry, for divine intervention.
Brunello Nucci sends a photo of a sign outside a church in Greenwich, Connecticut, offering 鈥渜uantum spirituality鈥�
Held in the House
A BELT and braces approach being useful in cases of delivery error, Feedback鈥檚 colleague followed up the attempts chronicled above by taking a copy of the document to the parliamentary post room. Error 003: document must be in an envelope to be X-rayed.
A friendlier policeman allowed him to put it through the X-ray machine in a plastic folder and continue to the post room. That provoked a flashback to talking with anti-war protesters who had been held and, after intervention by a lawyer, fed, in that place. Apparently, the last person to occupy the traditional cell in the Clock Tower was in 1880. The colleague managed to restrain himself and avoid discovering where miscreants are now held.
Lords and revenants
ALL the above was connected with a in which, rather wonderfully, Lords discussed the meaning of 鈥渞evenant鈥�. If a literary or artistic work whose creator cannot be located is described as an 鈥渙rphan work鈥�, surely when its 鈥減arent鈥� creator shows up they are no-longer-dead 鈥� or 鈥渞evenant鈥�.
Saving the spooks鈥� site
HEALTH hazards rarely have upsides. An exception lurks in the Grunewald forest near Berlin, at , a 120-metre mound built from second world war rubble on the remains of Albert Speer鈥檚 military college. The US National Security Agency then erected towers and radomes on it to spy on the East.
Computer storage could not cope with the vast amount of snoop data, so everything was printed on paper. The paper then had to be burned on-site for security. For safety, the enormous storage and incinerator buildings were thick with asbestos.
Developers who got control of the site at the end of the cold war built one show flat, then ran out of money for asbestos clearance. New owners have hermetically sealed the storage and incinerator buildings. There is some very fine graffiti art, and talk of a spy museum. All thanks to asbestos.
Managementgonads goes quantum
INEVITABLY, the magical invocation of quantum mechanics has spread into the field of creative writing that Feedback, seeking to avoid both sexism and obscenity filters, files under 鈥渕anagementgonads鈥�. Leila Whitney forwards a press release plugging a text entitled: 鈥�.鈥� Its premise is that we must avoid 鈥渜uarky behaviour鈥�. That鈥檚 defined as emitting 鈥渟mall, negative message clouds (strange quarks)鈥�, such as frowning when someone spouts rubbish.
Our sense of lexical symmetry now demands that theorists come up with a model of fundamental physics including a particle called the 鈥渟nark鈥�.
Quarks made simple
THINGS are so much simpler in the world of management consultancy portrayed in the press release mentioned above. Apparently, 鈥渋n quantum physics, quarks are so tiny that they are almost impossible to see鈥�. Leila Whitney proposes a much cheaper alternative to the Large Hadron Collider, 鈥減erhaps with a hand lens?鈥�
And now we retrieve a message from Brian Clegg, more closely following the spirit of the wonderfully named PR agency . He suggests that the firm buys the author of the press release a copy of his latest book. All right then, Brian. It鈥檚 .
Future computing now
FINALLY, while informing the world about the latest science and technology news, this publication suggested on Facebook that 鈥渨e might log on to future computers simply by having them watch our mouths as we speak鈥�.
Glyn Williams 鈥渞ather likes the idea of being able to log on to future computers, instead of having to wait to log on to them in the future鈥�.