Maybe. Then again, maybe not. I’ve a feeling that Ira is a lot like Claudius from “I, Claudius” by Robert Graves and that he knows enough to tell a hawk from a handsaw when the wind is Nor’ by Northwest! ^_~
Yes, it’s probably one of many. Dr. Lee probably selected it just for Ira because it controls the weather just within a few feet of his guard shack. I just hope he can handle an indoor hurricane.
Give a man a heater, and he’ll be warm for a few years.
Teach a man how to build a weather control device and he’ll show them, show them all!!! I mean, be warm for life.
Actually, she probably would have given him a heater, except she was expressly forbidden from spending money by management, and it’s well established that Dr. Lee has a very hard time going against doing whatever her employers ask of her.
If so, it’s a delusion shared by everyone else, since Not Being Mad was her primary purpose at A-Sig. She actually reminds me a lot of the description of Igors in Making Money, if we’re swapping Discworld references.
“[M]ost of the people who employed Igors were not conventionally sane. Ask them to build a storm attractor and a set of lightning storage jars and they would laugh at you. They needed, oh, how they needed someone in possession of a fully working brain, and every Igor was guaranteed to have at least one of those.”
Come to think of it, Discworld also has several characters who are so very sane they’re not normal. Ginny isn’t quite as bad as Jeremy Clockson, but maybe on the same level as Sane Alex from Going Postal.
The thing is, “mad scientist” is a misnomer. They’re not really scientists at all. They’re not using reproducible methods of pushing forward the boundaries of sapient knowledge. They’re doing the impossible through techniques that they barely grasp and other people can’t reproduce. What they’re doing isn’t science. It’s magic. They’re not scientists; they’re wizards whose trappings are technology.
Dr. Lee isn’t a wizard. She’s something stranger and more rare – unique in the setting, from what we’ve been told. She doesn’t have magic powers that she uses to craft magical devices. What she does is take the magical devices that wizards have crafted, and she makes them reproducible by ordinary mortals. She turns the magic into science.
Agatha Heterodyne tells us that any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science. Virginia Lee doesn’t do magic. She does the analysis.
Helen (from Narbonic) was shown to be writing research papers, though. It’s more like the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics than magic: less caring about how it works and more about how to make it work. Also, neither make any goddamn sense.
As I recall, Annex One’s had sufficient structural damage that there’s exposure to the elements — and while a lot of the more insane aspects of A1 are still running, basic infrastructural services like HVAC are not.
So a weather control device (which therefore wouldn’t use basic infrastructural services) is eminently practical if you want to keep the building climate controlled.
And waitasec… “Dr. Jones can build it for you”? Is Tigerlily still in control of Annex One? Also, Ginny may have checked the internal security cameras, but clearly not the local-airspace records. You’d think she’d know by now….
Surely anyone with the right knowledge and experience could build Virginia’s entirely sensible weather control machine. I am intrigued by the notion that Tigerlily would ever consider “building it for him”, though.
Tigerlily is still in control of Annex One, which she’s turned into her funky lair, as per the last storyline. Skin Horse is no longer operating out of Annex One.
It’s kind of an ideal situation, really. Tigerlily Jones is happy, but she’s also being contained and monitored and almost certainly analyzed from afar, letting Anasigma/black ops social services mine her for inventions without acknowledging that’s what they’re doing.
What, you thought Ira was going into work every day purely because he forgot? He’s clearly still picking up a paycheck.
2. This is an interesting glimpse into how Dr. Lee’s mind works. I agree that if she’s not a madgirl yet, it probably is only a matter of time. I wonder if the plans will become a Chekov’s Gun later?
In case you missed it in the comments below… DON’T PUT SPOILERS IN THE COMMENTS. Even if you preface it with the word “spoiler”, it’s still a spoiler, and they’re frowned upon around here.
Anything Ira says may or may not be foreshadowing. Unfortunately, no one he says it to will actually know whether it was important until the moment arrives – and perhaps not even then. Recall the insane ramblings he mumbled to Dr. Sanders, which turned out to be eerily accurate and useful in his quest to win Tigerlily’s contest. Yet Chris didn’t know it was anything but gibberish until the last minute.
And for all we know, there may be a to/from tag on the gift with Virginia’s name on it, so he might not be “remembering” much of anything.
Aw, he remembered her name.
Also, him forgetting the plans in three…two…
Maybe. Then again, maybe not. I’ve a feeling that Ira is a lot like Claudius from “I, Claudius” by Robert Graves and that he knows enough to tell a hawk from a handsaw when the wind is Nor’ by Northwest! ^_~
Barbarian: “hawk from a handsaw” was originally from Hamlet.
I do agree, though: he’s probably only half crazy.
I hope Ira is now working at the hew Skin Horse building.
It doesn’t look like it. And the fact that Dr. Lee suggests having Tigerlily build the device for him implies that he is indeed back at A1.
I seem to remember weather control devices being the first step down the road to madness.
Yeah, so she’s probably seen a lot of blueprints for those, given that it’s been her job to study the inventions of mad scientists.
Yes, it’s probably one of many. Dr. Lee probably selected it just for Ira because it controls the weather just within a few feet of his guard shack. I just hope he can handle an indoor hurricane.
She gives him weather control machine plans instead of a heater. Mad Science Logic in a nutshell.
Give a man a heater, and he’ll be warm for a few years.
Teach a man how to build a weather control device and he’ll show them, show them all!!! I mean, be warm for life.
Actually, she probably would have given him a heater, except she was expressly forbidden from spending money by management, and it’s well established that Dr. Lee has a very hard time going against doing whatever her employers ask of her.
Is Ira suddenly sinister for anyone else?
Suddenly? No. Ira’s been the prime suspect for the “real” identity behind Mr. Green for a long while now.
That’s nuts. You’re nuts. I’m nuts ’cause that actually makes sense to me.
She’s not Mad, but that’s not the same thing as being sane.
That is what dried frog pills are for.
Thank you for refreshing a lovely memory.
I think she is just very very sane
Perhaps even “yzarc”? (compare to “knurd”)
Seriously though, I think she’s pretty much Mad, it’s just that her primary delusion is that she’s the sanest one of all.
If so, it’s a delusion shared by everyone else, since Not Being Mad was her primary purpose at A-Sig. She actually reminds me a lot of the description of Igors in Making Money, if we’re swapping Discworld references.
“[M]ost of the people who employed Igors were not conventionally sane. Ask them to build a storm attractor and a set of lightning storage jars and they would laugh at you. They needed, oh, how they needed someone in possession of a fully working brain, and every Igor was guaranteed to have at least one of those.”
Come to think of it, Discworld also has several characters who are so very sane they’re not normal. Ginny isn’t quite as bad as Jeremy Clockson, but maybe on the same level as Sane Alex from Going Postal.
The thing is, “mad scientist” is a misnomer. They’re not really scientists at all. They’re not using reproducible methods of pushing forward the boundaries of sapient knowledge. They’re doing the impossible through techniques that they barely grasp and other people can’t reproduce. What they’re doing isn’t science. It’s magic. They’re not scientists; they’re wizards whose trappings are technology.
Dr. Lee isn’t a wizard. She’s something stranger and more rare – unique in the setting, from what we’ve been told. She doesn’t have magic powers that she uses to craft magical devices. What she does is take the magical devices that wizards have crafted, and she makes them reproducible by ordinary mortals. She turns the magic into science.
Agatha Heterodyne tells us that any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science. Virginia Lee doesn’t do magic. She does the analysis.
… but not being a wizard doesn’t mean that she can’t be a little off-kilter.
Kudos! You’ve put into words what I felt but could not.
Virginia will always do the right thing…when someone tells her what it is.
Helen (from Narbonic) was shown to be writing research papers, though. It’s more like the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics than magic: less caring about how it works and more about how to make it work. Also, neither make any goddamn sense.
“She does the analysis.”
That effectively makes her a scientist. And as we all know, magic is just science that we don’t yet understand.
In other words, mad “scientists” are really mad engineers.
I’ve got a catchy name for it: a “thermostat.”
…or how about “anthropogenic climate change”?
You’re not allowed to say that in this brave new revisionist reality.
As I recall, Annex One’s had sufficient structural damage that there’s exposure to the elements — and while a lot of the more insane aspects of A1 are still running, basic infrastructural services like HVAC are not.
So a weather control device (which therefore wouldn’t use basic infrastructural services) is eminently practical if you want to keep the building climate controlled.
And waitasec… “Dr. Jones can build it for you”? Is Tigerlily still in control of Annex One? Also, Ginny may have checked the internal security cameras, but clearly not the local-airspace records. You’d think she’d know by now….
She doesn’t have to be in control of anything: who else do they know that can build something like that?
Surely anyone with the right knowledge and experience could build Virginia’s entirely sensible weather control machine. I am intrigued by the notion that Tigerlily would ever consider “building it for him”, though.
She may not have gotten done turning that one into science, so Ira will need the services of a wizard to have it crafted.
Tigerlily will do it just so she can make “improvements”.
Tigerlily is still in control of Annex One, which she’s turned into her funky lair, as per the last storyline. Skin Horse is no longer operating out of Annex One.
It’s kind of an ideal situation, really. Tigerlily Jones is happy, but she’s also being contained and monitored and almost certainly analyzed from afar, letting Anasigma/black ops social services mine her for inventions without acknowledging that’s what they’re doing.
What, you thought Ira was going into work every day purely because he forgot? He’s clearly still picking up a paycheck.
1. Poor Nick.
2. This is an interesting glimpse into how Dr. Lee’s mind works. I agree that if she’s not a madgirl yet, it probably is only a matter of time. I wonder if the plans will become a Chekov’s Gun later?
Slightly spoilery notice from the future: the plans were, in fact, a Chekov’s Gun. Nice job on past readers for predicting that!
In case you missed it in the comments below… DON’T PUT SPOILERS IN THE COMMENTS. Even if you preface it with the word “spoiler”, it’s still a spoiler, and they’re frowned upon around here.
This is going to come up later…
I certainly hope so.
OH dang. For some reason I feel like Ira remembering her name is foreshadowing or something like that.
Anything Ira says may or may not be foreshadowing. Unfortunately, no one he says it to will actually know whether it was important until the moment arrives – and perhaps not even then. Recall the insane ramblings he mumbled to Dr. Sanders, which turned out to be eerily accurate and useful in his quest to win Tigerlily’s contest. Yet Chris didn’t know it was anything but gibberish until the last minute.
And for all we know, there may be a to/from tag on the gift with Virginia’s name on it, so he might not be “remembering” much of anything.
I think it is more telling that she is Virginia to him, not Dr Lee.
Just tagging on here to say: THE GUY BELOW DROPPED A MILD SPOILER.
Now just 299hrs and 57minutes of community service left to do.
On re-read, this is a crucial moment.
Leaving spoilers in the comments for new readers to find is pretty damn rude, you know.
I would be perfectly happy if Shaenon and Jeff would delete spoilers.
SPOILER: I come from the future, and in the future, I come here to comment on the past future people of the past.
At least they were kind of vague about it.
You know, even looking back on this today, this is still very sweet. <3