Houston, 2015: Miss Uncertainty

Genres. I must select the right genre! Let see… Action Thriller Detective SF. Space Opera SF. Post-Nuclear Apocalypse SF. Zombie Apocalypse SF. Fantasy SF. Combat Fantasy SF. And even, holy crap: Post-Nuclear Combat Magical Fantasy SF. The last is when Major Ferelli, from The Year Zero, whacks the good goblins with his annihilation torpedo. The surviving Houstonites, all in gas masks, rush along the smoldering radioactive ruins to finish off zombies, mutants, or evil ninja turtles. The brave use magic spells and silver-tipped arrows. Silver-tipped, naturally.

In literary genres, they have some obscure laws. Of them – I understand next to nothing. Being an oilman, I have my own laws!

Here comes the Young's Modulus, with its buddy, the Ultimate Strength. If you load a drillpipe beyond its Ultimate Strength, sooner or later the pipe snaps and whacks you – in the head. So your bloody ‘protective’ hard-hat finds its way into your ‘protective’ steel-caps boots. You can mumble magic spells, or pray to the God of All Drill Pipes, or take a proper grip on your favorite semi-automatic. The law-respecting Wicked Flying Pipe does not care less. By law, it must whack. The Law of Physics, you know? As for my genre, it must be… Not-So-Alternative-History. I fashion no annihilation torpedoes, but as far as the Space-Time Collisions – I have them plenty.

What am I about? Ah, so those Laws of Physics, damn it! The Law of Conservation of Energy, AKA The First Principle of Thermodynamics. Have you studied it at school long time ago? Forgotten? Never heard? Too bad. This very Law is playing a cruel practical joke with all the inhabitants of the planet Earth, including you, Dear Reader! A joke so practical and so cruel, the Wicked Flying Pipe from the previous paragraph looks a harmless schoolyard prank. Intrigued?