Podcasts about perhaps i'm

RACISM IS NOT ABOUT RACISM is a deep dive - perhaps opinionated - into the possible origin of racism. It's not racism that causes racism. We have to look much deeper! This is a rant on tracing racism way back to where it all started... join me to see what you think? Perhaps I'm wrong and I'm open to that. Perhaps you have an insight that could help us all? Perhaps you wanna share your own voice or opinion on the matter? Visit www.youlovelifepodcast.com to have a constructive conversation around this topic. After all, I am committed to creating a world that works for everyone! Show Notes (Dictionary Deep Dive): Racism Prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior. Prejudice Preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience. Discrimination The unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people or things, especially on the grounds of race, age, or sex. Antagonism Active hostility or opposition. Race A race is a grouping of humans based on shared physical or social qualities into categories generally viewed as distinct by society. Superior Higher in rank, status, or quality. Unjust Not based on or behaving according to what is morally right and fair. Morally In a way that is considered right according to the code of behavior of a particular society. Right Morally good, justified, or acceptable. Code A set of rules and standards adhered to by a society, class, or individual Rules One of a set of explicit or understood regulations or principles governing conduct within a particular activity or sphere. Fair In accordance with the rules or standards; legitimate. Standards Principles of conduct informed by notions of honor and decency. Honor Adherence to what is right or to a conventional standard of conduct. Acceptable Able to be agreed on; suitable. Agree Have the same opinion about something; concur Opinion A view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge Judgement An opinion or conclusion Decency Behavior that conforms to accepted standards of morality or respectability Conforms Comply with rules, standards, or laws Laws The system of rules which a particular country or community recognizes as regulating the actions of its members and which it may enforce by the imposition of penalties (Stereotype) A widely held but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing.

We live in a pretty clown like Universe that is for sure. I'm sure Cardi B has earned her way to the top. It is pretty wild however, to think that this female rapper is the voice of a generation & or perhaps a certain demographic within the United States. She is a mediocre rapper & a former raunchy stripper yet somehow she has been propelled to the top of the entertainment culture? She is now starting to have more strong opinions within the politics game despite having much or any of an education in that realm. Ultimately, Cardi B's presence in Culture is a sign of the times that were in. With Cardi B rocking with Bernie Sanders, It might be the right opportunity to return to Reality. I'm partly joking & I'm partly serious! Perhaps I'm way off base when it comes to the new Queen of Rap?

Author Rachel Vorona Cote joins Suchandrika Chakrabarti on Freelance Pod's first birthday episode, to talk about grieving in a digital age. We first spoke after I read Rachel's Longreads piece, The Fraught Culture of Online Mourning (https://longreads.com/2019/05/21/the-fraught-culture-of-online-mourning/), earlier this year. Rachel had lost her mother 18 months before writing the essay. She took to the internet during her mother's last illness, tweeting updates. Soon after her death, Rachel wrote Dead Mom Soundtrack, or the Top 5 Songs About Losing Your Mother (https://pitchfork.com/thepitch/dead-mom-soundtrack-or-the-top-5-songs-about-losing-your-mother/?mbid=homepage-more-latest-and-video), for Pitchfork.  As someone who lost their parents in an analogue age, I'm fascinated by how the internet has enabled greater visibility for the bereaved. It's possible to find people in a similarly painful and isolating state anywhere in the world, and to have meaningful, cathartic conversations without ever meeting - as Rachel and I have.  I've left in Rachel's side of the conversation, where she talks about my early experiences of grief. Perhaps I'm not ready to get into them on this podcast yet; it's too intimate. She mentions a couple of personal essays I've written, so here are links: Grief doesn’t have five stages (https://theoutline.com/post/6135/unconventional-wisdom-no-stages-of-grief?zd=2&zi=nn56rjpu) The storage unit that became a portal to my childhood home (https://www.curbed.com/2019/10/10/20905310/story-deceased-parents-grief-storage-units) Check out Rachel's book Too Much (https://www.amazon.com/Too-Much-Victorian-Constraints-Still/dp/1538729709/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1EA01G90E9E34&keywords=too+much+rachel+vorona+cote&qid=1559599468&s=gateway&sprefix=too+much+rac%2Caps%2C123&sr=8-1), which is available to pre-order now, and is published in February 2020.  Don't forget that there are still tickets available for Freelance Pod's third live recording of the year, at the Boulevard Theatre in Soho. They're only £12, and what else are you doing this Sunday evening? (https://boulevardtheatre.co.uk/whats-on/sunday-service-podcasts-2/)   -- How has your industry moved from analogue to digital? Each episode, creative guests tell host Suchandrika Chakrabarti how the internet has revolutionised work. Newsletter: https://suchandrika.substack.com/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/freelancepod/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/freelance_pod_ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/FreelancePod/ YouTube: https://goo.gl/chfccD 

Hi and welcome back to Weekly Dev Tips. I’m your host Steve Smith, aka Ardalis. This is episode 36, in which we'll discuss a question I recently received about guard clauses and exceptions. If you’re enjoying these tips, please leave a comment or rating in your podcast app, tell a friend about the podcast, or follow us on twitter and retweet our episode announcements so we can increase our audience. I really appreciate it. Exceptions and Guard Clauses This week's tip is on the topic guard clauses and exceptions. Specifically, whether and when it's appropriate to throw an exception in response to certain kinds of inputs. Sponsor - devBetter Group Career Coaching for Developers If you're not advancing as quickly in your career as you'd like, you may find value in joining a semi-formal career and technical coaching program like devBetter.com. I launched devBetter a few months ago and so far we have a small group of motivated developers meeting every week or two. I answer questions, review code, suggest areas in which to improve, and occasionally assign homework. Interested? Learn more at devBetter.com. Show Notes / Transcript As a bit of background, I described Guard Clauses in Episode 4. If you're listening to these shows in most-recent-first order, I suggest you configure your podcast app to let you listen in order and then start back with episode 1. You'll thank me later. In any case, a guard clause is a check you make at the start of a function or method that throws an exception if some input is not valid. For instance, you could have a function that is supposed to send an email to an email address that's provided as a string argument. If the string is null, it might throw an ArgumentNullException or something similar before attempting to create and send the email. If you like the guard clause pattern, I have a nuget package you can use to easily add and extend them in a consistent fashion in your applications - look for the link in the show notes. Listener Jeremy C. writes: i discovered your podcast recently, and am going through it. I love the Guard class shortcut for happy path. What i noticed, is that this behavior relies exclusively on throwing exceptions rather than what I learned (20 years ago) in school that exceptions are for the unexpected, and if you can reliably prevent throwing an exception, like checking for a null and handling it, you should to avoid the execution cost of exception handling. Is my information just out-dated? :) Perhaps I'm too old of a coder and too many old habits are stuck. It's true that exceptions should not be used for control flow in your applications. That means if it's a normal condition for a function to get a null as an argument, perhaps because that situation means "create a new thing" instead of "do something with this thing", then you wouldn't want to write code that depended on an exception being thrown for its behavior. For example, you wouldn't want to have a try block that tried to work with the object, and then a catch block that caught the NullReferenceException when it was null and created a new instance there. There's plenty of reference material you can find about why this is considered a bad practice. In my opinion there are two main reasons. One is performance - exceptions are far more expensive than if statements so you shouldn't use them where an if statement is more appopriate. This is the main one, and because of it, writing code that leverages try-catch statements for something more than error handling is unexpected. Developers will be surprised to see this approach, which violates the Principle of Least Astonishment. You want readers of your code to be able to immediately understand what it's doing, and surprising them by doing things in odd ways is contrary to that goal. Coming back to guard clauses, the idea is that you're setting up an expectation that under all normal conditions in your application you expect that these arguments will follow certain constraints. If they don't, the program's simply not going to work the way it should. In this case, an exception is the appropriate response and is more elegant than any other solution like returning a boolean value or magic number or null and the caller having to know to check for that result. Thanks Jeremy for the great question! After I answered, he summed it up like this: So the Guard Clause is for the situation of, "I told you the expected inputs, and while I'll protect myself from bad data, I'm not going to make a huge mess of if statements to protect myself, I'll pass the mess back to the code giving me crap." Pretty much. Show Resources and Links devBetter Guard Clauses Principle of Least Astonishment

It's easier to start the day healthy than to finish the day healthy. So, whatever you can do to front-load your day whether it be a workout, your green juice, or meditation, get as much done early in the day as possible. Allow yourself to be human and understand that it's going to be much harder to do any of that later in the day if you wait long enough. - Yuri Elkaim JOIN THE FACEBOOK GROUP | REVIEW THIS PODCAST  20% OFF ORGANIFI - USE CODE: WELLNESSFORCE How can you make being healthy as easy and simple as possible? What steps can you take to set yourself up for success from the very moment you wake up? On Wellness Force Radio episode 232, Registered Holistic Nutritionist, Author of The All-Day Energy Diet, Host of the Healthpreneur Podcast, and Founder of Healthpreneur, Yuri Elkaim, reveals how you can plan and front-load your day for health success, how to set up your environment to avoid daily decision fatigue, and why self-awareness is the first step towards moving in the right direction of changing and creating healthy habits. Find out how you can easily begin living a healthier lifestyle today through self-awareness, planning, and regular movement. "Front-load your day with a workout, green juice, or meditation. Get as much done as early as possible. Starting the day healthy is easier than finishing it healthy." - @yelkaim on @wellnessforce Radio episode 232 wellnessforce.com/232   Attend Healthpreneur LIVE in Scottsdale, Arizona from September 20-23, 2018 Healthpreneur™ LIVE provides an intimate "invite-only" environment for 150 visionary health, fitness, and wellness entrepreneurs to truly connect - at a deep level - with one another, learn from industry leaders, and implement breakthrough strategies to help serve more people, make more money, and enjoy more freedom. This special event takes place once per year at a 5-star paradise resort that reflects our attention to detail, intimacy, and quality. Our first event, in September 2017, gathered an extraordinary community of changemakers and visionary health and fitness entrepreneurs who are driven by epic ideas to impact the world, while creating a business and life they love. Our 100+ attendees were so blown away by the experience that the average rating was 9.87 (out of 10) and the net promoter score (ie. how willing are you to recommend this event to a friend?) was 96 (out of 100). Nearly everyone said it was the BEST EVENT they’d ever been to. At Healthpreneur™ LIVE you will receive powerful training, deep connections, unique experiences, and mindset shifts that will multiply your impact, income, and freedom so that you can play an even bigger game while enjoying the ride.   Listen To Episode 232 As Yuri Elkaim Uncovers: About his condition, Alopecia, and how that's impacted his view on health and wellness. His faith in himself and that the universe or a higher power is protecting and guiding him. Why and how he chooses to live in a positive state of mind when things go wrong rather than feel bad and pity himself. The moment he decided to stop covering up his hair loss and come out about it on YouTube and share what he was going through. His self-identity crisis of separating himself from his young pro-soccer player from his healthpreneur and business owner version. How your self-identity is truly created and in alignment when your personality, beliefs, and how you see yourself. Why changing how we look on the outside will automatically affect how we feel on the inside. How self-image is tied very closely to our personal standards. The fact that we're able to change the negative voice inside our head at any given moment we choose and how we can do exactly that. The truth and power in of believing that you are here for a reason. How your food cravings aren't actually physiological hunger cravings but psychological cravings caused by boredom, anxiety, or feelings of being out of control. Why self-awareness is the first step towards moving in the right direction of changing and creating healthy habits. How he sets his environment up to help him avoid daily decision fatigue. Why we as humans might not like having to make so many decisions on a regular basis and how structure = freedom. The key to front-loading your day - The benefits of tackling all your favorite health activities early in the morning - exercise, meditation, or drinking your green juice. How health coaches begin the conversation about decision fatigue and overwhelm with clients. Why he believes it's so important to be authentic and truly you on social media in order to attract the right clients for you. His steps on how to truly speak your truth with to your audience on followers online. Power Quotes From The Show "The easiest way for me to change how I feel and shift my mindset is to just start moving my body. Find your healthy outlet to really move your mind and body in a more positive matter." - @yelkaim on @wellnessforce Radio episode 232 wellnessforce.com/232 "When you give yourself a certain identity, you kind of box yourself into a stereotype to some degree. So, a lot of people with weight issues can't really identify or visualize themselves as a lean, thin, energetic person. The problem with that is if you can't even see that for yourself as a possibility, then you're not going to act in accordance with that. Our brain is never going to act or our body will never behave in discord with how we see ourselves. So, how we behave and our beliefs; all of this has to be congruent with how we see ourselves showing up in the world which is essentially our self-identity." - Yuri Elkaim "It's important for all of us to realize that we're here for a reason. I don't think we'd be here if there wasn't a reason. So tell yourself, 'I believe I'm here for a reason. Perhaps I'm not too sure what that is but I'm here which means that I'm here for a reason and I'm going to figure it out.' That is part of the spiritual journey of understanding yourself and achieving self-actualization." - Yuri Elkaim "Structure equals freedom. When we look at our lives and how we live our days, I really believe that a lot of people have to structure their day. How does structure give us more freedom? When you plan ahead, you don't have to think in the moment. When you think ahead of time, that alleviates the need to make those daily decisions. Meal planning works because the worst question you can ask yourself in the moment, especially with a family, is, 'What's for dinner?' If you ask that question when it's time for dinner, you've already lost the battle." - Yuri Elkaim   Links From Today's Show Yuri Elkaim Facebook Twitter Instagram YouTube Pinterest Healthpreneur Healthpreneur Live 2018 Facebook Instagram YouTube Healthpreneur Podcast Getting Past Your Emotional Demons to Create a Business Breakthrough with Josh Trent [Episode 125] From Soccer to Bed to No Hair On My Head (My Unusual Journey) The All-Day Energy Diet by Yuri Elkaim The All-Day Fat Burning Diet by Yuri Elkaim How to Beat Cancer: The Top 15 Cancer-Fighting Foods Yuri Elkaim: Raw Food Dieting, Where Vegans Go Wrong, and What Canadians Think of Canola Yuri Elkaim Quick Facts The Hero's Journey by Joseph Campbell Dr. Maxwell Maltz and Psycho-Cybernetics Tony Robbins WFR Free Guide: The Morning 21 WFR 046 Dr. John Gray   About Yuri Elkaim Yuri Elkaim is a bit of an outlier and renegade in the nutrition and health community. His mission is to empower everyday men and women with proper nutrition and health wisdom so they can take better control of their own health. Some refer to him as the "health whisperer" for being to get to the heart of what matters and produce amazing health, weight loss, and fitness results where there seemed little hope. He's a Registered Holistic Nutritionist and fitness expert most famous for skyrocketing his clients' energy almost overnight and helping them achieve athlete-like fitness...without gimmicks, following radical weight loss diets, or killing themselves in the gym. He's on a mission to transform the lives of more than 10 million people by 2018. He also holds a High Honours degree in Physical Education and Health/Kinesiology from the University of Toronto, is a former professional soccer player, and for 7 seasons acted as the strength & conditioning/nutrition coach for the nationally ranked men's soccer program at the University of Toronto. Most recently, he's the author of "The All-Day Energy Diet", published by Hay House. He is also the professor of Super Nutrition Academy, the author of Eating for Energy and the Total Wellness Cleanse, and the creator of more than 130 workout programs, including Fitter U, Fitter U Fitness, Amazing Abs Solution, and Treadmill Trainer. Yuri and his programs been featured across the nation's media including the Huffington Post, AskMen.com, US News & World Report, Breakfast Television, Perfect Fit, A-Channel Morning, CTV news, e-Talk Daily, Global News.       Get More Wellness In Your Life Join the WFR Community on facebook Send Josh Trent a personal message Tweet me on Twitter: Send us a fun tweet (or a what's up) Comment on the Facebook page Sign up to get an email alert whenever we release a new episode Support This Podcast Leave a 5 star review on iTunes Share this episode with someone you care about Contact Wellness Force Radio for podcast sponsorship and partnership opportunities Rate & Review Wellness Force ---> REVIEW THE PODCAST Ask A Live Question For The Next Episode ---> Click here to leave a voicemail directly to Josh Trent to be read live on the air.  You May Also Like These Episodes Food Freedom Forever With Melissa Hartwig Nir Eyal: Breaking Bad Habits, Technology Addiction, & Emotional Triggers Healthy, Happy & Harder To Kill w/ Steph Gaudreau of Stupid Easy Paleo Beyond Meditation: How To Get A Better Brain With Ariel Garten Living A Healthy Lifestyle In A Modern World With Dan Pardi Creating A Life Worth Living With Michael Strasner   Join the Wellness Force Newsletter: www.wellnessforce.com/news Don't miss next week's show: Subscribe and stay updated Did you like this show on Ketosis? Rate and review Wellness Force on iTunes You read all the way to the bottom? That's what I call love! Write to me and let me know what you'd like to have to get more wellness in your life.  

Maybe I can't change. Perhaps I'm condemned to be me. I suppose I'll never know why things are the way they are until I've noticed a few more details. This episode is a rant about how some people live their lives - and howvmy mind works too often for my own good

I'll be honest, I haven't seen this film since we did this podcast. I wasn't really keen on it at the time, and the passing of years has not been kind. Perhaps I'm just old and miserable now. Perhaps it isn't all that good.

Into the Nth Dimensionby David D. LevineThe fence around Dr. Diabolus's lair is twenty feet tall, electrified and topped with razor wire.  I'd expected no less.  From one of the many pouches at my belt I pull a pair of acorns and toss them at the base of the fence. I exert my special power.  Each acorn immediately sprouts, roots digging through asphalt as the leafy stem reaches skyward.  Wood fibers KRACKLE as the stems extend, lengthen, thicken, green skin changing to grayish bark in a moment.  Leaves SSHHH into existence; branches reach out to the neighbor tree, twining themselves into rungs. Before the twin oaks have reached their full height I spring into action, clambering up the living ladder as it grows, creeping along a limb even as it extends over the razor wire.  It's a dramatic, foolhardy move, but I can't delay -- Sprout is in peril!  The branch sags under my weight, lowering me to within ten feet of the ground, and I leap down with practiced ease. Full transcript after the cut:----more----Hello! Welcome to GlitterShip episode 22 for February ... 20th, oops. This is your host, Keffy, and I'm super excited to be sharing this story with you!Our story today is "Into the Nth Dimension" by David D. Levine, read by... David D. Levine.David is the author of novel Arabella of Mars, which will be out from Tor Books in July 2016, and over fifty science fiction and fantasy stories. His story “Tk’Tk’Tk” won the Hugo Award in 2006, and he has been shortlisted for awards including the Hugo, Nebula, Campbell, and Sturgeon. Stories have appeared in Asimov’s, Analog, F&SF, numerous Year’s Best anthologies, and his award-winning collection Space Magic.Oh, just one more thing! While I was putting this episode together the SFWA Nebula award nominations came out, and David JUST, as in, literally minutes ago, received a Nebula nomination for his story "Damage," which was released on Tor.com. Congratulations!GlitterShip would also like to congratulate some of the authors whose stories appeared in previous episodes: Ken Liu (Episode 15), was nominated for best Novel for his book "The Grace of Kings", Rose Lemberg (Episode 7) was nominated for her novelette "Grandmother-nai-Leylit's Cloth of Winds", and Sarah Pinsker (Episode 2) was also nominated for a novelette, "Our Lady of the Open Road."Ok. NOW you can listen to the story.Into the Nth Dimensionby David D. LevineThe fence around Dr. Diabolus's lair is twenty feet tall, electrified and topped with razor wire.  I'd expected no less.  From one of the many pouches at my belt I pull a pair of acorns and toss them at the base of the fence. I exert my special power.  Each acorn immediately sprouts, roots digging through asphalt as the leafy stem reaches skyward.  Wood fibers KRACKLE as the stems extend, lengthen, thicken, green skin changing to grayish bark in a moment.  Leaves SSHHH into existence; branches reach out to the neighbor tree, twining themselves into rungs. Before the twin oaks have reached their full height I spring into action, clambering up the living ladder as it grows, creeping along a limb even as it extends over the razor wire.  It's a dramatic, foolhardy move, but I can't delay -- Sprout is in peril!  The branch sags under my weight, lowering me to within ten feet of the ground, and I leap down with practiced ease. Again I concentrate, and the two trees wither away behind me, a gnawed patch of asphalt and a few stray leaves the only sign they'd ever existed.  I feel their pain as they wilt and die, but I don't want my intrusion discovered sooner than necessary.  The loss of their green and growing lives is just the latest of the many sacrifices I've made.  I press onward.Slippery elm makes short work of the side door lock; mushrooms blind security cameras and heat sensors.  These bright corridors, humming with electricity and weirder energies, are cold places of steel and concrete, offering me no plants or plant matter to leverage my powers.  I've faced worse.  I prowl quickly, silently, keeping my head down, all senses alert to any trace of the kidnapped Sprout.Voices!  I duck into an alcove as two of Dr. Diabolus's goons round the corner.  As soon as they've passed I spring out behind them, tossing seeds at their feet.  Fast-twining English ivy ensnares one before he can cry out, but the other evades its tendrils.  "Phyto-Man!" he gasps.POW! my fist responds.  He drops cold beside his still-struggling comrade, whose eyes glare with hatred above his smothered mouth.  I direct the ivy to bind the unconscious goon as well, so he'll raise no alarm when he awakes.Even their underwear is synthetic fiber.  Dr. Diabolus is thorough, I'll grant him that.Deeper and deeper into the cavernous lair I probe, keeping an eye on the pipes and conduits that line the ceiling, smaller leading to larger, following the branch to find the trunk.  I know Dr. Diabolus; wherever he's holding my sidekick it will be near his latest contrivance, and all his inventions require massive amounts of power. If only he'd gone solar instead of stealing plutonium, we might have been allies.At last I come to a massive, vault-like door, all steel and chrome, set in a concrete wall into which many thick conduits vanish.  But nothing is more persistent than a plant.  I tuck dozens of tiny dandelion seeds into the crack between door and jamb.  Their indomitable roots reach deep, swelling and prying, until with a WHANGG of tearing metal the door bursts from its frame. With my own muscles I wrench the shattered door aside and burst into the chamber.  Dr. Diabolus turns to me, cape swirling.  "You disappoint me, Phyto-Man," he sneers, his artificial eye glowing red.  "I expected you here half an hour ago.""Traffic was terrible," I quip.  The chamber is dominated by a complex machine, seething with arcane energies that make my head swim, but there's no sign of Sprout.  "What have you done with my sidekick, you fiend?""I sent him to... the Nth Dimension!"  He pulls a lever on the control panel before him.  A ten-foot iris of blue steel in the center of the machine SNICKs open, revealing...Looking into the opening makes my eyes feel like they're being pulled out of my head.  It's as though all the colors of the palette have somehow been smeared together with... others... forming impossible combinations of hue and tone that swirl sickeningly.  But worse than that, the weird amalgam of color seems to bend... around a corner that isn't there.  It's painful to see, even harder to look away.CHANGG!  Something hard and cold fastens onto my bicep, breaking the spell.  "What?" I cry.  Before I can move, a second steel claw CHANGGs onto my other arm.  CHANGG!  CHANGG!  CHANGG!  I'm caught like a fly, steel bracelets ringing my arms, legs, and neck.  Jointed metal arms haul me off the floor, suspend me in the air before the gloating Dr. Diabolus. "HAHAHAHAHA!" he laughs as I struggle in vain.  "You've foiled my plans for the last time, Phyto-Man!""If you've harmed Sprout--!" I growl through clenched teeth, straining against the imprisoning metal."My dear Phyto-Man, I must confess... I don't know!"  He works the controls and the arms propel me, none too gently, toward the yawning portal.  The uncanny colors swirl crazily, filling my vision, seeming to tug at every fiber of my being.  "But whatever has become of your Sprout, you will shortly be joining him there.  Bon voyage, Emerald Avenger!"The arms thrust me forward.  With a SPRANK! the five claws open simultaneously, flinging me into the swirling abyss.A hard, gritty surface presses against my side.  I'm cold, my head is spinning, and everything hurts.  There's a thin, rushing sound off in the distance.  Traffic?I sit up and open my eyes.  And immediately I wish I hadn't.There's nothing to see but a cracked and filthy concrete floor and my own hands, but they're all wrong... seriously wrong.  The floor curves away from me in every direction -- the same impossible curvature I'd seen in Dr. Diabolus's portal -- despite the fact that it looks and feels flat.  And the surface looks like... like concrete multiplied by itself.  Cracks are crackier.  Grit is grittier.  It's all realer than real; it pounds on my eyes as though I were staring into the sun, though there's barely any light.  And the color is not just gray, but a weird amalgam of thousands of different grays blended smoothly together.  A whole shining rainbow of grays.My heart is pounding.   I've faced death many times, fought monsters, escaped from traps, but I've never experienced anything this disturbing.  Always before the threat came from outside, but now it's me -- my own perceptions -- that have changed.My hands, too, are a disconcerting, amplified version of themselves.  I turn them before my eyes, and as they rotate I seem to see both sides at the same time as the front.  In color they are... kind of an ultra-pink, not the plain pink I've seen every day of my life but an eye-hurting blend of unnatural shades.  Pinks that don't exist, have never existed.  And as I look more closely I see disturbing swirls of texture in my skin, spiraling like microscopic galaxies, like nothing I've ever seen before.I swallow and rip my attention away from my own fingers.  Have I been drugged?  I shake my head hard, but that just makes the headache and dizziness worse.  I pound my fists on the ground, but though I feel the impact and the pain there's no comforting THUD, just a muffled thump so faint and distant I might as well be imagining it. "Hello?" I call.  No, nothing wrong with my hearing; my voice bounces back to me from the darkness, echoing off the distant, unseen walls.To my surprise there's an immediate reply.  "Michael?"  The voice is heartbreakingly familiar.  I feel a twinge of hope."Sprout?"  I peer into the darkness, hoping for a glimpse of green tights and pointed shoes.  It's a ridiculous outfit.  Why have we never changed it?And why have I never wondered that before?"It's me, Michael.  Richard."A familiar figure appears in the dim distance, but with everything so strange here I can't afford to relax.  "Is this a secure area?  We should stick to code names...""No need.  There's no Sprout here, and no Phyto-Man either."Worries spring up in my mind -- impostors, hypnosis, possession, brainwashing -- but I decide to bluff it out in case there are unseen observers.  "Well, I'm here now, Sprout." "This all seems very strange, I know, but don't worry.  Everything will be all right."Despite his reassurances, there's a strangeness about Sprout as he approaches.  He's wearing street clothes, in colors and textures as hallucinogenic as everything else here, and his face combines familiarity with an alien super-reality exactly as my own hands do, but the really disturbing thing is the way he moves.  Each step flows into the next with a weird gliding motion that propels him forward seamlessly, without transitions.  It's like he's rolling toward me on a treadmill, constantly cresting a hill that isn't there.  I push down feelings of nausea and... and fear.  Never in all my adventures have I faced anything as disquieting as this place.  "Where am I?""Dr. Diabolus called it the Nth Dimension, but the people here just call it the world."  He's reached me now, and the mingled concern and relief in his face match the conflicting emotions in my own heart.  "I'm so glad you're finally here."He bends down and helps me to my feet, a disturbing reversal, and I find that I move with the same unnatural glide that he does.  Even more disturbing, I find I'm naked.  "My costume!"  I cover myself with my hands as best I can, but the loss of my belt pouches, my carefully nurtured collection of seeds, leaves me feeling not just nude but defenseless.I reach out with my powers.  Perhaps a seed from a discarded Fig Newton lies in a crack on the floor, a seed I can grow into leaves to cover my nakedness.  But there's nothing; my powers are dulled almost to nonexistence.  I can feel wood beams supporting the ceiling high above, but I can't warp them to my will. I'm helpless.  For the first time in... I can't remember when."Don't worry," Sprout says, "no one here wears costumes.  I brought you some clothes."  He turns, the motion revealing sides and back, width and depth and thickness, all at once.  I groan and nearly lose my balance.  "Oh!" he says.  "I'm sorry.  Try closing one eye.  It helps."I do, and it does -- the colors are still wrong but the disorienting sense of everything being too far away and too close at the same time is greatly reduced.  Sprout -- Richard -- reaches into a rustling paper bag and hands me a folded bundle. Putting the clothes on is a challenge.  Each trouser leg recedes like a portal to another world; buttons and zippers feel much larger, more detailed than they should.  I close my eyes completely and let my instincts take over.  It makes a big difference.  How many times in my life have I dressed myself?  But this still feels like the first time.I sit on the filthy floor to tie the unfamiliar shoes.  "That's better," I say.  "Now let's get to work."  Maybe action will still the trembling dread in my heart.  "There's no time to lose -- we need to get back to our own dimension and defeat Dr. Diabolus before it's too late!"Richard smiles and shakes his head.  I'm starting to get used to the weird multi-dimensional effect.  "Don't worry, there's plenty of time."  He puts out a hand.  "Come on.  I'll explain over coffee."Sprout's lack of concern raises anew the questions I'd had about drugs, hypnosis, imposters.  But, lost in a strange, incomprehensible world, I have no better alternative to offer.  I take his hand. His hand is warm and soft in mine.  When was the last time I'd grasped it without gloves, without haste, without danger all around? He leads me across the floor -- now that my eyes have adapted a bit to the darkness and strangeness I see that the space is a cavernous, disused warehouse -- to a corroded metal door.  It opens with a muted squeak of rusty hinges, not the SKREEK I would have expected, but once we pass through it to the street I'm assaulted by a cacophony of sounds, visions, and smells more intense than New Year's Eve in Metro City.  Cars in an astonishing variety of designs and colors careen by, with the same seamless motion as Sprout's walk but a hundred times faster.  Each one seems to zoom in from the horizon and vanish away to infinity all in a moment, but even as they speed by I can't help but notice their scratches and dents and chips in the paint and a hundred other details.  It's a dizzying kaleidoscope of color and detail."Whoa!" I cry out as Sprout hauls me back from the curb."Careful, big guy."  He pats my shoulder.  "You're not invulnerable here.""Well, I've never been in Dynamic Man's league...""No, I mean you can really get hurt easily.  It doesn't take much, and it takes a long time to heal.  Look at this."  He pulls up his sleeve, revealing a hideous scab on his elbow.  "I scraped this on a brick wall when I first got here.  Just a little scrape, nothing I'd even have noticed if I were in a fist fight with the Demolisher, but it hurt like a son of a bitch --"I've never heard such language.  "Sprout!""-- and a month later it's still not all the way better."A month?  Immediately I'm on high alert again.  Has the imposter slipped up?  Sprout only disappeared the day before yesterday.But he notices the change in my expression -- faces here seem more subtle, more expressive -- and puts up a hand.  "Sorry.  We're on a monthly schedule.  One or two of our days, more or less, is a month here.  I should have told you right away."  His eyes dip to the sidewalk.  "There's a lot I should have told you, before."My suspicions are only slightly allayed, but I still have little alternative but to stick with this person, whether or not he's the Sprout I know.  Whoever he is, he just saved my life.We walk to a coffee shop.  Safe from the chaos of the street, I can begin to appreciate the wonder of this world -- the colors and textures, the tears in the vinyl seat's upholstery, the individual grains of spilled sugar on the laminate tabletop.  My spoon makes a tiny tink, tink noise as I stir my coffee.  The flavor is astonishing -- rich and sweet and dark.  "So you've been here a whole month?" He nods.  "I showed up in the same place you did.  It's the closest analog in this world to Dr. Diabolus's lair.  It took me quite a while to figure this place out, but I finally did.""You always were the brains of this partnership."  Before Sprout, there had been no Phyto-Computer, no chemical lab, no advanced cross-breeding program in the Hidden Greenhouse.  I'd really been little more than a thug with a green thumb."This world... it's like a layer above our world.  Everything here is... bigger.  More complex.  More detailed.  Even the color spectrum... there's an infinity of different colors here, Michael."I think back on the time I fell into the Hollow Earth, and how I had to help the downtrodden people there throw off the tyrannical overlord Karg before I could return to the surface.  "Then they must have even bigger problems than we do.  More villainous villains!  More despotic despots!  More disastrous natural disasters!"  I find myself grinning with anticipation.  "This could be our greatest adventure!""You might think so, but I haven't seen any sign of it.  There aren't any villains here.""It's some kind of Utopia, then?""Not really."  His face squinches up the way it does when he's thinking hard.  "There are people who do bad things.  But every time someone does something that seems entirely villainous to me, a whole bunch of other people come along and say it was really the right thing to do.  I'm kind of confused, really."  He shakes his head.  "Even bank robbers have their defenders here.  And there are tornadoes and hurricanes and earthquakes, but they're... diffuse.  I mean, yeah, people get hurt, but you never see the President's daughter trapped under a collapsed building or someone racing to get the secret plans to the hidden base before the whole Eastern Seaboard becomes uninhabitable.""Sounds... boring.""Oh, it's not!"  His eyes brighten and he grabs my hands across the table.  "It's the most wonderful place, Michael.  There's art and culture and nature like nothing you've ever seen.  Not just stuffy charity balls where the only exciting thing is when The Rutabaga tries to steal the debutante's diamond necklace.  I can't wait to show you Turandot."I pull my hands from his.  "Whoa, whoa, whoa, kiddo.  We're not here to be tourists.  We're here for a reason.  And once our job is done here, we'll go back where we came from.  That's the way the world works.""Not this world.  In this world you can do whatever you want, make the best of what you've got, succeed or fail or just muddle along... you're not limited to playing the role you were born into, fighting the same villains and foiling the same plots over and over again.  Not like our world."  He reaches into his hoodie's front pocket, pulls out a slim colorful magazine.  "To the people here, we're fictional!"The title of the magazine is The Amazing Phyto-Man, issue 157.  On the cover, a hulking over-muscled brute with a ridiculous green outfit and a caricature of my own face smacks a tentacled monstrosity in the beak.  The pages inside are divided into squares and rectangles, each bearing a picture and some text...It shows the whole story of how I got here.  Over the fence, down the corridors, the confrontation with Dr. Diabolus, the metal arms flinging me into the portal.I feel as though the world has been jerked out from under my feet.  "This is impossible.  Absurd.  Some kind of hoax.""It's no hoax.  There were ten copies of this one on the rack I bought it from.  All our friends have their own publications too."  He taps the final panel, showing me screaming as I fall into the swirling colors... but the colors on the page are the flat, limited palette of the world I came from.  "This is how I knew you'd be arriving here."I stare at the page.  It's wood pulp with vegetable inks.  My powers are weak here, almost nonexistent, but I can feel the minuscule thread of green life in it.  In some ways this stupid little magazine is the only thing in the whole chromium-and-vinyl coffee shop that's real. The only thing that's real...I turn back a page.  It's one large panel, with Dr. Diabolus laughing "HAHAHAHAHA!" as I struggle in the grip of the metal arms.  I stare at his flat, cartoonish face.I exert my power. It's not easy.  What I'm trying to do is unlike anything I've ever done before.  My teeth grind together; my pulse pounds in my temples. This is as hard and as strange as the very first time I ever made a seed sprout. It had been an apple seed, a discarded pip from my lunch, that happened to be lying on the floor the day that eerie green-glowing meteorite had crashed into the experimental greenhouse with its stocks of Growth Serum X.  That tiny seed, and the potential apple tree within, had been all that stood between me and certain death as the heavy beam had come crashing down toward me.  As though in a dream I'd sensed its potential, I'd reached out, I'd pulled harder than I'd ever pulled on anything before... and the tree burst into being, root and branch and leaf cushioning the beam's fall and saving my life.That had been the first time I'd felt that green power flowing through me.  Now I feel it again, a thin green thread of life pulsing in the dead, flattened wood pulp before me.  But this time it's different somehow, pulling at me even as I pull at it.Sweat stings my eyes and runs down my nose.  I keep straining...And then Dr. Diabolus blinks. The caricature face turns fractionally toward me, its look of triumph beginning to change into one of astonishment...It's more than I can sustain.  I collapse, my breath rushing out in a whoosh as I fall back into the padded seat.  The page before me reverts to its previous form, but I feel a sense of triumph. Sprout snatches the magazine away.  "What did you do?" "I used my powers.  I touched our world.  I made a change." "So what?""We can use this!"  I pound the table.  "I don't know how, but somehow we can use this magazine to get back to our own world!""Hush!" Sprout pats the air with his hands; I notice that the server and the other patrons are staring.  I sit down, noticing as I do that I'd surged to my feet.  "Michael... I don't want to go back to the world we came from.""We have to!"He looks at me for a long moment, his expression unreadable. And then he bolts from the table. I stare stupidly at the door as the little bell over it tinkles, then take off after him.Sprout's fast, but ever since that day in the experimental greenhouse I've been stronger and tougher and faster than most people, and at least some of that seems to have come through the portal with me.  I manage to make it through the door before his heels vanish around the corner.Running in this world is a kaleidoscopic, hallucinogenic experience.  Walls seem to rush at me, a riot of color and texture; cars veer and swerve, horns blaring.  But I keep my eyes fixed on Sprout's blue hoodie as he dashes across streets, pushes through crowds of protesting civilians, runs down alleys. Block after block, I'm gaining.  Sprout was always the smart one in our partnership, but I'm the one who battled The Piledriver to a standstill.  Soon I'm only a few feet behind.We're racing down an alley, dodging around dumpsters and piles of newspaper, when I get almost close enough to touch him.  He looks over his shoulder... and trips on a bundle of magazines.  He tumbles on the concrete with an "oomph" that sounds almost like something from our original world.I catch up to him just as he's sitting up.  Bright red blood runs from his nose; there's a rusty smell.  "Guh?" he says.I bend down, put an arm around his shoulder.  "Are you all right, old buddy?"He stares into my eyes for a moment, blood painting his nose and mouth.And then he kisses me.I taste blood.  I feel his warm lips soft under mine. I kiss him back.Then, horrified, I push him away.  "What are we doing, Sprout?""Kissing.  And you liked it as much as I did."  His bloody lips twist into an ironic smile.  "If you couldn't figure that much out, I guess I really am the brains of this partnership.""But... but you're just a kid!"He glares at me.  "I'm twenty-two, Michael."Twenty-two?  It's strange to realize that he's right.  He was fifteen when I adopted him after Maniac killed his parents, but that was... seven years ago.  Where did the time go?  How had I failed to notice he'd grown into a lithe, attractive young man?  "Even so... it's... it's wrong.""Maybe where we came from.  Not here."  He pulls a bandana from his pocket, wipes his mouth.  Blood still trickles from his nose but it's slowing.  "This world is better than ours, Michael.  It's complex and it's mundane and it's sometimes tedious, but it's not just the same round of villains and fights and secret identities over and over again.  It's... it's real, Michael.  And here I can be what I've always wanted to be, instead of just playing a role."  He holds out the bandana.  "And so can you."Sprout keeps holding out the bandana. After a while I take it, and wipe my own mouth.Then I stand up. "I'm a hero, Richard.  It may be a role, but it's the only role I know."Sprout just looks at me.  The expression on his blood-spattered face is a sick compound of longing, sadness, disappointment.  Perhaps I'm learning how to understand what I see in this world.I wonder what the expression on my own face tells him."Give me the magazine, Sprout.  We'll take it to the warehouse where we came in.  I figure that's the best place to try going back to our world.""No."Sprout lies at my feet, looking so small and weak, the front of his blue hoodie stained black with his blood.  I could take the magazine from him easily.  "I'll find another copy.""You don't have any money to buy one.""I'll steal it."He gives a weak little laugh.  "Liar."I have to smile myself.  "Okay, maybe not."  I sit back down.  "Come back with me, Sprout.  You know it's where we belong."He sits up, leans against me.  His shoulder is warm, the only warm thing in this cold, garbage-strewn alley, and I let it rest on my chest.  "Give this world a chance, Michael.  You've only just arrived.  I've already found a job at a nursery.  You could work there too."  He looks up at me.  His nose has stopped bleeding.  "We could share the apartment."I consider the idea.  I put my arm around my sidekick, lean back against the filthy brick wall, and think very hard about it.  This world is amazing, with its details and colors and motions and flavors.  And to share it with Sprout would be... something I hadn't even realized I desired. But in the end, it's duty that wins out.  "I'm sorry, Sprout.  Even if I wanted to -- and there's a part of me that does, believe me -- it's more than just you and me.  There are people depending on us back home.  If we don't go back there, who'll keep the Scimitar Sisters in check?"  I give him one last squeeze, disentangle myself, and stand up.  "Coming?""You're sure I can't change your mind?"I'm so, so tempted.  "I'm sure.""Then I'm coming too."  He stands, brushes himself off.  "I'd rather be a cartoon hero with you than alone here."We walk hand-in-hand back to the warehouse.  As we pass the coffee shop, I pause.  Sprout looks up at me, expectant.  "I, uh... I still have some of my powers here."  I clear my throat.  "I wonder if there's.... if there's any way we can bring... some of this world, back to ours?""I don't think so."  He points to a small shield printed in the corner of the magazine's cover.  "There are rules against it."Finally we find ourselves again in the dark, echoey space where we entered this world.  I think about how strange it looked to me when I first arrived, and I realize I've grown used to these new perceptions.  My old world will seem so flat and colorless by comparison. Sprout stands beside me as I spread the magazine out in a patch of sunlight.  There is no joy in me as I contemplate the garish images full of POW and KRUNCH, only a dull sense of obligation.  "It's not too late to change your mind," Sprout says.  "We can make a life together here.""I'm sorry, Sprout.  Our world needs saving."  But even as I say it, I know I'm trying to convince myself as well as him.  I hold out my hand.Without a word, he takes it.I bend down and stare hard at the last page, showing my cartoon avatar falling into the vortex between worlds.  I exert my will, block out all other sensations, focus my powers on the ink-saturated wood pulp.  Somehow, I know, I can use this image of the portal to return myself and Sprout to the world where we were born.It's the hardest thing I've ever done. I concentrate.  I work my power.  I push and pull and strain... this is as hard as the time I used pea vines to temporarily close up the Grand Canyon.  Harder.I strain still more intensely.  The printed vortex begins to whirl...I feel again, just as I did on that first day in the experimental greenhouse, the deep connection between my soul and the green life underlying the page...I feel the warmth of Sprout's hand in mine...And I realize that the connection runs both ways. With an unprecedented effort of will, I reverse my power. Where before the meteor's green energy had flowed into me at my moment of greatest need, now I send the energy flowing from myself into the printed page. I scream in pain as the power drains from me like my life's blood. The image before me springs to life.  Just as the metal claws release, the cartoon me on the page reaches down and tears open his belt.  Seeds of all descriptions pour out in their thousands, most falling into the vortex, but many others sprouting and twining and filling the portal with leaves and stems and branches.  I bounce off the web of vegetable matter, springing right back toward Dr. Diabolus.  WHAM!  My fist connects with the villain's chin.Then all is blackness.Later.  I open my eyes, and the first thing I see is Dr. Diabolus's lab.  Everything is flat, static, in eight garish colors.  But then I blink, and realize I've fallen face-first into the magazine spread on the floor before me.I sit up.  I'm no longer looking at the last page of The Amazing Phyto-Man issue 157.  It's now the first page of issue 158, a single large panel.  In it Dr. Diabolus, threatened by an enormous Venus flytrap, cowers at the controls of his dimensional portal, through which a grinning Sprout steps to take the hand of Phyto-Man.  All's well in Metro City."Michael?"  Richard is just awakening beside me.  "Wha... what just happened?"It takes me a long, reflective moment to find an answer to his question.  "I... I sent the power back where it came from, I think."  I look within myself.  It certainly isn't in there any more.  "It's with him now."  I tap the page. Richard's eyes dart from the page to my face.  "But that's you.""Not any more.  I'm just Michael now."  I stroke the flat, cartoon version of myself with my fingertips.  "Phyto-Man is back where he belongs.  I don't know how much of me went with him, but I hope... I hope he enjoyed his day in this world.  Maybe he can use what I learned here to make Metro City a better place.""But what about... us?  What happens next?"I close the magazine.  "I don't know.  Isn't it amazing?"END“Into the Nth Dimension” was originally published in Human For A Day, edited by Jennifer Brozek and Martin H. Greenberg in 2011.This recording is a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license which means you can share it with anyone you’d like, but please don’t change or sell it. Our theme is “Aurora Borealis” by Bird Creek, available through the Google Audio Library.Thanks for listening, and I’ll be back on March 1st with “Je me souviens” by Su J. Sokol.

Near the end of this podcast I begin to wonder if this life is real or imagined. Perhaps I'm laying in a hospital in a coma and I'm only dreaming all this.