Work Emails

Emails, such as the one below, get sent out approximately once a month. It is a ficticious story written by the sender in a mock-news story format.


SETI Institute: We Are Not Alone

(AP - MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIFORNIA) Scientists at the SETI Institute in northern California made a shocking announcement over the weekend: communication has been established with an intelligent species outside our own solar system. Researchers at the command center of SETI’s Allen Telescope Array began receiving signals early Saturday morning that indicated significant evidence of design – including an interstellar “primer” that allowed scientist at the center to decode incoming messages.
“By Saturday evening, we were prepared to make our first reply,” explained SETI Director Lance Dumont. “We were pretty excited as you can image – previous to this transmission we’ve only picked up local CB traffic or the occasional pre-teen with a GI JOE walkie-talkie. We also get free ESPN.”

Following are excerpts from that first interstellar conversation with what Dumont labeled “Contact 1”.

SETI: Greetings. We have received your transmission.
CONTACT 1: [Static]
SETI: Are you receiving our reply transmission?
CONTACT 1: We are receiving your transmission.
SETI: How did you become aware of us? Was it our first detonation of a nuclear device? [Trinity Test, July 16, 1945]
CONTACT 1: [Static – or possibly muffled laughter?] No. That was not what drew or attention to your planet.
SETI: Was it our first satellite launch? [Sputnik, October 4, 1957]
CONTACT 1: Negative. What is… “satellite”?
SETI: Never mind. Was it when we spun up the Super Collider and discovered dark matter? [Outside Geneva, Switzerland, April 4, 2011]
CONTACT 1: Dark what? Chocolate?
SETI: *Explicative Deleted*
CONTACT 1: Actually, what caught our attention was your development of the “pod” coffee maker system. That’s the usual benchmark we use to determine whether a civilization is advanced to the degree that contact is feasible.
SETI: [Static]
CONTACT 1: We do have one question, however – and this is to settle a bet between Gloork and Egon down in the engine room – were your Starbuck coffee requisition centers named after the character of the same name in Battlestar Galactica, or vice-versa? And what time does the Starbucks in Mountain View open? – the commander of our battle fleet wanted me to ask that one – like he needs more caffeine.”
*Transmission* Terminated*

“That’s right,” said Dumont, “we hung up on them. The line at Starbucks is already way too long by the time I get there in the morning – there’s no way I’m going to wait behind a bunch of out-of-towners for my vanilla latte”.


It’s about that time again. If you want to participate in November’s Coffee Club (at least until the battle fleet arrives), please drop your $5 donation by K13.

And watch the skies.



Here's what really gets me about this. And no, it's not that state and federal employees are wasting taxpayer dollars writing and reading such silliness, or that the story is completely unrealistic -- who would believe that the good folks at SETI would actually ask a question regarding a satellite, and when asked "what's a satellite" in response would respond with "never mind" rather than explaining what a satellite was? They know that by dismissing that question you're only going to alienate (pun!) your new friends by not answering their question or make it sound like you're not really asking the question but, rather, setting them up for some stupid punchline -- or that the entire purpose of the email is to tell the entire office about giving money to the coffee fund when some of us (read: me) don't give two fucks about your fucking coffee. No. What really gets me is that this email assumes that we are dumb enough to think there's such a thing as free ESPN. Come on! I wasn't born yesterday, dickless!