I was
browsing ebay for an SX guitar when I saw someone was selling scoops of
dirt from their special back yard hole. This eccentric twist on pet
rocks caught my eye as does everything about holes. You know its true
what they say. You really do have to do things you enjoy doing; and I
really do count myself lucky being in the portable hole business, and
making better holes portable with the people I do it with. And I am truly fascinated by, and
have a passion for anything holes.
Of course I’m not alone in my fascination in and
with these half empty and half full enigmas. In fact holes have been
around a whole lot longer than ancient Sumeria, and its lasting
invention, the wheel...or as later philosophers I ran across would
argue, an inverse slice of a not quite but approaching perfectly round
hole the Goodrich blimp would be proud of.
Before the wheel, holes go back as far as Earth's
formative days and its deep ocean holes. We could even go and ask about
those holes. There are many smart people who work at Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution. They research how oceans function, and how
they interact with Earth’s various climatic and ecological systems, and
of course deep ocean holes. And they like to answer questions, at least
on the Natural Geographic shows I saw on tv.
In fact holes are so around us we don't even have
to find them and dig them out. We can just ask, listen or read some.
For example, activists speak loudly and
alarmingly, and seem informed about holes in the Ozone layer, while
their opponents punch holes into their arguments and each other.
Astronomers and astrophysicists debate what happens if a black hole
tries to go through a worm hole. When they're not studying oceans or
stars, well off scientists and their colleagues winter and ski at
Jackson Hole, while in summers they golf. Golfers, and especially those
who are also scientists, are emotionally and physically and sometimes
inextricably entwined in and with holes.
Some misinformed people think all holes are equal,
as a hole is a hole is a hole. This was most memorably quoted by Richard
Burton explaining to Clint Eastwood that the German bullet holes were actually British in
Where Eagles Dare, one of my favourite movies ever for its photography,
story, and twists through a world war two showcase of heroic daring
courtesy of Burton and Eastwood.
Portable holes, which can be categorized by the
circumference of their opening and their depth relative to origin, are
said by some to contravene the normal laws of physics. Others would
argue every Portable Hole has its own particular telescoping extension
into previously non existing space, might carry equipment through it,
and may even be good to hide in sometimes.
If I were talking physics and the realities of
circumstance time and place, and the behaviour of animate and inanimate
objects, I say holes are abstract and arbitrary since they depend on the
required existence and state of some observer, which includes perhaps
overly informed scientists arguing that if a hole's invariant
properties, those intrinsic to the geometry and dynamics of holes,
satisfy one space time, they must also satisfy, through any
transformation, another space time. This, they say is because all
observables can be reduced to invariants.
An example makes this a little more clear. Say you
go from one Walmart to another. What scientists mean is that in both
space times, all observables pertinent to the original Walmart, trip,
and the destination Walmart, will be invariants. These include the time
elapsed along the journey, the mass and shape of your car and its
velocity, and whether the car is accelerating or not at any time in its
journey, your age and mass at the start of the trip and your age mass at
destination. In both space times, almost all the stuff Walmart sells
would still come from China, and since invariants and observables in
both space times agree, you'd have the same family and job and car, and
you'd still live in the same house. Of course it begs the question, how
would you know if you've been transformed, but this question has not
deterred theses scientists.
Philosophers, linguists, and others are all busy
with the concept of holes.
I've heard argued, for example, that holes do not
exist in themselves at all, and that all truths about holes boil down to
truths about holed objects. This means the object "is holed" and has "a
hole surrounding part that defines the hole shape and volume" and which
orients the hole in the whole. There's no "hole" in the object but a
"hole in a whole " that exists only as long as someone cares.
I have to think this approach really livens up
cocktails at conferences among space time continuum physicists arguing
about "invariant holes transformed unchanged through manifold
substantivalistic manipulations". After a few drinks these big thinkers
consume themselves in their favourite drinking game Moebius Strip.
Some thinkers argue holes are not the immaterial
"empty" entities they seem to be. They say holes are material and bound
to their both parasitic and symbiotic material hosts, existing only with
and in containers. For every hole there is a hole-surround; for every
hole-surround there is a hole. Alternatively, one could hold that holes
are "negative" parts of their material hosts, like saying the donut hole
is the negative part of the donut. Taking this approach, making a hole
would be like adding a part, and changing an object to get rid of a hole
would mean to remove a part. This of course confuses pre linguists a
whole lot about holes.
Yet others see holes as "disturbances" of some
sort. From this vantage point, a hole is cousin to a knot in a rope or a
wrinkle in a carpet. Leading to string theory which slings me right back
to only caring about getting my hands on that elusive SX guitar I was
telling you about when we talked about someone using ebay to sell scoops
of dirt from their special back yard hole.
Getting back to holes, they can also be taken at
their ontological face value. Holes can then be structured and talked
about, and any part or conversation about a part may or may not relate
to anything defined or undefined. Holes can then be topologically
described and sorted by W-hat A-wful L-ousy M-erchandise
A-nd R-otten T-hings, but at the lowest possible
prices, and Walmart can become Wholemart, and a "whole lot better
mart"..
You can see from all this that there’s a lot of
thinking and contortioning that has and goes on about holes, and, if you
are reading between the lines, you've concluded I'm well informed about
them.
Why you might ask?
It's simple really. Because we sell Portable
Holes. With so much going on out there about holes, what is it about our
portable holes in particular that make them different from other holes,
and in particular, the portable holes made by Stacking Pits and
Cavities, and options others provide to our customers? Why should
someone even be our customer? What's in it for them?
From an operating point of view, I need to know all I can to make better
holes, and our processes more productive. Sometimes I dream and think
about such things as "can two holes occupy the same space at the same
time?”
The bottom line is, if we are to be good at what
we do, it's my business to learn all I can about holes.... so....er...and
you have to have seen this coming...we don't end up in a hole...