Word: shortcutting
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Outside the major news organization's tent, the Japanese television network NHK is pissed off at its tent city neighbors, the major news organization. Between its two trailers is a great shortcut into the convention hall, but NHK wants its preciously paid for space all to itself. So the network taped a "DO NOT ENTER" sign to a sun-withered chair. It is ignored. And so are the resulting curses from Japanese television technicians...
This rip in space-time, better known as a wormhole, could in theory serve as a shortcut to a distant part of the universe (characters on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine use wormholes the way New Yorkers use subways). But according to an idea proposed in the 1980s by Stephen Hawking, it could also lead out of our cosmos altogether, creating a "baby universe" that would then expand and grow, forming its own self-contained branch of space-time...
...large in the neighborhood of very massive objects. If an object is dense enough, the curvature can become nearly infinite, perhaps opening a tunnel that connects distant regions of space-time as though they were next door. Physicists call this tunnel a wormhole, in an analogy to the shortcut a worm eats from one side of a curved apple to the other...
...enjoying the cool, moonlit night. Rob and I discuss our mutual fondness for Tony Hillerman's novels, even imagining we are helping Joe Leaphorn track a killer out there in the darkness. This time I focus and, encouraged by the goodwill of the other three, dare to suggest a shortcut, which saves us time. We quickly find all the checkpoints and then curl up together in our trash bags to rest. Dan, the father of two young girls, whispers, "Night-night, Rob-Rob," to which, Rob, also a father, responds, "Night-night, Dan-Dan. Night-night...
...really a shortcut? Yes. If you can stomach the heinous architecture, cutting down the Quincy path can reduce a trip from Leverett to Tommy's by about eight seconds...