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Previous Articles Exposing Hollywood's anti-German agenda I'm not ashamed to be religious or a liberal 'Beat Me with a Stick' Elmo and other great toys Making a difference: why I do what I do Telemarketing ban has ended a great pastime I don't rule the world, and that's fine with me Making the journey from prejudice to understanding There's no comparing genocide and killing geese All that's left is an empty feeling An unrequited love for some really neat words Foster dads offer hands and hearts ... for the time being. Thanksgiving dinner and other forms of ritual madness. Zen and the art of not getting run over by a Mack truck A lifetime of regrets as another year goes down the tubes Reform Party Convention ends in shoot-out Virtual immortality isn't all it's cracked up to be Insider's look at the Republican National Convention turns up many surprises Car Repair for Dummies, Part One: This is a Car Sadness marks the passing of a beloved mattress At last, something worse than 'Jane Eyre' Every town has a story. Tombstone has a fixation. Forget the Trekkies, the real nutcases are on the Luce Chalk one up for the faceless restaurant customers Feeling sick? Maybe it's time to get a shave. Guest Writer: Toto, I don't think we're in Mayberry anymore Guest Writer: The need for speed Does this mean we won't get free popcorn anymore? Out of the way, Martha Stewart -- I'm in the kitchen now How I'm surviving my brush with 'Jane Eyre' First blizzard of the year evokes frivolous memories, no deep thoughts Isn't it time to jump on the bandwagon with the Real Thing? Forward this column and you can turn e-mail into $300! Trips to the moon, disaster figure in mildew prognostications True confessions (more or less) of a closet survivalist Who understands what dreams may come? Hey, everyone, look -- it's an elephant! Wouldn't 'Senator Learn' have a nice ring? To my little girl: while you're sleeping . . . Special Report: Entering the Baby Zone Battling the suburban white whale Wanted: Politician to tackle key issues Something else to worry about this fall Wanted: Dumber Mice and Better Mouse Traps One More Stop on the Road to Adulthood Follow the fashion leads of the journalist from Krypton This is why naming children by committee never caught on Psoriasis may be ugly, but at least it doesn't leave scars Another casualty of the ancient family curse Quest for baby names too big to handle How the seniors taught me to get down And don't forget your scarf when you go inside Guest Writer: No room for Paradise as vandals force Dew Drop Inn to close The samba of the mad Vulcan Maybe I could be directed by Spielberg The aliens in Rhode Island don't want you to read this Voice of nostalgia is a call to destruction My wife is having the baby, but I look pregnant The end of the world as we know it Run for the hills - Y2K’s a’comin’ fast What's in a name? Shakespeare had no idea Don't waste your energy on the 'gas out' Career choice leaves a lasting mark One Easter leftover, hold the ham please

Virtual immortality isn't all it's cracked up to be By David Learn I wish it hadn't become so easy to attain immortality. Actual physical immortality is pretty hard to come by. Aside from a half-dozen people in Rhode Island, the only immortal I know of is couch potato Stuart Finnegan of Five Forks, Pa., who got immortality three years ago by eating radioactive banana-flavored Dannon yogurt and who has announced his intention of spending his life watching reruns of "Bowling for Dollars." For those of us who don't like banana-flavored yogurt, radioactive or otherwise, historians traditionally have provided an alternate route to immortality. This option usually involves doing things your mother said not to and as a consequence dying prematurely, which, admittedly, takes away some of its charm, but at least people remember you afterward. Like for half a year, if you're lucky. In the good old days, such feats had to change the course of human history. That's why Alexander the Great conquered the known world, Sir Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin, and Alaric the Visigoth brought the Roman Empire to its knees. I just don't have what it takes. I can't even win a game of Risk without using tactical nuclear weapons to rout my opponent's armies. If I saw mold growing on a Petri dish, I probably would try to hide it before my wife saw it and yelled at me for not doing the dishes. As for bringing an entire civilization to the point of collapse -- Well, I admit I've come close once or twice just this past week, but that is pretty much the sole province of Congress nowadays, and I actually feel kind of guilty if I run five minutes past the limit on the parking meter. Trust me, I just don't have what it takes to be an anarchist. But what I lack in audacity and skill, I have compensated for in timing. Unlike the larger-than-life villains and heroes of history, I achieved a form of immortality about 10 years ago without even trying. I didn't get any cities named after me like Alexander did, but there are a few directories on web sites and on FTP servers named "David Learn" in my honor. I was a college student 10 years ago when I discovered the Internet, which in those days was limited primarily to e-mail, listservers and discussion boards called newsgroups. While my peers were developing into full-blown alcoholics, I was struggling with an addiction to the computer. How bad was I? I was pathetic. I hung out primarily on the Star Trek newsgroups, where I soon made my presence known. I wrote parodies. I wrote fan fiction. I wrote a list of references to Shakespeare within Star Trek. I even posted the first few sections of my honor's thesis on the religious themes of Star Trek. I posted so much that people I had never met knew me by name, quoted me and satirized me. Well, with the Internet, anyone can be assured of a place in history. When I punched my name into a search engine earlier this month, you probably can guess what I found. Parodies. Stories. Lists. Discussions of whether using the transporter killed people. Debates over whether Kirk was a better captain than Picard. Arguments over whether Lt. Data has a soul. All of them had my name somewhere in them, too often in the byline. It was as if someone had exhumed all the bodies in my basement and then strewn them across the stage of a twisted production of "This is Your Life." Given the nature of the Internet, I won't be surprised if a lot of these things still are available online if I buy the proverbial farm, kick the proverbial bucket or otherwise end my mortal existence in the next 50 or 60 years. (Please note I said "if." I don't like radioactive yogurt of any flavor, personally, but I'm hopeful I'll find another out.) There's only one thing I can do to stop this from being my legacy. Anyone know any civilizations to topple? You may forward this article, but please leave this notice intact. Copyright © 2000-2002 by David A. Learn.