Today's Fun, so I can spend more time writing other things, is another exerpt from "The Mediocre American Novel."

Harold Black was probably the only person in America who wasn't looking forward to the upcoming news report about what happened to the sun. It's not that he wasn't dying to know what had in fact happened to the sun. Harold Black's problem with the explanation about to be broadcast live on every major news network was that he was the person supposed to be giving it.

Six years ago, Harold Black had received his Ph.D. in Astrophysics and Astronomy (the other AA) and became a professor at MIT. Four days ago he'd driven to Harvard for a week-long symposium on recalculating the location of Galactic Central Point based on the recent discovery of sub-atomic particles emitted by black holes. Yesterday he'd publicly refuted an older professor from California who'd insisted that nothing was supposed to be able to escape a black hole by saying "It's all well and good to talk about how prior theory dictates that particles can't be emitted from a black hole, but it does nothing to alter the fact that these particles are coming out of a black hole just as certainly as the sun rises every morning."

Nine and a half hours ago the sun was supposed to rise.

Two hours after that, the Great Hall of the Astronomy building, where the first discussions of the day were to be held, was filled with the best minds in a discipline which frequently dealt with phenomena either too small to imagine or too far away for most to even hope of grasping the distances involved, which hoped to discover the fundamental laws of the universe, which was viewed by the majority of people as so complicated and theoretical that only incredibly academic and intelligent people should ever bother giving it even a first thought, let alone a second, which had just quietly and effortlessly knocked every last one of them soundly on his or her respective ass. Eventually they managed to get organized, contact observatories around the world, and generally try to figure out what in the world had just happened to the world.

Three hours ago they'd been contacted by the President, who told them that they were to act as the country's official Global Astrophysical Crisis Center, since just about anybody who was fit to tackle the current situation was already there. Immediately after that he pleaded with them to explain what the hell was going on.

They told him to remain calm and wait for further information.

Forty-five minutes ago they found out that the press had learned the location of the newly founded Global Astrophysical Crisis Center and were on their way. Half an hour ago somebody had remembered Harold's rebuking comment from the other day and the squabbling over who was going to have to deal with the press abruptly ended.

Twenty minutes ago Harold Black switched the primary focus of his attention from preparing some intelligent, reliable, and reassuring conclusions for the reporters to drinking heavily.

About the time we began reviewing Prof. Black's day, he was informed that the press had arrived and were setting up on the steps of the physics building. (Camera crews universally have a fetish for stone buildings with enormous front steps. So do lawyers.) Since then he's been trying to make himself look more presentable and respected. Right about now he's getting to the crowd of reporters and cameramen huddled in front of a podium at the top of the steps of the physics building.

He's heading around to the other side of the building and going in a side door, because he feels that coming out of the building will look more official than pushing his way up to it through the reporters. He's at the podium now, looking out at all the news people watching him eagerly, almost desperately. He's checking the microphones' power switches out of habit, pauses for a moment to allow the narrator to catch up, and then Harold Black began to speak.

"Hello everyone, I'm Prof. Harold Black and I've been selected by my colleagues at the Global Astrophysical Crisis Center to-" He was interrupted by a flurry of questions. All the reporters were yelling and calling for his attention at once, so that he couldn't understand what any of them were saying.

"SHUT UP!! ALL OF YOU JUST SHUT THE HELL UP!!!" In the moment of silence that followed, Harold considered the possibility that he may have had too much to drink. He quickly set aside the idea as there wasn't really anything that could be done about it now.

"There will be time at the end for questions," continued Harold. "Asking them now would be time wasting and foolish. However, it's entirely likely that asking them at the end won't do you a bloody lot of good either because if there's something I haven't covered it's probably because I'm not able to divulge that information." Harold was particularly fond of that last bit, as he felt it sounded much better than "because I don't have the slightest idea what happened."

"Now then, you all know what I'm here to talk about, unless you're far less observant than I'm giving you credit for. The sun didn't come up this morning and it hasn't made any changes to that policy recently." Harold snickered slightly, but noticed that few of the reporters seemed to appreciate his attempt to lighten the mood. Maybe the problem wasn't that he'd had too much too drink, but rather that the rest of them hadn't had enough.

"I want to assure you all that the Global Astrophysical Crisis Center is working in constant contact with NASA and observatories around the world to determine the cause of our current emergency and what exactly can be done about it. I regret that there's nothing I can currently tell you about why the sun didn't rise today, but I can give you some information on what has and has not happened.

"The earth has not stopped rotating. We know that the sun is not currently visible in the sky at any point on the globe. Neither is any sunlight currently reflecting off the moon. The good news is that no portion of the earth will be exposed to continual sunlight, turning it into uninhabitable desert. The bad news is that this situation eliminates all the energy that the sun transfers to the planet's atmosphere and ecosystem. It will get a lot colder and all photosynthetic plants will die off. Without prompt action, so will we."

The assembled reporters were stunned by his bluntness, most of them staring feebly forward looking dazed and drooling slightly. Only a very few were still taking any notes. One or two had fainted. Most of them had assumed that this was all just some sort of unplanned eclipse that would be inconvenient for a while and then just go away.

"At least," thought Harold Black, "They're quiet and paying attention. That's more than can be said for my freshman physics classes. But the cameras are still rolling, so I might as well keep going."

"We also know that the sun did not go nova, because if it had the blast would have killed us all," Harold said, despite the fact Professor Severson was standing by his theory that the sun had in fact gone nova and had blown humanity into a different plane of existence, perhaps the afterlife.

"We've also calculated, based on the positions of the stars, that the earth is in the same location that it was yesterday, except of course being one day further along in its revolution." He didn't mention that they were furiously trying to refine those calculations to see if the earth had broken orbit and was now going straight, and whether or not they'd crash into any of the other planets if it had.

"So we now that we're dealing with some completely unheard of astrological or metaphysical phenomenon. We're working hard to quantify it and determine if it's temporary, permanent, or perhaps even reversible. In the meantime, I've been told that the Department of Agriculture is planning to distribute large networks of sunlamps to farmers of staple crops to keep the food supply going, and the Department of Energy is planning increased use of nuclear and geothermal power to supply the necessary heat and light."

"If there are any questions I'll answer them at this time."