First Contact by Evan Mandery Page A

sounds that are not present in English.
    Some of the translations, however, are better. For example, the Rigelian term for what I have referred to here as feng shui is also unpronounceable and unspellable in English, yet it corresponds to the art of arranging furniture to enhance the spiritual energy of a room. Its practice is associated, as on Earth, with the kind of people who worry about the environment and eat things like macrobiotic oatmeal. Through a remarkable coincidence, yoga is called yoga on Rigel-Rigel and its practice is largely similar to that on Earth. One popular position is called Huinatulana , which, loosely translated, means “downward facing dromedary.”
     
    T HE P ROFESSOR SAT DOWN for his evening’s work between the squealing washer and the vibrating dryer, underneath the flickering lightbulb in, all things considered, a rather good mood. He had long agoreleased his anger over matters such as the wet laundry on his desk and the oatmeal and yoga mats lying fallow in what should have been his office. He was just happy to have some free time to think about his research, which he loved, and his current project, which he found particularly engaging and which was, by any measure, quite important.
    No sooner had he sat down than his wife began to scream from upstairs.
    “John!” she screamed. “John!”
    The lightbulb flickered off and she screamed his name again.
    After years of living in the house, Mrs. Fendle-Frinkle knew screaming from across the house was an inefficient method of communication. Under normal circumstances it was difficult to hear someone two stories away; with the washer and dryer running it was virtually impossible. The Professor had explained this many times, but still his wife insisted on screaming from across the house.
    “Hold on,” the Professor shouted, and he walked upstairs. His wife was sitting in bed watching television with the volume turned all the way up.
    “What is it, Evelyn?”
    “There’s no toilet paper upstairs,” she said without shifting her focus from the television set.
    He could take the laundry on the desk and the shaking of the dryer, but the gross inefficiency of this drove the Professor crazy. If his wife needed toilet paper she could have walked down to the basement and gotten it herself. This would have been a total of two trips: one trip down and one trip up. The Professor, who had already walked up once, now had to walk down to get the toilet paper, back up again to put it in the bathroom, and back down to resume his work: a total of four trips. He muttered the whole way and made the mistake of mumbling the word “shrew” within earshot of his wife. Earshot should have been a radius of six inches or so since his wife had the television turned up so high, but Evelyn had extraordinary perception when it came to criticism of her. She turned down the volume of the television set and the Professor understood immediately he had made a mistake.
    “What was that, honey?” she asked saccharinely.
    “What was what?”
    “I thought I heard you say something.”
    The Professor popped his head back into the bedroom.
    “No, love. I didn’t say anything. Nothing at all.”
    He knew she didn’t believe him. And he knew he would pay a price for his insubordination.
    “Wash done yet?”
    “No, still running.”
    “Make sure you fold the clothes in the dryer.”
    “I will.”
    “And transfer the wash after it’s done.”
    “Of course.”
    “And turn the dryer back on.”
    “Not a problem.”
    “And don’t forget to turn off the buzzer. I don’t want it to go off while I’m sleeping. You always forget to turn it off.”
    In fact the Professor had forgotten precisely once, seven years earlier.
    “I’ll be sure to turn it off. Anything else?”
    He turned, starting to walk away, thinking he had gotten off rather easily. He should have known better.
    “What are you working on down there?”
    The Professor turned back. “Oh, this and that,”