In The Name of Science
When I was a little boy I used to enjoy taking apart old radios and stuff to see how they worked. Once I got hold of an old black and white TV, that was great. I must stress I wasn’t a vandal but I was inquisitive. Not in the sort of way serial killers are inquisitive about their victim’s insides. Or maybe in exactly the same way.
I wasn’t a freak. I must stress I wasn’t a freak. I really wasn't. I didn’t, for example, once use my Lego to build a little car with a little driver and a little passer by on the street, who was waving to them and I didn’t put firework bangers underneath them all and watch them blow up. Or film it.
OK, I did.
Don’t be frightened. It’s not like I ever did anything crazy, like burn a house down. Well, actually I did. No not really.
Well, yeah OK, really; just the top floor and roof. Imagine my dark eyes…see the fire…watch it burn. No seriously, I wasn’t some psychopath, it was an accident on the road of inquiry. Scientific inquiry. Or at least the eight year old equivalent.
The kind of desire for knowledge which makes you cut open a battery is, I’m sure, common with children; but it really is really something you need to grow out of. I speak from experience. There’s a name for it now I’m a grown up, it’s called ‘Invalidating the Warranty’.