A: Can I borrow a knife?
B: What do you need it for?
A: What do you mean?
B: What you need it for will determine which one I give you.
A: How many knives do you have?!?
B: What do you need a knife for? -- FightingFit
"No, no, no," said Human Arin. "I gotta go down this rabbit hole. How many knives do you own?"
"One for every purpose and then some," dismissed Human Bob. "I have a collection."
"That's not a number."
"Dude. Just tell me what you need the knife for. I'll get you the right tool for the right job."
"I want a freaking number now. Okay? You got a knife for that?"
"Well, there is one I made for the purpose of making woodcut moveable type..."
"You make them?"
It was that yawp that gained Companion Zesh's interest. Ze put down hir hobby-work and moved over to where the Ship's Humans were having an argument.
"Everybody needs a hobby," chirped Bob. "Gimmie the specs and your favourite colour and I can have it for you in like a fortnight."
"Sounds like an investment of time and learning," said Zesh. "What did you want the knife for, Human Arin?"
"I just need to cut a bunch of wires for resplicing, but this gonzo..."
"More or less than twenty standard wires?" said Bob.
"You see? Do you see? Today I learned Bob has a knife for every occasion. Including whether or not it's more than twenty wires. What the actual flakk?"
"I understand. I was upset to learn that you had a knife specifically for consuming cheese. I also understand the Human compulsion to collect tools and weapons."
"Yeah, I get that, but I still think Bob has too many dang knives."
"I prefer to think of it as almost the right amount of knives."
"Points of view, points of view," chirped Zesh quickly. "Let us solve the problem at hand? Human Bob, do you have a count of the blades you own?"
"Not a precise one..."
"They have so many knives they lost count!" Arin squeaked.
"And it depends if you count the swords and polearm blades..."
"And they have weaponry too!"
"But if you're talking tool-type knives, then I've got close to five hundred. Excluding the ones that exist for novelty purposes, and not counting the chisels."
"Chisels too?" said Arin.
"I blacksmith. Deal with it."
"Human Arin. You now know how many knives there are. Now to answer Human Bob's question - how many wires were you planning to cut at once?"
"One at a time? I need them bespoke, so... not cutting bundles."
"Oh that's just a little utility blade," Human Bob automatically got one out of a handy pocket in their pants. "Yes it has a hand-made sheath, please oil it after you're done."
"And you sew. Of course you do."
"Something else bothering you?" asked Zesh.
"Jealousy. This dude has like ten million hobbies and I'm hard-pressed doodling around on Minecraft Virtual at the end of the day."
Bob alerted. "Dude! Are you the one building that mondo treehouse in NoWeatherWorld?"
"Uh. Maybe?"
"That thing is EPIC! I wish I had the time to do that. Man. I can't believe you're building that in Survival. All those tree types and wood types and bits... Like. Whoah."
Maybe, someday, the Humans would learn not to underestimate themselves. Until then, a Companion's job was never done.
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / lantapix]
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