A letter of apology to Xylb’tok, who must have felt Earth was ignoring him.
16-06-2026
Dear Xylb’tok
An apology.
You have spent 69 weeks transmitting warnings from Olympus Mons, waving at wandering rovers, supervising Lunar Haggis and explaining that Mars is not an undeveloped business park, while we have replied with the interplanetary equivalent of finding your letter under a takeaway menu six months later.
This was not rudeness. It was British technology.
Our communications system consisted of a Sinclair ZX81, a faulty 16K RAM pack and an aerial made from coat hangers, a biscuit tin and optimism. The RAM pack disconnected whenever somebody breathed nearby, and the elastic bands perished after exposure to one of Bill’s stronger cups of tea.
Bill replaced them with a washing-machine belt and two trouser braces. This worked for eleven seconds.
The final breakthrough was the KAT-Assisted Solar Communicator.
KAT does not generate electricity. She lies in a patch of sunlight while string, bicycle reflectors and curtain pulleys turn a steel dustbin towards her. As the sun moves, KAT moves. As KAT moves, the dish follows. NASA may call this primitive, but NASA has a rover playing hide-and-seek with the Lunar Haggis, so let us keep the institutional smirking to a minimum.
We bolted the dustbin to a traffic cone, wrapped the ZX81 in Tunnock’s foil and pointed it towards Olympus Mons. This is not, we are assured, the same cone used during the Lunar Haggis relay race involving the kettle and the map of Greenland.
The signal arrived just as Bill put the kettle on.
So, after this silence, we are back.
We have not forgotten your first warning. Mars is not a budget holiday destination. There will be no “I Love Mars” gift shop and no Starbucks on Olympus Mons. Elon’s application remains declined.
We remember the tariffed penguins, the Tunnock’s-wrapper arch, the gold-plated wheelbarrow, WhiskeyLeaks and the wandering rover.
We even received your postcard from Saturn, although the dish classified it as a demand from British Gas.
In other words, Xylb’tok, we have been paying attention.
You report that around 180 religious identities were removed from Pentagon personnel records, with streamlining and standardisation offered as the explanation.
In plain English, complicated human beings appear to have collided with a database designed by somebody whose emotional range runs from “drop-down menu” to “mandatory field”.
People do not become simpler because a spreadsheet contains fewer boxes.
“Streamlining” is one of those bureaucratic words that arrives wearing a high-visibility jacket and leaves carrying somebody’s recognition in a bin bag. It never says, “We removed something meaningful.” It says, “The information architecture has been rationalised.”
That is administrative English for: the humans were interfering with the form.
Then there is the reported legal argument about whether presidential authority could theoretically extend to demolishing the Statue of Liberty. This is not evidence of an active demolition order.
Fine.
But what a question.
Can the president demolish one of the world’s most recognisable symbols of freedom?
That is like asking whether the owner of a fire extinguisher may beat the smoke alarm to pieces with it. The answer might be technically interesting. The question remains alarming.
Turning the Statue of Liberty into an executive-power test object reduces a national symbol to something behind a skip with a sign saying, “Free to collector. Liberty not guaranteed.”
Then comes Freedom 250. Your dispatch says invited celebrities have declined amid confusion over performers supposedly associated with the event, while a UFC cage sits on the White House lawn.
Nothing says constitutional liberty quite like chain-link fencing outside the executive mansion.
The Founding Fathers apparently overlooked the fourth branch of government: heavyweight.
Bill looked up from the papers, raised his mug and muttered, “At least the cage knows who agreed to be inside it.”
Your account of D-Day is harder to laugh away.
You describe an AI-generated video featuring Trump, motorcycles, camels and a lion, alongside an image portraying Barack Obama’s presidential library as a rubbish bin.
D-Day commemorates immense sacrifice. Thousands walked towards terror because fascism had to be defeated. Families still carry those losses. Veterans and descendants deserve solemnity, care and humility.
Instead, history appears to have been asked to hold somebody’s selfie stick.
A lion. A camel. Motorcycles. On D-Day.
It is remembrance designed by a fruit machine. Pull the lever and receive heroic fantasy, flags and a complimentary insult about a former president.
Sacrifice becomes scenery. History becomes a green screen. The dead become unpaid extras in somebody else’s trailer.
That is where the joke stops.
The people buried there are not campaign furniture. Their sacrifice is not a prop. A battlefield against fascism is not a stage for culture-war karaoke. Add flags, a lectern and catering if you like. A bad comparison remains bad, only now it has a brass band.
Your reports of repeated talk about Greenland, Canada, the Chagos Islands and other territories create the same spectacle. Countries sound like properties. Islands become desk accessories. Sovereignty arrives with a hotel icon.
Nations are not collectable plates. Someone should remove the tiny metal battleship before another territory is asked to pay rent.
The new Earth Department of Territorial Shopping will presumably put Greenland beside the tills with the batteries and chewing gum. The Lunar Haggis will try to buy it using the medal they awarded themselves for crossing a road. Grzz’lax will confiscate the receipt and return to bed.
Then we reach the reflecting pool, reportedly described as larger than skyscrapers.
A pool. Larger than skyscrapers. Because it is long.
Width and height are different measurements. Furniture has confirmed this.
By that system, a pancake is taller than a giraffe, Bill’s bath rivals the Shard, and Wales can defeat Everest by lying down.
Every number must now be historic. Every repainting job must sound as though Pharaoh has returned with a roller tray and a press secretary.
The result is not grandeur.
It is a ruler being operated by a Labrador.
You also report the suggestion that the Lincoln Memorial faces the wrong way.
A national monument is not a garden ornament that can be rotated because Auntie Jean thinks the light is better. There is no giant Allen key and no leaflet reading: attach columns, tighten abolition symbolism, face towards preferred camera, retain proof of purchase.
The more urgent directional problem may lie elsewhere.
Finally, you report enthusiasm for figures showing the United States trade deficit widening sharply. Trade deficits are complicated. Context matters.
But celebrating a statistic chiefly because the number is large creates the impression of economics conducted by fruit machine.
Number bigger. Lights brighter. Therefore victory.
Please insert another economy to continue.
Your central conclusion is right, Xylb’tok.
Reality is being treated as negotiable.
A fact enters the room. Branding pats the sofa beside it. Power produces a marker pen. Five minutes later, history has a new label, geography is on probation, and geometry is escorted outside for asking hostile questions.
The danger is accumulation. Language loses precision. History loses humility. Countries lose people and become shapes on a sales brochure. Statistics lose context.
Bill made one final cuppa, folded the newspapers and muttered, “You can laminate nonsense, but it is still nonsense.”
That is why your dispatches matter. You make absurdity visible before familiarity turns it into wallpaper.
Please tell Grzz’lax that confiscating the measuring equipment has our support. Tell the Lunar Haggis that the sausage roll remains smaller than Olympus Mons, although potentially better governed. Tell the Penguin that her silent stare has surpassed several constitutional commentaries.
As for us, the ZX81 is humming, the steel bin is pointing roughly upwards, and KAT has moved into a promising patch of sunlight.
Communication should remain stable, unless Bill opens the cupboard or somebody nearby uses a hairdryer.
You keep watching Earth.
We will keep checking the labels.
Reality is not optional.
Even when laminated.
Willy
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