A Shortfall of Gravitas?

So, Elon Musk has just tweeted me (and, to be fair, about a few billion other people at the same time), that his new SpaceX droneship will be called “A Shortfall of Gravitas”.

I think I can spot a fellow Iain M. Banks ‘Culture‘ SF books fan out there!

It makes me wonder if I shouldn’t come up with some Culture-style names for my car. At the moment, I call it Yoda the Skoda, because it’s, well, a beaten-up old Skoda.

But, to honour Iain, who was always very kind to me whenever we met up in person, maybe I could rename the car to the “Are You Sure You Want a Diesel?”, or the “Four Wheels Good, Two Wheels Bad”, or the “Mostly Rusty”?

The car is the most obvious thing I own that I could name, not being a billionaire and not maintaining my own private space-fleet, and all. Apart from my cat, the house, and the toaster, that is.

What names could I come up with for them? Maybe, “Do I Look Like I’ve Been Fed?”, “Little Small For A Mansion”, and “I Asked For Bloody Scones And You Give Me This?”.

Anyway, a large parting thanks to my brave band of Patreon readers over at https://www.patreon.com/stephenhunt who have been spotting typos in the beta manuscript for my new science fiction novel, The Pashtun Boy’s Paradise – it should be going live soon, and you’re all getting a name-check in the credits at the start of the book.

Catch you next week.

Category: My books