For millennia, science-minded men and women have looked to the skies for the answers to life’s greatest questions. Why are we here? Are we alone in the universe? If I’m a Scorpio and he’s a Capricorn can we last as a couple even if Mars is in retrograde? While our greatest minds have managed to use the scientific method and physics to find some answers, through all the years of research the skies have never talked back. Until this weekend, when the Sun gave an exclusive first interview to The Gabbler.
The Gabbler: Thank you so much for agreeing to speak with me today, Sun. May I call you Sun?
The Sun: Oh, you’re welcome. You’re so, so, SO welcome. And please, call me Sun. I’m so excited to talk to you. Yes, please, please, please call me Sun. It’s just so, so, so, so, SO exciting to talk to you.
TG: Um…are you okay, Sun?
TS: What do you mean, okay? Of course I’m okay. I’m so, so, SO okay. I’m better than okay, I’m on fire! Ha! Get it?! Because I’m a ball of firey gases! Ha! Get it?! I’m ON FIRE!
TG: Okay. It just seems like you’re a little…coked out or something.
TS: Coked out?! I can’t do drugs! I’m a star! You know what I do to coke, huh? I burn it up, baby! Burn, baby, burn, I’m on fire!
TG: Yeah, I got the whole fire thing. You’re a star. Very funny. But where do you get all this energy?
TS: Nuclear fusion, baby! So you know hydrogen, right? Like, the element? You know, the H in your precious H2O?! So I take two of those and I’m like-BAM!-helium. All day long! All night long! Just because you don’t see me doesn’t mean I’m not there, burning, baby, burning! I’m on fire!
TG: And that makes you THIS energetic all of the time?
TS: Ohmygoodness, NO! I’m toning it down for you, baby! Reining it in! Calming it down! Namaste! Just! For! You!
TG: So how much energy do you normally have?
TS: A LOT! According to your silly little astrophysicists, it’s something like 92 billion megaton nuclear bombs exploding. BAM!
TG: Per day? That’s insane.
TS: Per day?!?! Hell no. Per second, baby! That’s 92 billion exploding megaton nuclear bombs per second, at your service! Fueling your planet, letting life exist on Earth and maybe Mars (but I’m not telling). No big deal, you’re welcome, sorry, not sorry!
TG: I don’t think you used that last one right.
TS: What one?! Sorry not sorry?! But I’m not sorry! Not sorry about skin cancer, that’s for sure! Not even sorry about wrinkles and leathery skin and sunburn! Put on some clothes! Or at least some sunscreen. I got a solar system to fuel! I put the soul in solar system!
TG: Well, yeah. It’s Latin for sun, which is you.
TS: Why can’t you let me be just a little bit punny, baby?! This is my first chance to speak to humans. I just want to play a little bit! Why do you think I decided to talk to someone so unscientific? If I wanted technical information, I’d be talking to NASA, baby!
TG: Hey! I’m smart and sciencey! I took Intro to Statistics in college! There were numbers and stuff. And could you stop calling me baby? It’s kind of degrading.
TS: Listen, baby. I’m 4.6 billion years old! I have another 5 billion to go before I even start dying, which is a long process for a star. So to me, you’re a baby! A bay-bay! Totally infantile! You were born a baby, you live a baby, and you die a little itty bitty baby! I’ll probably still be thinking about this interview when you die!
TG: You’re going to think about this interview until I die? That’s so sweet!
TS: Don’t get too flattered there, okay? Don’t get carried away! It’s like a second to me! An itty bitty baby second! The blink of a solar flare! This tiny, insignificant second to the Sun and you’re dead. Sorry, not sorry!
TG: See? This is why I hate astronomy. The enormity of space and time always makes me hyper-aware of my own mortality and utter insignificance.
TS: Don’t get sad, baby! Get glad! You’re a good kid! Let’s talk about dying stars, instead! Stars die, too, you know. We run out of hydrogen in our core and then-BAM!-we expand and collapse like the over-stretched elastic in a pair of fat sweatpants!
TG: Well that doesn’t sound great, either.
TS: Eh! I have another five billion years. At least! And if stars didn’t die we wouldn’t have cool things like black holes! Or elements. You know that’s where all the elements on earth come from, right? You’re made from dead stars! You’re welcome!
TG: I’m made out of stardust? That’s…beautiful.
TS: Don’t get carried away again, baby! You humans with your romance. We’re just balls of gas! You think we’re so wonderful with your twinkle, twinkle, like a diamond in the sky, when you wish upon a star bullshit! We’re just balls of fire! Good gracious!
TG: Well, you know, if humans are romantic about normal k”stars, we’re downright worshipful of you. Tell me, it was a little bit fun back in the day when you had a whole planet full of people whose highest deities all were sun gods, right?
TS: Sun gods! What a silly idea! None of them even knew what hydrogen was, let alone how to fuse it into helium! How could they be sun gods! Give me nuclear fusion over a god any day! Or night! I’m always here!
TG: So you’re honestly not that into being worshiped?
TS: I don’t need to be worshipped, I’m on fire!
TG: Yeah, I know, I’m pretty sold on the fire thing, thanks. Well, it’s been very enlightening talking to you. Thanks for the interview. I’m sure NASA is going to go crazy once they figure out that the sun is really just a ball of fire with ADHD.
TS: You’re very, VERY welcome! I’m burning up with joy! I’m on fire!
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