A Glaswegian God
by Tom Greenwood
Genre: Humour
Swearwords: None.
Description: A lot of strange people live in Glasgow; this is the tale of one of them.
_____________________________________________________________________
The day I met God and he bought me a beer was a wet Thursday. That’s got your attention hasn’t it? What happened was I was walking along a street in the West End towards a bus stop when I noticed an old man walking towards me. I didn’t really pay him much attention until he was only a couple of feet away. Then he just stepped out into the traffic with no regard to the oncoming traffic. I grabbed him by his collar, back onto the pavement to a cacophony of car horns.
“What are you doing?” I asked, ignoring the taxi driver shouting out of his window.
“It’s okay, I can’t die.”
A nutter I thought.
“Of course you can die.”
“No I can’t.”
“So what makes you so special?”
“Because I am.”
“That really doesn’t answer the question,” I pointed out.
“No I suppose not, well then I am special because I created the universe,” he replied in the most matter-of-fact voice you can imagine.
Well that stopped me in my tracks, so to speak. I still thought he was a nutter mind.
“When I created the universe, I created it so I couldn’t be killed,” he continued.
Well you would do that I suppose. Supposing that you wanted to live forever.
“So you created the universe?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“So why are you in Glasgow?” I asked.
“You have to be somewhere and why not, I quite like Glasgow.”
“I hope you don’t mind, but I don’t really believe you,” I replied and then paused to think of something else to say. “Say I had a gun, pointed it at your head and pulled the trigger, what would stop the bullet from blowing your brains out?”
“I don’t know, you could drop dead, the gun might misfire, a meteorite might fall on your head, anything. Just then, you pulled me out of the oncoming traffic. The laws of the universe conspired to make that happen.”
I was sort-of interested and not in too much of a hurry; you meet lots of loonies in Glasgow, usually incoherent drunks, but this was a loony you could have a sensible conversation with. Well semi-sensible.
“Look I’ll prove it to you,” he said.
“Eh?”
“I’ll try and kill myself again.”
“No don’t do that.”
“See.”
“See what?”
“You stopped me again.”
“No I didn’t.”
“Yes you just said not to.”
I didn’t say anything for a moment, trying to find the flaw in his argument that I knew was there. “I was advising against killing yourself,” I eventually explained. “I don’t really want you to kill yourself just to try and prove your immortality. I’d feel sort of guilty if you actually ended up dead but I didn’t actually stop you.”
“Why? People die all the time,” he asked.
“Yes but not as result of trying to prove… Why am I having this conversation?”
“You don’t believe that I am the creator of the universe.”
“No I don’t, because if you were, why would you be an old man in Glasgow?”
“Because it’s the way I choose to be.”
“Right? Okay, if you created the universe,” I started, thinking I would try and defeat him through the power of logic, “where did you come from?”
“From the universe before this one.”
“And how did you get here?”
“Through the portal between universes.”
I had to admit that was quite a good answer even if it didn’t explain anything.
“Have you ever wondered why physics is difficult to understand?” he asked.
“Apart from me being thick?”
“Yes, but greater minds than yours can’t figure it out.”
That was true, what little I knew about the laws of physics was that they made no sense what-so-ever.
“It’s because the laws have to be really complex, so I can’t die. The whole observer thing is tied up with it.”
“The what?”
“How an observer influences an event. That’s one of my laws, it was very difficult to set up.”
I decided to change the subject because well frankly at this point I was lost. “When did you come across to this universe?”
“After a few years of its existence.”
“But life couldn’t exist then?”
“Not life as you know it, I’ve changed forms several times since then.”
Still didn’t explain anything.
“Okay, why?” I asked.
“Why what?”
“Why bother creating a new universe?”
“My universe was dying, I’m from a very technologically advanced species. Despite all of our advances we couldn’t defeat the laws of thermodynamics.”
“So you created another universe with the same rules of thermodynamics?” See I knew some physics.
“Well yes it’s easier that way. Once this universe gets too old I’ll just have to create a new one.”
“So you’re God?”
“Yes but not as you usually think about him on this planet. I’m not all those things beginning with omni.”
“So apart from not dying what are your other godly powers.”
“I don’t want to reveal all of them but I’ve lived here a long time.”
“How long?”
“Millions of years. I remember the dinosaurs, I’m older than the universe remember?”
“The meteor that killed the dinosaurs didn’t get you then?”
“Nope, nor all the gamma-ray events, nor the super volcanoes, nor the Cuban Missile crisis. None of the things that have nearly wiped out life on Earth.”
Well if a loony is going to have a loony story he may as well do the research.
“You can say that as long as I live on this planet, I protect it from the events that would wipe out all humans, because if you were all to die then I would probably as well.”
“Didn’t work when you were a dinosaur?”
“I was a mammal at the time?”
“If that is true, I would like to buy you a pint because even though I don’t believe you, you do weave a coherent and knowledgeable story,” I said. If I was going to trip him up, metaphorically speaking, it would be best under the influence of alcohol.
“People normally don’t believe me.” He sounded quite disappointed.
“And what do most of them do?”
“They humour me.”
“Glasgow humour.”
“Not just Glasgow, the Romans were really sarcastic. They would sometimes try and prove me wrong by sacrificing me to their gods.”
“Obviously they never succeeded.”
“Then they would try and worship me, which is even more annoying. Look as normally I’m not in such a generous mood, I’ll buy you a beer. Look at it as a reward for saving my life.”
“Promise not to try and kill yourself in my company again?”
He raised his right arm, “I swear on all of creation that I will not try and kill myself in your presence again. Note I left out the word ‘my’ before creation.”
I had noticed.
It was not a pub that I had been in before but it was the closest. He bought two pints of Special and took a few sips from one.
“It’s a dangerous universe out there,” he explained.
“Apart from the gamma ray events? What else?” I asked drinking my Special. Not my favourite tipple but I didn’t want to piss off God.
“Aliens.”
“Aliens!”
“Yes nasty aliens. My presence on Earth stops them noticing you. Not just you but the whole planet.”
“Really!”
“Yes you lot all keep looking for them, and they keep looking for new planets to plunder.”
“How do you know this?”
“I did sort of create them in a round about way.”
“That was very irresponsible,” I said. “You should do something about them. You said you could change shape. What shape were you during the age of the dinosaurs?”
“Most of the time I was dinosaur-shaped.”
“So why don’t you change into a dinosaur?”
“Well not in the pub, it would draw attention to myself.”
“I suppose it would. How about someone else?”
“In what way?”
“Make yourself look like someone else.”
“Anyone in particular?”
“Jessica Alba?”
“Phew, for a moment there, I thought you were going to say Jessica Rabbit.”
“Now that would be interesting.”
“Come on drink up, outside I’ll change into Jessica Alba.”
“In a way, I’m not sure I want you to.”
“Why not?”
“Because part of me will be disappointed when you don’t.”
“Oh ye of little faith.”
“See the aliens?” I asked.
“Are there lot of different sorts?”
“Oh yes?’
“Nasty?”
“Oh yes the nice ones get wiped out.”
Well that answers the Fermi paradox. And if you don’t know what that is then look it up on Google or somewhere because after I spoke to him I spent quite a lot of time finding out what he had been speaking about.
“Do you not get bored?” I asked.
“No if I do, I just let time pass me by or I try and do something to liven things up a bit, like I did tonight. Come on, have you got a camera on that phone of yours?”
“Why?”
“So you can get a photo with Jessica. I just hope nobody is watching when I change.”
I waited outside the dark alley, it only took a few moments but then Jessica Alba walked out.
“Come on, take that photo!” the Jessica who wasn’t Jessica said.
I couldn’t move, I was trying to think ways that everything he had said couldn’t be true.
“There’s Jessica Alba,” a shout came from down the road and three semi-drunks came running towards us.
“Bugger,” not-Jessica said in a very un-Jessica and quite-Glaswegian manner and ran back into the alleyway.
“She went down that way,” one of the newly arrived drunks shouted and ran into the alley.
There was a roar and the three men ran back out.
“What’s wrong with Jessica?” I asked.
“She’s been eaten by a dinosaur,” one said running away looking as if he’d just seen a dinosaur.
Five minutes later the old man walked out again.
“Believe me now?” he asked.
Swearwords: None.
Description: A lot of strange people live in Glasgow; this is the tale of one of them.
_____________________________________________________________________
The day I met God and he bought me a beer was a wet Thursday. That’s got your attention hasn’t it? What happened was I was walking along a street in the West End towards a bus stop when I noticed an old man walking towards me. I didn’t really pay him much attention until he was only a couple of feet away. Then he just stepped out into the traffic with no regard to the oncoming traffic. I grabbed him by his collar, back onto the pavement to a cacophony of car horns.
“What are you doing?” I asked, ignoring the taxi driver shouting out of his window.
“It’s okay, I can’t die.”
A nutter I thought.
“Of course you can die.”
“No I can’t.”
“So what makes you so special?”
“Because I am.”
“That really doesn’t answer the question,” I pointed out.
“No I suppose not, well then I am special because I created the universe,” he replied in the most matter-of-fact voice you can imagine.
Well that stopped me in my tracks, so to speak. I still thought he was a nutter mind.
“When I created the universe, I created it so I couldn’t be killed,” he continued.
Well you would do that I suppose. Supposing that you wanted to live forever.
“So you created the universe?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“So why are you in Glasgow?” I asked.
“You have to be somewhere and why not, I quite like Glasgow.”
“I hope you don’t mind, but I don’t really believe you,” I replied and then paused to think of something else to say. “Say I had a gun, pointed it at your head and pulled the trigger, what would stop the bullet from blowing your brains out?”
“I don’t know, you could drop dead, the gun might misfire, a meteorite might fall on your head, anything. Just then, you pulled me out of the oncoming traffic. The laws of the universe conspired to make that happen.”
I was sort-of interested and not in too much of a hurry; you meet lots of loonies in Glasgow, usually incoherent drunks, but this was a loony you could have a sensible conversation with. Well semi-sensible.
“Look I’ll prove it to you,” he said.
“Eh?”
“I’ll try and kill myself again.”
“No don’t do that.”
“See.”
“See what?”
“You stopped me again.”
“No I didn’t.”
“Yes you just said not to.”
I didn’t say anything for a moment, trying to find the flaw in his argument that I knew was there. “I was advising against killing yourself,” I eventually explained. “I don’t really want you to kill yourself just to try and prove your immortality. I’d feel sort of guilty if you actually ended up dead but I didn’t actually stop you.”
“Why? People die all the time,” he asked.
“Yes but not as result of trying to prove… Why am I having this conversation?”
“You don’t believe that I am the creator of the universe.”
“No I don’t, because if you were, why would you be an old man in Glasgow?”
“Because it’s the way I choose to be.”
“Right? Okay, if you created the universe,” I started, thinking I would try and defeat him through the power of logic, “where did you come from?”
“From the universe before this one.”
“And how did you get here?”
“Through the portal between universes.”
I had to admit that was quite a good answer even if it didn’t explain anything.
“Have you ever wondered why physics is difficult to understand?” he asked.
“Apart from me being thick?”
“Yes, but greater minds than yours can’t figure it out.”
That was true, what little I knew about the laws of physics was that they made no sense what-so-ever.
“It’s because the laws have to be really complex, so I can’t die. The whole observer thing is tied up with it.”
“The what?”
“How an observer influences an event. That’s one of my laws, it was very difficult to set up.”
I decided to change the subject because well frankly at this point I was lost. “When did you come across to this universe?”
“After a few years of its existence.”
“But life couldn’t exist then?”
“Not life as you know it, I’ve changed forms several times since then.”
Still didn’t explain anything.
“Okay, why?” I asked.
“Why what?”
“Why bother creating a new universe?”
“My universe was dying, I’m from a very technologically advanced species. Despite all of our advances we couldn’t defeat the laws of thermodynamics.”
“So you created another universe with the same rules of thermodynamics?” See I knew some physics.
“Well yes it’s easier that way. Once this universe gets too old I’ll just have to create a new one.”
“So you’re God?”
“Yes but not as you usually think about him on this planet. I’m not all those things beginning with omni.”
“So apart from not dying what are your other godly powers.”
“I don’t want to reveal all of them but I’ve lived here a long time.”
“How long?”
“Millions of years. I remember the dinosaurs, I’m older than the universe remember?”
“The meteor that killed the dinosaurs didn’t get you then?”
“Nope, nor all the gamma-ray events, nor the super volcanoes, nor the Cuban Missile crisis. None of the things that have nearly wiped out life on Earth.”
Well if a loony is going to have a loony story he may as well do the research.
“You can say that as long as I live on this planet, I protect it from the events that would wipe out all humans, because if you were all to die then I would probably as well.”
“Didn’t work when you were a dinosaur?”
“I was a mammal at the time?”
“If that is true, I would like to buy you a pint because even though I don’t believe you, you do weave a coherent and knowledgeable story,” I said. If I was going to trip him up, metaphorically speaking, it would be best under the influence of alcohol.
“People normally don’t believe me.” He sounded quite disappointed.
“And what do most of them do?”
“They humour me.”
“Glasgow humour.”
“Not just Glasgow, the Romans were really sarcastic. They would sometimes try and prove me wrong by sacrificing me to their gods.”
“Obviously they never succeeded.”
“Then they would try and worship me, which is even more annoying. Look as normally I’m not in such a generous mood, I’ll buy you a beer. Look at it as a reward for saving my life.”
“Promise not to try and kill yourself in my company again?”
He raised his right arm, “I swear on all of creation that I will not try and kill myself in your presence again. Note I left out the word ‘my’ before creation.”
I had noticed.
It was not a pub that I had been in before but it was the closest. He bought two pints of Special and took a few sips from one.
“It’s a dangerous universe out there,” he explained.
“Apart from the gamma ray events? What else?” I asked drinking my Special. Not my favourite tipple but I didn’t want to piss off God.
“Aliens.”
“Aliens!”
“Yes nasty aliens. My presence on Earth stops them noticing you. Not just you but the whole planet.”
“Really!”
“Yes you lot all keep looking for them, and they keep looking for new planets to plunder.”
“How do you know this?”
“I did sort of create them in a round about way.”
“That was very irresponsible,” I said. “You should do something about them. You said you could change shape. What shape were you during the age of the dinosaurs?”
“Most of the time I was dinosaur-shaped.”
“So why don’t you change into a dinosaur?”
“Well not in the pub, it would draw attention to myself.”
“I suppose it would. How about someone else?”
“In what way?”
“Make yourself look like someone else.”
“Anyone in particular?”
“Jessica Alba?”
“Phew, for a moment there, I thought you were going to say Jessica Rabbit.”
“Now that would be interesting.”
“Come on drink up, outside I’ll change into Jessica Alba.”
“In a way, I’m not sure I want you to.”
“Why not?”
“Because part of me will be disappointed when you don’t.”
“Oh ye of little faith.”
“See the aliens?” I asked.
“Are there lot of different sorts?”
“Oh yes?’
“Nasty?”
“Oh yes the nice ones get wiped out.”
Well that answers the Fermi paradox. And if you don’t know what that is then look it up on Google or somewhere because after I spoke to him I spent quite a lot of time finding out what he had been speaking about.
“Do you not get bored?” I asked.
“No if I do, I just let time pass me by or I try and do something to liven things up a bit, like I did tonight. Come on, have you got a camera on that phone of yours?”
“Why?”
“So you can get a photo with Jessica. I just hope nobody is watching when I change.”
I waited outside the dark alley, it only took a few moments but then Jessica Alba walked out.
“Come on, take that photo!” the Jessica who wasn’t Jessica said.
I couldn’t move, I was trying to think ways that everything he had said couldn’t be true.
“There’s Jessica Alba,” a shout came from down the road and three semi-drunks came running towards us.
“Bugger,” not-Jessica said in a very un-Jessica and quite-Glaswegian manner and ran back into the alleyway.
“She went down that way,” one of the newly arrived drunks shouted and ran into the alley.
There was a roar and the three men ran back out.
“What’s wrong with Jessica?” I asked.
“She’s been eaten by a dinosaur,” one said running away looking as if he’d just seen a dinosaur.
Five minutes later the old man walked out again.
“Believe me now?” he asked.
About the Author
Tom Greenwood was born in Bishopbriggs and now lives in Edinburgh with his wife, two daughters and a rabbit. If you like his stories, you might want to read his novel, which can be found by clicking on the image below.