Dhog with a Pearl Earring

People think that because I hang out with the universe that I have a kind of inside track on things and can get special deals from the universe and stuff.  Consequently they frequently try to pat my tummy under the mistaken impression that because of my influence with the universe I can grant wishes or something, like my tummy was one of those genie bottles. You know the one, where you rub it and a magical dude pops out and grants three wishes.

What a mistake.

The universe does not do anyone any favors. This is part of a long-standing policy it developed many billions of years ago at the very beginning of everything after an exchange with dark matter.

It turns out that a huge amount of the matter in the universe is shy and embarrassed about being seen in public. Kind of agoraphobia, if you know what I mean, and what is the universe if not the biggest goddamn agora ever? (Agora means, in Greek, “public market place.”) So here the universe created this gargantuan, objectively terrifying empty space and plopped matter right down in the middle of it, and, like all of the creatures it creates, matter has an anxiety disorder that causes it to be fearful of wide-open spaces. Tra la!

This is the kind of thing that the universe would not do if it had any foresight, but it is constantly rushing into everything headlong without thinking. So all of a sudden there it is sitting there having created itself (well, technically, God created it first, but that's a long story I can't get into here) with a bazillion trillion gazillion tons of matter 85% of which is pathologically shy and utterly appalled at the fact that it is suddenly in the middle of this vast empty space.

And it starts screaming.

Really loud, in fear.

The universe felt terrible about this, and tried to console all the matter. The matter responded by saying, “Do me a favor, if you make me dark, then no one can see me,” and the universe was so upset with its mistake, and not taking the feelings of all this matter, into consideration that it went ahead, poof, just like the aforementioned genie, and all of a sudden 85% of the matter in the universe was no longer visible anymore.