There was a failed telecommunications project recently that left me with several small satellite dishes to store away. I'll store them in hope that one day they'll be used to bend invisible beams of information through the sky. Somehow we'll alchemize these imperceptible data streams into gold bricks to weigh down the company coffers. Then we'll all get fat and smoke cigars.

The dishes are small: two feet wide, grey, and plastic. They're light. When I get my own home, I want to buy them on the cheap and use them for decorations. While neighbors change their decorations from Easter to Halloween to Christmas, I'll just keep the same old satellite dishes up year round. I figure a few on the roof, a few on the porch overhang, and a few in the garden ought to do it. I don't mind cleaning off birdshit every few months.

My next plan would be to build, steal, or even buy an LED sign. I'll waterproof it and hang in under the gutter. I'll write cute messages and slogans for each holiday and address these greetings to various alien races. There are plenty of weird star and galaxy names with Greek numbers in them like Alpha Centauri and Delta Quadrant, so I can make up names for alien races without straining my imagination too hard. My messages will be friendly so the neighbors will think I'm crazy but harmless.

Stuff like "Happy Thanksgiving, Omega Hyperions! Come visit next Thursday and I'll swap my turkey and pumpkin pie for your zoolchex kizunlii and zzbrtx xtrrllen and we'll drink beers on my front porch rocking chairs. See you soon!"

Occasionally I'll make a big show out of adjusting the direction they're facing. I'll don a straw hat and some faded overalls and punch numbers into my calculater and strain my brow and rub my chin. Then I'll carefully reposition each one and chirp like a sparrow and snap my fingers before scuttling across my roof to the next.

Nobody will ever try to recruit me for Jehovah's Witnesses or sell me girl scout cookies, but you can bet your ass the kids'll come trick or treating. 7:30 AM - Bottle Rocket Fire Alarm