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Today, Jon looked a little worse for wear. Well, to be fair, he always did. But today he looked even worse.

That was what happened when an alternate you drank himself blind and you were left with the hangover.

"Afternoon," Jon murmured. "I'm keeping the lights low because we're doing a movie day." Sure, that was why.

"Movies, films, moving pictures - they're a way of telling stories, like plays. There's a lot of things they can show that aren't real. Never believe everything you see. They also can feed into popular culture, and you may find people quoting from them or referring to them.

"Today we're watching a film. It's one a lot of people know. Now you'll know it, too."

He put on Space Battles.

intheeyeofthebeholding

Today class was in a regular classroom, albeit with a large screen at the front for him to show things on.

"Today," Jon announced, "we're going to briefly cover sport." He grimaced. "I'm not much of a follower myself, but for many people it's an important element of life." For some reason.

"In the United States, one of the major sports is called football." He showed some footage as he spoke. "The rest of the world refers to this as American Football, because 'football' elsewhere is this." He showed different footage. "Because you play it with your feet, which at least makes sense. American football is more similar to rugby. Sort of. In all of these sports, there is a ball, and two teams, and each team has to get the ball into the other team's net or end zone. That seems to be how a lot of team sports work."

There was different footage now. "Basketball is another US sport that follows this rule, although the field - called a court - is much smaller. As are the nets."

He changed the footage yet again. "One exception to the format is another major sport in the US, baseball. In this sport, one team stays on the field, and the other hits a ball and then tries to make it around these bases, while the first team tries to prevent them from doing so.

"All of these sports have a lot of fans. That is, people who enjoy them, cheer for the team from their city or a city they identify with, and follow their exploits. Often people will get together and have parties while watching the games, or travel to view them in person."

The screen split to show four different things at once: swimming, gymnastics, fencing, and surfing. "Right now, something called the Olympics is going on. It's based somewhat on an old Greek tradition and was revived last century. Nations all over the world - at least the ones that can afford it - send athletes to one location to compete in sports. Right now it's in France. Mostly. It's meant to be every four years, though lately there have been some exceptions, and the summer and winter games are split so there's really games every two years. Anyway, there are a lot of different sports going on, and whichever individual or team wins or comes in second or third is awarded a medal. It's all very competitive."

He frowned slightly at the screen before turning back to the class. "If you have any questions about any of the sports I've mentioned or others I haven't, please let me know, and I will do my best to answer them."

intheeyeofthebeholding

Today, class was meeting in the Danger Shop, which was programmed into a modern kitchen. Or something more like several of them, to allow for differences.

"Cooking appliances have changed a bit over the years," Jon said, "so if you're coming from somewhere or somewhen else, I thought we'd go over them."

He gestured at the first stove. "Stovetops can be electric or gas. This is an electric one that's slightly older; it's got coils. This one," he went to the next one, "is also electric, but it's got a flat top. Either of these works the same way: there are knobs, one for each of the elements, and you turn them to switch a specific element on." He demonstrated the high and low ends, showed how the elements might glow or have a light to show they were on. "This one," he went to the next stove, "is gas. I don't know if there are any of these on the island, but just in case. These have a little flame called a pilot light that's always on. Er. Well, it should be. If you smell something bad, check the light, because if it's not on, the gas could be leaking, which would make...well, to oversimplify it, it would make the whole room flammable. But turning the knob for an element lights the flames in the element, and then you just cook over the fire. In a pan or pot. All of these use cookware. Cooking food directly on them is messy and may ruin them.

"Under a stove, you almost always have an oven. That's for things you need to bake or heat all around instead of just from the bottom up." Look, he was competent, but he wasn't a chef. If you wanted details, ask Hannibal. "There's a knob that lets you adjust the temperature, and then you put the food inside it. Usually also in cookware, but not always."

He moved to the next equipment. "This is a microwave oven. It cooks food by pushing radiation through it. It cooks much faster than a stove or oven, but it has limitations - you can't put metal in it, it won't make things crispy, and apparently it's bad for heating water for tea. You put food inside it, close the door, then push the buttons to type in how long you want to heat things for. You may also be able to control the level of radiation, but honestly, you won't often need to."

And the last bit of cooking equipment he held up proudly. "This is an electric kettle. You fill it with water, plug it in, and press the button, and it boils water. Perfect for tea, or anything else you might want hot water for."

He waved at one last thing. "That's a refrigerator. Usually there's a big part and a small part. The small part is for frozen things, the large part keeps things cold but not frozen. There's not much else to know about it, but it's very useful."

He went over his lecture mentally to make sure he hadn't forgotten things, then nodded. "If you have any questions, please ask; otherwise we can get to cooking things."

intheeyeofthebeholding

Jon came into the classroom today with a large cardboard box, which he set on the desk at the front.

"Good afternoon. Today we'll be jumping to something much more complex, yet fairly important in daily life at this time." Though possibly not quite as important as Summer believed.

He took his own out of his pocket. "This is a mobile. Or I suppose around here it's mostly called a phone. A cellular telephone. That means it's designed to be a mode of voice communication you can take nearly anywhere with you. It uses electricity to fill its batteries, so you plug it in until the indicator here shows it's at one hundred percent, and then you can unplug it and bring it with you.

"You can use it for its original intent, which is calling others, by going here. The image on this button is designed to look like an old-fashioned telephone handset. From here, each telephone has a number, and if you type in that number, it will ring that telephone." He dialed a number and one of the phones in the box rang. He took a moment to fish it out. "Then the person on the other end presses the green button to answer, and you can talk."

He paused for a moment. "But, erm. That's actually their original purpose, but many people no longer use it. You can also type messages to other people, look up all kinds of information you might need, engage in social media, which is rather like being at a party or posting bills, or...or diving into shark-infested waters, honestly. And you can also play games. So today, I'll pass this around, and you can take a phone if you don't already have one, and we'll go through a few of these things. And after class, if you have any further questions, Summer at the Turtle and Canary or Caritas is an excellent resource. As well as providing these phones, she uses hers very frequently for many different things."

Because Jon mostly texted people and watched cat videos.

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