What do you want to ask the universe?

I have been thinking too much again and it is keeping me awake — again.

There are things in the universe I don’t understand, questions that can’t be answered on Google. Have you ever noticed that most everything can be answered on Google?

I asked my friends what they would like to know.

K.Y. says, “I want to know what is on the other side of space, what is on the other side of the universe? Ever since I was a little kid I have been fascinated with space and stars. Is Heaven on the other side, at the end of space?”

Wow, those are really a deep questions. I’m afraid mine are much more mundane: If corn oil is made from pressed corn, what is baby oil made of — pressed babies?

OK, I didn’t make that one up myself. It has been on the Web for a long time. But it still makes me giggle. And if there are disgruntled employees at a company, are there gruntled ones as well?

Hey, Ms. or Mr. Universe! Why do we have ice cream headaches?

I know I can Google the medical mechanics of ice cream headaches, but I want to know whose big idea it was to have our bodies respond that way. Here I am driving down the freeway, big slurping my way through an exquisite Starbucks Vente Green Tea Frappucino, double blend, hold the whip please, when I feel it start.

OH NO! Now you have done it, Hartley. ICE CREAM HEADACHE.

A spike drives into the sinus below my right eye, snakes around through my temple to that god-awful tender spot at the base of my skull then up to the top of my head where red devils poke at my brain with forked lighting bolts.

I am blind in one eye, sick to my stomach and nothing will make it go away. It just has to fade on its own.

So, Universe, why is our body constructed that way? What earthly or heavenly good does it do? Why couldn’t you just say, “Let the little humans enjoy their ice cream without pain. No sweat off our brow.”

The possibility of such a pain certainly decreases the deliciousness of said icy drink. The only answer is slow slurping. But that is not as fun and the drink really is not as tasty. Once in a while, a girl wants to take big slurps.

It’s not fair, I tell you. But then, nothing in life or the Universe is ever really fair. At least that is what my mother used to say.