Faldoni, parts 3068 - 3071

 3068. Now that you have your interpretation you have to adjust it with these calibrations. If the sky is overcast add plus 2. If you are worried about unpaid bills add plus 3. If you are over sixty years old add plus 4.  On the other hand, if the sun is shining, there is no wind, and it is over sixty-five degrees in April then subtract 5. If the check engine light in your car is not on then subtract 7. 

 3069. Yes, these and similar adjustments that you can figure out for yourself are necessary to counterbalance the tendency to find a good prognosis if you are on a good mood, and a bad prognosis if you are distressed and uneasy in your mind. 

 3070. You may think that I am trying to undermine the idea of telling the future by the study of signs, but that is not true. I am only attempting to insert a little rationality into the process. Just because our prognostications are likely to be more optimistic on a cloudless day, than at the beginning of a thunderstorm, does not mean that they are only a reflection of a fleeting mood. Signs will accurately predict the future, if only we are sufficiently objective in their utilization.

 

 3071. But to return to our narrative, our Jailer could not utilize the business of pointing to a line in a book as a method because he could not read. But, more importantly, he decided to manufacture his predictions instead of look for them.  With this in mind he went to pay a visit to the old Cantaloupe man. He had some questions to ask him, and in the answers he hoped to find the salvation of the painter Faldoni.