A reminder to new students that you don’t need to beat the Thought Balloons with sticks to harvest the metadata. The visiting balloons will naturally emit metadata as part of their normal activity, and after the balloons have drifted a safe distance, you can easily move in and collect the metadata in your commemorative Psyhigh Thought Balloon Fest 2019 metadata collection bag, available from @Huldra in the Biological and Metaphorical Psychic Flora and Fauna Equipment Centre.

Remember, “A thought balloon never forgets,” so don’t go around punching them! And you’re never quite sure how @GROTTO G.S.M. INC. undisclosed security officers are going to react.

It is easy to forget about the balloons. They become almost invisible through time. In fact, recent scientific studies show that the balloons don't actually migrate, but are always there, all year round, hovering ominously above us the whole time. We become blind to them, existentially ignoring them with every fiber of our being.

Except for this time of year. It's in the fall they say that the veil between worlds becomes thinnest, but the veil isn't between worlds--it's a veil of our own perception. It's when we allow ourselves to see what's really there. Perhaps it's a holiday for our minds--with all that energy we spend all year not seeing them, we have to give ourselves a little break, and let them through, once a year.

So take a good look now -- before we start hiding them from ourselves again.

The balloons don't seem to move. They just float there in the air.

I organized the Cheer Squad from Cylindrical Dorm to cheer them on. We got up early and lined up along the service roads in the chilly morning fog and waved our pompoms on sticks and cheered for the balloons. We wanted to welcome them. We wanted them to shower us with candy. We wanted them to touch down upon the ground and lift us up by our tiny arms and into their gondolas and take us for rides in the morning light.

But the balloons did not move. They remain there in the air. Floating still.