"That would be putting it mildly," Ray says. "Let me put it like this: a while ago, I was asked by a friend here at Milliways if I didn't come to the Bar for something approaching normalcy, since it was obviously in short supply at home. Said friend is a giant space alien robot, several million years old, who can turn into a truck without batting an optic. My world needs pretty much all the shoring-up it can get."