With " Gravity's Rainbow ( Large ), " for instance, he began by using an 18-foot-long beaded pull cord, creating catenaries, or chains, on the wood surface that pleased his eye, then traced them with a white pencil.
42.
A pullstring ( pull string, pull-string ), pullcord ( pull cord, pull-cord ), or pullchain ( pull-chain, pull chain ) is a string, cord, or chain wound on a spring-loaded spindle that engages a mechanism when it is pulled.
43.
The line then carries all the pulses generated by all the devices . ( This is analogous to the pull cord on some buses and trolleys that any passenger can pull to signal the driver that they are requesting a stop . ) However, interrupt pulses from different devices may merge if they occur close in time.
44.
He discovers that the mysterious signal comes from a power station, but it is not a human survivor -just a tilted Coca-Cola bottle hanging by its neck from an open window shade's pull cord; random ocean breezes bump the bottle against a " live " telegraph key to send the random signals.
45.
A single yank on the pull cord, with the flywheel offering just the right amount of resistance, and the engine coughs, clears its throat and springs to life _ even after a long hibernation ( or estivation, in the case of the snow blower . ) In a small, mechanical way, you could almost say, it is a metaphorical re-enactment of birth itself.
