Before the clocks stopped, Narwhal Slotterfield was an ordinary basketball referee. He blew his whistle. He stretched the rules. He even had a girlfriend. But then the clock thing happened. Now it's 7:23 pm, Narwhal's in a diner in the middle of the Great Plains,, and now is all he's got. Left to wander a planet where people stand like manikins and raindrops never reach the earth, our ref soon realizes he has the power to officiate the universe itself, an endeavor that leads him along a philosophical mobius strip wrapped around the world as tightly as a wedding ring. A love story, in other words.