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gentlemanbones:

nineprotons:

nitewrighter:

You know that whole trope where like, the protagonists get teleported up into the aliens’ spaceship or base or whatever and the alien appears to them only it doesn’t appear as it really looks like but rather, since it doesn’t want to scare the protagonists, it takes the form of something we find familiar and pleasing and is like, “I look like your dad or whatever–is this form okay?” Like I think about that trope a lot and I think like, what if the alien couldn’t pick out a form via telepathy and only had earth media to try and decide what form would scare its human guests least and be accepted almost immediately and honestly the more I think about it the more options for what form that might be are just really fun to me.

“I have chosen the form of your earth playwright and composer Lin-Manuel Miranda–do not be afraid. I come in peace.”

“Greetings. I am Glofnorbo of the cloud you call the ‘Pegasus Nebula.’ I have scanned your earth media from afar and empirically decided that you would find the form of the one known as Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson most pleasing. I have come to confer with your leaders.” 

“Do not be panic. I come in peace. I have assumed the form of your insectoid demigoddess ‘Hatsune Miku’ so that we may communicate peacefully without my true form horrifying you.” 

“It was decided that I would assume the form of your ‘Mister Rogers’ in order to best welcome your world to the galactic neighborhood without frightening your kind.”

“…So did your colleague take on the form of Jack Black for that reason too?”

“No, that is the actual Jack Black. We do not know how to make him leave.”

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bonehandledknife:

captainhuggermuggerus:

leaper182:

justgot1:

lonestorm:

lonestorm:

I met my favorite person this weekend.

I have these Native American reenactments in the summer, okay. We dress in authentic Native garb and go teach about our culture and whatnot at historical events. There’s this one on a weekend that housed all reenactors from Ancient Greece to World War II–you can walk through a timeline of living history. It’s cool.

So there are these guys in a tent on the far hill called the Scottish Highlanders. They bring about two to five people to their thing per year. They do all the good medieval Scottish jazz. Kilts, weapons, challenging you to fights.

But theres this one guy that is there every time. I always go visit to hear him give in depth talks about Scottish Reavers and their malitia and weaponry and stuff. He’s fun, so I go talk to him and he’s asking about what school I’m going to, what I want to do, etc.

So I tell him I want to be a history teacher and I like to write. He asks me if I have anything published, and I say no, thinking he means an actual book. But he waves me off and asks, “No, online. Have you ever heard of Fanfiction.net?”

Let me explain a thing. This guy. Is well over six feet. His biceps are bigger than my head, he’s about 45 years old, he has the thickest Scottish accent you’ve ever witnessed, he can wave two axes around like nobody’s business, he usually resolves friendly arguments with full on battle in armor with real weaponry with the scars to prove it, and he kind of has a biker gang.

And this guy starts telling me about the 700 page Doctor Who fanfiction that he’s been writing for six years and still running. 

Shamelessly continues to explain how he gets together with his badass biker buddies and they ride to his house with bottles of Jack Daniels and talk about the next fanfiction that they’re going to write together. (More Doctor Who, Xena Warrior Princess, Agents of Shield, Lord of the Rings…) They dare each other to write crossovers for interesting character interaction. This guy raves with excitement over character development and analysis. 

I cried. 

By the way

Here he is. Mike. In his Scottish glory.

Here he is with his buddy, Bear.

Here he is with his buddy Bear and me.

And here he is holding an ax to my throat.

I LOVE THIS. The perils of a site like Tumblr which is dominated by people under 30 (not on my dash, though, but that’s what demographics insist is true) is they genuinely don’t think anyone older has any interests in common with them. I feel like Livejournal was more varied in this regard, though again, my flist on LJ had all ages on it, so maybe it was just me. The only over 40s they know are the adults in positions of authority like parents and teachers, and surely Mom and Mr. W the Chem teacher have never heard of fan fiction or have the least interest in anything on the interwebs. A kid at work (I work at a university) who I jokingly called a meme lord once told me I needed to stop learning such things from my kid – who is 11 and basically uses the internet to watch Minecraft videos on YouTube, but of course she must be the one teaching me all these modernfangled intertoob things!

I admit though that I have fallen into the stereotype that fandom is all women, because that’s been my experience by far; I think the number of male-identified people I’ve come across in my various fandoms wouldn’t pass the single digits. But that’s probably due to the nature of my reading and the way I curate my dash. Where’s a big ol’ 40 something biker dude who writes Stucky?? Point him out to me and I’ll add him to my dash!

Mike the Doctor Who Scottish badass fills me with hope and love. <3

okay but what’s his username I want to read a 700 page Doctor Who fan fiction

seriously tho, where’s the fic

I’ve discovered there’s a lot you can do inside haunted houses.

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thesmilegiver:

mooneue:

mishasminions:

fictionalfeather:

For example, you can:

• be in a shampoo commercial

• start a boy band:

• spot some choice booty:

• break into song:

• see some people in frankly offensive outfits:

• attend a metal show:

• listen to some sick jams:

• discover zombieism:

• sample some tasty snacks:

• watch someone get burned bad:

• find something you really like:

• find something you really, really like:

• find something you REALLY REALLY LIKE:

• and wonder if you left the stove on:

THIS POST HAD ME AT SHAMPOO COMMERCIAL

@wadanohairdryer

“see some people in frankly offensive outfits”

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argumate:

argumate:

syntheticbakingchocolate:

argumate:

You know what would be great? A festival where we can eat a ton of starchy carbohydrates and fats, said every human culture ever.

You know what would be better? FASTING (a great deal of human culture)

You know what would be even better??

*human culture looks at each other, quivering with nervous excitement*

FASTING followed by FEASTING!

*fireworks explode, human culture high fives itself, falls over*

oh and alcohol.

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holzmantweed:

artifactrix:

sorcyress:

silentstep:

therobotmonster:

moniquill:

siderealsandman:

friendlytroll:

prokopetz:

mikhailvladimirovich:

bogleech:

It’s funny how science fiction universes so often treat humans as a boring, default everyman species or even the weakest and dumbest.

I want to see a sci fi universe where we’re actually considered one of the more hideous and terrifying species.

How do we know our saliva and skin oils wouldn’t be ultra-corrosive to most other sapient races? What if we actually have the strongest vocal chords and can paralyze or kill the inhabitants of other worlds just by screaming at them? What if most sentient life in the universe turns out to be vegetable-like and lives in fear of us rare “animal” races who can move so quickly and chew shit up with our teeth?

Like that old story “they’re made of meat,” only we’re scarier.

HOLY SHIT THEY EAT CAPSAICIN FOR FUN

YOU GUYS I HEARD A HUMAN ONCE ATE AN AIRPLANE.

A HUMAN CAN KEEP FIGHTING FOR HOURS EVEN AFTER YOU SHOOT IT

humans are a proud warrior race with a pantheon of bloody gods: Ram-Bo, Schwarzenegger, etc.

REMOVING A LIMB WILL NOT FATALLY INCAPACITATE HUMANS: ALWAYS DESTROY THE HEAD.

WARNING: HUMANS CAN DETECT YOU EVEN AT NIGHT BY TRACKING VIBRATIONS THROUGH THE ATMOSPHERE

WARNING: HUMANS CAN REPRODUCE AT A RATE OF 1 PER SPACEYEAR. DESTROY INFESTATIONS IMMEDIATELY

THE HUMAN MOUTH HAS OVER THIRTY OUTCROPS OF BONE AND POWERFUL JAW MUSCLES.

HUMAN BITES CAN BE FATALLY INFECTIOUS EVEN TO OTHER HUMANS

WARNING: HUMANS CAN AND WILL USE IMPROVISED WEAPONS. SEE CLASSIFIED DATA LABELED J. CHAN.

HUMANS CAN PROJECT BIOWEAPONS FROM ALMOST EVERY ORIFICE ON THEIR BODY. DO NOT INHALE

OH GOD THE HUMANS FIGURED OUT DOOR HANDLES OH GOD OH GOD

More seriously, humans do have a number of advantages even among Terrestrial life. Our endurance, shock resistance, and ability to recover from injury is absurdly high compared to almost any other animal. We often use the phrase “healthy as a horse” to connote heartiness – but compared to a human, a horse is as fragile as spun glass. There’s mounting evidence that our primitive ancestors would hunt large prey simply by following it at a walking pace, without sleep or rest, until it died of exhaustion; it’s called pursuit predation. Basically, we’re the Terminator.

(The only other animal that can sort of keep up with us? Dogs. That’s why we use them for hunting. And even then, it’s only “sort of”.)

Now extrapolate that to a galaxy in which most sapient life did not evolve from hyper-specialised pursuit predators:

• Our strength and speed is nothing to write home about, but we don’t need to overpower or outrun you. We just need to outlast you – and by any other species’ standards, we just plain don’t get tired.
• Where a simple broken leg will cause most species to go into shock and die, we can recover from virtually any injury that’s not immediately fatal. Even traumatic dismemberment isn’t necessarily a career-ending injury for a human.
• We heal from injuries with extreme rapidity, recovering in weeks from wounds that would take others months or years to heal. The results aren’t pretty – humans have hyperactive scar tissue, among our other survival-oriented traits – but they’re highly functional.
• Speaking of scarring, look at our medical science. We developed surgery centuries before developing even the most rudimentary anesthetics or life support. In extermis, humans have been known to perform surgery on themselves – and survive. Thanks to our extreme heartiness, we regard as routine medical procedures what most other species would regard as inventive forms of murder. We even perform radical surgery on ourselves for purely cosmetic reasons.

In essence, we’d be Space Orcs.

Our jaws have too many TEETH in them, so we developed a way to WELD METAL TO OUR TEETH and FORCE THE BONES IN OUR JAW to restructure over the course of years to fit them back into shape, and then we continue to wear metal in out mouths to keep them in place. 

We formed cohabitative relationships with tiny mammals and insects we keep at bay from bothering us by death, often using little analouge traps. 

And by god, we will eat anything. 

• We use borderline toxic peppers to season our food. 
• We expose ourselves to potentially lethal solar radiation in the pursuit of darkening our skin. 
• We risk hearing loss for the opportunity to see our favorite musicians live. 
• We have a game where two people get into an enclosed area and hit each other until time runs out/one of them pass out
• We willingly jump out of planes with only a flimsy piece of cloth to prevent us from splattering against the ground. 
• Our response to natural disasters is to just rebuild our buildings in the exact same places. 
• We climb mountains and risk freezing to death for bragging rights
• We invented dogs. We took our one time predators and completely domesticated them. 
• On a planet full of lions, tigers and bears, we managed to advance further and faster than any other species on the planet. 

Klingons and Krogan and Orcs ain’t got shit on us

We drink ethanol (in concentrations high enough to be used as an effective as microbicide or a solvent!) for the express purpose of achieving blood toxicity and disrupting normal brain function… AS A RECREATIONAL ACTIVITY!

On the same subject, we also deliberately incinerate assorted substances and then inhale the particulate-heavy smoke and vapor resulting for the same effect. EVEN IN THE FACE OF SAID SUBSTANCES BEING CARCINOGENIC, BECAUSE WE JUST DON’T GIVE A FUCK.

Humans do not have biological castes. Kill their commander and another will take its place. Soldiers left alone on a planet will start farming and manufacturing to survive. Farmers and manufacturers will take up arms and kill you if pressed. Just because two humans look different doesn’t mean they cannot do each other’s jobs.

Breeding does not kill them. A single human can mate dozens or hundreds of times in a lifetime. They often do so as recreation. Xenobiology team six believes they do not have a mating season but this is too strange to be true.

Their appendages are not designed for hitting, so they developed special training to make them very good at hitting anyhow. 

The proteins making up their bodies are toxic and cause prion disease. Do not touch anything humans have touched. Do not consume earth foods. Fire does not adequately remove this contamination.

Humans perceive sixteen times the colors we do. Do not hide in bushes or vines from humans. They can distinguish your pelt from the foliage with ease.

We tried venting waste gas into the tunnels to kill the humans when they attacked. Turns out they breathe it. 

Everything on their planet came from a single biological strain. They developed comprehensive genetics BEFORE they developed space travel. 

They lack radio receptors and cannot be brought into compliance with right-thought simply by broadcasting to them. Even after we learned how to translate it into sound-waves one of their hatchlings drove the Great Authority mad by responding to every demand with a single question: “Why?”

#an individual human being is actually a microbiome in its own right—you are dealing with a legion each time you approach them     #they carry pathological agents inside their deep tissues and this is advantageous to their health     #one of the most widespread and resilient viruses on their planet is treated as mildly hazardous—even though it causes     #massive disruption to the body’s homeostasis     #(their young offspring endure multiple rhinovirus infections EACH YEAR yet they seem unperturbed by this)     #they have developed such long lifespans that now their primary threat is their own body’s degeneration     #humanity has literally figured out how to survive so long that their body gives out under them     #and they are not satisfied with that     #stupid willful vengeful survivalists who treat mortality like a challenge    

I love every single variation on this post, whenever it scrolls across my dash. 

Although bipedal and nominally terrestrial, humans are also capable of highly efficient climbing, brachiation, and swimming without mechanical or technological assistance.

In times of plenty, humans will ingest surplus food and metabolize it into a form of stored nutrition which permeates their tissues and forms a protective, thermally insulating layer under their skin.  Even a human with minimal ‘fat’ reserves can go for several Terran days without appreciable food intake.

Humans are highly neuroplastic, and retain the ability to learn throughout their life cycle.  Indeed, geriatric humans rely increasingly on the synthesis and application of their accumulated knowledge as their physical condition declines.

The human olfactory system is notoriously insensitive, and scents which may incapacitate other species have no appreciable effect on them.

Humans are effectively psy-null.  They possess no psionic abilities of their own, and attempts at one-way psionic contact have resulted in severe trauma to researchers due to the alien structure of human minds.

The human skeleton is composed of a hard, resilient mineral-biological composite.  This renders them capable of withstanding heavy loads and impacts, and of delivering devastating blows with all extremities.  Although somewhat brittle, the stone-based tissue of human bone retains the ability to heal when injured.

Diplomatic Corp Directive 487.3(A): Do not interpret a huuman’s outstretched open hand as an attack.  Humans assert peaceful intent by showing they have not augmented their weaponry at the moment.

Diplomatic Corp Directive 492.1(D): Diplomats are expressly forbidden from attempting to interpret human facial expressions without certification 45781, third grade.  Wars have begun over a failure to differentiate between a human baring its oral bones to indicate happiness and to indicate confidence of superior firepower.

Diplomatic Corp Directive 501.1(A): Human language sacrifices precision for breadth of content.  Do not attempt to parse the meaning of a human language statement without certification 45123, fifth grade.

Diplomatic Corp Directive 505.1(B): Under no circumstances attempt communication in any human language using the word “fuck” or any other word that can refer to sexual intercourse.  The statement may be interpreted as a sexual proposition – which may be regarded as proper or improper according to rules we have not successfully decoded; or it may be taken as a threat of imminent violence.  Confine all communications to GalacticTrade Fifteen, per the Treaty of Pluto.