Small town culture is knowing that there are Old Folks with strange nicknames but never knowing the stories behind them.
Of course, I made the mistake of asking why everyone calls this one guy Brickaday and it turns out that he worked at a brickyard for 40 years, stealing exactly one brick every day and making no particular efforts to conceal the theft. Nobody thought anything of it until years later he was discovered to have built three houses.
His boss is said to have shrugged and made some remarks about the importance of coming up with a plan and sticking to it.
I‘m trying to arrange my face into an appropriate approximation of silent bafflement and failing miserably.
i appreciate brickaday
chaotic good
My grandpa once told me he worked with a guy called Scrappy at General Motors back in the 50s. Every few days he would wheelbarrow out metal shavings and the foreman was convinced he was stealing things and hiding them in the scrap metal to get it out of the factory. But every time they’d go through the scrap they’d find nothing. He was stealing the wheelbarrows.
One of my late grandfather’s friends was called Salami because he used to steal salami and cured meats so I’m seeing a pattern here
So human babies REALLY need to be touched. Its totally critical for development. Small babies can literally die if you don’t cuddle them enough.
But imagine that the aliens are more like reptiles, in that they just sort of hatch and their parents feed them or stay around (and presumably, like, educate them, since they’re intelligent aliens), but don’t carry them around or cuddle in the same way.
So one of them gets stuck with a human baby that they’re responsible for and of course, they go ask a xenobiologist or someone ‘what do you do for a human baby, they’re all weird and squishy’.
And the scientist says: well, you have to stroke them. Like actually pick them up and stroke their skin.
Why, says the alien, what could that possibly accomplish. Does it make their skin tougher. Will they grow proper scales.
No, no, that’s just what human skin is like, you just… you have stroke them or they won’t grow right. They get a stroking-deficiency and can die.
Suddenly our obsession with petting everything makes sense to them.
“Why do they ask to pet our fur? Why do they touch every animal we find? Humans are so strange!”
“No, no, Pod Leader, we have discovered the reason for this. Humans require tactile contact for health. Their young will actually die without frequent touchings of skin, Even as adults, their health deteriorates if they are isolated from touch. Human Technical Adjunct Rupert is trying to nurture us and preserve our healthfulness with this touching they offer.”
“… they actually believe that touching our fur with their grubby paws is healthful?”
“For humans, Pod Leader, it is.A little unsanitary, we are understanding the reservations, but it is kindly meant. We think it is actually very nice of Human Technical Adjunct Rupert to be so concerned with our healthfulness.”
“We are still not sure we believe this. That sounds like a weak attempt at deceit to us.”
“Let us show you this vid of humans nurturing their young, it is very instructive.”
Some time later, Human Technical Adjunct Rupert is bewildered but pleased to find that fur-petting is now encouraged provided they have washed their paws. This seems reasonable to Human Technical Adjunct Rupert.
Iron in the Sand 