All Hallows Eve

An interesting phenomenon is occurring today. I was concerned I would have to invoke emergency evacuation protocols again. Starting a couple weeks ago, my new friend the television began warning me of a coming cataclysm in which, from what I could understand, the dead would rise from their graves, and all manner of creature would rise up against the humans. In all of my studying, I could not find the creatures described except in human mythology. That is, until I discovered it is all mythology.

This is a day, my sister tells me, people celebrate the dead of this world by dressing up in all manner of costumes, pulling pranks, and seeking out candy. It is quite a concept. When most people I seem to encounter are very concerned that their appearances remain plain and conservative in relation to the standards of this society, this holiday give them a chance to “let loose” as they say. Even my neighbor is having a gathering today and has encouraged me and my sister to come and dress up. If only he knew that we are already dressed up.

Madison is a willing participant, as she is with most human activities these days, and encouraged me to go in costume. I considered for a moment, attempting to take my natural form, but I worried about that. So, I am dressing up in green as a “Martian.” My sister calls it irony. Again, I apologize to any noble warriors of Mars that might take this as an insult.

Laughter and Romance

As I watch more television, I have questions I do not seem to understand. There are certain programs, as I understand it, that are “live,” as in they are currently happening, such as new programs and some of my dear cooking shows. These programs seem to exist with the purpose of some interactivity, though it baffles me because there is no way for me as the viewer to respond to any of the people in these programs. As accomplished as I feel at learning to grill up a marinated pork roast, I feel rather silly talking back to the television.

Which brings up another thing. Some of these programs I am seeing have random bits of laugher echoing from the screen, yet I can see no one laughing. For instance, thanks to my sisters sudden interest in the males of this planet and her insistence that I should “date,” I have attempted to study more on this local notion of romance. Thus, I was watching this interesting romantic program called “Mike and Molly,” which concerns from what I can understand the only two large people who live in a city full of small people, and said couple’s genetic necessity to copulate. It all seems to make perfect sense except their mating ritual is continually interrupted by laughter coming from some unseen people. From where does that laughter originate?

Perhaps these laughing people are unseen because they are so small, thus their need to ridicule even larger people. This is sad to me because Mike and Molly seem to be quite pleasant people. I still do not have a grasp on human comedy. I am sure there is some humorous element I am missing, but then I was trained to be an analyst. Madison understands human behavior much better than I do. Still I do not understand where the laughter could be coming from. I certainly hope these unseen ridiculers do not suddenly surround me.

In other developments, my sister has been “seeing” an as yet unnamed human boy. According to Douglas, who has become quite a reliable source of information to my surprise, Madison has gone on several dates with this boy, including spending time with him after school. I do not like it, and Douglas seems almost as concerned as I am. For the time being, I can trust him to get to the bottom of this.

Television

One aspect of human culture I have not talked enough about, but deserves much more attention particularly because of its breadth and influence where I have taken up residence, is television.

I have particularly enjoyed watching the Food Network due to my newly found interest in cooking. More recently, I have expanded my knowledge on the workings and content of this device that is, I believe affectionately, called the “idiot box.”

Thanks to my recent illness, I was unable to do much cooking, so I turned to other channels for entertainment. My sister is enamored with the program “Dancing With The Stars”. Dancing is, of course, a universally shared activity for many species throughout the galaxy, but for bipeds encumbered by their inability to fly, humans have a greater variety of dances than I anticipated. It is a testament to their creativity. It is also a testament to their hormones, since most every dance seems to be part of some mating ritual or another.

I am impressed with the sheer volume of programming that is produced for television, and after being sick for over a week and unable to do much else but watch television, I am further impressed by how hard entertaining programming is hard to find. Yet, everyone watches. “Glee” is quite entertaining, though. I do not get the sense from my sister that there is quite that much singing in her high school, but I am curious what goes on over there.

To digress a moment, I suspect this boy she went on a date with this past weekend is in some kind of musical group. That seems to be the pattern, but she will not answer any questions on the matter, insisting I need to get a girlfriend of my own. Again, I do not see the logic.

I have also become introduced to Video On Demand. They may seem the same, but movies are quite different from television. Curious by how humanity must think of extra-terrestrial life, I have listed a queue of movies on the subject. “Alien” being at the top of the list alphabetically, is quite amusing. Apparently, humanity thinks that we aliens have nothing better to do than to attach to their faces, turn them into symbiotic hosts, then burst from their chests only to continue to hunt them for food. The whole acid for blood thing is quite unfortunate also. I imagine, the poor Aliens from the movie do not get invited to many sporting activities.

I will continue to watch on. I am hoping to learn more about the human space exploration program “Star Trek”. Of course, I will always go back to the Food Network. I do still like that Giada De Laurentis.

Teenagers, Part 3

Human bodies are too frail sometimes. Not as frail as, say, the salt people of Canis Minor (they dissolve instantly in water), but still frail enough to become unwilling host to any number of microorganisms. In this case, it was apparently a common cold, but the conventional nature of this virus did not prepare me for the endless coughing and mucus coming out of my nose.

I still blame Douglas. To be fair, I should take it easy on him, as Madison keeps reminding me. It may not entirely be his fault, but schools are the perfect breeding ground for these viruses, and teenagers, with their propensity to mingle socially, are the perfect incubators. Madison was sick as well last week, but she got over it much quicker than I. She got it from Douglas, Douglas got it from his friend Raphael, and Raphael got it from someone in gym class because apparently something is going around. I questioned why none of these children were quarantined for such a highly contagious virus, but my sister assured me that the common cold is not enough to warrant a student to be forced to stay home from school. That did not keep her from trying, of course.

Still, I cannot hold it against Douglas. He was quite helpful in suggesting remedies to cure my ailment. Chicken soup was one of the more interesting ones. My initial mission training on humans included several vitamin needs as well as pharmacological remedies, but chicken soup was considered to be a mere placebo. It worked quite effectively, though. I must run further tests. Douglas has actually been quite helpful, so I must add him as an interview subject.

It should be noted, that Douglas and my sister Madison are not, to use the common parlance, dating. They are only, as my sister keeps reminding me, “just friends.” However, my sister did have a date last night with some mystery boy. She was not out past her agreed upon curfew, but I do not like it. A date on a Saturday night can only be trouble.

I must discover who this date she had was. I do not like him.

Sickness

I have been waylaid by some illness that is affecting my body in a way I am not quite familiar with. I believe they call it a "cold" though the weather has been unseasonably hot lately. I am told it will pass soon as long as I rest and drink plenty of liquids. Such a curious thing to say, since I cannot imagine how I would drink a solid or a gas.

I hope to be back up around soon. How I contracted this disease is a mystery, but I am still suspicious of Douglas.