Sciencing Things All Sciencily, Monday

[whatisclocks]

"You're going to be here every week, aren't you?" Philomena said, considering the class with a sigh. "So I hear people sometimes just put the telly on in classes and let you all watch, so I wanted to do that today 'cos it's easier than filling your brains with knowledge, like."

She pushed the television to the center of the classroom.

"I did this documentary about Shakespeare once," she confided. "Turns out he's not just a funny man in tights that likes to wear feathers in his cap. Anyway, I'm not gonna show you the documentary 'cos I look fantastic in it but theatre's not great if you want to follow the story and text all the time, Shakespeare really ought've thought about that."

A pause. A tilt of the head.

"... And this is supposed to be a science class," she said. "So I found this movie that's supposed to be about these two Shakespeare men but they're walkin' about talking about sciencing, I like the one who looks like a weasel, I think he killed someone this one time. Anyway, he gets like, distracted by bathtubs and flowers and crap, it sort of reminds me of me, and I need you lot to write an essay about like, all the science parts, so I can tell if you've been sciencing right."

She had, at this point, already put on the movie, and was talking through it, and didn't particularly seem to care. "I never did get this bit," she said. "Or that bit. Is that a chocolate coin? It looks like a ye olde chocolate coin of some sort, he better not eat it, it looks like it's been there for months. Oh, but you can tell this is like, proper Shakespeare, 'cos of all the mud. They had that back then in Shakespeare times, loads of mud, it was basically all they ate. Kind of sad, isn't it? They slept on mud, and played with mud, and probably had loads of sex with mud... that's why Shakespearian stuff is so longwinded and boring most of the time, all the bloody mud, I bet people were dying to hear anything about anything that wasn't mud--"

She spent the rest of the movie talking at length. It was nearly impossible to hear most of the dialogue. "...I don't get the boat," she said. "Why are they not not on a boat? Feels like they'd be less dead if they'd just taken an airplane or somethin', tickets aren't that expensive and airplanes only leak if they're about to catch fire..."

Comments

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[whatisclocks]

It's a whole new take on movie day.

Watch the Movie

[whatisclocks]

... if you can make any sense of it while Philomena's loudly chatting about how she thought sky in Shakespearian times wasn't black and white and that seems like a failure in realism...

Write an Essay

[whatisclocks]

Yes, Philomena still expects you to write an essay about this. Any of it.

Probably best if you stick with her interpretation, really.

Talk to the TA

[whatisclocks]

Maybe she has her own opinions on mud.

Talk to Philomena

[whatisclocks]

Mud? For the record, she's not a fan.

OOC

[whatisclocks]

Re: Talk to the TA

[good_for_six]

That depended on if there was wrestling going on in the mud or not.

Re: Sign In!

[onefootoutthedoor]

Peebee

Re: OOC

[onefootoutthedoor]

DAMN IT I SUDDENLY HATE THAT THE ALL-ELCOR HAMLET DOESN'T EXIST FOR PEEBEE YET.

Re: Sign In!

[snipsnspecks]

Ahsoka Tano

Re: Watch the Movie

[onefootoutthedoor]

Peebee was less attempting to watch the movie than she was looking up Shakespeare, because none of this made any sense to her.

Well. Not that any of Philomena's lectures made much sense in the first place, but a point of reference would help. How else was she going to fully appreciate the WTFery here?

Re: Sign In!

[intotheout]

Gratuity Tucci

Re: Sign In!

[era_two_triangle]

Peridot

Re: OOC

[sharp_man]

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead?

Re: OOC

[rebelseekspizza]

WITH THE FILE NUMBERS TAKEN OFF but yes.

(Also it totally says 'the sky was black and white', not 'the sky wasn't black and white' up there, la la la la)

Re: Watch the Movie

[era_two_triangle]

Peridot had no idea what was going on.

None.

At all. So she was kind of resorting to squinting angrily at the screen, as if maybe doing that much would help her decipher what the movie was about, at the very least.

It wasn't working.

Re: Write an Essay

[intotheout]

Tip had seen this movie before and still had no idea what was going on. Still, it was only barely the weirdest school writing assignment she'd ever gotten, so she got to work.

The section on Shakespeare's metaphors for mud-sexing (all of them, every metaphor was for the purposes of this essay about mud-sexing) was, she felt, particularly inspired.

Re: Watch the Movie

[onefootoutthedoor]

"Yeah," Peebee said out of the corner of her mouth, "I got nothing either."

The angry squinting kind of amused her.

Re: Watch the Movie

[era_two_triangle]

"Humans make no sense," Peridot complained, not even terribly concerned about her volume, here. "What about this is scientific? Unless we're studying human behavioral patterns... somehow..."

In which case, this class was gold, if only for looking at the reactions of their classmates.

Re: Watch the Movie

[onefootoutthedoor]

"Oooooh, are we studying human behavioral patterns?" Peebee maybe sounded far too excited about that. "Because that could be a really, really long term study and I am nowhere near done scratching the surface."

She peered at the screen for a moment. "I'd really like to think most humans don't think this is actually science, but . . ." She winced. "I think this might be actually, physically painful."

Re: Watch the Movie

[era_two_triangle]

Peridot tilted her head a little.

"This might actually be a marginally more tolerable use of my time if there is a way to turn it into a study on human behaviors," she admitted. "Otherwise..."

She looked back at the screen.

She shuddered.

"I'm never going to understand this planet."

Re: Watch the Movie

[onefootoutthedoor]

"Never is a pretty long time," Peebee remarked. "How long have you been here, anyway?"

Re: Watch the Movie

[era_two_triangle]

"A little over one Earth year," Peridot sighed. "Practically no time at all. And admittedly, humanity makes... slightly more sense than it did when I arrived, but it feels as though every time I think I understand something about them, two more questions come up that I can't even begin to answer."

Re: Watch the Movie

[onefootoutthedoor]

"One year? Pffffffft," Peebee said, and waved her hand. "Makes me feel better about not having much of a handle on them after a couple of weeks, though. Fascinating species so far, I have to say. I don't think any of ours back home have this many generic variations!"

Re: Watch the Movie

[era_two_triangle]

"Humanity's variety is strange to you?" Peridot tilted her head at the fellow non-human she was talking to, looking thoughtful. "I think it's odd that there's so little variety, though I suppose we can't all be selectively created to bring out the best possible attributes for our specific roles."

She shrugged.

"Oh sure, there's plenty of variation from one individual to the next, but they all seem to fit within a very specific range of physical parameters."

The whole 'genders' thing threw her off a bit, though.

Re: OOC

[spin_kick_snap]

Mud is compulsory.

/nerd

Re: Watch the Movie

[onefootoutthedoor]

"Shapewise, you mean?" Peebee guessed, because hello, talking to a triangle. . "I was thinking in terms of height and pigmentation, things like that. For a species more or less confined to a single planet, it's fascinating. Though, I guess most people don't choose specific traits in their partners when they decide to reproduce."

She did think that was kind of weird, to be honest.

Re: Watch the Movie

[era_two_triangle]

Oh, Peebee. You were wading into the weird and wonderful world of Gems, now.

"And I meant especially in terms of height and pigmentation," Peridot replied. "The largest members of my race are taller than this building by far, and could pick either of us up in one hand."

Humanity couldn't boast that.

"I'll admit I don't understand organic reproduction very well," she added, as an afterthought. "If they aren't choosing partners based on potential outcomes, what are they choosing them for?"

Re: Watch the Movie

[onefootoutthedoor]

". . . okay, wow," Peebee said, because that was impressive. "Really? And . . . wait, so you're not actually organic? But not synthetic either? That -- huh."

As for the question, she flung both arms up in a broad, unnecessarily dramatic shrug. "Don't look at me. It's not something I personally ever want to think about." COMMITMENT WAS SCARY REALLY NOT HER THING.

Re: Watch the Movie

[era_two_triangle]

"We're Gems," Peridot noted with a tiny shrug of her tiny shoulders. "We're made the way that Gems are made."

Which was a nice, vague way to say that they were engineered, more or less, and grown in massive quarries known as Kindergartens. But the idea that they were somehow synthetic was offensive to her little certified Kindergartener heart.

"You don't want to reproduce?" She tilted her head curiously. "Too young? Simply not interested in the process or in raising a new organism from its-" she ran through several words for it in her head, thankfully breezing by 'larval' to settle on, "infant stages?"

Re: Watch the Movie

[onefootoutthedoor]

"And have a kid reliant on me for sixty or seventy years before she's ready to go off on her own?" Peebee shuddered, and never mind that she was only 47 herself. "Nooooooooooooooo thank you. Way more attachment to another person than I ever want."

She would have been amused by 'larval,' though.

She tilted her head. "I'm not familiar with Gems. At least, not as sapient life forms, just -- eh, my translator might be missing something, that's always a possibility."

Re: Watch the Movie

[era_two_triangle]

"Gems don't form attachments at all," Peridot mused, tilting her head. "Not even with new Gems. But you aren't mis-hearing."

She gestured to the triangular stone in the middle of her forehead.

"This is me. Everything else is just a hard-light projection so that I can interact with my surroundings. All of the important stuff, though, is right here."

In the gem part of the Gem.

Re: Watch the Movie

[onefootoutthedoor]

"Okay, definitely wow," Peebee blurted out. "As far as we know there aren't any life forms like that anywhere in my universe. That's amazing. Hard-light projection? Huh. Makes sense.
I can see it. Never would've occurred to me, but I can see it."

Not that she realized it, but she was talking a little bit like she would about a specimen. Stop that, Peebee.

Re: Watch the Movie

[era_two_triangle]

Not that Peridot really noticed. She talked about anything unfamiliar a little bit like she would about a specimen.

"It allows us to adapt to almost any unfamiliar environment or new world," she explained, and yes, she was absolutely bragging a little. "Any atmosphere or any level of gravity. So long as it won't damage our gem and it's an environment that doesn't destroy light, we can handle it."

It made intergalactic conquest so easy.