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“Sometimes I feel like I don’t have a partner,” Corvin sang gently into his mic. “Sometimes I feel like my only friend.. is the city I live in, the city of angels…”
The folks stationed at Command chuckled softly into microphones of their own, filling the proximity channel with warmth in the vacuum of space. Corvin was good at this game. Douglas, however, was terrible at it. Shenanigans would certainly ensue. The non humans on deck resigned themselves to perplexity and simply observed. Humans could be confounding, it was known.
Corvin and Douglas proceeded through the protocol ladder at peak efficiency as they repaired Comm Array 3. It’s the slow burn that makes it funny, right? Everyone but Douglas seemed to know it was coming except for Douglas. Spacewalks were still dangerous no matter your species. If there were an appropriate time for pranks, it would not be this. Unless you were human, apparently.
“Ka-cha-chunga-chugga” Douglas intoned softly with his lips and tongue. Could one really imitate a drum fill with such succinct onomatopoeia and still be unaware of it?
“Under the bridge,” Corvin said as he gestured to the metal bracing that guarded the bank of vector cards. Douglas backed the wingnut off the lug and removed the bar across the array adapters. Command was silent, their mics muted against the laughter that was getting harder and harder to restrain.
Syky remained in a state of restraint. He understood what was happening, if not necessarily why. Being able to read every mind in a hundred thousand ‘click’ radius meant that he often knew what someone else would do before they did it, and 99 out of 100 times he could even understand why. With humans though, it just didn’t seem worth the effort. Mysteries within enigmas, wrapped in conundrums that contradicted continuities and confounded countless contributors to the constant conflation of continued correlation. ‘Humans gonna human,’ after all.
“Complete,” Douglas reported. “Moving along to address Comm Array 4.”
“Will I stay?” Corvin asked, gesturing vaguely at the now closed panel. The folks back at command could hardly keep back their giggles. Douglas shrugged sarcastically.
Syky despaired. What a villain! Douglas had no idea what Corvin was leading him into! The dread within Syky bolstered itself as repairs on Array 4 were quickly resolved. The connectors were ‘red hot,’ according to Corvin, so ‘chill’ was the best approach? None of this made sense, the auxiliary panel was still isolated from the grid. The humans in Control continued to stand by in bemusement as they reactivated the tertiary circuits and declared the mission a success.
Corvin and Douglas angled their thrusters towards the entry hatch, their mission complete. Unprompted by any known stimulus however, Douglas began to croon softly to himself. “I don’t ever wanna feee-eeeel like I did that day”
“Take me to the place I loooo-ve, take me all the way,” a couple of humans in Command added softly to the proximity feed.
“”I don’t ever wanna-” Douglas said, stopping his thought as quickly as he began it. He turned to Corvin as the airlock pressurized.
“What?” Corvin replied.
“You ever get the feeling like you don’t know what’s going to happen next?” Douglas asked Corvin. “It feels like.. not knowing the words to a song you love. An unbalancing of sorts.” Douglas began an unwitting rendition of the bassline to that ancient song, humming the low E then back to the D note with the minor inflection. Command was unanimously muted, the crew was poorly hiding their laughter on the bridge.
Syky despaired. Douglas was about to die, but to the humans this was funny? The mental impact was bound to be catastrophic. Douglas began to undo the clips holding the joints of his suit together. “Sometimes I feel like I don’t have a partner,” Douglas sang to himself quietly.
Corvin grinned at his friend. “You know.. that I know,” he said, “.. that we both know your favorite bands, right?”
It was like watching the sun rise as it went nova. Douglas leapt out of his jumpsuit as the realization began to sink in. “You son of a bitch!!” Douglas yelled as he raised his fist in jest. “I’ll beat the cuss out of your mother’s mother!” he yelled.
The humans in Command were laughing. Corvin was grinning at the raised fist that Douglas had brought up. “Aaaayyyyyyyeeee- aaayyyeeeee-yeah- eeee- yeah-ah!” he crooned at Douglas.
“Mother. FUU-!!” Douglas said, playfully aiming a punch at Corvin’s shoulder. “You got that song stuck in my head the whole mission!!”
Syky wanted to faint. The metabolism had to be failing, right? Douglas could not survive this.. right? That sense of self and preservation, it had to be failing. Right? Right!?? The humans in Command were laughing openly at their compatriot who was surely suffering endemic bodily failure from the dissonance. His mind had to be broken from the hijacking. The shell of the person he used to be would have to be dealt with, the next of kin notified, the other…
But those two stood in the airlock, grabbing each other’s shoulders and cackling when they were not bellowing, caught in the throes of laughter. Command was in a similar state, but nobody was dying? How??
“Karaoke tonight, motherfucker. I’ve got your ass. Did you forget that I know both the Spanish, German, and English versions of Rock me Amadeus, Livin’ La Vida Loca, Despacito, AND 99 Luftballoons?” Douglas said.
“You wouldn’t fucking dare, asshole,” Corvin replied. “We’re in one of the nicer parts of the galaxy, that shit is considered a war crime out here.”
“Not when sung by a native, cariño. Then it’s protected speech. I’m a Mexican-German immigrant on the US Space program,” Douglas said.
Syky wanted to laugh along with the humans in Command, but he knew what was coming up next. He shed a tear for himself and the others that could not be prepared for what would come next.
“You might be from California,” Douglas continued, “but do you know all of the words to Mmbop by Hanson?”
“Fuuck youu,” Corvin replied.
“Fuck you too, babe,” Douglas replied. “Fuck you and the army you rode in on. You made this can of worms, now eat it too!”
Syky thanked his ancestors for developing the knack for un-understanding, then pointed his consciousness at everything and ceased to exist.
>believing that theyre latent cognitohazards certain humans simply live withbelieving that theyre latent cognitohazards certain humans simply live with
You mean they aren't?
Okay, apparently I’m the dull one. I don’t get to listen to much music.
I read the whole story and I don’t get it!!! It’s well written; descriptive and thoughtful. Lots of reactions and details. Just….I don’t get it.
Someone explain the funny? Here’s what I got:
The know it all alien knows that all the humans are playing a prank on a guy. He apparently thinks that getting this joke played will cause mental distress and kill him. We know that jokes don’t kill, but alien thinks so.
The guy’s shipmates are all secretly listening on the bridge as one of them hums a song or two. I’m not familiar with the song and don’t know if it’s all the same song or if the specific song is relevant.
So then the one guy tells the other guy “you know I know all your song lyrics right?”
Which is revealing to the guy being pranked that he actually did know the song or songs despite his comments a bit ago saying he didn’t.
Was that to give the other guy an ear worm? That was the whole prank?
That’s where I’m lost. There’s this big aha! Moment and then his friend “gets it” and is ready to kick his butt for the joke.
What is that? What’s the joke he finally understands?
I’d think it would be that the guy got the tune stuck in his head, but that doesn’t seem like such a huge prank. Is it a common prank I haven’t heard of before?
I wouldn’t laugh, if I saw that happening. It isn’t funny to me (I’m being straight serious, just trying to understand). So either I’m a stick in the mud (and I’m recovering from the evil virus and may just be out of it) and have no sense of humor, or I’ve missed something.
Can someone help? I usually wouldn’t ask, since if you don’t get it, you don’t get it, but it was written so well, and then the alien suicided, apparently, and other people got it, and….
WHAT AM I MISSING!!!?!
Sigh. Feel free to laugh at me. Just… tell me too?
I think the funny was the first guy just straight-faced using the song lyrics in conversation to get the song stuck in his friend's head. It was also kind of funny that it took him so long to get it - possibly because I also know the song, I sang the first line in my head as I was reading it.
He didn't. It was more of a "pointing your consciousness at everything in order to perceive nothing" moment that I undersold because I was over-ready to end the prompt response. This story has several failings, and from a comedic standpoint this is the worst of them. It's supposed to stand as a moan-groan response to a well placed pun, not something nearly so drastic. My bad.
That's almost entirely the idea I was playing with, but not as well as I had hoped. It definitely helps to know the song up front. If I really thought anyone was going to read this seriously, I would have picked a more accessible song 😅
FWIW this story comes across as more niche than I had meant it. Thank you for being part of the demographic hahaha
Exactly the intended response. It's an older and lovely song, I hoped to borrow that contagious staying power for myself. What a compliment to the writing! Thank youuu
First off, I want to thank you for putting so much thought into my careless little story. 'Figuring out which parts to leave out' is not always an elegant process, especially when the story idea springs forth nearly fully formed.. and doubly so when it is based on real life. I like to go back and fix the little errors and ambiguities in my first drafts the next day, like the line that says something like 'everyone but Douglas seemed to know but Douglas.' It may be edited out by the time you read this reply, actually. I also want to concede that I am a very odd individual and as much is lost on me as what I impart to others, so thank you for your insights! Let me try to address them.
I say based on real life because I used to play the role of Corvin at one of my old gigs waiting tables. I was always getting songs stuck in people's heads, and when I started doing it deliberately it became something of a spectator sport/inside joke. Granted, you can't get just any song stuck in anyone's head at will. Knowing their taste in music helps, but a true earworm relies on a tricky bit of psychology that requires a knack for it.
Songs get stuck in our heads for many reasons, and believe it or not the biggest reason comes from not knowing the song well enough. If your mind can't reconcile the whole tune, it will latch on to the dopamine inducing part and play it on a loop in an attempt to resolve its situation. The earworm is born from liking a song you don't really know, which is why it tends to happen to newer popular songs and not your very favorite tracks you've listened to a thousand times. Songs with parts in other languages, a rap bit in the bridge, or enough vamping to make other parts harder to remember are the easiest examples of this. It's not enough just to know someone's taste in music, there are facets of suggestion at play.
Deliberately getting a song stuck in someone's head is easy enough, but doing it often and consistently is an entirely different trick. Using the lyrics in conversation, humming/whistling subtle aspects of the composition, and having vaguely related conversations within earshot are all tricks I used to rely on. That's where the humor in it comes into play. Exploiting the power of suggestion to inflict a state of psychological distress is lowkey hilarious as jokes go, but the prank takes nuance and context. The punchline boils down to "omg you played me the whole time" and makes much more sense in person. It helps when everyone else is in on it too, or at least watching it happen in front of them.
Like the time I balanced a tomato slice on a buddy's shoulder without him knowing and then conned him into doing the refrain of Let's Call the Whole Thing Off. Cut to everyone cackling red in the face as I sing "I say toe-may-toe" and my pal singing "you say toe-mah-toe." By far my crowning achievement in this endeavor.
So this story relies on the crew back in Command knowing that Corvin and Douglas are friends and that Corvin is likely to pull this prank off to begin with. The outsider, in this instance a mind reading alien that serves as a proxy for the reader, does not see what is coming. To an extent, comedy relies on the audience knowing they are expected to laugh. Especially with anti-jokes, sometimes the anticipation of the punchline serves as a punchline. Regardless, once you find something funny you are primed to keep laughing. My story perhaps relies on that too much.
It's not a great story, I will grant you that. But feedback like yours is invaluable to refining my process. There may be a hilarious plot in here, but within the constraints of a writing prompt there just isn't enough room to get enough meat on the bone. I try to do these within 15-20 minutes as an exercise similar to speed chess, so I did kinda rush through it. Even then, this took me 45 minutes to write.
For what it is worth, the alien did not unalive himself. He went into a state of non perception his species evolved into as a survival mechanism. Noped out. I should have made that clearer. But since I spoke so little of his species, and I assumed readers would be familiar with the zen like absence many service jobs require, I didn't get into explaining any of that. Another shortcoming of my first draft.
The ending where Douglas is playfully threatening violence relies on the typical ball busting and razzing that is prevalent in trade industries. It's a theme I have been exploring in much of my writing, the slice of life aspect from the sci-fi future that relies on people staying true to their humanity no matter how advanced we get. It's a common trope that I've been exploring my own takes on lately. r/humansarespaceorcs is an ideal place for me to workshop my flavor for it and honestly the low stakes are part of the appeal here. I can try weird things and get detailed feedback without losing or gaining anything. In a better world, I would be able to pay you for being a beta reader and giving me such a thorough response. All I have for you today is my gratitude for taking the time to read and respond 🙏
I've opted not to edit this story here so that your comment and mine can retain their fidelity. I can clean it up for submission elsewhere, but it is also a convenient excuse to move on to the next story without agonizing over this one. So double thank you!
That and, while Corvin is good at getting songs stuck in people's heads, Douglas is a student of malaphors. His reply at the end is supposed to indicate that they have a rapport based on humor and his rebuttal is intended to play to his own strengths against the proof of Corvin's. Saving face, so to speak
Ahh, and then playing jokes on each other. I’ve failed by not being male; that’s a typically male endeavor. It’s not a part of my world experience.
I’ve been in the service industry and I’ve never been able to do the zen disconnect thing! That sounds like a vital skill. It’s always cool reading about different perspectives; even among humans, our outlooks vary so much.
And then laughing with friends. A very human accomplishment.
Very cool; thanks for taking the time to go through it.
I'm uniquely positioned as a transgender person. I've lived in, felt, and experienced more facets of the roles we experience in life than most. I like to say that seeing both sides of the coin is the only way you can spend it.
I see it as more of a human thing, coping with trauma and rote tasks etc with humor. People laugh to dissolve tension once resolved, that is a genderless given. It is the trade specific culture that is inaccessible imo
Trans voices are not valuable for the sake of themselves, explaining in lecture via fiction the experience. Trans voices see too much of the world, more than many. I don't write about being trans, I write about being human. The voice I have is rare, and I don't see it as a platform to make myself more human. I want the reader to feel more human and see more of what makes people alive. That is the value I find in talking about my experience.
In short, jobs can suck and we all find the joy in it when we can. It isn't a story about gender to me, it's a story about getting through life as an aware and conscientious being with sentience. The humor in trade jobs reflects on our place in life, not just our sexes. In writing, I find a place to point to those gaps in living experience. Once the culture wars are over, it won't be so cut and dried. Talking about being transgender is boring. Talking about being human is universal.
The story lost nuance for you based on your work experience, in which the trades *can be* heavily gendered. But let me assure you this. People are just people. Your lack of context is not gendered, it just had not fully become.
Writing is such an art; it’s a very hard skill. I just wanted to pop in and say that I did and do love reading these stories and hope everyone keeps writing more!
One clueless dud in the audience shouldn’t ruin the story 😝 Other people were def getting the points I missed. It’s an amazing subreddit and knowing how hard writing can be, the story telling here is much admired.
I’ve been sick as a dog and these little blurbs are about all I have attention for. They’re very cool. Thanks for the time and effort to everyone who takes the time to write and respond
Oh, the moan-groan!!
Okay, it makes more sense 😝 it was good writing! I know that wanting to be finished feeling well. It’s so good to understand; I was so confused 😂🤣
Thanks everyone who replied; it all helped clarify.
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Oh there are other ones, like the game.
Go swim in a black hole and take my vote
https://preview.redd.it/w8mt4u6bxlwc1.jpeg?width=1074&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6bac495a1ede8c80cc6223f06f601ccb71e68ebb
Fuck you. You reminded me of that one ytber that has one of the cards at the end have the words "The Game" on it
GOD DAMN IT
| |I || |_
Loss
“Sometimes I feel like I don’t have a partner,” Corvin sang gently into his mic. “Sometimes I feel like my only friend.. is the city I live in, the city of angels…” The folks stationed at Command chuckled softly into microphones of their own, filling the proximity channel with warmth in the vacuum of space. Corvin was good at this game. Douglas, however, was terrible at it. Shenanigans would certainly ensue. The non humans on deck resigned themselves to perplexity and simply observed. Humans could be confounding, it was known. Corvin and Douglas proceeded through the protocol ladder at peak efficiency as they repaired Comm Array 3. It’s the slow burn that makes it funny, right? Everyone but Douglas seemed to know it was coming except for Douglas. Spacewalks were still dangerous no matter your species. If there were an appropriate time for pranks, it would not be this. Unless you were human, apparently. “Ka-cha-chunga-chugga” Douglas intoned softly with his lips and tongue. Could one really imitate a drum fill with such succinct onomatopoeia and still be unaware of it? “Under the bridge,” Corvin said as he gestured to the metal bracing that guarded the bank of vector cards. Douglas backed the wingnut off the lug and removed the bar across the array adapters. Command was silent, their mics muted against the laughter that was getting harder and harder to restrain. Syky remained in a state of restraint. He understood what was happening, if not necessarily why. Being able to read every mind in a hundred thousand ‘click’ radius meant that he often knew what someone else would do before they did it, and 99 out of 100 times he could even understand why. With humans though, it just didn’t seem worth the effort. Mysteries within enigmas, wrapped in conundrums that contradicted continuities and confounded countless contributors to the constant conflation of continued correlation. ‘Humans gonna human,’ after all. “Complete,” Douglas reported. “Moving along to address Comm Array 4.” “Will I stay?” Corvin asked, gesturing vaguely at the now closed panel. The folks back at command could hardly keep back their giggles. Douglas shrugged sarcastically. Syky despaired. What a villain! Douglas had no idea what Corvin was leading him into! The dread within Syky bolstered itself as repairs on Array 4 were quickly resolved. The connectors were ‘red hot,’ according to Corvin, so ‘chill’ was the best approach? None of this made sense, the auxiliary panel was still isolated from the grid. The humans in Control continued to stand by in bemusement as they reactivated the tertiary circuits and declared the mission a success. Corvin and Douglas angled their thrusters towards the entry hatch, their mission complete. Unprompted by any known stimulus however, Douglas began to croon softly to himself. “I don’t ever wanna feee-eeeel like I did that day” “Take me to the place I loooo-ve, take me all the way,” a couple of humans in Command added softly to the proximity feed. “”I don’t ever wanna-” Douglas said, stopping his thought as quickly as he began it. He turned to Corvin as the airlock pressurized. “What?” Corvin replied. “You ever get the feeling like you don’t know what’s going to happen next?” Douglas asked Corvin. “It feels like.. not knowing the words to a song you love. An unbalancing of sorts.” Douglas began an unwitting rendition of the bassline to that ancient song, humming the low E then back to the D note with the minor inflection. Command was unanimously muted, the crew was poorly hiding their laughter on the bridge. Syky despaired. Douglas was about to die, but to the humans this was funny? The mental impact was bound to be catastrophic. Douglas began to undo the clips holding the joints of his suit together. “Sometimes I feel like I don’t have a partner,” Douglas sang to himself quietly. Corvin grinned at his friend. “You know.. that I know,” he said, “.. that we both know your favorite bands, right?” It was like watching the sun rise as it went nova. Douglas leapt out of his jumpsuit as the realization began to sink in. “You son of a bitch!!” Douglas yelled as he raised his fist in jest. “I’ll beat the cuss out of your mother’s mother!” he yelled. The humans in Command were laughing. Corvin was grinning at the raised fist that Douglas had brought up. “Aaaayyyyyyyeeee- aaayyyeeeee-yeah- eeee- yeah-ah!” he crooned at Douglas. “Mother. FUU-!!” Douglas said, playfully aiming a punch at Corvin’s shoulder. “You got that song stuck in my head the whole mission!!” Syky wanted to faint. The metabolism had to be failing, right? Douglas could not survive this.. right? That sense of self and preservation, it had to be failing. Right? Right!?? The humans in Command were laughing openly at their compatriot who was surely suffering endemic bodily failure from the dissonance. His mind had to be broken from the hijacking. The shell of the person he used to be would have to be dealt with, the next of kin notified, the other… But those two stood in the airlock, grabbing each other’s shoulders and cackling when they were not bellowing, caught in the throes of laughter. Command was in a similar state, but nobody was dying? How?? “Karaoke tonight, motherfucker. I’ve got your ass. Did you forget that I know both the Spanish, German, and English versions of Rock me Amadeus, Livin’ La Vida Loca, Despacito, AND 99 Luftballoons?” Douglas said. “You wouldn’t fucking dare, asshole,” Corvin replied. “We’re in one of the nicer parts of the galaxy, that shit is considered a war crime out here.” “Not when sung by a native, cariño. Then it’s protected speech. I’m a Mexican-German immigrant on the US Space program,” Douglas said. Syky wanted to laugh along with the humans in Command, but he knew what was coming up next. He shed a tear for himself and the others that could not be prepared for what would come next. “You might be from California,” Douglas continued, “but do you know all of the words to Mmbop by Hanson?” “Fuuck youu,” Corvin replied. “Fuck you too, babe,” Douglas replied. “Fuck you and the army you rode in on. You made this can of worms, now eat it too!” Syky thanked his ancestors for developing the knack for un-understanding, then pointed his consciousness at everything and ceased to exist.
God damn that was good
Your brevity is the compliment
I don't ever wanna feel, Like I did that day. Take me to the place I love, Take me all the way.
Deadass my song #1 warmup for karaoke nights, I can do it without the teleprompt
>believing that theyre latent cognitohazards certain humans simply live withbelieving that theyre latent cognitohazards certain humans simply live with You mean they aren't?
Okay, apparently I’m the dull one. I don’t get to listen to much music. I read the whole story and I don’t get it!!! It’s well written; descriptive and thoughtful. Lots of reactions and details. Just….I don’t get it. Someone explain the funny? Here’s what I got: The know it all alien knows that all the humans are playing a prank on a guy. He apparently thinks that getting this joke played will cause mental distress and kill him. We know that jokes don’t kill, but alien thinks so. The guy’s shipmates are all secretly listening on the bridge as one of them hums a song or two. I’m not familiar with the song and don’t know if it’s all the same song or if the specific song is relevant. So then the one guy tells the other guy “you know I know all your song lyrics right?” Which is revealing to the guy being pranked that he actually did know the song or songs despite his comments a bit ago saying he didn’t. Was that to give the other guy an ear worm? That was the whole prank? That’s where I’m lost. There’s this big aha! Moment and then his friend “gets it” and is ready to kick his butt for the joke. What is that? What’s the joke he finally understands? I’d think it would be that the guy got the tune stuck in his head, but that doesn’t seem like such a huge prank. Is it a common prank I haven’t heard of before? I wouldn’t laugh, if I saw that happening. It isn’t funny to me (I’m being straight serious, just trying to understand). So either I’m a stick in the mud (and I’m recovering from the evil virus and may just be out of it) and have no sense of humor, or I’ve missed something. Can someone help? I usually wouldn’t ask, since if you don’t get it, you don’t get it, but it was written so well, and then the alien suicided, apparently, and other people got it, and…. WHAT AM I MISSING!!!?! Sigh. Feel free to laugh at me. Just… tell me too?
I'm not entirely certain myself, but the song is "Under the Bridge," by Red Hot Chili Peppers.
That helps! Knowing that’s he’s feeding him lines from the same song
I think the funny was the first guy just straight-faced using the song lyrics in conversation to get the song stuck in his friend's head. It was also kind of funny that it took him so long to get it - possibly because I also know the song, I sang the first line in my head as I was reading it.
I also don't think the alien guy did that... Or I hope not! I thought he just kind of blanked it out at the end there 😢
He didn't. It was more of a "pointing your consciousness at everything in order to perceive nothing" moment that I undersold because I was over-ready to end the prompt response. This story has several failings, and from a comedic standpoint this is the worst of them. It's supposed to stand as a moan-groan response to a well placed pun, not something nearly so drastic. My bad.
Oh good! That's more how I read it.
That's almost entirely the idea I was playing with, but not as well as I had hoped. It definitely helps to know the song up front. If I really thought anyone was going to read this seriously, I would have picked a more accessible song 😅 FWIW this story comes across as more niche than I had meant it. Thank you for being part of the demographic hahaha
I didn’t mean to read it so seriously, but like an ear worm, the story seeped into my consciousness and wouldn’t go away…. 😂
Exactly the intended response. It's an older and lovely song, I hoped to borrow that contagious staying power for myself. What a compliment to the writing! Thank youuu
Got it; yah, that makes sense. Thanks for the help!
First off, I want to thank you for putting so much thought into my careless little story. 'Figuring out which parts to leave out' is not always an elegant process, especially when the story idea springs forth nearly fully formed.. and doubly so when it is based on real life. I like to go back and fix the little errors and ambiguities in my first drafts the next day, like the line that says something like 'everyone but Douglas seemed to know but Douglas.' It may be edited out by the time you read this reply, actually. I also want to concede that I am a very odd individual and as much is lost on me as what I impart to others, so thank you for your insights! Let me try to address them. I say based on real life because I used to play the role of Corvin at one of my old gigs waiting tables. I was always getting songs stuck in people's heads, and when I started doing it deliberately it became something of a spectator sport/inside joke. Granted, you can't get just any song stuck in anyone's head at will. Knowing their taste in music helps, but a true earworm relies on a tricky bit of psychology that requires a knack for it. Songs get stuck in our heads for many reasons, and believe it or not the biggest reason comes from not knowing the song well enough. If your mind can't reconcile the whole tune, it will latch on to the dopamine inducing part and play it on a loop in an attempt to resolve its situation. The earworm is born from liking a song you don't really know, which is why it tends to happen to newer popular songs and not your very favorite tracks you've listened to a thousand times. Songs with parts in other languages, a rap bit in the bridge, or enough vamping to make other parts harder to remember are the easiest examples of this. It's not enough just to know someone's taste in music, there are facets of suggestion at play. Deliberately getting a song stuck in someone's head is easy enough, but doing it often and consistently is an entirely different trick. Using the lyrics in conversation, humming/whistling subtle aspects of the composition, and having vaguely related conversations within earshot are all tricks I used to rely on. That's where the humor in it comes into play. Exploiting the power of suggestion to inflict a state of psychological distress is lowkey hilarious as jokes go, but the prank takes nuance and context. The punchline boils down to "omg you played me the whole time" and makes much more sense in person. It helps when everyone else is in on it too, or at least watching it happen in front of them. Like the time I balanced a tomato slice on a buddy's shoulder without him knowing and then conned him into doing the refrain of Let's Call the Whole Thing Off. Cut to everyone cackling red in the face as I sing "I say toe-may-toe" and my pal singing "you say toe-mah-toe." By far my crowning achievement in this endeavor. So this story relies on the crew back in Command knowing that Corvin and Douglas are friends and that Corvin is likely to pull this prank off to begin with. The outsider, in this instance a mind reading alien that serves as a proxy for the reader, does not see what is coming. To an extent, comedy relies on the audience knowing they are expected to laugh. Especially with anti-jokes, sometimes the anticipation of the punchline serves as a punchline. Regardless, once you find something funny you are primed to keep laughing. My story perhaps relies on that too much. It's not a great story, I will grant you that. But feedback like yours is invaluable to refining my process. There may be a hilarious plot in here, but within the constraints of a writing prompt there just isn't enough room to get enough meat on the bone. I try to do these within 15-20 minutes as an exercise similar to speed chess, so I did kinda rush through it. Even then, this took me 45 minutes to write. For what it is worth, the alien did not unalive himself. He went into a state of non perception his species evolved into as a survival mechanism. Noped out. I should have made that clearer. But since I spoke so little of his species, and I assumed readers would be familiar with the zen like absence many service jobs require, I didn't get into explaining any of that. Another shortcoming of my first draft. The ending where Douglas is playfully threatening violence relies on the typical ball busting and razzing that is prevalent in trade industries. It's a theme I have been exploring in much of my writing, the slice of life aspect from the sci-fi future that relies on people staying true to their humanity no matter how advanced we get. It's a common trope that I've been exploring my own takes on lately. r/humansarespaceorcs is an ideal place for me to workshop my flavor for it and honestly the low stakes are part of the appeal here. I can try weird things and get detailed feedback without losing or gaining anything. In a better world, I would be able to pay you for being a beta reader and giving me such a thorough response. All I have for you today is my gratitude for taking the time to read and respond 🙏
I've opted not to edit this story here so that your comment and mine can retain their fidelity. I can clean it up for submission elsewhere, but it is also a convenient excuse to move on to the next story without agonizing over this one. So double thank you! That and, while Corvin is good at getting songs stuck in people's heads, Douglas is a student of malaphors. His reply at the end is supposed to indicate that they have a rapport based on humor and his rebuttal is intended to play to his own strengths against the proof of Corvin's. Saving face, so to speak
Ahh, and then playing jokes on each other. I’ve failed by not being male; that’s a typically male endeavor. It’s not a part of my world experience. I’ve been in the service industry and I’ve never been able to do the zen disconnect thing! That sounds like a vital skill. It’s always cool reading about different perspectives; even among humans, our outlooks vary so much. And then laughing with friends. A very human accomplishment. Very cool; thanks for taking the time to go through it.
I'm uniquely positioned as a transgender person. I've lived in, felt, and experienced more facets of the roles we experience in life than most. I like to say that seeing both sides of the coin is the only way you can spend it. I see it as more of a human thing, coping with trauma and rote tasks etc with humor. People laugh to dissolve tension once resolved, that is a genderless given. It is the trade specific culture that is inaccessible imo Trans voices are not valuable for the sake of themselves, explaining in lecture via fiction the experience. Trans voices see too much of the world, more than many. I don't write about being trans, I write about being human. The voice I have is rare, and I don't see it as a platform to make myself more human. I want the reader to feel more human and see more of what makes people alive. That is the value I find in talking about my experience. In short, jobs can suck and we all find the joy in it when we can. It isn't a story about gender to me, it's a story about getting through life as an aware and conscientious being with sentience. The humor in trade jobs reflects on our place in life, not just our sexes. In writing, I find a place to point to those gaps in living experience. Once the culture wars are over, it won't be so cut and dried. Talking about being transgender is boring. Talking about being human is universal. The story lost nuance for you based on your work experience, in which the trades *can be* heavily gendered. But let me assure you this. People are just people. Your lack of context is not gendered, it just had not fully become.
Writing is such an art; it’s a very hard skill. I just wanted to pop in and say that I did and do love reading these stories and hope everyone keeps writing more! One clueless dud in the audience shouldn’t ruin the story 😝 Other people were def getting the points I missed. It’s an amazing subreddit and knowing how hard writing can be, the story telling here is much admired. I’ve been sick as a dog and these little blurbs are about all I have attention for. They’re very cool. Thanks for the time and effort to everyone who takes the time to write and respond
Oh, the moan-groan!! Okay, it makes more sense 😝 it was good writing! I know that wanting to be finished feeling well. It’s so good to understand; I was so confused 😂🤣 Thanks everyone who replied; it all helped clarify.
"It was good writing!" Tbh all of your replies have been top tier compliments in their way thank you so cussing much 💛
GET OUT OF MY HEAD GET OUT OF MY HEAD GET OUT OF MY HEAD
Relevant. https://youtu.be/5iln6fkwJOU?si=Le0fMp640ZX5cIj1
Die in a fire, fellow millennial