—

Ed Yong

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/01/hagfish-slime/581002/

As a little kid, I was SOOOOOO damn obsessed with Shrek.

I mean the kind of obsessed where I’d watch it over and over again days in a row. It was all I ever wanted to watch.

It got to the point where I had memorised it word-for-word, and beat-for-beat. This meant that, somehow, I could watch it in my head—timed perfectly. No fast forwarding, no skipping.

Now this was fine for car trips and such, because my dad would be like “Hey do you want some colouring-in to do?” And id be like “Nah, I’m going to watch Shrek in my head.”

Ocassionally my dad would ask where I was up to in the movie—just to check on me.

Youre probably thinking Huh that’s weird but cool I guess?

Wrong. Sort of.

It got so bad that I’d watch it in my head at night before I went to sleep. My dad would literally check on me at night, notice I was blankly staring up at the ceiling, and have to yell “Stop watching Shrek and go to sleep!”

I cant remember how this faded from being one of my abilities, but it sure was cool while it lasted.