Nerd Questier

Dick, 10 years old: “A bunch of my classmates decided to play a racist prank on me and my teacher punished ME for reacting. I got detention!”

Goon: *taking a moment to look him up and down*

Goon: “…but you’re white.”

Dick: *looks into the camera like he’s on The Office and sighs before KOing the guy with a single punch*

Dick, talking to the unconscious goon: “I wasn’t always this white you know. I can’t help that Gotham is allergic to the sun! But also racism can be against an ethnic group! It doesn’t have to be just skin color!”

Goon: *unconscious*

Dick: “Unbelievable! Twice in one day. Today’s the freaking worst!”

——————————

Tim, 15 years old, looking haggard as he types away on his wrist computer, *sighs*: “Some jerk attacked me on my way home from buying a Father’s Day gift and it was ruined! It was expensive, too! And my girlfriend thinks I’m giving her the silent treatment, and like, I am, but not on purpose.”

Goon, tied up: “Oh…um…well, is it really the silent treatment if it’s not on purpose?”

Tim, pausing: “…you know…that’s a really good question.” *turns to Dick lurking in the corner* “Hey Nightwing—“

Dick, immediately: “—if it’s been at least three days after a few months of dating, yes, otherwise you’re fine.”

Tim, 25% more relaxed: “Oh cool! We’ve only been together officially for a month so I’m good!”

Goon: “Uh, I don’t think that’s how that works.”

——————————

Stephanie, 17, loudly fake crying to make the goons uncomfortable: “Batman was being mean to me while I’m literally on my period! How could he? He knows when my periods are! Or…at least he should! Don’t you think he should? He’d know Nightwing or Robin’s if they were girls!”

Goon 1: “Um…”

Goon 2, side whispering to Goon 1: “Yeah I’m not touching that with a ten foot pole.”

Stephanie, deadpan: “Pussy.”

Goon 1: “Wha—“

Goon 3: “How dare he. What a bitch.”

Stephanie: “RIGHT???”

——————————

Jason, 20, holding a goon in a headlock during an interrogation: “As in right this very moment or in general?”

Goon, wheezing: “Are those different answers?”

Jason: “One is significantly longer than the other.”

Goon, incredulous, not expecting this in the middle of an interrogation: “Whichever’s shorter!”

Jason: “I’ve got a permanent wedgie going on right now because I bought the wrong sized underwear and honestly it’s kind of making me want to shoot you in the face if you don’t start talking in the next thirty seconds.”

Goon: “Can I change my answer?”

Jason: “Sure but the longer one’s gonna make me want to shoot you in the face in only fifteen seconds.”

Goon: “…damn.”

Jason: “It’s a hard-knock life, buddy.”

——————————

Bruce: …

Goon: …

Bruce: 😠

Goon: 😰

Bruce, backing goon up against a wall, towering above him, growling: “Your mom.”

I can't say I care for the concept of "Gay Wrath Month" on here. One, because June should have also been Gay Wrath Month. Why is wrath against a system that fights to kill you not something to be Proud of? How is that not Pride in yourself and your survival? Anger is not an unhealthy or unnatural emotion that cannot coexist with other emotions, if directed towards something important! I am quite Proud of my anger, honestly. So I guess I feel weird because I don't "get" it.

definitely been woken in the middle of the night to be told by one of the kids saying m that they threw up or had an accident

been told something disturbing like "you're old and going to die soon" or "there's a lady standing in that corner who says she knows you" while the kid is falling asleep in their dark, very empty room.

held a tissue while one of the kids blew their nose

stepped on discarded toys or tripped on sneakers left on the stairs.

To start off, some facts:

-White wine is made from sweet pulp inside of the grape (minus the seeds).

-Red wine is made from both the skin and the grape (and the seeds and stems…sometimes? Can’t remember).

-Tannin is the substance found in red wines, coffee, dark chocolate. Tannins are responsible for the bitter taste in those foods.

-Tannins are found in the skin of the grape, as well as the seeds and the stems. Therefore, most red wines will have tannins, versus most whites will not have tannins.

-Red wines vary in level of tannins, depending on variety of grape, climate, and fermentation process. Pinot noir tends to be very low tannin. Shiraz/Syrah, choice of poison for our beloved brunette surgeon, is very heavy on the tannins.

-Some white wines (most commonly Chardonnay) are aged in oak barrels instead of metal containers. Oak barrels have tannins, which seeps into the wine during the fermentation process. That’s why Chardonnays tend to be “drier” aka it has tannins.

-White wines like Sauvingnon Blancs are usually fermented in steel barrels (aka no tannins. Aka usually very fruity and light and sweet).

Your ability to taste tannins is genetic.

There is a genetic marker determining whether your taste cells are sensitive to tannins.

Basically two people can drink the exact same wine and have wildly different reactions because: 1. Person A can’t taste tannins, so they taste the actual wine flavor. 2. Person B can taste tannins, and that tends to overpower ALL the other flavors in the wine. Basically all they taste is tannins and none of the wine.

I am super tannin sensitive, so if I drink a wine like Cabernet Sauvignon (very tannin heavy, aka “very dry”, it tastes like bitter ethanol alcohol to me, whereas my best friend can’t taste tannins so the same wine is maybe a little bitter but they can actually taste the grape and different flavors. To her, a wine like Sauv Blanc is too sweet, tastes like sugar water. But to me it tastes good.

So unless it’s the taste of the alcohol or all wines you hate, chances are you might hate the taste of red wine, especially the heavier red wines, because taste the tannin overpowers everything else. And all you taste is bitter bitter ethanol bitter more ethanol. 

More tannin info: -Tannins bind to fat.

-This is why tannin heavy wines are recommended with fatty foods (Shiraz and steak). Whenever you eat food with high fat content, the fat builds up on your tongue. A sip of red wine will bind with the fat on your tongue and clear it away. That’s why the sip of wine between bites of fat heavy foods is considered a palate cleanser.

-By that logic, this is why white wines are recommended with low fat foods, like fish. Salmon is fattier than most fish, which is why Chardonnay (tannin heavy white wine) or Pinot Noir (low tannin red wine) is recommended with salmon.

-People who are sensitive to tannins can drink tannin heavy red wines with fatty food and generally the wine won’t taste gross. The fat on your tongue (from that steak) will bind with the tannin and neutralize the tannin taste. Aka the only time I ever drink Cabernet Sauvignon or Shiraz is with a steak or heavy, creamy pasta. Aka never bc I don’t often eat either.

-The reason dairy helps coffee taste better is because the fat in milk/creams binds with the tannins in coffee and neutralizes the bitter taste. This is why people who can’t taste tannins can generally drink coffee black without milk (sugar is a different story). It’s also why almond milk in coffee is the worst idea (almond milk is already bitter and has no fat).

More wine facts: -90% of the “aromas” of wine are marketing BS

-You know the labels that say like “cherry with a hint of blackberry?” There’s no real way to infuse cherry or blackberry into grape wine without screwing with the fermentation process. It’s all created by the wine marketing industry to sell you win. Sometimes if you smell cherry before you drink the wine, you might taste it in the wine (because majority of flavor comes from smell). Or if you think there is cherry flavor in the wine, your brain can trick your taste buds into tasting it.

-The only true flavors found in real grape wine are grapes (obviously), oak/earthy flavor (the barrels), vanilla (barrels, oak sticks), tannins. (There are a few others but can’t remember. I think maybe cinnamon?).

-People’s perception of wine often affect how good it tastes to them. Social psychology studies show that people will rate the exact same wine differently if they’re told the wines are different in price. (They rated the more expensive wine as tastier).

Space (and stars) are a much newer concept to Erid, at least relative to us. They cannot perceive stars. They can't even see their own sky.

And then here we are, utterly obsessed. The number of songs, movies, and TV shows that reference stars, the moon, our sun, it's light, astronauts, space — we can hardly go five minutes without bringing up at least one of those things. NONE of them are things Eridians have an established affinity for; to them, they're scientific concepts, and that's pretty much it.

And yet, stars are one of the first things our kids learn how to draw. We have a specific name for the connections we trace between them, and those constellations have been built into thousands of years of our history. We fought a proxy war based on who could get to them the fastest. I absolutely believe that, to Erid, this would be our defining characteristic above and beyond anything else.

While I love and greatly enjoy all the adorable fics, art and headcanons about Rocky, Adrian and Grace forming a little family unit together... I strongly doubt that Eridians have any real concept of the nuclear family.

The thing is that nuclear families (family units consisting of a married couple and any kids they have) are a relatively modern and largely Western invention; for most of human history and in most parts of the world households have been larger and involved extended family members, tending more towards clans than individual units.

Notably, this is also more common in more collectivist societies- and Eridians are supposed to be even more collectivist in nature than humans are.

Eridians make major decisions by joining together in large groups that form a single consciousness.

They need to watch each other sleep on an irregular timeline, which would be wildly impractical with two people who aren't stuck on a tiny spaceship together, and instead have jobs and obligations outside the home.

They traditionally stored food from hunting in large communal piles.

In the movie Rocky has a family crest that he uses to introduce himself, indicating a major focus on family/clan as a part of identity.

James Ortiz's headcanon about arranged marriage also fits, since those usually happen in societies that view marriage as a union between families, rather than between individuals.

All of this points to Eridians living together in large groups joined by kinship, and potentially friendship as well. They have many adults in the home that all support the family, watch each other sleep, and come together to make important decisions. And this family identity is an important part of how they see themselves and their purpose in the world.

And then there's the issue of Eridian reproduction.

When you put together that Eridians lay five eggs at a time, that they live for centuries, and that egg laying is easier than giving birth, you're looking at one Eridian mating pair having up to five kids at minimum, and dozens at maximum. Maybe in the past it evened out due to child mortality, but assuming they've largely solved that with modernity it's a recipe for massive, unsustainable population growth.

I've seen several fan explanations for this, but for me the simplest is that Eridians just don't put as much emphasis on individual couples having children as humans do. Each family generation is probably quite large, but only a couple kids in that generation will choose to have children of their own, and then those children will be raised by the family, It-Takes-a-Village style.

It's similar to how it was an evolutionary benefit for human families to have single, gay and elderly members: including childless adults increases chances of survival for the children the family does have. And quintuplets have gotta be a lot for one couple to handle, even with Eridian multi-tasking abilities.

If I can get even more out there, considering the collectivist nature of Eridians and the relatively detached method of laying eggs vs. childbirth/nursing, it's entirely possible that Eridians don't actually put that much stock in who a child's biological parents are. There are human societies that historically reckoned kinship similarly, referring to some or all aunts/uncles as parents, and cousins as siblings.

All of which is to say that again, large and tight-knit extended families are very likely the default for most Eridians.

And oh boy, the implications this has for the story!

Imagine Ryland "No close family, no friends, not even a dog" Grace, arriving at Erid to discover that he has not only been adopted by Rocky's mate but by his entire, massive family as well.

Imagine Rocky's relatives, many of whom are likely also engineers, working to maintain Grace's dome. Because that's what you do for family, and any family of Rocky's is one of theirs.

Imagine Rocky and Adrian having a clutch and Grace getting ready to be an uncle only to discover he is 100% considered a parent too.

Imagine this lonely, isolated person having a huge support system for the rest of his life.

potential god joel design to go with my last post cuz i eventually wanna draw him and sheriff jimmy interacting 🤭

i wanted to make it more interesting than this but there arent enough hours in the day for me to mess around with designs anymore

+ a messy king of mezalea joel design wip under cut cuz idk if ill ever finish it at this point but just know i am rotating him in my mind ↓

How to traumatize your alien crab friend in his first visit to your home planet (yes they're on earth)

but rocky and grace put the whole diplomacy thing in jeopardy by being too best buddy with it. like they're both really low level members of the mission. some engineer necessary for ship maintenance, and an obligatory molecular biologist they brought along in case they found more alien cells out in space. and these two guys like, somehow keep ending up hanging out essentially "at the back of the classroom." consistently left out of the actually important negotiations, and well, they're bored!

grace steals some laptops and starts jury-rigging his own personal translator for rocky, despite the fact that the official translation software is way quicker to learn and much more nuanced. rocky starts learning english, simplifies his eridian, and immediately starts mocking grace for needing the software. they start blabbing to each other about all the weird quirks of their respective cultures and advanced science their planets can do. the whole time they are ribbing each other about culture stuff. grace eats in front of rocky. rocky forces grace to sleep in a corridor somewhere so he can keep watch.

then stratt and the eridian leader find out and it's like

stratt: you. you've been meeting in private with a member of the eridian deligation?

grace: ... yyyes.

stratt: and you shared with them classified scientific documents?

grace: i... maybe gave him. a laptop. he's so smart! what was i supposed to do?

stratt: HIM? you've assigned male pronouns to a genderless species?

grace: he said he likes to match!

stratt: do you even know the name of this eridian?!

grace: i call him rocky :)

stratt: 😰

then on rocky's side of things it's like

eridian leader: sorry did you say you called the human after one of its digestive noises?

rocky: yeah :)

eridian leader: and. you've been telling it about how to make xenonite. one of our most vital trading resources.

rocky: yes yes, grace is very ignorant about basic chemistry 🙄

eridian leader: right. and you watch it sleep. despite the fact that all the human beings we have spoken to have described this as a cultural violation?

rocky: well he didn't like it at first but he came around!!

anyway both sides of the delegation are sweating profusely (metaphorically speaking) until they see rocky and grace in action and are like ohh! they're both freaks. we are not to blame for this. these two are just really bad at navigating cultural norms.

pt2

it’s “get a kiss from your teacher” day

rocky’s big brain plan to get more smooches backfired spectacularly

dont be too greedy guys

“Hey, it’s like yours!” Buck says, and Eddie just looks at him. Because, yes. Yes, it is like his. But also, no, it is most definitely not.

“It’s st. Theodore. Mine is st. Christopher.”

Because that totally helps clear things up on Buck’s end.

“Okay…? What’s the difference?”

“St. Christopher is the patron saint of travelers. St. Theodore is the patron saint of soldiers.”

And Buck would just look at him because Eddie is a soldier.

He won’t say “kind of like you”

He’ll say “thank you” and the scene will shift away from them and that gift– that silent moment of Buck’s beginning recognition of that maybe a few of the people in his life have been right– maybe there is something there with Eddie. But how? How could he have possibly fallen into a one-sided love with his straight best friend?