I’ve long held a gripe about science-fiction aliens: they’re always far too unimaginative. I know it’s because SF is rarely about real aliens but is always about ourselves (and is also usually but keeping the budget manageable, in the case of SF movies), but still…the model is always our species, and they can’t even broaden their horizons enough to look at the diversity within the phylum Chordata, let alone examine some of the weirdness in other phyla. And, of course, any alien life form isn’t even going to be at all related to us, so it should be even stranger. Avatar was just the worst example of this trend — and Cameron did not have the budget excuse — but Star Trek and Star Wars were also pretty feeble in biological creativity department.

Examples that buck the trend are rare. District 9 at least modeled their aliens after cockroaches. Babylon 5 had most of their primary interacting alien races boringly humanoid, but had a few oddballs lurking mostly offscreen.

At least here’s one artist who does biologically informed aliens. Here’s one example, check out his gallery.

Because I am weirded out by this new fad of vajazzling, or the gluing of shiny little rhinestones to women’s crotches. I think the problem is that I’m a biologist, so I find skin quite pleasant as it is; this must be something to appeal to geologists, who think it can’t be sexy unless it is mineralized.

Jill mentions that it only seems to be an adornment for women, which does seem a little bit unfair. Or maybe it’s a good thing — I grew up in the 1970s, and really, disco balls have no appeal at all for me.

There. Now your morning is wrecked with a horrifying mental image, too.

I’m still digging out from under the pile of neglected email that accumulated during my extended travels. I’m also still dealing with my disrupted physiology from all the zipping and the flying and the carousing and the glaven-hey, so cut me some slack, OK? Anyway, here are a few things that popped up that looked interesting, but that I’ll have to just quickly announce to clear them from my to-do list. I’ll let you sort through them.

• The city council of Fresno is feeling some heat: the Central Valley Alliance of Atheists and Skeptics is trying to end the practice of prayer before meetings. This isn’t just generic non-denominational prayer, either; it’s very jesus-christy.

  Wait a minute…the mayor is named Swearengin? I wonder if they have another problem…

• From 22 February to the 26th, Oxford University is holding a series of free lectures called Think Week. Looks provocative. Wish I could be there.

• The NCSE has posted a short article listing Five Reasons Why Evolution Is Important. It’s a nice article on some medical motivations to study evolution, but the Huffington Post? That den of lunacy and woo? I feel tainted now. NCSE alongside the likes of Robert Lanza and Dana Ullman? They should feel dirty, too.

• Remember that very stupid article about how liberals are so condescending? It turns out that wasn’t just some wingnut penning a screed and sending it in to the Washington Post and getting lucky: the Post actively commissioned the right-wing brain-puke. Gotta love that liberal media.

• Lindsay Beyerstein has a well-balanced piece on a recent accusation that 18th century pioneers of obstetrics were butchers who murdered women. I’m inclined to say that they were — birthing wards of that era were horrors, where doctors with no knowledge of hygiene would wander from bed to bed spreading pus and filth around. But this specific accusation that Hunter and Smellie had pregnant women intentionally murdered to provide cadavers for their textbooks doesn’t sound likely.

• Although I would never say doctors are automatically innocent. A doctor in Texas was peddling herbal crap on the side, got reported, and retaliated by charging the whistleblowers with a crime. Oh, well…at least we can console ourselves with the idea that he wasn’t really a doctor, but just a fraud with an M.D.

• Worst. Journalist. Ever. Suzan Masur is back, sowing her own peculiar brand of indignant cluelessness about science.

• I complained about UM’s Center for Woo and it’s promotion of homeopathy. The U daily paper published a brief complaint about the insanity of supporting homeopathy. There was one response from a supporter of homeopathy whose argument was basically that it’s all a matter of opinion, and we ought to encourage all kinds of diverse opinions. Total silence from the administration. I expect they’re quietly working behind the scenes to create a new Center for Astrology.

• Speaking of editorial exchanges on newspaper letter pages, here’s a Canadian opposing creationism. Followed by a cretin defending creationism. Followed by a pastor peddling NOMA. If this turns into a 3-way contest, I’m going to feel really queasy aligning with the sky-pilots.

• Apparently, there’s a British evangelical channel where the announcers read out testimonials to faith, which is ripe for satire. Someone sent in the opening rap to the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and a sneaky paean to the Force which was a rewrite of the Star Wars narrative…and the announcer read them out before catching on. This could be a fun habit.

• An interesting analysis of the linking patterns in Facebook profiles shows that the US is broken up into 7 broad domains. Hang on there—I’m living in Stayathomia, where most people link to nearby friends? I wish! I’m feeling a bit strained from all the recent Gosomewhereelsia.

• That service that offers to care for your pet if you get raptured? They’ve got over 100 clients who are actually paying money for it! I thought the hypothetical pet-salvation service was a funny idea, but if they’re actually making money off the delusions of others, that’s awfully close to fraud.