JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

Saffy’s interests include ancient history and shredding cardboard boxes.

As I am writing a History of the World from the felid perspective, my human thought it would amuse me to watch the History Channel show, Ancient Aliens. This is a show in which quacks proponents of ancient astronaut theories trundle out “evidence” that extraterrestrials have visited the earth and played a role in human history, especially architecture. The classic text—hihihihihi, excuse me. The classic text in this field is Erich von Daniken’s Chariots of the Gods; the author himself appears wearing a hairpiece of paleoarchaeological interest.

Now I have no problem with scientists—hihihihihi, excuse me—claiming that visitors from other planets hung around this one. It would be nice to find intelligent life out there, provided they don’t eat us or make us worship Tom Cruise. We can all use new vacation destinations, and I can’t wait to see what extraterrestrial materials can be used as kitty litter. However, I find that much of the, uh, logic behind these ancient alien theories goes like this.

“Human beings could not have made that themselves. Therefore, aliens!”

Now I happen to like humans—they bother to produce thousands of varieties and flavors of cat food. But humans as a species are deeply insecure, and I say this as one who takes advantage of these insecurities—I don’t like this brand! You are a bad cat parent!

The “experts” on Ancient Aliens are always saying, “These pyramids are too complicated, they surely had help from aliens.” Or, “Why would they bother to build such a complicated thing to look at the sky if they weren’t for looking at the aliens’ home planets?” I’ll tell you why humans look at the sky: Because it’s there! They spend incredible amounts of time and energy on endeavors that seem foolish—because they dream!

That “zoo hypothesis” that says aliens haven’t made contact because humans are too primitive or stupid—come on. Granted, people have done spectacularly dumbass things throughout history, but why so glum? Human insecurity is the root of the most idiotic chapters in your history, and if you want to know more you should wait for my book.

Anyway Ancient Aliens keeps bringing up the pyramids in Egypt and how the Egyptians couldn’t possibly have constructed them using technology they had at the time. Here’s a preview of my book: You know how the Egyptians built the Pyramids? Toxo!

If you read this website regularly then you’ve heard of Toxoplasma gondii, a clever little parasite that lives in cats’ digestive systems and comes out in our poop. The toxo gets into mice and rewires their brains so they actually get excited when they smell cats. So the mice get really brave and foolhardy, and they approach us when they should be scurrying away. Well studies show that toxo also affects humans—it makes them feel invincible!

You know there were lots of cats in ancient Egypt so the Egyptians probably had toxo. And when the Pharaoh said, “Let’s build these massive structures that are too complicated for our existing technology,” they all said, “Sure!”

And that’s how the pyramids were built.

Anna Paquin as Lisa Cohen with Matt Damon as her math teacher. This is the third time we’ve seen Paquin as a student temptress (25th Hour, The Squid and the Whale) and in all three the movie is set in New York. Paquin won an Oscar as a child and is now best known for True Blood, in which she has sex with a variety of supernatural creatures.

Kenneth Lonergan’s Margaret, shot in 2005 and released just last year due to editing problems and legal tangles, is raw, intense and amazing. It’s the kind of movie where someone gets hit by a bus and as she lies on the street bewildered and bleeding she asks people what happened, and when they tell her she says, “You gotta be kidding me.”

Margaret is the kind of movie where you want to yell, “You self-dramatizing bitch, not everything is about you!” and moments later somebody does it for you: “This isn’t an opera! And we are not all supporting characters to the drama of your amazing life!” Probably best to see it at home so that every time you want to slap Anna Paquin you can channel your energy into cleaning surfaces or shining shoes.

While reading the galleys of Ambeth Ocampo’s forthcoming book Looking Back 5: Rizal’s Teeth, Bonifacio’s Bones in order to compose a blurb (“Ambeth Ocampo does it again! Couldn’t put it down! 5 stars!”), we were reminded of his piece addressing certain rumors about our national hero. We heard the “father of Hitler” legend from one of Ambeth’s earlier books; the Jack the Ripper theory is more recent.

Textbook history states that Rizal was in London from May 1888 to January 1889, spending time in the British Museum Library copying Antonio de Morga’s Sucesos de las Islas Filipinas (1609) by hand because there were no photocopying machines at the time. Jack the Ripper was active around this time and, since we do not know what Rizal did at night or on the days he was not in the library, Rizal is now suspect.

For someone who wrote a great deal on the most ordinary things, Rizal only made passing reference to Jack the Ripper in an essay on the Guardia Civil he wrote in the April 30, 1890 issue of La Solidaridad. Can this be added to the flimsy but growing list of circumstantial evidence to suspect Rizal?
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