I've got a list of names | Glowfic Constellation

Afen is disappointed in the universe. He bounds back and forth across his room explaining why to his wife, his infant granddaughter, the end table, and a reporter flabbergasted by her good luck and cringing silently against the wall in the hopes he won't remember she's there.

"There is no reason to suppose that a species evolving independently of Amentans, with their own evolutionary history and living mammalian species likely related to theirs, would end up looking like us. None. Every explanation every scientist has ventured to the press has been unimaginative and unconvincing retroactive refitting of bad models to baffling data. Aliens shouldn't look like us but with different hair colors. Aliens that are not made out of carbon at all would be unsurprising; aliens with only as much physiological dissimilarity as exists between us and animal species on our planet would be mildly surprising; aliens with opposable thumbs would be truly remarkable. This is not remarkable and biologically enlightening; this is just inconsistent with everything we understand about the universe. It doesn't teach us new things about evolution; it should make us rethink evolution. - don't quote that part, they'll take it out of context."

Reporter nods rapidly.

"All of that said, I've picked up three of the languages and I'm working on building a good machine translator, it's a challenge with as little as they've produced in the way of electronic records. I'm absolutely going there to meet them as soon as the politicians figure out what to do with themselves."

"Do you have any predictions about that?"

"About politics? Why would I have predictions about politics? They deliberately obscure relevant information, for one thing, and for another it's deathly boring."

"- I mean, sir, surely you hear from your son about -"

"I have seven children and some of them are very dense indeed but not quite dense enough to try to interest me in politics."

"I was referring to -"

"I know who you were referring to. If you want a statement from Aitim go bother Aitim."

"Thank you for your time."

"I did not alter my activities in response to your presence and therefore you can't yet be said to have wasted any of my time though you should go before you do."

...out skitters the reporter.

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"That will make it more interesting, at least. I've been thinking we should visit the city in Canada now and then. Maybe alternate Mondays, work is slow on Mondays, they seem to commit fewer assaults while they're in church the previous day."

"Huh. Sure, we can do that. Missing a real city?"

"And I think Imeles might be on the verge of dumping his girlfriend and he's less likely to pack up and go back to Anitam if he meets more people on this planet."

"He could meet humans! They're lovely! But yes, sure."

"That might be all right for Asame later but right now with the social mores they've got I'm not sure any human girls would make good spring friends."

"Oh, that! Yes, they're so serious about it, won't be in the same room lest anyone think less of them. I'm sure there are exceptions, but I guess it'd be a bother wading through - and they're still not very clean really -"

"They really aren't. City alternate Mondays? We can meet up with your cousins, Asame can play with their kids and when our babies all come along they can be friends."

"Sure!"

Shasali puts it on her schedule.

The stores start selling pocket everythings. Public showers + restrooms + charging ports for electronic devices are built.

Earthlings get less smelly, if incompletely.

There are ads on their pocket everythings showing unappealing people who aren't clean be transformed into attractive successful clean people. There are ads for small families: "two is enough!" and "give your kids the attention they deserve!" and "build a sustainable world!"

The ads don't poll very well.

The marketers will cycle through endless variants until they find ones that focus-group more acceptably while sticking to the theme.

There are improvements to be had, although what works best varies a lot by subpopulation.

That's fine! Showers and small families in whatever local variant sells!

Some humans have their own ritual cleanliness standards which are not much like Amentan ones; they run into issues with that in Islamic countries.

Amentans will meticulously abide by local ritual cleanliness standards, they're not monsters. The locals will eventually be expected to also abide by Amentan ones!

Locals resent that. Especially in regions where water is scarce and showers seem insane and five-hour ones positively ludicrous.

Amentans are working on the scarcity of water thing.