These magnificent and slightly terrifying creatures are tardigrades—stocky organisms less than 1mm long, also known as “water bears”. They’re found all over the world, from deserts to the Arctic, but they always need water to perform necessary biological processes. However, if their habitats dry up or they’re exposed to physical or chemical extremes, they can enter a state of total metabolic shutdown called anhydrobiosis, and survive in this state for years—then, when conditions are right again, they can just spring back to life. Anhydrobiosis involves processes at molecular and physiological levels, but basically, when cells become stressed through dehydration, ‘bioprotectors’ are formed to protect the cell’s important molecules and minimise cell damage. Tardigrades are nicknamed the hardiest creatures on Earth, and they appear to be just as hardy above it, too. In 2007, an experiment launched them into a 10-day orbit, and proved that they can survive exposure to the sub-zero temperatures, intense radiation, and oxygen-deprived vacuum of space. Now they’re part of Project Biokis, a program sponsored by the Italian Space Agency that aims to study creatures like tardigrades and develop techniques to protect other organisms—humans especially—from the extreme conditions of space.
This post is actually quite long... so it's under a read more. Uhm..... just ignore the paranthesis.... it's just a lot of Roslyn going on stupid tangents.
Since hearing about the trip to Cape Cod Roslyn had been thinking about ways to actually head to her destination. It wasn’t like she didn’t like the idea. After all it would be a chance to see familiar faces and reunite with the trolls again. And if there was anything that Roslyn wanted it was that; she held dearly the people she had met during that and being separated from them after everything that had happened was difficult. Keeping hidden and still keeping in touch was hard and Roslyn was often frustrated that there was no way she could ascertain the safety of her fellow trolls but through flimsy social media. So getting to see them in the flesh was certainly welcomed.
Still, as much as she liked the idea it was getting there in the first place that was an ordeal. From her various google researches (To go on a tangent for a moment: Roslyn was really beginning to love the human research engine, it was quite useful! Then again there was always a wealth of information on the net, something Roslyn took advantage of, though mostly to research things such as “alien conspiracies” and “psychology” (human wizards were also a topic of interest, but one Roslyn would rather keep secret.) it seemed like Cape Cod, was not exactly in the vicinity, in fact it was in another country. While Roslyn had no qualms of purchasing a car (or “borrowing one”) it seemed unlikely that she could pass the border between the Us and Canada without some kind of identification.
So that left…….. well not very many legal options that’s what. For a moment Roslyn had felt like forgoing the trip, after all safety came first. Just because she wanted to see everyone didn’t mean she should compromise her fellow trolls safety for that.
However things turned up during one of her each endeavors on the web she had found a ship that was heading to Cape Cod. After making sure she could easily secure a return trip afterwards (it would be useless to go and then be unable to return home afterwards right?) she quickly reserved a room on the ship. (It was rather expensive, but it was a small price to pay for traveling safely.)
The trip on the boat had been more nerve-wracking then she had expected, keeping hidden but still eating and keeping hydrated wasn’t easy and being around so many people was terrifying. After having spent the better part of three years alone in a secluded house with only a catfish and a mutant cat for company it was rather difficult to get used to social interactions.
(She was getting one of her neighbours to house sit while she was away. While she had never actually the person in real life a short search and a few e-mails later she had found someone in the vicinity of her house that seemed…. Honest enough. If anything happened while she was away. She thought the monetary compensation would be enough to deter the person from doing too much damage to her property.)
At any rate after all three days of general discomfort and trying to be as discreet as possible she finally arrived at the port in Cape Cod. All that was left was traveling to the actual beach house a short cab ride later. (Unfortunately she couldn't exactly walk around wearing a hodded cape, though Roslyn would have rather liked that, at least she could somewhat escaped odd looks that way. But the excuse of "Oh I'm going to a costumed party between friends" was luckily more or less accpeted(The willingness for humans to accept something farfetched(like a costumed party in the middle of summer) over a simple truth(the existance of extraterrestrials.) was actually pretty fascinating.) though it certainly didn't stop the odd looks, it was better odd looks then admitting she was an alien.
It seemed a great many of the huamns were actually already there when she arrived. Which she supposed was normal considering they had less distance to travel, and could generally speaking get there without having to work around issue such as being a foreign species. Poised, albeit actually quite nervously she rang the doorbell to the house.
“There are monstrous changes taking place in the world, forces shaping a future whose face we do not know. Some of these forces seem evil to us, perhaps not in themselves but because their tendency is to eliminate other things we hold good. It is true that two men can lift a bigger stone than one man. A group can build automobiles quicker and better than one man, and bread from a huge factory is cheaper and more uniform. When our food and clothing and housing all are born in the complication of mass production, mass method is bound to get into our thinking and to eliminate all other thinking. In our time mass or collective production has entered our economics, our politics, and even our religion, so that some nations have substituted the idea collective for the idea God. This in my time is the danger. There is great tension in the world, tension toward a breaking point, and men are unhappy and confused.”
I'm sorry to hear your summer was not the least bit relaxing. Well hopefully going to the beach house will give you some need time for rest and relaxation. Assuming you're given permission to go of course.
Mine was sadly, long and tedious. In between waiting for my grubtop to get fixed I didn't really have much to do. Tough it was pleasant enough to relax at the lake and read books, so I suppose not all was lost.
Well, it seems that my technical problems are finally resolved. Hopefully things won't degenerate again. I'm sorry if I've been hard to contact, unfortunately, there wasn't much I could do while my computer was in repair.
Sorry Sryder, I won't e͜͢ņ̸ļ̀i̡g͠h̴̕t̨én ͢͠y̴͢ou͟on the joys of h̵͡͞u̶̷͠m͜àn̡ ̶̧̡s̸̸ęx͏̶ual ͏̛activites, b̸u͟͢t͠ ́I'm certain you can use google wel̢̧ĺ͢͡ e̸̷no҉ù͘g͟h͡ ̧̡t̴͢͏o̶͟ ̴f͠ín͜d̵͜ ò̕͜ųt͟ ̶o̢͟ń ̨y҉o̴̕u҉͘r̛͟ ̧̛o͜͞ẁn̨͡.I '̸̨́d̴͡ ̕͢s͏u҉g͟g̀es̴̡͝t͠ ̡y̡̨òu̕͡ ̀look up 'sloppy makeouts' as well. ́͠I͝'́v͡e̴̛ ͢͏h̡̢e̴̕á̢r̕͜d̢͘͠ t̷h̨a͟͞t ͘wa͏̛͢s̷͘also very educational.
While, it's not quite as bad as before. My computer is still havingt̸e̸͠chni̢͘͠c͝ą̴l͟ ̶d͏if͡f̡ic̢̕ųl̸̀t̸̡͢i̸͟e͏̡͜s̷̨.͞It seems whateverv̧i̶̛ru̕͘şit caught is d̴͡ęt̷e͢ŕ҉́m͘͜i̵̢n̷̡é́d҉͡ ̵̀ţ͢͝o͝ ͘st̶͢ay̸͜.̷͏While I sent it off to get repaired ( hence not being online for a while) unfortunately it's not as wellŕ̀͡e͏p͡͡à͘͏i̸̛re̕d̴̢ ̨͏a̶̕s͡͏ I ͢҉̕h̴͞a̷͞d͏̢́ hop̡̀͜e̷d.́̕
