Editing 1899: Ears

{{comic
| number    = 1899
| date      = October 6, 2017
| title     = Ears
| image     = ears.png
| titletext = My theory is that most humans have been colonized with alien mind-control slugs that hold the earbuds for them, and the ones who can't wear earbuds are the only surviving free ones.
}}

==Explanation==
[[Cueball]] and [[Megan]] are sitting in a park together and appear to be cloudwatching. Cueball asks if Megan has ever looked up in the sky and wondered, implying that he is thinking deep thoughts while allowing his mind to wander. It is possible, but not evident, that Cueball is listening to some audio device through {{w|Headphones#Ear-fitting headphones|earbuds}}, and his wondering is caused because he looked up at the sky and they fell out, leading to the thoughts about what it would be like to have "normal shaped ears" so he could wear earbuds without that happening. (This joke is directed towards a large group of people who cannot use earbuds successfully because they fall out.) Megan's response could either be making fun of Cueball (whatever goes on in his head with the random conversation points he tends to bring up) or agreeing with him that earbud wearers' ears are mysterious.

The comic appears to be a variation on a famous and oft-quoted fragment from {{w|Voltaire}}'s satirical novella ''{{w|Candide}}'', wherein Dr. Pangloss states that we live in '{{w|the best of all possible worlds}}', among other reasons because '…noses were made to wear spectacles, and so we have spectacles'.

The title text is a play on conspiracy theories wherein the human race is being assimilated by aliens, and the person coming up with the conspiracy theory thinks he is one of the few "free" survivors. The use of "brain slugs" in particular may be a reference to the ''{{w|Animorphs}}'' book series, a nostalgic favorite of Randall's, in which humanity is being colonized by parasitic alien slugs called [http://animorphs.wikia.com/wiki/Yeerk Yeerks], that enter a human's brain through the ears and can control them. Randall/Cueball here may be suggesting that the reason most humans can wear earbuds is because the Yeerks hold the earbuds in place.

Another possibility, given the earbud/music reference, is that Randall is making a joke about {{w|earworm}}s.

==Transcript==
:[Cueball is sitting with his back towards Megan who is lying on her back on a grassy hill. Both are looking up at a sky with small puffy clouds (one large, two small, and four tiny). In the background fields are visible below their vantage point.]

:[Same setting, but with the clouds removed, to make room for Cueball's text.]
:Cueball: Do you ever just look up at the sky and wonder...

:[Same setting, zoomed a bit out to make more of the background fields visible, still with the clouds missing due to the text from the two people.]
:Cueball: "What are normal peoples' ears shaped like, that earbuds stay in without falling out?"
:Megan: Man, who ''knows'' what's going on in there.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Animorphs]]