“No, Joey. For the last time, you cannot wear my skin so we can be “twinsies” for Halloween.”
Granted. It comes with all the other changes a snake goes through during the process. No appetite, lethargy, solitary behavior, irritability, and accordingly for a few days before (like a little extra PMS). It is difficult to get out of. You smell unpleasant and extra musky during the process. Your eyes also shed. If you do not completely shed the old skin, it can cause infection.
If you have children, they do all this more frequently. Their rooms are just filled with piles of skin. It reeks.
Adults get pretty gross about it, too. Every day on public transportation there’s just that guy that’s peeling himself and dropping the pieces on the ground. If it were socially acceptable to eat your own skin he wouldn’t have to throw it away like this, he says loud enough for the rest of the passengers to hear him. A third agree with him. Car drivers are no better; people shaped sheddings become the new tumbleweed.
People that need help with this process are more expensive to take care of, such as the elderly. Fewer people can afford long term care. Multigenerational homes become ever more common. Skin just piles up because nobody can agree about whole turn it is to take out the skin bucket to the curb because somebody is always PSSing (pre shedding syndrome) and the cycles never match up.
A market for shed skin also develops, with a grading scale. Celebrities’ go for the most, but plenty of people make a bit of money on OnlySheds through shedding vids and auctioning off their skin. There needs to be a slew of new laws regarding selling the skin of minors.
Black clothing goes completely out of style.
So many birthdays, school dances, speed dating events, etc, get ruined by just having skin hanging off people. New psychiatric issues enter the DSM.
Judo, wrestling, etc, have to adjust rules so and can’t slip away by keeping skin that’s ready to shed on before matches, making them slippery.
I love it, that is an incredible set of mental pictures
Granted. Because you said like snakes, and not e g. “in the manner snakes shed skin,” our skin literally turns into live snakes as it sheds.
Granted. When you try to flush it down the toilet, it fucks up your whole house plumbing.
Granted. I don’t think I could eat that much skin at once, though.
Granted. That’s it. That’s already horrible.
Granted. We now shed our skins like snakes (instead of small flakes) all the time. As in, we are constantly peeling off a full layer of skin. Humans become fatigued as their bodies attempt to keep up with the constant loss of skin, and there is now more dead skin lying around than ever before.
Plot twist: As humans, we learn and recognize the causes of fatigue, and start eating our own shed skins for nutrients.
As a reminder, we are shedding all the time, so we shed while we eat our own skin. We get stuck in a never ending loop of shedding and eating skin.
Granted. But the shed skin stays stuck in your hair, unless you prepare in advance and get shaved completely bald first.
