h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

a short story with the following plot idea?
The initial plot of the story is that there are alines (or some form of non human) secretly infiltrating the human race and business, especially I think. They have disguised themselves somehow by preventing humans from seeing them how they really are. However, it transpires that smokers who smoke a certain amount or more can see them. There is a lower limit, something like 10 ciggies per day, and something in the ciggies counteracts whatever it was the aliens were doing.
The story starts with an office worker outside his office having his morning smoke (the 10 o'clockers or something) and suddenly being able to see these aliens wandering around. They, of course, do not know that smokers can see them.

Can't remember much more than that, and may well have got some of it wrong. Certainly wasn;t a recent story, but not sur ehow old.
And now I am being bugged by working out who wrote it, ring any bells for anyone?

I am sorry I have no idea?

I don't know, in all honesty, but it certainly sounds like the sort of thing that Philip K. Dick would come up with. He was a big fan of his secret invasions. I know he wrote a story called 'The War With The Fnools' in which the Fnools were identical to humans apart from the fact that they were only two feet tall. They then discover that smoking makes them grow two four feet, and that drinking makes them grow to six feet, at which point the human authorities get worried that they will not be able to tell them from humans at all. It is only when one of the fnools sleeps with the main character's secretary and grows to eight feet tall that the humans discover the fnools' fatal weakness and everyone lives happily ever after, in a vaguely slapstick fashion.

Hmm, could have been, and that isn't one of the PKD's I have read! One to add to the todo list!

As I recall these alien bods were vaguely human but they had grotesquely formed heads, totally non human.

Well, as I said, he did loads of alien invasion ones, although you probably know that, as you seem to a fan too. He did a short story called 'The Hanging Stranger' in which the aliens were disguised or hidden, as I seem to recall. They were pretty hideous, I think. More insectoid than deformed, though. I don't own any of the short stories, and all the PKD novels I have are currently packed in the garage.

Might be a Ray Bradbury

Yeah, it could. He had a taste for the slightly bizarre, too.

Who says it's bizarre.

If I smoke a certain amount I often see aliens too.

OK, clarification, smoking normal commercially available, legal tobacco

Hmm. Ray Bradbury. Could be.

He's another one who i know I have read, but would be hard pressed to say what books. Like when I did a check on PKD - I'd completely forgotten he wrote 'Do Androids dream of electric sheep' and 'we can rebuild you wholesale'. But i've read them both. Same with music and films, I enjoy the stories (or otherwise), I might remember the characters names, I will remember the plotlines mostly, but I almost never remember the authors/singers/directors etc.

Hence I end with questions like this!

I'm pretty sure that it's not Ray Bradbury. Far too 'obvious' for him.

On the other hand it does sound suspiciously like the basic plot for John Carpenter's wonderful (and criminally under-rated) 'They Live', which I know was based on a short story...

A very quick search reveals that the screenplay was written by Carpenter under a psuedonym and based on a story by a Ray Nelson called 'Eight O'Clock in the Morning'(written in 1963).

What i am unable to confirm is that Carpemter changed 'smoking' in the original story to 'sunglasses' in the movie. Sorry about that.

But that's what I'd put my money on.

Hang on, is that the weird one where a certain type of sunglasses reveal the aliens and their nasty alien messages hidden under billboards? I've been wondering about that film for ages.

Sorry, it isn't smoking in 'Eight o'clock in the morning', it's a stage hypnotist:

http://www.vanguardnewsnetwork.com/index438.htm

That is indeed the very one. It features one of the best lines in cinema history;

'I came here to do 2 things, chew gum and kick ass. Looks like I'm fresh out of gum.'

Can't access the site. The work filters tell me I can't access sites of 'Racism and Hate'.

I saw that at an odd time of the day (either very late or very early) on an obscure sky channel a few years back, but I missed the first five or ten minutes, so I spent most of the time watching it in a sort of bleary confusion.

Actually, it was blocked for me, too. I used Google's cache:

http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache:SYoGqhMBg7kJ:www.vanguardnewsnetwork.com/index438.htm+%2B%22ray+nelson%22+%2B%22eight+o%27clock+in+the+morning%22&hl=en

Well it all sounds a pretty naff 'secret' invasion by these aliens considering anyone who has been to a stage hypnotist, smokes or wears sunglasses can see them and all you have to do to take them out is 'sleep' with them.

'Quick, there's one go get em'

*stubbs out ciggarette and drops trousers*

Interesting. Is taht the whole story?

Thats less than short...that wouldn't cover Gerri Halliwells embarrasment...

Actually, re-reading the thread, it seems to me that Ictoan may have conflated 'War with Fnools' with 'They Live'.

Any clues, Ictoan?

I believe the story appeared as a one-shot in a comic, which explains the extremely short length.