Writing : (Un)Official Presents: WAR2 - I Can't Realistically Keep Up With All These Round Numbers

A coworker of mine went to a mermaid convention last year. Said it was both freaky and supremely disappointing. But yes, next big thing.

Gordon - what's even more impressive is that your coworker actually admitted to this. This is the kind of information you don't share. I'm a clopper, and I damn sure don't tell anyone that I go to Bronycon. 

Damn that Aegis.

I'm pretty much that one old guy who tells the one story about the one time he got laid to every new face in the dive as though it were evidence that even he himself had once "lived it up."

When mermaids marry, do they have mermaids of honor?

And for pets... do they have Purrmaids?

(I can keep going)

I want that tail for my kitties! They're be mercatmen I guess, since they're boys. 

Funny enough, I just bought my soon-to-be nine year old two mermaid books today to take with us on vacation next week. I bought the first two of the Emily Windsnap series (book 4 just released a week or so ago I think). I love children's books and spend more time in that section of Barnes & Noble than any where else in the store (followed closely by Starbucks!) 

I don't get the appeal of fish-people mixes. More interesting combos can be made yet google image results for those such as "squirrel human halfie" remain disappointing at the least.

Don't cross the streams.

Or maybe a trident fight? That's the preferred weapon of fish people.

I'd think that tridents would be terrible weapons underwater. They're really more a fisherman vs. fish people weapon. The barbed points means they can get good traction and won't come out while you're using the long shaft as a lever to pivot fish-people (or is it 'water-breathing inclined'?) over into a boat. And even then, you typically use harpoons as your first resort so  you can pull the lung-challenged close enough to use the tridents... making them more tools than weapons.

On equal footing (land vs. land or water vs. water) it loses its main advantage as a means of leverage. Or at the very least is no better than a long spear... and actually worse because a spear only has one point of pressure to break surface cohesion (i.e. to poke atlantic-americans with) where tridents have two or three, which means the same amount of pressure is being divided between two or three points which limits penetration. And even if you do manage to brute force a trident into one of them damn scalies while you're both underwater, then the trident becomes as much a leverage for the chum as it is for you.

I imagine fish people would be much more inclined to rely on domesticated animal life which is much more specially designed to combat the peculiarities of underwater combat than half-people. Armies of P.S.O.U.S.s (Pistol Shrimp of unusual size...) would be devestating. Trained electric eels. Octopi spies. Stingray ambushes. Watch-Sharks.

Water-resistance would be such an issue, that most conventional weapons (that we've devoloped for use on land) are useless. Though they'd probably have a highly developed grappling martial art.

Or guns.

I apoogize. I'm done rambling about this... I blame the fever...

"I'm about to teach you things that can't be taught."

I'm in favor of drowning. As a tactic, I mean.

Me too. It's not even that there's anything there, it's that the depths go on forever...

Like, I'd rather swim in a pool where you can see all the sharks.

Fear of the unknown and being out of your element. Even pictures of nice whales freak me out, not because of the whales, but the deep blue expanse of water around them. 

Actually, Liana, most people who die in a plane crash die of asphyxiation from the smoke. Of course, some burn in the fire, and some are so broken, they can't get out to safety.  But most don't die on impact. Sorry :(

You're all weird and creepy, ..... thats why I like this place.

Gordon, in VA Beach I assume you just carried a spear gun for all troubles aquatic and domestic.

I would fight a shark. I think I could take it.

Emma wrote a story like that for War

I am terrified of those diving stories though where people lose which way is up, and try to lunge to the surface when their lungs are just about to burst but really they're just going further down and then they probably die.

I had something like this happen once when I was in a wal-mart late at night and high.

In case you didn't see it, the new Winners Bracket matchup stories are posted for your reading and voting pleasure.

The meatballs taste like that crust that collects in the pockets of people's ears. Plus gravy.

I've got about one-third of something that I don't know how to end yet. Which is a no-no for me, especially with really short stuff. But if I didn't start putting some words down, I'd be turning in a one-page story tomorrow night.