That Awkward Moment When: Mermaid Edtion!

[MermaidMichelle]

That does sound very awkward, Jaffa! As lifeguards, we were required at every inservice (qualification update, once every three months) to lift a 10-pound brick from the deepest part of the deep end (~12 feet) and carry it to the side without letting it go under. It takes practice sometimes, but by the end the other guards were calling me "The Statue of Liberty"...lol

[Mermaid Jaffa]

That does sound very awkward, Jaffa! As lifeguards, we were required at every inservice (qualification update, once every three months) to lift a 10-pound brick from the deepest part of the deep end (~12 metres) and carry it to the side without letting it go under. It takes practice sometimes, but by the end the other guards were calling me "The Statue of Liberty"...lol

Made even worse by my underwater perception's not very good. I thought it was merely centimeters away from me, when in fact I had to dive down very deep to fish it out!
I was also a little baffled why the rubber merfin would sink... Afterwards, I figured it would be because of the extra fabric from having the swimwear lining, and dorsal fin.

The deep end is 2.08 m, may not be very deep by US standards, but its deep to me as I've not swam in any other pool deeper than that.

[Fun123joker]

That does sound very awkward, Jaffa! As lifeguards, we were required at every inservice (qualification update, once every three months) to lift a 10-pound brick from the deepest part of the deep end (~12 metres) and carry it to the side without letting it go under. It takes practice sometimes, but by the end the other guards were calling me "The Statue of Liberty"...lol

yeah. my sister tried out for a life gaurd job in the summer. the bosses and manager really really really wanted to hire her thing is that she could do that part. it hard part was that you could dive for it you just had to sink to the bottom and grab it. no one in my family knows how to sink.

[Mermaid Jaffa]

yeah. my sister tried out for a life gaurd job in the summer. the bosses and manager really really really wanted to hire her thing is that she could do that part. it hard part was that you could dive for it you just had to sink to the bottom and grab it. no one in my family knows how to sink.

I'm a natural floater too.

[Echidna]

the deepest part of the deep end (~12 metres) and carry it to the side without letting it go under.

12 metres deep?!
Holy mackerel!
That's not a pool, that's a dive tower

Btw, it's normal for the human body to have a certain buoyancy in the first few metres under the surface.
Most diving regulations say the weights have to be so that your body will float up the last 3 metres (in case of an emergency).

Roughly, it goes like:

surface to 3-5 metres depth: humans float up
5m to 10m: neutral buoyancy (if someone loses consciousness in that range, they won't float up, but stay where they are)
10m + : freefall zone. If you don't swim actively upward in this depth, you will sink.

That is why bodies that are sucked that far down often never surface in deep lakes or the ocean, they will simply sink to the bottom.

[Mermaid Meara]

Thanks for that information Echidna. Explains why despite the fact I'm a natural sinker, it still takes 8 lbs of weights to sink me to the bottom of a 10 foot deep pool and keep me there.

[Mermaid Sirenia]

That awkward moment when you look outside and it's snowing... but you live in florida... it's been snowing here for 4 hours now lol, but it should be back in the 80s this weekend

[Mermaid Jaffa]

TAMW you bang your fluke on the plastic lane things and for a split second you feel pain!

[Mermaid Kelda]

I hear you Jaffa! I swam in a pool with a rocky bottom and every time my fluke scraped the bottom I felt the vibrations and said "ow!"
If only I could control my tail as well as I "feel" its pain, maybe I wouldn't bang it into so many things xD But I guess it's sort of like driving a car! It takes a while to know how much space it takes up.

[MermaidMimi]

That awkward moment, when someone thinks what you do as a mermaid is a fetish thing. :/

[Naufra]

That awkward moment, when someone thinks what you do as a mermaid is a fetish thing. :/

Yeah, that's pretty awkward. I've had people assume that about quite a few of my hobbies. It's even more fun when they don't believe you when you tell them it has nothing to do with sex and they insist on talking about it loudly on the sales floor at your place of employment. There were some reeeeeeeaaaaally stupid people at my old job, but that particular one got canned that same night for sexual harassment.

[Yulia]

TAMW you're putting your clothes on after swimming, and another guest at the pool looks at your empty tail and says: "That... Looks a bit morbid when it lies there like that"

[Mermaid Jaffa]

TAMW you're putting on your tail poolside and the lifeguard walks past, you smile at him but he refuses to look at you, instead one can hear him muttering "mermaid"!
TAMW one realizes the money spent so far on fabrics, fins and tails, one could've bought a fancy Mertailor Flipper or competitor...
TAMW the instructors for the Swim Squad sets up shop next to your lane.
TAMW the swim squad is failing at the dolphin kick whilst you are swishing up and down the lane in your tail!
TAMW one of the instructors is seriously eyeballing you like he's got fireballs coming out of his eyes!

[Merman Jamie]

TAMW you're putting on your tail poolside and the lifeguard walks past, you smile at him but he refuses to look at you, instead one can hear him muttering "mermaid"!
TAMW one realizes the money spent so far on fabrics, fins and tails, one could've bought a fancy Mertailor Flipper or competitor...
TAMW the instructors for the Swim Squad sets up shop next to your lane.
TAMW the swim squad is failing at the dolphin kick whilst you are swishing up and down the lane in your tail!
TAMW one of the instructors is seriously eyeballing you like he's got fireballs coming out of his eyes!

those are cool Jaffa. good work on showing the swim squad how to do the dolphin kick

[Mermaid Alea]

That awkward moment when your feet have been hurting for the past few days, but you have literally done nothing to make them ache. Then you realize that maybe it is a sign that you are meant to be swimming in your tail instead of walking on your feet! I haven't gotten to try my monofin in the water at all yet.

That awkward moment when you look outside and it's snowing... but you live in florida... it's been snowing here for 4 hours now lol, but it should be back in the 80s this weekend

What? Really? I am in Florida too and I am close to Alabama so usually if it snows in Florida it happens here. I didn't know there was snow!? I guess for once we didn't get it. This winter is making me consider moving to a warmer spot in Florida. I don't like cold weather some people need to live where there are seasons but I think I would be happy with an endless summer.

TAMW you're putting your clothes on after swimming, and another guest at the pool looks at your empty tail and says: "That... Looks a bit morbid when it lies there like that"

Morbid? Weird when I see an empty tail it looks pretty to me.

[Mermaid Jaffa]

those are cool Jaffa. good work on showing the swim squad how to do the dolphin kick

Yea but the swim squad are just kids. So I dunno, maybe it wasn't nice to swim alongside in my lane every time they did it.
I tried to show one kid in the deep end that wasn't in the squad but had a loud mouth teacher screaming at him in Korean, them underwater how to do it properly, but the lady kept yelling at the poor kid. He really had to clue and the teacher wasn't any good, instead of showing how, she screamed at him until saliva came out of her mouth!

[Merman Jamie]

Yea but the swim squad are just kids. So I dunno, maybe it wasn't nice to swim alongside in my lane every time they did it.
I tried to show one kid in the deep end that wasn't in the squad but had a loud mouth teacher screaming at him in Korean, them underwater how to do it properly, but the lady kept yelling at the poor kid. He really had to clue and the teacher wasn't any good, instead of showing how, she screamed at him until saliva came out of her mouth!

teachers like that suck

[Juniper Summer]

That awkward moment when there's an adorable 2 yr old at the pool who believes your a real mermaid and when you get out, you have to scoot all the way across the concrete to the changing room so she won't see you take your tail off.

[MermaidMichelle]

Wow, Juniper! I admire your devotion to the child's fantasies! Now if only people would explain Santa Claus as "a real-life gift-giver who is in Heaven now but whose spirit and example help to inspire the gift-giving spirit of Christmas." Reindeer are optional.

As to mermaid fetishism, I am reminded of how earlier this week I ordered a replacement slip to go under the many long skirts I wear in the winter. It is technically a hobble skirt, yet has a kick pleat so that walking might be reasonable. I'm not using it as a fetish item, yet because of our oversexualized world even the hobble skirt is often seen as such. The same holds true for the mermaid tail (though it kicks it up from "hobble skirt" to "can't move skirt" status); it emphasizes the legs while rendering the wearer more vulnerable (at least on land) and feminine, and the undulating motions of mermaid swimming can be seen as sexual too...

...yet they certainly don't have to be! Just as I wanted a narrow skirt to keep people from ogling my legs if my skirts are blown upward (during an Awkward Moment, as it were), we all have our own reasons for wanting to be mermaids and (correct me if I'm wrong) they are very seldom (if ever) to titillate!

I shall end with...

That awkward moment when a child pulls on one of your pectoral fins and you instinctively say "ow!" Those little children who didn't believe before suddenly are wondering again....

[PearlieMae]

That awkward moment when the celebrity model keeps telling you how awesome your tail is while walking along with the tailmaker whose tail they will be modeling.