I’m reading a fiction called “Primal Sorcery” where a significant plot point is that sorcerers can instinctively manifest magic when under great duress, but the protagonist only ever gained the ability to turn invisible because there aren’t many stressful situations that aren’t solved by turning invisible…
One of my all-time favorite science fiction authors was Frederic Brown, who wrote very short stories (novels as well, but he’s most well-known for the short stories). One was about a man in a Muslim sultanate who invents an invisibility potion. He drinks the potion and decides to sneak into the sultan’s harem at night… at which point he’s murdered by one of the guards because it’s night and being invisible doesn’t matter when you make noise.
it’s honestly surprising that “invisible dude runs into a blind person who, obviously, has no clue they’re invisible” isn’t a more common trope, it’s such a no-brainer
They are pretty cool creatures. Imagine if you were from some other planet, came here and saw an octopus for the first time (assuming you didn't have such things on your own planet). You'd not know if they were truly the intelligent rulers of the planet or not, but they sure would look very alien and scary.
At any rate, I've always wanted a pet squid. Though apparently I'd have to turn most of my living room in a giant aquarium with water recirculators.
Well of course, he or she would have to have a full time job and pay for their room and board, I'm not running a charity here.
I can see it now. "Whatever happened to that guy in the apartment up there who had the pet squid? Nobody's seen him in 15 weeks and something big is sloshing around in the dark up there."
i’d just like to interject for a moment, concerning the plural of octopus.
If you had looked it up, you would have discovered that ‘octopi’ is not the preferred spelling. It is not a spelling at all. The word does not exist, except in the mouths of those who are pretending to be educated but in fact are not. This is because the ‘us’ ending of ‘octopus’ is not a Latin nominative singular ending, which would form its plural by changing to the letter ‘i’. Instead, the syllable ‘pus’ in ‘octopus’ is the Greek word for ‘foot.’ And it forms its plural the Greek way. Therefore ‘octopoda’, not ‘octopi’. Never ‘octopi’.
Except you also fell for the trap of pretending to be educated. The entire "how to use 'octopus' as a plural noun" is an internet clickbait phenomenon, and both linguists and communications experts have chimed in to say that language is not prescriptive based on supposed origins of words/phrases, but rather it is labile and the most correct form of communication is that which is most readily understood -- therefore, they agree, saying simply 'octopus' or 'octopuses' is correct in English, as that is what English speakers already use.
A word becomes distinct from its origins based on the context it is used in - i.e. we're speaking English in the modern era, derived from generations of English speakers, and we are so far detached from any Greek origins in our language that it may as well not exist; these words have become English words through common use, and thus are subject to the grammatical rules of English. In the future, other words of varying origins with their 'appropriate' pluralizations and conjugations may be slowly overwritten by casual or undereducated use, adopting English grammar instead, and as long as that becomes the most common use, it is then the correct one.
After all, language is for communication, and communication requires common understanding, so language is naturally defined by that which facilitates communication - not notions of history or propriety.
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