Gin and a moat

[paxillin]

Not by one of the Queens this time... But we can drink here.

Is Boden slang for drugs? Because it you read the last few posts here but replace Boden with drugs everything makes more sense.

That's why you are the Queen. Drugs would be the solution. My life would still not be a Boden catalogue, but I could pretend. I think Schadenfreude needs another bottle of plonk.

wait till you try it on the Boden thread.

Alcoholis also a solution Pax - literally speaking.

Alcohol is also a solution

True enough, unless its 100% but that's undrinkable and would be a very foolish thing to bring anywhere me or the dragonlets.

Dragons and -lets only get beer or wine, surely? I forgot how concentrated it has to be to ignite. I agree alcohol is the solution for many problems. There'd be no AIBU if people shared a bottle of plonk over the fence more often. Shame the drinking age is so high, I bet the kids would be lovelier, too. Except dragonlets perhaps, they wreak enough havoc.

Dragons can drink/inhale the flames from whatever they want. I'm just thinking of the safety of you poor flammables. Well, that and not liking the taste of undiluted spirits. A bit of but there's nothing to beat a nice

So where does the spark come from, do you burp fire? Is there a flint in your epiglottis?

Aren't dragon scales and claws composed of flint? I thought they just snapped their "fingers" to get a spark.

Its a finely balanced process involving the production of a mix of gases within their flammability limits coupled with the precise use of a highly exothermic reaction, the details of which are for obvious reasons kept secret.

Looks like we need to capture a dragon and investigate if they won't talk. Perhaps we can dissect a dragonlet? Can't be finger-flicking, they'd have their claws in front of their mouth for fire breathing. Plus you could handcuff them to be safe from fire.

Looks like we need to capture a dragon and investigate if they won't talk. Perhaps we can dissect a dragonlet?

Just how lucky are you feeling? Apart from the obvious hazard (i.e. Me if you mess with the little 'uns) , you're very likely to set off a massive explosion if you mess with one. Don't bother trying to investigate Errol, what goes on in his unconventional innards to achieve jet propulsion must be incredibly unstable. Unless you want to relocate Mortificado in very small pieces.

Oh. Perhaps not. Perhaps we still have dragon eggs? I mean you could learn a lot about chickens from cracking open an almost-hatchling egg.

Otherwise we collect a discarded scale, isolate the fire gene and transfect some E. coli, see if they breathe fire. If not, try it in fruit flies or zebra fish.

'The fire gene'? Do you really think there's only one gene involved?

And you seem to be overlooking the key word 'breath' in your choice of lungless organisms. While obviously the flammable components of the mix come from elsewhere, lungs are crucial to getting the oxygen ratio correct and providing the sheer physical puff.

Hm, chickens then. But if it is a multi-gene phenomenon we can dissect it even further, we figure out which gene codes for the flint, which one for the methane...

I believe there are some lesser dragons which use flint, but they don't synthesise it FFS. They just eat it, a bit like birds do with stones in their crops. The fermentation process (obviously) depends on gut bacteria. So leave those poor eggs alone.

(Well, unless you want the ex pope to confit them, tbh we've got enough dragonlets to be going on with)

So if one was rectally inserting some dragon faeces, let the bacteria flourish and ate a flint... sounds explosive.

On your own head be it. Hm, more likely on our heads be you, in ashy form.

how disappointing must it be to be a fire breathing fish.

But what a glorious suicide if you are a fire-breathing fish! A moat full of bouillabaisse.

But the water would put out the fire would it not? Someone science this.

They could fire burp on the surface.