Dear AntiMatter,
Woof, there's a lot here. Here we go:

Dear cindy,
Well, there are a lot of us, so I'm not going to be able to give you a complete nomenclature. But I can give you a statistical analysis, as this was something that interested me in my college days. It turns out that, due to an as-yet unexplained phenomenon, nearly 50% of all flat fish (myself included) are named Eric. That includes 30% of the female flat fish population. Another 10% of the males are named Robert (due to a love for that finest of crooners, Mr. Goulet, which seems to be part of our genetic heritage). The remainder of our population are named after members of You Can't Do That On Television, except for a small percentage of us who's parents never got cable.
-ATF

Dear Billy,
Although we at Ask the Fish welcome all types of questions, we realize that there are some questions that we just aren't capable of answering properly and we'll have to outsource it. We suggest you go straight to the source, and send an email to rob/AT/cockeyed/DOT/com, asking him how much is inside a barrel of monkeys. ("I did. Rob sent me here." "Oh did he?")
-ATF

Dear from,
If I know E.J. (and believe me, I "know" E.J.), then you bet your sweet bippy David's gay. Those jewelry-wearing North Island guys--whoa, dude. What a bunch of legal statements. On the other hand, what in God's name are you talking about?
-ATF

Dear sir,
This one was what a professional logician might call "a real poser." As well-educated as the Fish is, he cannot be expected to be a master of every field of humor- err, piscine endeavor. So he called in an expert in the flatulating arts: the illustrious Ferg. In all seriousness, her undergraduate degree was a B.M.! We are proud to bring you the very first Ask the Ferg:
"Why do farts smell? The entire goal of postmodern art is to provoke a response. This way, even unartistic people can create something extraordinary."
Also, you're right: Dog farts and old people smell worse than other people's farts.
-ATF

Dear Jill,
Oh HELL yes. When I hear that "tickticktickticktick" sound I become uncontrollably aroused. It's like some sort of nightmarish Pavlov experiment. It's taken me years of therapy to be able to last longer than the point at which they say "those stories and Andy Rooney."
-ATF

Dear wondering,
Using the cosmic powers granted to us by the Spectre in our struggle with the Anti-Monitor, we fused the infinite Earths throughout the Multiverse into one spacial entity. However, this created a labrynthine maze of alternate timelines through which, with the blessing of the Quintessence (Ganthet, Zeus, Shazam, the Phantom Stranger, and Highfather Izaya), one can travel. This new chronal rainbow is known as Hypertime. That's where we get shitfaced and work on the site.
-ATF

Dear Bill,
Even given that fish are tiny-brained ignoramuses (a fact which I do not concede, but only accept for sake of argument), please note that I am a DOGFISH, a creature with the head of a dog. And as everyone knows, dogs are highly intelligent creatures, capable of independant thought and creativity. Although I will admit that having the head of a dog does result in an unquenchable desire to sniff my own butt (unquenchable as there is nothing there to sniff).


Second of all, for a better written essay on why fish are smarter than humans, see Albert McCallums The Smartest Creature, a brilliantly structured piece which has become a standard text in underwater universities around the world.
-ATF

Dear Anonymous,
Well, there are a couple of ways to go about it. We've found that obtaining a Playstation 2 or GameCube is an effective way of passing the time (and it quickly sheds that embarrassing and unsightly muscle tone that may have been collecting).

If that's out of your price range, may we recommend causing trouble? Certainly not of the 'getting the police involved' sort. More of the 'getting people to gather around and wonder what the hell you are doing' sort. For examples and ideas, see our pranks page. Making something (e.g. a replica of Noah's Arc, a 30-ft tall stick figure, a giant pair of googlie eyes on the side of a building, etc) for no good reason is always fun, the bigger the better. And destroying it afterwards can be incredibly gratifying.
Maybe you and your twin sister and your dull friends could re-enact "The Parent Trap" for the your thimble-sized town. Proceed could benefit All Too Flat.
-ATF

Dear Kennybrushing,
It's extremely efficient, yes. You just have to be careful to not spit any foam on your Powerbook.
Then again, maybe you shouldn't be taking toilet advice from us...
-ATF

Dear Drowsy,
Well, your first problem is that it isn't funny. At all. Which doesn't necessarily mean that the joke is going to fail (we do a lot of things that aren't funny, and yet people still seem to be entertained), but it's a good first step.

Generally speaking, I've found when you have to spell out the punch line to someone, you're going to want to rethink your approach. May I suggest photoshopping the picture so that the guy has had a pie thrown in his face? Or make it a movie of the guy with a car on a leash getting hit in the groin with a football? High level humor is one thing, but a football in the groin is a football in the groin.
-ATF

Dear Need,
That reminds me of a story of my younger days. I was a young fish, just out of school, and I was swimming along near the coast checking out some of the pleasure boats. Y'know, doing jumping tricks to impress the women. Anyway, I must have gotten carried away cuz the next thing I know I'm 30 miles from home. So I start swimming home when suddenly wham, I run straight into a fishing net. The net pulls me out of the water and into this little fishing boat. I'm scared out of my scales...thoughts run through my mind. I gotta escape. I'm not going out like this. I look to my side and I see 5 or 6 other fish flopping around in this net. But one catches my eye. She's beautiful. A majestic head, eyes that are deep and understanding, and her tail, what a tail. I look here in the eye and she says to me, "We're in a sticky situation here." I nod my head and say "How 'bout we bust out of here." and she says "I thought you'd never ask." So the fisherman comes over and dumps us out of the net and he's carrying this gigantic stick. He bends over menacingly with his stick and just as he makes his move, I flop out of the way and shoot a jet of water into his eyes. He recoils back, stumbles, and then falls as he trips over this girl fish's tail. We flop over to the side of the boat, join fins and jump back into the water and freedom. And that's the story of how I met my fiancee Stacey. Anyway, to answer your question; yes, I do think it's possible to find love in a net.
-ATF

Dear Bull,
That's a really interesting question! Originally, the designation BB refered to the size of the pellet that those types of guns shoot. BB pellets traditionally have a diameter of 0.18 inches, which fell in between shot size B and shot size BBB.
These days, the designation "BB gun" does not necessarily refer to a gun that fires a single piece of shot of size BB, but rather it refers (however inaccurately) to the entire class of air powered rifles.
Personally, I am a much bigger fan of the DD.
-ATF

Dear thankless,
Fortunately, one facet of the Fish is a professional editor, and his professional proofreaders would tell you that it's "thank you" if you're saying it to someone, and "thank-you" if you're describing a type of note. You're-welcome.
And not to be a total pain in the butt, but (ha!) you should really put your punctuation inside your quotation marks like this: "thank you?"
(For more info on inane punctuation, see this old Fish (he played two)).
-ATF