Well well well, it is certainly good to hear from Targo, which is getting rarer and it is nice to see a visit from Bench. However, it is an amazing treat to get both of you! So thanks.
Does a fish have a heart? Yes it does. Can a fish have a heart attack? I don't know. Can fishermen have heart attacks? Yes. What if they are frustrated? Here is my story.
A short time ago, in a place far, far away a gentleman met another who had a boat, gear and the knowledge to fish, fish away. One of the gentlemen was me.
So I met and climbed into the craft. The water, though calm, looked cold, uninviting, but ready for a fishing rod. We set out, travelling slowly upstream to the special spot, where we found another mate with his wife, already fishing.
"G'day"
Pleasantries were exchanged first, then blissful working of the river for her treasure ensued. All was quiet, until, "So have you caught anything today?"
"No, but I did yesterday. We have only been here for an hour and a half"
Silence. Swish goes the water.
I asked again, "So, how're those Roos goin?"
"Sssh...quiet, you are scaring the fish!" She exclaimed with vigour and contempt. I was thinking because if they had been quiet for the last hour and a half like they said they were, silence wasn't the golden lure.
" I just wanted to...."
"Shaddup! You are scaring the fish, and if you are going to continue I will have to ask you to leave. We were here first." This time he was the culprit. Man, I wondered again about this strange breed. My boatmate chuckled silently. His brother and sister in law were the real serious, dour, fishing type. Whenever, they fished tension was high and most people just kept quiet, hoping they would not make eye contact.
Suddenly, my line gave a tug! " Pull up, pull up " was the exclamation but to no avail. Fishy fish was only teasing. I decided to name her in honour of my fishing mates, surly girl. Surly girl wouldn't bite.
Now the surly girl in the little white dingy got a bite. She dutifully reeled her prize in, but it was a fighter.
"C'mon Terese, go, go, get her man. You can do it. Have you got her?"
"Quiet, I'm trying to concentrate." Her arm tensed, her eye was gleaming, her brow perspired.
"I gotta name it for you."
"Would you just shut up."
"But you gotta name her. Look, she's getting closer. Oh man, this is exciting." I stood up rather too quickly, the boat violently keeled over but my blonde companion and I steadied our vessel before we had a tragedy.
"*&^% off. Shut your face!" Her face contorted with rage. It seemed she was a bit hot, but I wasn't really doing anything. " You are causing waves, I can't concentrate and would you quit being so excitable, like a little kid"
Undaunted I blurted, "Happy Mood"
"What?" This time it was the husband. " Happy what? Are you making fun of my wife?"
"No, its the name of the fish, don't you think it is...."
"You are naming the fish? " She was looking at the waters, while his mouth still hung open with disbelief
"Yeah, Happy Mood." I watched as she reeled her in. The hook was caught deep into the belly, wriggling, unable to breathe, eyes wide open, flopping all over in the bottom of the boat. Terese pulled, but the hook wouldn't come out.
"Grab me the pliers." They were handed over but it was no use. The hook was too far, and it couldn't be reached. "Measure it," she ordered.
"Don't call her an IT, her name is Happy Mood," I declared.
"Just do keep you mouth shut, how do you know if it's a girl?" She was seething.
"Its a little short love. We are going to have to throw it back in," her husband faithfully said.
Cutting the line, she carefully placed Happy Mood in to the water. " That hook will dissolve eventually. It's the acids in the stomach of a fish."
I pondered. It seemed a little inhumane to me. Of course, would it be inhumane if it was a fish? Wouldn't that be another word. This kind of philosophies are too much for my tiny brain. What did I know, they were probably right. I mean, catching an animal with a sharp hook, dragging it by its innards, pulling it out, where it couldn't breathe, yanking on the foreign object, cutting the line.... that didn't seem very, uh, what is the word, fish friendly, to me. Oh well, at least she kissed it before depositing, my Happy Mood back where she belonged. I thought it looked like the fish had done a little poo.
My boat mate suddenly came to life. "Fairdinkum mate!" He yelled while furiously pulling the line in. " Get the net ready." I did, and quickly slid our prize into the bottom of the water filled box. Unfastening the hook, I realized I didn't have time to name our treasure. This was so exciting. Again, I nearly capsized us. Once measured, it was just a little short to keep. I asked for our passenger, kissed her, and then much to the horror of our surly friends, lobbed her in a high parabolic arc 20 meters away. Splash! See ya my nameless friend.
" I can't believe you did that. That was uncalled for. You probably gave the poor thing a heart attack", exclaimed the cranky duo. "Don't you know anything? You don't treat a fish like that. It isn't how things are supposed to be done. In all my years I have never seen anyone do THAT!" They both droned on with animation.
Give a fish a heart attack? I hadn't thought of that. What a selfish jerk I am. " C-can a fish even have a heart attack," I stammered? I enforced my will and asked to be taken immediately to shore. My friend complied and while I detected the beginnings of a slight smirk, he kept his face straight like a poker player eyeing a winning hand.
Tonight, after weeks of turmoil, I finally had the courage to google fish heart attacks. I had done something so unruly, so cruel, acting like an unjust judge. What did I find? I found that fish oil actually helps with heart disease. What did I glean from that? Well, number one, if my unnamed fish was a cure for heart problems, it must have a healthy heart and couldn't have been in any duress. Number two, the hook in our little fish, Happy Mood, would not be too happy. But what do I know, I'm not a fisherman.
10 comments:
Just got back into town. Haven't read the Nemo story yet, on a tight schedule today. I read the one before it about oil, and I have a question. Just what in the blazing inferno do you think I agree with Osama bin Laden about?
I hope you're not implying that I think it was a good thing to kill five thousand people in New York on September eleventh. That is sick. I am sad if you have misinterpreted me that thoroughly. Obviously I have had trouble expressing myself.
However, if you're implying that I agree with Osama that the American empire is destructive and greedy, then yes, I do agree with him about that. I think that Osama is perhaps overlooking the fact that he is even more destructive and greedy than the American empire, but that really is splitting hairs. They're both pretty much the same species of beast.
Previously we had a discussion of capitalism and I had some further thoughts on it since I got such a contradictry response to what I would have wanted.
If you are the kind of person who wants your actions to benefit everybody else in your world, then you will not thrive in capitalism. Capitalism is all about joining one team and trying to do everything you can to knock the other team down. There's no such thing as acting in the common good when you are a member of a capitalist society.
Another thing about America. If they really attacked Iraq to oust Saddam, well, there are atrocities in the world that are a hundred times worse than what Saddam was doing, that they barely even mention in their national press releases. How stupid do you have to be to really believe that they went in there with benevolent interests?
I can address your other thougts but one disturbing aspect of your comment is contained in your last line. Are you calling someone stupid because they have a different opinion than you? Why would I be stupid, I have a different view. Nobody is stupid for voicing their thoughts on this site are they? Isn't that what promotes discussion?
I also question your broad sweeping statement, " if you are the kind of person who wants your actions to benefit everybody else in your world, then you will not thrive in capitalism." That comment smacks of arrogance because you don't back it up with anything. The capitalist society is one that researches AIDS, Cancer, and vaccinates babies against smallpox, polio and other harmful ailments. If you are against capitalism, what DO you agree with?
What do you think of the fish?
Now I have taken the time to read the story of the fish, and I apologize for interjecting my far less delightful thoughts amidst that sheer legendary story. Truly a masterpiece.
Now Mr. Some Guy, as to your criticisms of my comments, I apologize for my angry, thoughtless, stupid words. Let me try to put it more positively.
In my opinion, ever since the inception of government and nation as concepts in human psyche, citizens have been willingly, thoroughly duped en masse by every single government that has ever existed. The very idea that someone should have the right to tell you what to do and insult your own ability to exercise good judgement makes me angry. Now the American government has millions of naive supporters who enable that government to continue the atrocities that 'national forces' have been doing forever. Anyone who does let themselves get duped by this is obviously not alone, and therefore doesn't have to feel singled out, but it's still a shame that people don't question them a little more.
It's like the story in the Bible that claims that God drowned everybody on the Earth. What kind of sick malevolence makes someone drown an entire world full of people?!? And yet human beings in their naive and thoughtless manner have been indoctrinated into this story in their upbringing for as long as that book's been around!! And they think God is actually "good" even after he committed this, and other, atrocities according to the accounts of that book. It makes me angry that anyone would condone the drowning of others. I think it's sick. I think a religion that is founded on such obscene filth is bound to do waaaay more harm to the world that embraces it than good. And of course what makes me angriest is that I remember a time in my life when I was taken in by that sick spiel too!! I can't believe in my beautiful, loving youth, I was accosted by people who put that book in front of my face and said it was the word of God, or the "good book". It's not "the good book". In fact it's not even a very good book. But now, just like that morbid Qur'an, everybody in the world are justifying armies and bombs and killing and atrocities in the name of "good books" that allege that God thinks that killing and torturing people is really great under the right circumstances.
So as you can see, I have a hard time expressing myself about these atrocities without it coming out in an insulting fashion. However, I could say that a guy that feels sorrow in his heart for the suffering of a fish is far too good a man to bow down to an alleged being (of whose existence I've never seen anything that gave me any reason to believe) who is so murderously savage that he would drown an entire world full of people. It makes me want to punch something to see such a wonderful man defaced by devotion to such a horrible book. Calling him stupid would be a terrible mistake on my part, but I guess I can be just as shortsighted in my ability to deal with people as God apparently was when he decided to throw everybody back in the water that they evolved out of. I guess nobody's perfect eh?
Now as to your other question, I do not believe that capitalism contributes to curing medical ailments. The societies where such things occur are hybrid capitalist/socialist societies, and it's the socialist aspect of the people there that causes these things to occur. Capitalism is synonymous with condoned unlimited greed. Why does anybody need to have a billion dollars in a society where many people could comfortably live out the rest of their lives on one thousandth of that or less? It's absurd, and it's not the reason that money was created. The only reason for us to condone the existence of money in our society is to facilitate our ability to share and make sure everybody's looked after. When one capitalist decides to accrue so much wealth that he has the power of a monarch, then his existence is more harmful to the common good than beneficial. There is no reason why this should be allowed. With great wealth comes the responsibility to look out for others. If a wealthy person does not acknowledge this responsibility, then he or she is a capitalist, and it does the world no good for that person to have all of that money. Personally, I want more people in the world that do good for it instead of harm.
Well Psam it's nice to see you back... but sorry to say I haven't got the brain power at this hour and in this heat ;)
So on to Nemo... cute story, cute adventure. Sound like something fun to remember. Silly woman that lady was, scare the fish tee hee hee seems that you caught more fish when chatting than they did when they were quiet *giggles*
Oh but I have a thought... how is throwing a fish back in the water, when they jump high out of the water to begin with, have you ever seen one jump, so close to you that you could almost touch it. Reminds me of the time at Naskonath (I spelt it wrong I know) Dad let Gordie take out the boat, Amanda and I were in it and Gord drove. As we sped through the water full of waves a fish jumped right there in front, it's an image that has been etched in my mind, one of many that was so magnificent it never left.
So back to throwing the fish in, when fish clearly jump... I don't personally see the harm. But what about wounding a fish in the gills, where is struggled to breathe, then to pull and yank and increase the damage only to realize that A. it wasn't coming out and B. that it was too small anyways. *sigh* I wonder if that fish even survived. I think personally what they did to that poor fish was way worse than you tossing the fish in the water....
some people !
Do I have a story for you!! Last weekend, well, Friday evening, darling Ed and I were entertaining one of our precious grandsons at the mouth of the Adams River, allowing the little gaffer to use an unbated fishing rod, casting the line into the water. Well, lo and behold, if he didn't catch a fish, promptly naming him Nemo. After much ado we finally convinced our little man that he couldn't keep the fish but we would take it home and eat it for supper. Here is where the story get interesting. When Ed began to clean the blue salmon which is rare in these parts he discovered an Australian Pink Thing lure attached to the innards of the fish.
Do you think Uncle Jim could beat this fish story???
AV
oh come on mom you can't be serious? There is no way that fish came all that way
silly !
Well, you can tune a piano but you can't tune a fish.
As for Psam - he can't be tuned or turned to believe in God. Maybe flooding the earth is more humane than it seems. By the way, I have a boat for sale Psam.
Nice story Chanks. I thouroughly enjoyed reading it. So real and so descriptive of what really happens. I never heard of people "naming" their fish. Must be an Aussie thing. If it happened up here in Canada there would be a lot of fish being ate that would probably have the no-name brand. We canucks really have no imagination when it comes to naming fish.
loved the story - especially the part about the long high lob throwing it back in. That was classic.
dost
dost,
I appreciate the offer for the boat, but noah thank you, I already have one.
I prefer trout
That was an awsome story,
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