There are plenty of fish in the sea, and now I know how to gut them!

Today was a big day for me. I officially quadrupled my record for most fishes caught in a day. My previous 1 was shattered today when I caught an astounding 4 Crappy! That's not even counting the ones I threw back. A Crappy is a fish indigenous to the lake, named for the dark gunk that they're often coated in. At least that's the only reason I could think of.

Over many years fishing in Maine I never had nearly as much success or enjoyment out of removing animals from their natural habitat. Often we would go out on the boat for hours scouring the waters for gullible sea-creatures. Often we would catch some slimy shrubbery but it never tasted very good, even with tartar sauce.

Today's fishing excursion got to the point that after 2 hours, with the sun going down, my envious fishing compatriots had to drag me away from the area now referred to as Zane's Cove. Thankfully I was wearing a life jacket so my head stayed above water.

Once we got back to the house it was time to do the inevitable. With a rope of 7 Crappy to clean we began our preparations for cooking dinner. Barrytone Sax laid the fish out and proceeded to show me the proper was to humiliate them. While I understand the necessity to cut the supple meat from the bone, dressing it up to look like Judy Garland before hand was a little uncalled for. Although I will admit that Barrystein Bear did do a lovely ventriloquist version of Somewhere Over the Rainbow. It felt empowering to imagine myself as the Wicked Witch exacting my revenge on the little water-loving tart.

At first I had some trouble finding my moral standing on doing the dirty work necessary in the eventual enjoyment of a filet of fish. In the end I swallowed my pride and entered the role of the carnivorous human and began chopping off heads left and right. Much like other forms of murder, what seems like an ugly disturbing task of taking a life isn't so tough once you get into a groove. I will admit that if my sister ever learned of this she probably would never speak to me again, but thankfully there's no possible way she would ever find out.