The Fishing Story or Bullshit baffles Brains
It appears to me that fishing magazine and book editors have forgotten one of the basics of a good fishing story…bullshit. The criteria nowadays seem based on what DID happen rather than what COULD have happened and surely what could have happened is what a great fishing story is all about.
The fertile imaginations of fishers have for years been the most important aspect of any fish story, and that’s exactly what it is …a story. Who the hell decided that an article or book on fishing can only include actual facts and figures with no tolerance for a bit of embellishing. It’s a damn shame and all of us are the poorer for it. We’ve all heard of the expression ‘you shoulda been here last week’ well where do you think that was first used….hmmmm… in a fishing story of course, where else?
A Great Fishing story [read bullshit] never needs to be exposed for what it is namely a lie, at best all it needs is to be qualified a bit. Who remembers the two old gents discussing past fishing exploits and one said to the other “I once caught a 40 pound snapper, huge he was! Took me all of 3 hours to land im”
His mate looked suitably impressed and said “That reminds me of the time I was fishing out at the point and pulled up an old kerosene lantern, it was covered in barnacles and weed, and you know what!, the flame was still going”
The other old guy went “come on, you don’t expect me to believe that do you?”
To which his mate replied, “ listen, you take 20 pounds off that snapper and I’ll blow the flame out”.
The above is a classic example of a true story that just needed to be qualified a bit. Both of the old gentlemen were well aware that both stories were the complete truth and both of them believed the other explicitly, but in the interest of decorum they both felt it was appropriate to, lets say, put a cap on the bull.
For longer than I can remember we poor fishermen and women have been accused of being the world’s greatest liars and this is simply not true and I for one am sick of it.. What is true is that we understand each other very well and we are only too aware how important hope is to us.
You know how it is, there we are preparing for a big fishing trip away. We spend hours oiling and cleaning reels, rigging lines, clearing out tackle boxes and then refilling them again.. Come the big day we are up early, very early, far earlier than any human in his or her right mind should be and off we go to the spot where LAST WEEK people were catching fish of untold size and quantity. And what is the most important ingredient we take with us, deep in our hearts, yep you guessed it….hope.
The ‘spot’ looks beautiful, a lazy current ripples the water and the sun shines warm and sparkling on it We spend the next hour, day or week, flogging this favoured stretch of water to foam without seeing a single fish, nothing, not a sausage.
The water is a desert and any marine animal has well and truly deserted it. In our frustration we resort to all sorts of deceitful and unsportsmanlike methods but the result remains the same…Zero.
Just when we have finally given up and start to think about packing up and going home with our tails well and truly between our legs that mythical creature ‘the bloke’ strolls up to us and asks “getting any” and when hearing our negative and usually colourful response says, “Mate, you shoulda’ been here last week”.……He then fills our fevered mind with tales of fish won and lost, records broken and broken again, and of people describing last weeks ‘run’ as the best they can ever remember and do we believe him???.... Of course we do, because when all is said and done we are fisherman and fisherwomen. and hope runs eternal in our hearts........Phil
Member since:
Saturday, 8th December, 2001
Location: Australia
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