Below is an excerpt from a book I’m writing called Adventures in Fishing (for Men). The book is a satirical allegory about Christian attempts at evangelism. He who has ears to hear…

Someone once said that to catch fish you have to think like a fish. You have to understand what fish want, what they need, and what their goals are in life. If you can do this, you will catch more fish because you are meeting their needs. This is called “Need Oriented Fishing.”

When businesses try to meet the needs of their customers, they learn what the needs are by doing surveys and opinion polls. Fisherman should do something similar with fish. I wracked my brain for weeks trying to figure out how to run a survey with fish, and I tried all sorts of experiments. For example, in one experiment, I wanted to find out if fish preferred grasshoppers or worms. Traditionally, worms are thought to be the common food of fish, but in more contemporary times, I believe that fish like to eat the faster pasted grasshoppers. So I bought a bunch of each and dumped them in my swimming pool. Whichever bug got eaten first was the one that the fish preferred.

The only problem was that so far, even though I had previously put out signs and banners inviting fish to my pool, none had actually shown up. I now figured that if I actually put worms and grasshoppers in my pool, maybe fish would start coming. For all I knew, fish had been secretly visiting my pool during the night, and when they saw that I didn’t have any actual worms and grasshoppers, and went back to hiding. So now that I was putting actual worms and grasshoppers in the pool, maybe some fish would start showing up. I was, after all, meeting their tangible need in my pool.

One day, as I was trying to think of some other fish needs, I realized that the reason I didn’t understand fish was that I was not a fish. To learn how to meet the needs of fish, I had to learn to think like a fish. And to think like a fish, I had to start acting like a fish. But fish really don’t do a whole lot. It seems like all they do is eat and swim. But eating and swimming like a fish might help me learn to think like one. Maybe after I learn to eat and swim like a fish, I would be better equipped to understand the inner workings of the fish mind.

Eating Like a Fish

I began with eating like a fish. Since I believe that worms are the traditional food for fish, I resolved to eat a worm. I went down to the fishing store and bought a Styrofoam container of earthworms. When I got home, I asked my wife if she could cook the worms up in some sort of dish for dinner. She just laughed. I told her I wasn’t joking, and she laughed harder. Women just don’t understand fishing.

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Below is an excerpt from a book I’m writing called Adventures in Fishing (for Men). The book is a satirical allegory about Christian attempts at evangelism. He who has ears to hear…

To be a true fisherman, there are certain things you have to do which really don’t make you a better fisherman, but prove to everyone else that you are the real deal, the genuine article. Apparently, there are a lot of false fishermen out there, and the primary thing that sets true fishermen apart from false fishermen are fishing rituals. False fishermen don’t practice these rituals, which prove they were never really fishermen in the first place.

I honestly don’t understand the significance of these rituals, but I was told that true fishermen have been doing them for thousands of years, and so if I wanted to be a true fisherman, I would have to do them too.

Net Washing

The first was net washing. I didn’t own a fishing net, so I had to go buy one. I wasn’t even sure how to fish with a net, but that didn’t matter. Great fishermen of the past used these fishing nets, and they would have to clean their nets, so to identify myself with the great fishermen of the past, I began a daily practice of cleaning my fishing net.

And I was determined to do a better job at it than others. I watched one guy clean his net, and he just sprinkled a little water on it and called it good. It didn’t take him more than a minute. I really doubt that the fishermen of the past could clean their net in under a minute, and I don’t think that sprinkling a net qualifies as washing.

So I make sure to take more time on my daily net cleaning, and really get the net fully into the water.

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Below is an excerpt from a book I’m writing called Adventures in Fishing (for Men). The book is a satirical allegory about Christian attempts at evangelism. He who has ears to hear…

As I continue my quest to become the world’s greatest fisherman, I have discovered that success is not measured in how many fish you actually catch, but in how well you present yourself as a fisherman. This was a great relief to me, because the more I learn about fishing, the less I like it. Some days, I am pretty sure I hate fish. They stink, they are slimy, and those bugged-out eyes kind of freak me out.

Thankfully, you don’t have to catch fish to be a world famous fisherman. All you have to do is project the image of being a successful fisherman and be able to teach others how to fish. There are two kinds of fisherman: those who fish, and those who teach others to fish. I am one of the latter.

But before people will listen to you about how to fish, you have to convince them that you are a great fisherman. How is this possible if, like me, you have never actually caught fish? There are numerous ways.

Fishing Necklace

The first thing I did was buy a fishing necklace with a hook on it. I made sure the hook on my necklace was plastic, of course. I didn’t want to risk any more trips to the hospital. I made sure the hook was fluorescent pink, and I wore it on the outside of my shirt so that everybody could see it as I walked around.

I felt pretty good about making such a public statement that I was a fisherman, but one day I saw a guy wearing a golden fishing hook. It looked very expensive, and when I asked him about it, he said it was real gold! Clearly he was a better fisherman than I was because he was wearing a golden hook and mine was cheap plastic. I immediately went out and bought myself the biggest, brightest, and most expensive golden fishing hook I could find. Now, everywhere I go, people look with admiration at my fishing hook necklace. The amazement is obvious on their faces about what a great fisherman I am.

Fishing T-Shirts

Another great way to show people that I am a fisherman is by wearing fisherman t-shirts. I have one t-shirt that says, “If you were to die tonight, do you know where you would fish for eternity?” Another that I wear a lot says, “Fish with Jesus on streams of living water… or try your luck at the lake of fire.” The choice is obvious. I find that wearing shirts like this really help me feel like a true fisherman.

Fishing Bumper Stickers

Also, bumper stickers are nice. My favorite bumper sticker, which I placed on both my cars and on the back of my fishing boat, reads, “Love the fish; hate fish guts.” I have often thought that fish would be much better if they didn’t have any guts. I have watched some videos about cleaning fish, and while I have never actually done it myself, it looks disgusting. I think that fish guts are actually what keeps me from catching any fish. I would not want to deal with their guts.

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Below is an excerpt from a book I’m writing called Adventures in Fishing (for Men). The book is a satirical allegory about Christian attempts at evangelism. He who has ears to hear…

Since no one would go with me to the river, I decided to go by myself.

But when I got down to the river, things didn’t go quite as planned. First of all, the bank was steep and I fell a few times on my way down to the water. But once I got down there, I discovered that the river was more dangerous than I ever imagined. The water was moving! I had heard rumors that people actually got into the river to fish, but I knew by looking at the water rushing by that nobody would be that foolish. Even if they survived, how would they ever get home?

Just as I was thinking these thoughts, I looked up the river and saw a boat floating down the river toward me, and inside were some fishermen! At first I thought these men were fearless, but as they floated closer, I realized that they were just foolish.

They were unwashed, sweaty men, with facial hair! Such burly, scruffy men should not be allowed to be fishermen. They give fishermen a bad name.

And the language they used was even worse. It sounded like they were trying to kill the fish with foul mouths. I immediately concluded that these were not true fishermen, but were frauds. They were false fishermen who only gave the appearance of fishing. Fishermen were like me. We have dignity, style, and can craft a flowery tale about the fish we’ve caught. Resorting to such coarse language as they did is only proof of a weak mind. They clearly hadn’t read all the books that I had about proper fisherman etiquette.

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Below is an excerpt from a book I’m writing called Adventures in Fishing (for Men). The book is a satirical allegory about Christian attempts at evangelism. He who has ears to hear…

While I waited for fish to come out from hiding and visit my pool, I decided to begin training myself about how fish think. I had read about this in a magazine and knew it was important. I figured that the best way to do this was to go where the fish lived.

I knew enough about fishing now to know that most fish lived in lakes, rivers, and streams. I certainly wasn’t going to live near one of these bodies of water, but it wouldn’t hurt to take a tour of one. I even came up with a fancy name for my excursion: I called it my “Fishin’ Mission.” There was a river not too far from me, and I decided to go there for my first trip.

I must confess that in the back of my mind I had plans for more than just seeing the river and learning about fish. In one of my magazines I read about “Fishing Tours” and decided that once I became a world-famous fisherman, I could charge people to go down the river with me where they could take pictures and learn from me about the dangers of rivers and the joys of fishing. Then they could go home and tell everybody about the river and show people pictures. Some of those people would want to come on the tour, and I could have a steady source of income. It would be great.

But first things first. Before my Fishin’ Mission could become world famous, I needed to get some actual experience going down the rivers and lakes to learn about the fish I was going to catch. I was a little too scared to go alone, however, so I decided to invite some other people to go along with me. This would be beneficial in two ways.

First, I had heard somewhere that there is no such thing as a “Lone Ranger Fisherman.” I think this means that no fisherman should fish alone but this explanation didn’t really make sense to me because the Lone Ranger had Tonto. Regardless, I figured it was good advice, and needed to find some people to go with me. When you are going to someplace as scary as lakes and rivers, there is strength in numbers.

The second reason I wanted to find some others to go with me is that they would be good PR. Once they came back with adventures stories of our time on the river, with pictures of the giant fish we caught, and tales of the monsters that got away, I would have people beating down my door to go on a Fishin’ Mission with me. All I needed to do was get a few people to go with me the first time, and then word of mouth would do the rest.

So I made up some flyers and stapled them on telephone poles and fences around town. Nobody called.

So then I plastered the flyers on the walls of some businesses in town and put them in the windshields of cars. I did get one call on those, but it was from the police telling me that they had received some complaints and if I did this again, I would get fined for littering.

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