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…

---

Fishermen are not as smart as they once were. Over the past fifty years, fisherman have been “dumbing down.” I blame the television.

To counteract this increasing ignorance, it is critical for fisherman to learn to talk like a fisherman. True fishermen know all the big fisherman words, and can casually throw fishing lingo into any conversation. As I started attending the fishing club every week, I quickly learned how little I knew about fishing.

During the weekly fishing lectures, and in conversations with other members after the meetings, I found myself in awe at all the big fishing terms that people threw around which I did not know. There was talk about dispenfishionalist fishcatology, angler awareness, covenants of fishing, efishiency quotient, the hydrostatic union, filioquota, and numerous other terms I didn’t understand.

And it wasn’t just the lingo. There were debates about which types of hooks were approved by God, how old a person could be before they went fishing, whether or not women could fish, and whether or not fishing could be done with rubber worms. Clearly, I had much to learn.

[Read more…]

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…

---

I wore my fishing shirt to the mall today, and as I checked out, the clerk behind the counter noticed my shirt, and said he was a fisherman too! It is amazing where you run into other fellow fishermen.

“Where do you attend a fishing club?” he asked.

I actually had never heard of a fishing club before, but didn’t want to appear stupid, so I mumbled something about how I am still looking for a good one.

“Oh! Well you should visit mine this week! We gather on Sunday mornings, and talk about all the best fishing spots and techniques. Sometimes we hear stories about great fishing trips of the past, and every once in a while, someone shares their favorite fishing technique or gives away their secret fishing hole. It would be a great way for you to fellowship with other fishermen!”

So I went. The meeting started at 10:30 AM on Sunday morning. The group met in a big, beautiful building, and when we walked in, a guy greeted us at the door and handed me a little pamphlet which explained what the group was going to do that morning.

The meeting began a little oddly, though. Someone got up and led us all in some fishing songs. I have never been much of a singer, but I did find myself tapping my toe along to a few of the songs. One of them almost brought me to tears when we sang about the suffering of a kingfisher.

After we sang, another guy got up, and he asked if there were any newcomers that day. I tried to huddle down into my seat so no one noticed me, but the guy who invited me raised his hand and pointed to me.

“We got one here!” he shouted.

“Well, stand on up, brother!” the man up front said.

[Read more…]

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…

---

There is only one thing better than fishing, and that is watching fishing on TV. In fact, I like watching fishing on TV so much, I have temporarily stopped fishing altogether. I feel so much more successful as a fisherman when I can watch others catch the “big one” and hear their tips and tricks for how they did it. It just goes to show that if I had been the one in that boat, with the knowledge that those fisherman had, I would have been the one to catch the big fish.

So while my wife thinks that watching fishing on TV is a waste of time, I think it is highly educational. The things I am learning about fishing will make me a highly successful, world-famous fisherman someday. I figure that the more I learn on TV, the better fisherman I will become. As a result, I turn on the TV first thing every morning to watch one or two fishing shows before work, and then I come straight home and watch fishing on TV for six or seven hours every night.

My favorite fishing channel is the Trout Broadcasting Network, TBN for short. It has one fisherman after another, all day long, talking about how they almost gotten eaten by lions while fishing in Africa, the harrowing adventure they had while fishing in Communist China, and how the Taliban almost killed them when they went fishing in Iran. These TV fishermen almost never do any actual fishing on their shows, but instead share their fish tales in front of large audiences and crowds. It is very inspiring.

The fishermen on TBN are very successful. They are always surrounded with beautiful potted plants, golden furniture, crystal chandeliers, and brass statues of fish. One fisherman I saw even had a giant oil painting of a fish descending into heaven from the peak of a waterfall. I am always in awe when I watch the show. I am not sure what fishermen paradise looks like, but it must be close what they show on TV. Best of all, in all my hours of watching, I have yet to see any dangerous fishing rods or barbed hooks. There is never any water a person might drown in, and most importantly of all, these fishermen are so thoughtful of their viewing audience, they never show any stinking, rotting fish.

[Read more…]

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.

[Read more…]

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.

[Read more…]