A certain aura of foodiness

Organizing my old pictures onto a new portable drive I came across a pair of gems that I’d been meaning to share. Not because they are truly fantastic pictures. Hardly. But rather because I think that they’re hilarious.

As a preface to the images themselves, understand that while I think fly fishing is a fantastic way to spend a day, I am not particularly grand at it. I can cast well enough (as long as my back isn’t right up against the shoreline) but the ability to tie neat flies eludes me.

The theory, (that I’ve been taught) is that a fly needs to have an aura of foodiness around it. It doesn’t need to look exactly like something a fish might want to sup upon, but it needs to look like something that the fish believes might — in fact — be sup-able. This single rule leads the vast majority of flies to fall into (in my eyes at least) three broad categories.

1. Big stuff: Designed to look like wallowing / distraught mice or other mammals.
2. “Wooly-buggers: Designed to look like some sort of insect floating serenely upon the surface of the water
3. Streamers: Designed to sink a few inches beneath the surface and entice the more cautious fish that feel like rising to the surface is a poor choice.

Within those three categories things tend to look pretty much the same. Most wooly bugger types have the same shape and are made with the same basic color scheme, as are most streamers, as are most of the big-things. Its pretty simple really. There are a few colors and shapes fishers can use that are “sure” to attract interest among their aquatic prey and unless those combinations aren’t working out, why change the formula?

So why, given that knowledge, was I handed this beauty and told to try my luc?.

Of course I can catch a fish with that. It totally looks like it could be food.

Wait…

The only place where that could pass at food is a candy store. No fish in the world is going to think “Oh! Sweet. Pink! My favorite foods are all neon pink!” If anything it should frighten fish away. Bright colors are supposed to indicate toxicity in the natural world. (Even though humans have decided that bright colors in our food simply mean “sour”).

Still, I tried it, and after a dozen fruitless casts it actually worked. Never before had I actually laughed at a fish, but there’s a first time for everything.

You sir, have made a terrible mistake.

I have no idea what that proves about fish. Except that apparently “foodiness” is a much broader term than I had imagined it to be.

On Homonyms and Emergency Rooms

From the Journal: 8/29/2011 (Alpaugh, California)

Plus Side: Went job searching today. Downside: Was able to go because of a trip to the ER in Delano. Idiotically, I slashed my hand open on a garden hoe. The ER doctor gladly glued it shut and billed me $100 for the fifteen minute job, which opened up again almost as soon as I got back to Alpaugh. I did learn a bit from the whole experience, though. Never tell a ER doctor that “A Ho cut you” when you walk into his office clutching your bloody hand. (He apparently didn’t see the humor of the Homonym.)

In retrospect, spending so much time sharpening everything wasn't the best idea.

While transferring a bag of parakeet seed (more on why later) from a wheelbarrow into my trunk I accidentally slashed my hand open on a garden hoe that had been lying there, blade up, since before lunch. We’d made a habit of sharpening the tools we used on a day to day basis in Alpaugh, including the hoes, until they were razor-edged. The work dulled them quickly and it was extraordinarily bad luck that the hoe in question had been sharpened only hours before. In all honesty I could probably have gotten away with not going to the hospital, especially considering that I recovered just fine after reopening the cut hours after having it closed. However, at the time the cut seemed deep enough to warrant the trip to Delano if not much concern on my part, hence the attempt at humor with the ER doctor.

I thought it was funny at least. Some people are just boring I guess.