Turns out I'm a ninja

So I just got back from fishing the Beaverhead River in Montana. The fish there see a lot of flies, see lots of fishermen and so they're smart. Many have postgraduate degrees. You can talk art with them.

Catching these fish with a flyrod was proving to be a chore so I changed tactics and just pulled one out of the water with my bare hands. Really. Swear.

Here it is, pictured below.


You might notice that this fish has seen better days, what with the decomposing head and all.

Sure, this rainbow was on its way out -- but still, technically, this is a living fish in a stream and you wouldn't think you could just pull it out of the water with your hands. But you'd be wrong.

I watched a video recently where a guy explained that if you can get your hands underneath a fish and rub its belly, they calm down and you can just pluck it out of the water.

So I tried it. Got my hands underwater, moved them upstream slowly and the fish was getting agitated, moved away a little bit but then I snuck up, made contact and he kind of flinched, but then settled down when I gave him a little belly rub.

Then I got both hands under there and just ... pulled him out of the water.

At that point I realized I was ninja so I spent the rest of the day sneaking around in the river breathing through a reed, jumping out of the water to karate kick other fishermen, used throwing stars to cut the ends off cigars of rich guys that like to float down toking on giant stogies ... used nunchucks to swat mosquitoes back at camp and caught caddis flies with chopsticks. Things like that.

So that's how a ninja spends his time when the fishing is slow.

I've got to go practice doing backflips now.