Fish Guts

This was the idyllic scene at our house this afternoon. Casey caught his first fish:



You may wonder why, if we've been living by this tidal creek for the last four years, this is the first fish Casey has ever caught, and it's a valid question. Casey is not equipped with the outdoor gene. He is equipped with the Star Wars gene. I have noticed that the outdoor gene and the Star Wars gene are, by and large, mutually exclusive. Occasionally, we can bully Casey into going on the boat or taking hikes in the woods or working in the (now dead) garden, but it's usually only because we've promised him there would be ice cream after. For some reason, though, Casey asked me recently about going fishing. When he asked, he certainly did not realize that it involved putting worms on hooks and handling slimy fish once they're caught and cutting their heads off, or he wouldn't have asked. The Science Channel must have featured making fishing rods in an episode of How It's Made recently and that's where he picked up the notion that fishing might be fun.



So the men fished this afternoon. And they caught something like 12 or 13 tilapia -- they threw some small ones back, so I'm not sure how many they actually caught -- all I know is Mike and Joe had to clean 11 tilapia before dinner. Casey was a good sport and really hung in there. Mike would bait the hook, cast the line, and then hand the rod over to Casey. It was good times -- quality male bonding.



And then it was time to clean the fish.



Casey lasted about two minutes. This was when he was saying, "Hey! I was going to put that one in a fish bowl in my room!"



When we told him we intended to eat all these fish for dinner, he nearly swooned.

I was pretty proud of him for actually staying outside for three hours without whining, so the fact that he couldn't stomach watching the fish get their heads cut off doesn't trouble me too much.



Mace, on the other hand, was all about fish guts. He stayed and watched every last gory bit and he even ate some tilapia at dinner.

Casey had a hamburger. I decided to hold off telling him how we get beef.