Friday, July 8, 2011

The art of being inept at very simple things... which technically makes me an adept artist

Hi everyone: my name is William, and I suck at things.


Have you also ever had that moment's realization of "i really suck at this activity"?  How about that moment when you realize: "how is it possible for a human being to be bad at this activity"? yeah... i just went through (another) one of those.

I recently went on a trip where everyone was fishing.  You may think that this requires a lot of effort... I did too.  I immagined fishing being a sport where a fish, the size of a volkswagen, would emerge from the depths, and it would be up to me and my trusty pole to bring the menace of the deep down so it would devour innocent people no more. In this immaginary world, the word "immagine" also DOES have 2 'm's in it.  But alas, this is not fishing... this is just a condensed/more exciting version of Moby Dick.
This is what I was expecting...


This is what actually happened...
As it turns out, I suck at fishing.  I know this is going to be paradoxical... but i am AWESOMELY terrible at it.  As in: it would take a normal person ("normies" is what i'll call them) a LOT of time and energy to accomplish the level of anti-skill that i have risen (fallen) to.  as it turns out, fishing is actually the easiest thing ever. it's even easier than making fun of Paul Walker. Fishing is a sport which only involves putting bait on a hook, sitting in a boat and drinking beer.  Bam... Done. that is fishing.  through a grueling lack of technique and absence of a worldly care, fish are drawn to you in droves. Every once in a while you are so rudely interrupted from drinking beer and, you have to muster up the energy/desire to reel in that fish which is the size of an object which is similar in shape to a huge fish (...dont judge on terrible analogies, lest ye be judged.  And you'll be analogized to a person who judges terrible analogies).  

Somehow, i managed to be the one individual NOT capable of this FEAT of inactivity.

There was only one moment of excitement during the whole fishing-sucking thing.  it was when i hooked a fish.  keep in mind: i didnt CATCH a fish... i HOOKED it.  And it was barely a fish... a tadpole probably couldave eaten it. by "hooked it" i mean litterally, my hook got stuck in the fish's back, and i reeled it in.  I dont even understand how this is physically possible.  I'm just trying to immagine what actually happened under the water which led to that fish getting a hook in its BACK.  the fish must have seen my lure and thought: "wow, does this Idiot actually think that this pathetic lure is going to catch anything?!?! He's not even drinking beer right..." and as he called over his fish buddies to join in a chorus of laughter at my ineptitude, i somehow spasmed very unlike an actual skilled fisherman would spasm, accidentally hooked it in it's back. either that, or the fish was so dis-interested in my lure that i had to hit him with the hook to bring him in.   

How is it POSSIBLE to suck at fishing? How did I manage to be terrible at doing NOTHING? I'm going to call it 'skill'. a therapist would probably prescribe some medication for this "skill" of mine.

Life lessons learned:
1) I need to get better at drinking beer and sitting in a boat
2) I should try finding a sport where i need a spear to protect myself from the fish instead of a hook
3) being able to humiliate at least one fish (in front of all his fish-friends), by hooking him in the back, made hours of frustration worth it. 
4) quick way to lose a lot of man points: be the only one to not catch ANY fish for an entire weekend
5) quick way to gain a lot of man points: come up with better analogies (as you may have guessed: i'm way in the negative here...)