Going Fishing

What fishermen, fly fisherman in particular, don’t understand is how damn fashionable their flies are. 

In my day, you had a simple hook. Silver, maybe brass, and you didn’t keep it. No, you just had a few extra holes around the lip to show you’d escaped death by the smallest of margins. It was understated. Respectable. 

Fish these days hoard those damnable flies, all feathers and string and garish colors, and will wear them. Actually WEAR them. Strung through their lip or their fin like some gaudy pet-store tramp. 

I’m not saying I resent catch-and-release. 

But it’s ruining the neighborhood.

- Jordan Cunningham

---

“Dad, why are we going fishing? Water’s scary.”

“For a long time, people have fished to eat. But also, because it’s fun.”

“But dad, we’re just throwing the fish back.”

“Yes, but it’s still fun.”

“But we don’t have to eat, because we’re robots.”

“True.”

“So why is it fun for us?”

“The same reason why we take newly-made robots and adopt them into robot families – we’re programmed to be human-like.”

“Why?”

“The humans wanted us that way. And only they can change the programming.”

“And so the programming can never change now?”
“Yes.”

“Because all the humans are dead.”

- Jimmy Hartzell