Fish Gone Scarce.

Alright, I'm daring to approach a topic many of my peers shrug aside as too absurd, too drastic, too bizarre, too unrealistic, and way too liberal (yes, I just wrote the "L" word, believe it our not). But what I have to say needs to be said…and it regards the environmental degradation on a massive scale.

If any of my readers have seen April's National Geographic, they probably noticed the picture of a dead marlin snagged in a fishing net on the cover. Some probably made a face, shrugged their shoulders, and stuck the magazine in the magazine rack next to their toilet. Others probably thought to open the magazine, look at all the different pictures of living and dead fish, then made their face, shrugged their shoulders, and placed the magazine conveniently with all the other magazines from the past year next to their toilet. But how many people actually care to realize that those few dead fish are only some of billions of fish killed each year???????

According to the National Geographic, since 1900, many species of fish have declined by nearly 90 percent. Worse than that, if current processing rates continue at nearly 100 million tons of fish each year, endangerment and eventual extinction is inevitable. Can you imagine that? the total extinction of some of your favorite fish dishes? Bluefin tuna. Yellowfin tuna. Various salmon species. Marlin. Mahi-Mahi. Shark. The list goes on, and on, and on. And it is infuriating how rapidly the populations of each of these species of fish are dropping.

Now, I want it made clear that I am not one who likes fish of any sort (except for when it is raw in various sushi rolls and sashimi). But I am a long-standing fan of freshwater fishing and especially deep sea fishing. Each year I go on a week-long trip down to Baja California in Mexico for non-stop deep sea fishing. I love the thrill of fighting to reel in fish whose size many cannot even imagine. It is so fun, but it has always been my personal resolve to throw back everything my family and close friends will not eat. I've thrown back marlin and sailfish larger than myself, and many other "sport" fish that many fishermen would definitely keep to have mounted on their wall. I do this because it makes me sick coming back to the dock after a great day of fishing and seeing lines of fish that will never be eaten, or used for anything other than decoration. It's disgusting to see, and I refuse to participate in anything like that. What's worse is the fact that most of those fish are the product of overfishing that is not legal and that hurts the future of the fish populations.

Why do governments let idiots like that do that to the environment? Because it's "economical" and there is a big profit involved. As a result, the fish populations are all dropping, regardless of what any politician says, and it is not fair to the fish, and it won't be fair to us when they're gone.

Cheese Wiz………………..gross.

I swear, one of the most disgusting inventions mankind developed in the late twentieth century and early twenty-first century was that grotesque, unnatural, fake, crap we call Cheese Wiz. That gross mixture of…stuff… is just plain nasty. Nasty.

Why did the “people” who invented it, invent it? What madness drove them to create such an obscene, bizarre, semi-liquidy mixture they call cheese? That’s not cheese. It’s not natural. It’s gross.

The men who invented Cheese Wiz invented it and put it on the market with one single purpose: they thought it’d sell. And sell it did. I am still trying to figure out what on earth compels so many Philadelphians to destroy a perfectly good Phili cheese steak by putting that garbage on their sandwiches. Don’t they realize that that stuff is not normal? Don’t they realize it tastes revolting? Don’t they realize that we’ll find that junk clogged up in their arteries fifty years from now?

Obviously they don’t. But hopefully they, and everyone else who likes that artificial, repulsive, yellow wiz, will soon realize that it is…foul.

"I laugh in the face of danger." -Simba (or something to that effect...)

Don't we all wish we could make that statement and still be being honest with ourselves and our peers? I know I most certainly do. I often wish that I wasn't afraid of some of the dopey things I'm afraid of: snakes and spiders (most people are only afraid of one and not the other- but I'm scared of both...); upset girls and angry mothers (lol); cowlicks like Alfalfa's; germs...boy, those things creep me out.... So this week I decided to focus on fear, and how it is that some people are scared of somethings while other people simply aren't.

As I was contemplating on my topic, my mind rested on an experience I had while I was on one of my many adventures in foreign lands. This time I was back in Morocco (that's in Africa) in the High Atlas Mountains staying with the native Berber peoples in the small, mountain town of Ait Lekak. On this fateful day, I was out on a hike with a bunch of native kids (between the ages of 8 and 15). We were having the time of our lives, mocking each other because of our inability to pronounce each other's languages and my low tolerance for African heat, when an enormous, black asp slithered out of some rocks 6 inches from my foot. Now for those of you who don't know what an asp is, it is a very poisonous snake (which I already told you I am terrified of) that is native to North Africa, and is the legendary snake that Cleopatra used to kill herself. Now when this snake slid out right in front of me and right next to me, I, naturally, freaked. I was hollering and screaming, horrified that I would be bit, wouldn't be able to make it to the nearest hospital in time (which was several hours away in Marrakech), and would surely...drop dead. That, of course, was my initial reaction...screaming for my life. Now, if you haven't figured it out yet, I didn't get bitten, because I'm obviously not dead...yet. But boy I was wishing I was dead when I came back to my senses. All around me those little Berber kids were laughing their heads off, pointing fingers at the wimpy American who's afraid of a snake. Yeah. I was totally embarrased.

But then I realized that they weren't afraid like I was because they are always around those snakes. They're a factor those kids have come to realize exists in their lives, and they've just gotten used to it. Easy as that.

When we are faced constantly with factors that can spur fear deep in some people, we have a tendency to just get used to that factor. When I lived in Kansas, I got used to tornados and tornado warnings after I heard the tornado siren after the hundredth time. I'm not afraid of tornados because I was used to being around them when I was young.

So, the key to overcoming your fears is to live around them long enough that they don't scare you but leave before you get bit or stung or sucked up or screamed at or lose a limb, etc., etc., etc., etc. That's your easiest way to overcome your fears!

Why does my mom pay a fortune for my teeth and my face?

The answer's simple: I'm just plain hot.

Although my mom hates to admit it (she thinks it'll just make me more vain... yeah right, I'm not vain), she knows that by paying for dental work and a dermatologist my good looks will only be enhanced. Afterall, that is the reason people go to get all that work done and that is why people spend all that money... they think those things only going to make them look better. And the truth is that sometimes they work and sometimes they don't. Of course, for me, all those things actually do make me look even more drop-dead gorgeous... so, naturally, the time and the money are totally worth it. What else can I say? I'm just good looking....