FISH HIT

Last February, in Tucson, you'll remember I was hit by a flying hamburger (see the February 24, 2007, posting entitled "In Such a Landscape"). This year, in Mazatlan, as SJG and I were strolling along the beach on our afternoon walk, I was hit by a fish, released from on high by one of the many gulls for whom our stretch of beach was prime feeding grounds. It was a small white fish, not as lovely as the carp in the print above by Aleah Koury, but a fish all the same. The gull seemed confused and circled above us in search of his lost fish. The sea waters carried it back into the ocean before the gull could retrieve it, and SJG and I moved on, wondering why I seem to be a prime target for these kinds of things.

At work this week, SJG reported the Fish Hit to one of her colleagues. He claims that it's well known that being hit by a fish is very good luck. I did a little googling this morning to see if this is indeed true but didn't easily find anything to confirm the assertion, other than the fact that fish are generally omens of good luck in Asian cultures. I'll have to do a little more research on the Fish Hit in particular, but in the meantime, my googling did turn up a CNN video clip from 2007 that documents a variety of very funny fish hits. Here's the link: http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/moos/2007/06/23/moos.fish.smacked.affl

(then click on "Fish Smacked" option to the right of the video screen)

Good luck!