Fish are money in disguise.

Once while I was fishing halibut in Alaska and wrestling some monster of the deep aboard, one of my shipmates looked at me and said, "More new money."

He was right. That huge flat fish I hauled in was little more than money. It was worth about a buck and a half a pound and figuring it to be about 250 pounds at $1.50/pound it was a $375 dollar bill in disguise, 10% or $37.50 of which belonged to me.

In fact, it was new money and nobody else had even seen it before I hauled the big flat bastard on board. I was in the business of catching new money and in a way creating new wealth.

The skipper that had hired me had enabled me to drag this new money on board.  

There is a lot more new money out there than a lot of people ever think of. The one that comes to mind right off is oil. When someone wrestles a barrel out of the ground he is creating new money. It becomes worth whatever the going rate a barrel of oil runs at the time he wrestles it out of the ground.

Miners wrestle iron ore out of the Mesabi range and that's new money and farmers grow new money. In fact one could actually say that farmers create new money because the fish and oil were in the earth to begin with. The farmer simply grows his own money.

I suppose for an apple farmer money really does grow on trees. Interesting. I just though about that as I write that for some money DOES grow on trees.

People that discover or create new money are pretty much basic producers. They produce the basics.

While at one point of my life I was a basic producer, these days I am not one. I am a part of the secondary group that do things with new money someone else has made.

In my case I move oil after it has been wrestled out of the ground and been refined.

Still, looking back on things it was pretty cool bringing new money to the surface when I was a fisherman.

Incidentally, as far as fish being money goes, I remember overhearing a pair of hookers chatting.

A guy I knew wandered into the bar wearing fishy coveralls. The newer of the pavement princesses said to the other that the fisherman smelled bad.

The older of the two replied, "Sweetie, in this town that's what money smells like."


The internet service I generally use is down now. I am pirating a weak signal from somewhere else and it has taken me over an hour and umpteen tries to get this out. I will likely be out of commission for another week or so.

Please bear with me. I'll see what I can do but promise nothing.

To find out why the blog is pink just cut and paste this: http://piccoloshash.blogspot.com/2009/12/my-feminine-side-blog-stays-pink.html