the trouble with not rising to the bait

[mopinko]

is by the time that bait gets shoved in your face, you are ravenous.

or at least i am.
applying on many levels today.

u?

[seabeyond]

1. ha hahahaha. sometimes. mostly not. i believe in alots of little nibbles thru the day.

then i am not ravenous.

[Iggo]

2. If you remember it's bait and not sustenance, you'll be okay.

[hunter]

3. As a kid I was fishing with my dad, Santa Monica bay.

I'd recently grown large enough, and skillful enough, to do a decent overhead cast without being a danger to myself or others.

We were fishing with live anchovies. Very fresh and lively anchovies.

I made a perfect cast and a damned seagull grabbed the anchovy. Fortunately the bird did not swallow the hook, the hook got caught in the bird equivalent of it's cheek.

I reeled the bird in and it was the angriest meanest bird I've ever encountered in my life. It took two grown men to hold the bird while my dad gently removed the hook with minimal injury to the bird.

I've had worse hook injuries, not long before I'd pierced my own ear. Like I said, danger to myself and others...

Even with the hook out and released the bird continued attacking people for a long minute or two.

[mopinko]

4. nothing about this story surprises me

and i do catch the metaphor.