I asked our editor to find an appropriate photo to illustrate today’s humor column… the general theme being, “Shooting fish in a barrel”.
He came up with the photo above, by photographer Jessica Teixeira, portraying a tin of ‘Porthos’ spiced sardines.
Wasn’t exactly what I had in mind. But competent help is hard to find in Pagosa Springs lately.
Nevertheless, onward and upward. “Like shooting fish in a barrel.” An intriguing English idiom.
Is this something that actually happens? Ever? A person standing over a barrel full of fish, with a gun, and getting some kind of satisfaction from this activity?
As many of our Daily Post readers know very well, the English people cobbled their language together by borrowing words and phrases from dozens of properly crafted languages — French, German, Dutch, Spanish, Norwegian, Latin, and so on — and often, the borrowed words and phrases were poorly translated.
I suspect “like shooting fish in a barrel” is one such badly mangled translation. Probably from French.
The English always had trouble translating French idioms.
So now we’re stuck with it. But as nonsensical as it appears on the surface, the idiom offers a perfect characterization of how the world works, sometimes.
Especially, in the journalism business.
Speaking as a journalist — a slightly presumptuous label, but I couldn’t think of a better one — the new administration in Washington DC appears committed to doing as many dumb things as they can, as quickly as possible.
It’s almost as if the whole Republican Party has embarked on an extended LSD trip.
Finding humorous material for comedy shows and YouTube videos and — yes, Daily Post columns — looks like it’s going to be a piece of cake, over the next four years.
Like shooting political fish in a barrel.
The tricky part is going to be, holding our noses while shooting the fish. Because that barrel is going to have a really strong smell, soon enough.
Which is another detail I need to complain about. The sardine tin photo. You can’t smell the sardines when they’re still inside the tin.
When I asked our editor why he picked a photograph of a sardine tin — to illustrate my column about fish in a barrel — he offered what I thought was a rather poor excuse.
“Fish don’t come in barrels these days,” he explained. “They come frozen, in plastic bags… or in tuna fish cans… or in sardine tins.”
I suppose he has a point. Or maybe he was just being lazy.
So what are we supposed to do? Line up sardine tins on the fence, and shoot them one by one?
It just doesn’t create the same visceral sensation as “fish in a barrel”.
And I’m pretty sure the French would object to the resulting idiom:
“Like shooting fish in sardine tins, lined up on a fence”.
For one thing, you miss the whole smell aspect. And that’s so important, if you’re writing about politics.