A couple of days ago I clocked something which I have been trying valiantly not to blog about ever since.
Because I suspect that, while dried fish was a staple food of the Vikings and continues to play its culinary part in our lives, dried fish for purely leisure purposes are not wholly politically correct.
However, the matter has become serious. When I avoid something I find side-splitting for too long I subconsciously over-compensate and become almost impossibly earnest.
And so, in the interests of my future stats, I shall publish and be damned. If you love fish and do not want to see them dried and lampooned, it’s best to give this post a miss.
So the sun has been shining with uncharacteristic longevity here in Folkestone on the South Coast of England.
In a short while I shall put down the lid of this laptop, and we will hie ourselves down the seaside steps , along the esplanade and onto the beach.
There we shall leave the male members of the family playing football, while Maddie and I wander further: past a harbour stocked with fishing boats and a couple of gleaming new high-class restaurants: all the way to The Shell Shop.
Oh, what an Alladin’s Cave it is! The Shell Shop, cash only please, is stocked with every shell the English Channel can proffer, laid out in trays for pocket money prices. In addition, it includes beach essentials: not your sarong and sunshades, but the buckets, spades and sandmats which mean hours of peaceful relaxation for grown ups everywhere.
As we left the shop on the first day, I happened to look up at the doorway.
Etched in cheerful marine blue, it is bedecked with glittering shell windchimes, cast iron wall lizards of many colours and other delights.
But this day, my eye fell on an unfortunate visitor to the shop indeed.
It was once a blowfish, I believe, although I’m happy to be corrected. He was he size of a small handbag and he hung from a handy thread; and his expression was that of a fish which has made a faux pas and is in the very act of saying ‘Pardon Me’.
It hung alongside all the other shells and baubles as if it was, indeed, perfectly normal indeed, de rigeur – to sell ex-blowfish to tourists.
My mind began immediately to freefall. Who buys a blowfish? Seriously? And once they have made their purchase, what do they do with it?
I tweeted, and my good friend Bandsmoke came back with one suggestion: it must be, she ventured with a cyberchuckle,, to hang in a car window, from the rear view mirror. Or was it too large for that?
It certainly would challenge one’s view, I thought, and the distraction of a blowfish dangling just above the M25 could vary from irritating to lethal.
Meanwhile it turned breezily on its twine, there above the door of the Shell Shop, shooting the breeze with nearby beachmats.
My friend espied the picture which, I confess, had now found its unfortunate way onto Facebook.
She and her son, my godson, joined us yesterday for the amble down to the sea front, seaside football and a wander to the ice cream shop.
When we reached the blowfish, she paused. I believe she stared at it for a very long time, a grin hovering just below the surface waiting to break out.
She,too, is a respecter of all things fishy, and a healthy appreciation of the absurd.
She has, she told us, a history with a sister tetraodontiae of the blowfish, the puffer fish.
There was an aquarium in the relaxation room of a top-notch health spa, and there she sat, relaxing studiously, when what should she notice, but a puffer fish looking most thin and reduced.
What that fish needs, she reasoned, is a bit more bulk.
So she tapped on the window to encourage it a bit.
But this was no ocean puffer fish, wet behind the ears, but a seasoned English one. No tap on the window could possibly unsettle it. It turned a blind eye to the upstart in the white fluffy gown.
My friend waited until it was in a relaxed state, and then hammered percussively on the side of the tank. It blew up obligingly like a hedgehog on helium.
This satisfying result achieved, my friend continued alarming puffer fish until staff offered her a manicure to get her out of there.
Blowfish belong neither hanging above a seaside shell-shop, nor dangling from the rear view mirror, nor even in an aquarium, inflating on request. Actually, the books say they are not even here in the English Channel. Maybe my friend and I were hallucinating.
They are happiest, I feel certain, poddling around with all the other blowfish wherever that may be.
Party on, blowfish.
Kate Shrewsday 
I’m way too chicken to actually eat one.
😀 I wonder what they taste like?
Absurdity along the lines of Monty Python — well done! Poor little puffer fish.
Not a good end, is it? It does make me hope fervently that reincarnation is just a philosophy….
Oooh now there’s a thought – imagine how irked he’s going to be in his second life!
😀 Aaah yes, nothing more therapeutic than a decadent belly laugh, thank you my friend for the smiles and the mention. A beast of noble proprtions it must be said with an upperclass air about it’s beak (do fish have a beak or a mouth??). Happy beaching – build a sandcastle for me! PS Fish are very worthy creatures that should be protected without question but are also particularly scrumptious battered with a side order of chips.
This fish had a beak, Bandsmoke, but I’m not sure whether it was inserted postmortem along with the plastic goggly eyes. We’ll go and build that sandcastle now. Your philosophy on fish, and indeed chips, seems very sound to me 😀
In Florida we think they are poisonous. But Orientals eat them. Maybe depends how you cook them. I’ll pass either way.
That clarifies it a bit, thanks, Carl. Clearly here in England we think neither, but stuff them instead.
Perhaps hanging on the seaside Christmas tree? Thanks for the smile this morning!
😀 The perfect use for this alternative decoration, Selena! Thank you…
According to one site I read, they are the worlds most popular toxic delicacy. The Puffer fish contain a toxin,high levels of tetrodotoxin,that is deadly to humans, a powerful poison that paralyses the muscles, eventually killing the victim through asphyxiation. However, they are considered a delicacy in Japan (fugu) in Korea (bok-uh) despite the fact that one bad cut means certain death. The poison is present mostly in the liver, ovaries, eggs, blood,intestines and skin and only highly trained and licensed chefs are allowed to cook it.
I cannot imagine what is left to eat after all those parts have been removed so perhaps drying and stuffing is best in the end!!!
Perhaps, Rosemary. You have to admire the Japanese take on food: it is often a performance art. And then my mind pans to Folkestone harbour, and watching supersized Britons tackle their fish in batter….erk…
Love it. Totally surreal!
That is the perfect word, Earlybird. Poor old blowfish.
With that beak on it, it resembles Monty Python’s Dead Parrot crossed with a Blowfish. 😛
Loved this:
Oh, what an Alladin’s Cave it is! The Shell Shop, cash only please, is stocked with every shell the English Channel can proffer, laid out in trays for pocket money prices.
Everything the channel can proffer . . . or puffer!
😀 Indeed, Nancy. The Channel proffers -or puffers- some rum contributions, too…
Perhaps the rum toting and swilling pirates purchase puffer fish to sit on their shoulders and look parrot-like?
LOL That’s it! The picture of a pirate with a puffer-fish on his shoulder….I shall carry it with me for a long, long time…
What a great MPFC Skit ~
You there! Pirate! What’s that on your shoulder?
Aye, matey. It’s me parrot!
That’s not a parrot. It’s a puffer fish.
Arrgh, matey . . . ye’d be wrong about that. Look at the beak. It’s me parrot!
Don’t be absurd. It’s a puffer fish, a common blowfish. It couldn’t fly tied to a kite!
So…did you buy one today? I feel we should buy a couple, one for the Pitt residence and one for the Coulson’s, they could join in on the facetime sessions!!
What an asset they would be, NIk…..
The picture in my mind of a hedgehog on helium is hilarious. Can you imagine the sound it would make? tee hee Love the post, Kate, love the post.
I never thought about the sound, Penny! Fantastic thought!
Gosh, Kate, these little fish seem to be quite prolific all over the world. My mother told a ‘true’?story of a child who held one in his hands whereupon it wriggled out of his grip, landing in his mouth and got stuck in his throat, suffocating him. Must have been a small species or a baby… I do remember noticing that its scaly skin was sort-of porcupine-ish!
Gracious,Denise, there’s an urban myth to pass on…what a tale!
That’s rather sad.
People have a lot to answer for, don’t they?
They do, Tilly.
As I read this entertaining post, I kept wondering, “What if Maddie abandoned her owls and took a fancy to blowfish….” Or more probable, what if the owls decided they thought a few blowfish decorations would warm the place up a bit. You may need to go back to that shop for interior decorating tips.
Before I leave tomorrow I’ll just pop back and buy up the shop’s stock of blowfish, shall I, Patti? 😀
*showing how wonderfully he has grasped the point* Ah, yes, inflation certainly affects the price of fish!
LOL not sure there was a point to this one…I think inflation was definitely in there somewhere 😀
Oh boo, poor thing. It is lovely to look at, but to cease to breathe for our penchant of kitsch?
Fishy dishes were actually the last to go in my diet which is now vegan. Every so often, I entertain the idea of a piece of salmon or what not…things like this make me glad I abstain from it all.
A wonderful post, Kate ~
As a vegan you were valiant to battle through this one! I admit seeing these guys makes me want to join you….
Poor blowfish. Good read again, though, Kate!
Yup, life sucks when you’re a blowfish: cheers, Tom.
that blowfish looks suspiciously like an ex-parrot that’s been left in the sun too long
Yes: it has ‘ex’-ness written all over it, doesn’t it?
If my kids ever saw this, they’d want one, so I’ll have to stay away from this type of shops. I’m not even sure I could find something like this in the US, but who knows…
My fond hope is that these are just some warped invention of the South Coast of England, and that you never, ever have to come face to face with one 😀 Thanks so much for stopping by to take a look!