Crazy Henry and I were under the Hennepin Avenue bridge to fish for river carp. something smelly had been dumped into the Mississippi that day and the carp were going crazy over it. we could practically reach out from the shore and grab them. I wanted a couple to plant with my sweet corn. we were using bamboo cane poles.
I was on edge that day. the sky was overcast in that way that feels like a prison sentence. I thought a quiet day of fishing would do my soul some good. then Crazy Henry had to start talking.
"I think we should buy Hong Kong from China" he said.
"what?" I said.
"you know" he replied. "like we bought Alaska from Russia all those years ago. let's buy Hong Kong so we got someplace to get our fireworks from and rice and stuff without a tariff. Hong Kong is pretty close to California, isn't it? Like Hawaii?"
with great self control I kept my own counsel and continued fishing. we were using kernels of canned corn for bait.
Crazy Henry tripped over a cable sunk in the mud. I helped him up and he insisted on pulling up the buried cable to see where it led. we got so involved that our poles were pulled into the river and floated away. we finally found the end of the cable looped around a tree stump twenty feet from the shore.
"huh. an old barge cable probably" I said.
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