Time Essay: The Sport of Fishing: The Lure of Failure

Fishing: a line with a worm on one end and a fool on the other. That definition seems as good as any. The bait may vary, but at the other end of the line, nothing is altered. At about this time each year, eager anglers pour down to lake shores and riverbanks in search of fresh-water fish. And each year, despite millions of dollars spent on equipment, despite the cleverest lures in history, the fisher folk are doomed to interminable hours of unsuccessful casts, tangled lines, spurned bait and impaled thumbs.

Theoretically, then, this...

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