Some guys just like to go on saltwater fishing expeditions. But others are outright fanatics with a passion for saltwater fishing that rivals the enthusiasm of 11-year-old girls for boy bands, Taylor Swift, and Twilight. Here are some warning signs that should tell you that your husband’s passion for saltwater fishing is turning into an obsession:
- Exotic vacation spots. He mentions destinations such as the Bahamas, Belize, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama, Los Roques in Venezuela, and the Baja Peninsula and the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico for your vacation (or honeymoon). They all sound good to you, until you Google them all and notice that they’re all prime saltwater fishing spots!
- The boat is his baby. You find out that his boat actually costs more than the house you own. And he really takes care of it. In fact, the outboard motor gets a preventive checkup more often than you visit the doctor and the dentist combined.
- Lots of fishing gear. It’s one thing to have a prominent bookmark on the browser for the Eat My Tackle website. But it’s another thing if it is his homepage. You know that he’s obsessed if he has more fishing rods than underwear and socks combined, and he has at least two dozen of any single lure in the same color.
- Morning blues. Every day without fail, you have to nag him in the morning before he gets out of bed at 7:30 AM. Even alarm clocks don’t work on him. Yet for some reason, on the weekends he wakes up bright and early—and cheerful!—at 4:30 AM even without any sort of alarm.
- Teaching is a noble profession. He’s thinking about switching careers, and asking details about becoming a teacher. And he says that it’s because this way he can go fishing on every weekend and every day of the summer.
- Saltwater getup. His idea of casual wear is a “Salt Death” T-shirt, a decrepit pair of shorts with about a dozen pockets, and a hat decked with lures. The problem is that this is pretty much his formal getup as well, except the T-shirt is signed by a champion angler that he’s afraid to wash.
- Inevitable weekend fishing. He laughs every time you ask him if he’s going fishing this coming weekend. It doesn’t matter if the news reports say that there’s a 90% chance of extremely severe thunderstorms. He’ll just say that the weather reporter doesn’t know what they’re talking about. And besides, even if they’re right it means that there’s a 10% chance that the weather is going to be great for fishing.
- Names for pets. You have cats and dogs, and their names are Bonefish, Barracuda, Redfish, Striped Bass, and Bonefish. But he also uses nicknames like Tarpon, Permit, Snook, and Dorado for your kids. Hopefully, these are not the names on their birth certificates!
If you see most or all of these signs, your husband is a certified saltwater fishing freak. And if you see nothing wrong with any of these signs, then so are you!