[Bill]

Marejo's funny joke reminded me of a true story. Several years back, a group of my friends went deep sea fishing for marlin on a charter boat. Rick was in the fishing chair when all of a sudden a giant Blue Marlin nails the bait and takes off. Everyone gathers around and watches as this huge fish is taking line and once in awhile as Rick is fighting him, jumps through the air! This was a huge, very strong fish, and if you've never hooked into one, it's alot of exertion to land them. After about 20 minutes of hard fighting, Rick grabs his chest and falls out of the seat and says, "I'm having a heart attack!" At that point 3 men almost break their necks fighting to get into the seat and grab the fishing rod and reel so that the fish couldn't get away! No one lunges for Rick as he slumps to the deck! After about 30 seconds, Jimmy winds up in the chair and reels in the slack and they determine the fish is still hooked and the fight resumes. Everyone cheers! Then they all look at Rick, who by this time has crawled over to lean against the side of the boat, obviously having a heart attack. Mind you, these guys have been fishing buddies for years. Jimmy says, "hey man! are you ok?" Rick says,"I'm having a heart attack" Everyone is still at the stern rail waiting for the Marlin to jump again. I'm not sure who asks, but someone says, "what do you want us to do?" Rick says,"that's the biggest fish I ever hooked into. You fight that GD thing and bring him on board!" LOL, yet another cheer goes up. Every few minutes or so, someone goes to sit with Rick while he's having his heart attack. At one point the captain shouts down from the pilothouse, "what's going on down there?" Rick says,"Just tell him I'm resting! If he knows I'm having a heart attack, he'll turn the boat around" The bait boy knows what's going on, but everyone assures him that he will get a great tip, so he doesn't tell the captain, but he feels bad for Rick, so he puts a cold, wet rag on his head and gives him a bottle of water and then goes back to the rail to watch the marlin jump. Periodically, they check on Rick, but he insists that this heart attack doesn't seem as bad as the others, and that they should keep fighting the fish. Once in awhile Rick shouts encouragement from the deck and asks how the fight is going. One time he actually crawled back over to the chair and wanted to take a turn in it, but the guys, who were taking turns in the fighting chair, wouldn't let him, telling him he had to "rest". They did check once in awhile to see if he wanted to bee-line back to shore, but Rick wanted that fish. Finally, after 4 HOURS! they got the marlin aboard and told the captain, "we're not sure, but we think maybe Rick had a little heart attack alittle while ago. Maybe we should head back to the dock." They shot back to the dock and had an ambulance waiting for Rick upon arrival.