Catfish, the Verb

The great thing about being alive today is that you can learn so much in just a few minutes online. You don't even have to get dressed and drive somewhere and sit in a lecture hall to get an education. Like today, for instance, still in my jammies I logged on to check my email and then went to Craigslist to see if my seven-year nightmare of being a writer in Maine had finally ended and there were some freelance writing jobs. (It hadn't and there weren't.) It all took about fifteen minutes, but even in that short time I learned the following:

1. No longer just something to eat (preferably fried and served with a ton of French fries, a couple of biscuits and side of slaw), the term "catfish" now refers to someone who pretends to be someone else online. It can be a verb, as in "I was totally catfished by a hot babe who turned out to be a creepy guy!" Apparently it comes from a documentary film (Catfish) that led to a TV show of the same name that was on a few years ago. I knew nothing about it then and still don't. But I do know what the verb "to catfish" means, and now so do you, in case you didn't already.

2. If you order a year's subscription to The New Yorker they will send you a free tote bag with The New Yorker written large on it. This makes a perfect beach bag, letting all the other beach-goers know how smart and well-read you are. I learned this after Googling the word catfish. Turns out The New Yorker did an article about "Catfish," the TV show, way back when.

3. A girl who starred on the "Catfish" TV show died over the weekend. She was twenty-three and the cause of death is unknown.

I feel much smarter now and am seriously considering getting a subscription to The New Yorker again. I used to have one years ago, but those damn magazines come every week and it was so hard to keep up. Also, it's a shameless liberal rag now. But still, they used to publish my drawings so I might forgive them.