To a piscator, a minnow is of less interest than a chub or chubs, which may be any one
of three families of small fish caught in large numbers and sold as live bait.

My Granddaddy Percy used to keep his minnows in some kind of creek can on Rocky Run. Whenever he went fishing, he'd go to the run, pull up that creek can (whatever it was called) by a rope, and trudge on off to wheverer he was going to fish. As a child, I thought he was postively brilliant for taking care of his bait that way. Piscatorial Percy. Real name: Percival.

Now, wwh, tell us a fish story! You're bound to have a good one you can reel in.

The first time I ever went fishing, I caught salt water perch just big enough to eat. I brought
it home, and that night put in under my pillow. Can't remember why I did that. My mother
was not amused.

>Can't remember why I did that.

you must have been expecting the Fish Fairy.
-ron obvious

we did a week of "fish" words at wwftd a couple of years ago: expiscate, halieutics, gillie, piscicapture and ichthyolatry. it was actually® one of our more successful theme weeks. <g>

tsuwm: More to the point, what constitutes a good week on wwftd?

wwh: That is the dearest little story! You and that dead fish under your pillow! Maybe you'd been reading stories about the natives fertilizing their crops with dead fish, and you were sort of fertilizing your dreams. On the other hand, were you in the habit of sleeping with various objects under your pillow? The Fish Fairy theory, too, sounds plausible. Still, just thinking about a little boy with a fish under his pillow does sound like the beginning of a fairy tale. Wonder what Maurice Sendak would do with your tale as a hook?

And, speaking of fish, isn't there a word for how the scales of fish fit over each other at the edges? It wouldn't be something like imbricated?
Not too many people seem to read Weekly Themes, but I hope someone can make a comment about fish scales.

Gosh, I miss Faldage! I just read what I wrote above:

You and that dead fish under your pillow!

...and immediately thought of how Faldage would have jumped all over that!

> what constitutes a good week on wwftd?

I'm so glad you asked! <g>
it's based on the floccinaucinihilipilification factor (FF); the closer to zero that the FF gets, the better (or worse, depending on).

floccinaucinihilipilification

Well, <g>, thanks, for that!

"flocc" = maybe "fleece"?

"nau" = maybe "sea"?

"nihil" = maybe something latinate and negative"

"pil" = maybe "hair"?

Mix in all the other stuff, could it mean something like the process of fleecing seasick people growing hair? Sheesh, tsuwm. Ask a simple question, get a word that'd get you thrown out of a bar!

Well, I just looked floccinaucinihilpilification up, and I wasn't that far off, I'll have you know, even though my definition isn't correct. And Quinion doesn't say anything at all about nauci, by the way. What does "nauci" mean? Not a single source on OneLookdictionary.com translates "nauci."

f. L. flocc, nauc, nihil, pil words signifying ‘at a small price’ or ‘at
nothing’ enumerated in a well-known rule of the Eton Latin Grammar

Dear WW: Ask and ye shall find:

naucum -i, n. a trifle; in genit. 'non nauci habere', to think nothing of.

Good Latin dictionary http://members.tripod.com/~S_Larson/latindict/LatinDict_N.html