Inebriated and very lovely fellow in Abbots Mill Garden:
| Him: | Excuse me, are you taking photographs? |
| Me: | No I’m texting my sister actually |
| Him: | Just cos there’s this mad fish over there |
| Me: | Is there really? |
| Him: | Yeah, do you wanna come see? |
| Me: | Yeah alright |
| Him: | Do you know fish? |
| Me: | No, not really, I’m not a fisherman |
| Him: | I dunno if it’s a pond fish or a coy carp or what but it’s there every day. Are you from Canterbury? |
| Me: | Not originally but I live here now |
| Him: | Well if you come down here tomorrow or whenever you’ll see. I saw you with your phone and i thought you might want to take a picture of it. I would if i had a/my phone. I dunno if it’s laying eggs or dying. |
| Me: | But it’s not dead, it moved! |
| Him: | Yeah, it moves! I’ve been throwing things at it, I’m not cruel… And it changes colour. It looks like – I dunno what it looks like to you but do you see a gold head? |
| Me: | Yeah |
| Him: | And a gold… Spike? |
| Me: | Yeah |
| Him: | And sometimes all its fins and all over its body goes gold as well and sometimes it’s just brown and muddy looking. It’s camouflage I suppose. |
He went off looking for a bin to put his empty cans in. I think he has thrown pennies at the fish, judging by the shiny pennies lying around it. Perhaps the fish sometimes looks muddy because it gets covered in the silt that it is rooting around in?
It was a great little conversation and really brightened up my day.