Whatever floats your boat in Fish On!

A friend of mine has expressed some concern about one of my more outré fantasies. How, she asks, do I propose to do all that without capsizing the canoe and getting Jeremy Wade and myself eaten by caimans?

Well. Believe it or not, I've devoted quite a bit of thought to this problem.

I'm actually not unfamiliar with the perils of partially clothed canoe disasters in waters full of toothy, carnivorous reptiles. When I lived in Florida, I and someone I'll call Mr. Adventure were in the habit of canoeing on the Hillsborough River. One lovely spring afternoon we were quite enjoying ourselves under some cypress trees when something horrible happened and I tipped the canoe over.

Regardless of what Mr. Adventure later claimed, it was not my fault. I couldn't see where we were going, and he was supposed to be the one watching out for things like dangling streamers of Spanish moss with huge, terrifying spiders on them.

Apparently there's some kind of special physics at work when it comes to capsizing canoes. I didn't just neatly fall into the water, I was propelled into the water with surprising force. I sank like a stone, slammed into the horrible primordial ooze on the river bottom, stuck there for a heart-stopping moment, and finally popped back to the surface.

The good news was, we were in fairly shallow water near the edge of the river. The bad news was, we were in fairly shallow water near the swampy edge of the river where all the alligators lived. I actually think I comported myself quite well, all things considered. Mr. Adventure was the one who screamed when he stepped on a log and thought it was a gator. I at least had the presence of mind to retrieve an oar and beat the log half to death.

Even after we were rescued by some passing boaters, the ordeal wasn't over. I had lost my favorite sandals and my underpants. Mr. Adventure was really pissed off at me and never took me canoeing again. It took four showers to remove the horrible primordial ooze from my hair and every nook, cranny, and orifice. Worse, I had swallowed an undetermined amount of the horrible primordial ooze and was pretty sure for a while that I had intestinal parasites. I didn't, but still, that's not one of your everyday worries, is it? It's both stressful and demoralizing.

Anyway, as you might imagine, I'm not anxious to repeat that experience in this life or any other. However, I still have a kinky attraction to boats that it would sadden me to deny. So I've come up with two sensible preventive measures to employ next time an opportunity presents itself. (Pay attention, Jeremy Wade.)

One: Anchor or tie up the damn boat so it doesn't drift into things like dangling streamers of Spanish moss with huge, terrifying spiders on them.

Two: Don't rock the boat, baby. Two words: Tantric sex. (This would also work in a hammock. Just sayin'.)