The Squid that...farted.

Over the weekend we drove down the coast to a pretty, curved beach, watched over by a tall thin lighthouse. The tide was high and the wind was still.  The shore was flat sandstone broken into thin plates and sea-washed into soft, round edges - perfect conditions for skipping rocks.
            Mr Tabubil is very good at it - he can get a stone dish the size of a dinner plate all the way across the little bay and out into the gulf.  His skips seem to pick up speed as they go - great shovels of rock bouncing and rolling across the water.

            I'm no good at it.   I  bring my wrist out and down instead of swinging from the elbow  and my little rocks cartwheel straight out sideways and sink without a ripple.

We met a dog that chased them into the water.  And ate them.  Which worried us, but her owner smiled at us and didn't seem concerned, and we decided not to worry until she did. 
            A little girl fishing with her grandparents came streaking across the rocks toward us.

            "Do you want to see what we caught?!"

            "You bet we would!"

            "We have these two fish here and they're really slimy.  It comes off in strings.  Do you want to touch them?"

            "Eeeeeewww."  We said appreciatively, and wiped our hands discreetly on our trouser legs.

            The little girl grinned up at us.  "And there's this littler fish.  Only there's only half of it.  A squid ate the rest.  And we almost caught a cuttlefish, but it farted and it got away."

Amen.