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Life's Pleasures Quote by Jeff Goldblum

"My friend Ed Begley goes fishing. It's a little smelly to me, I don't like it so much. I like to eat fish, but I don't like to catch them"

About this Quote

Goldblum turns a small confession into a miniature manifesto about modern pleasure: he wants the reward without the ritual. The line is funny because it sidesteps the macho romance of fishing with an almost childlike honesty. Where fishing is often packaged as wholesome patience, communion-with-nature, even moral virtue, he reduces it to its least Instagrammable detail: it smells. That blunt sensory aversion punctures the mythology.

The subtext is less about fish than about performance. Fishing is a hobby that signals something - self-reliance, calm, competence with tools - and Goldblum, a master of offbeat charisma, refuses the costume. He admits taste without appetite for struggle, and in doing so he also admits a kind of ethical squeamishness without preaching. "I like to eat fish" keeps him inside everyday contradiction; "but I don't like to catch them" gestures at the hidden labor and violence behind consumption, then quickly plays it for a shrugging laugh. That tension is the point: a neat portrait of how many of us outsource discomfort while keeping the benefits.

Context matters, too. As a pop-cultural figure known for charming stammer and self-aware eccentricity, Goldblum sells ambivalence as a lifestyle. The name-drop of Ed Begley - himself associated with earnest environmentalism - adds a faint halo of do-good seriousness, making Goldblum's distaste feel even more human. It's not a thesis. It's a vibe: the refusal to pretend that enjoying something requires you to romanticize the whole supply chain.

Quote Details

TopicWitty One-Liners
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Citation Formats

APA Style (7th ed.)
Goldblum, Jeff. (n.d.). My friend Ed Begley goes fishing. It's a little smelly to me, I don't like it so much. I like to eat fish, but I don't like to catch them. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/my-friend-ed-begley-goes-fishing-its-a-little-58724/

Chicago Style
Goldblum, Jeff. "My friend Ed Begley goes fishing. It's a little smelly to me, I don't like it so much. I like to eat fish, but I don't like to catch them." FixQuotes. Accessed February 3, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/my-friend-ed-begley-goes-fishing-its-a-little-58724/.

MLA Style (9th ed.)
"My friend Ed Begley goes fishing. It's a little smelly to me, I don't like it so much. I like to eat fish, but I don't like to catch them." FixQuotes, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/my-friend-ed-begley-goes-fishing-its-a-little-58724/. Accessed 3 Feb. 2026.

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Jeff Goldblum (born October 22, 1952) is a Actor from USA.

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