Captive Bred Squid

January 20th, 2026

I’m so sorry for my loyal blog fans (Charlie and Indy) that I haven’t been posting any blogs these past few days, but today, the blog is freaking back, and I’m gonna tell you all a little story.

A while ago, in the South of France in a small town near the beach lived a little boy named Louis. He only spoke French, but luckily for you I’ll be able to translate all the dialogue into English.

Louis was your classic troublemaker, always causing problems throughout his community, whether that be doing small pranks, stealing little trinkets from shops, or putting random gross stuff into the bread mixture while the baker wasn’t looking, Louis would do it all.

Until one day, Louis decided to do his biggest prank that he had ever tried to do up until this point, stealing the mayor's prized monocle. You see, the mayor had one eye left after losing it in the first world war. Funnily enough, he was actually a medic in the war and lost his eye due to one of his patients coughing some infection up into it, and due to his age his other eye had become very weak.

So not only would this prank render the mayor’s vision completely useless, but Louis decided to play this particular prank on the day of the grand unveiling of the town's brand new aquarium, which would be the very first aquarium in Europe to house a squid (Europeans at the time were enamoured with captive squids).

Anyways, Louis had to form his master plan in order for this prank to work, so he plotted in his room for several days and came up with something that one could consider: foolproof.

Step One: Enter the Mayor’s home late at night.

Step Two: Enter the Mayor’s bedroom late at night.

Step Three: Take the Monocle.

Step Four: Exit.

A rather perfect four-step plan, for a rather perfect four-step crime.

At the exact same time, but all the way over in Spain lived a small girl named Lola who only spoke Spanish (but don’t worry, I can translate). Unfortunately for her, she had in fact contracted Polio, a truly awful disease and didn’t have much life expectancy left. Her entire dream for her whole life was to see just one Captive Squid in an aquarium. So, when her father heard news of the aquarium’s opening in Louis’ town, he decided to bring his daughter to go and see the squid.

Unfortunately for the Spanish family, the daughter had to be kept inside of an Iron Lung to survive, which was a large metal ventilator that helped those with polio breath due to the paralysis developed from the disease. Even more unfortunately, Louis’ town was roughly 500 miles away from theirs, and since they drove a Fiat there was no way to drive, Lola’s father decided to walk and push her the whole entire way.

They had already embarked on their two month long journey, and were arriving the morning of the opening of the aquarium, and as Lola’s father was pushing as hard as he could in order to make it in time, Louis creeped slowly into the Mayor’s bedroom.

The Mayor lay asleep in the bed, snoring loudly, his wife next to him, somehow snoring even louder, perfect couple am I right? Anyways, Louis tip-toed over to the monocle, which rested on a velvet pillow on the Mayor’s bedside table, and after reaching it he slowly moved his hand towards it.

Right as he was about to grab it, the mayor turned and faced directly at him, “Squid” he murmured. He was just sleeping. Louis shook his head, and took the monocle, and slowly exited the room, as he shut the door he heard the mayor shout “Who’s there?”

Scared beyond belief, Louis rushed out of the door, ran down the hallway and burst into the first door he saw. An empty closet was inside, so he shut the door right behind him. He waited a few moments, and heard nothing. He assumed the coast was clear, but he wasn’t sure- then he heard a crack, a second one, a third, and he looked down right in time to see the floor completely collapse on him and he fell down into some dark hole.

The following morning the mayor woke up and looked everywhere for his prized monocle, but obviously, he was unable to find it, and he had to go to the grand aquarium unveiling without it.

So there he stood in front of the entire town, with a big pair of scissors and a red ribbon, just behind him Europe's first captive squid in a large tank. He began to speak.

“I am very honored to be the first city in the entire continent of Europe to encapture such a wonderful animal as the squid, our scientists have spent years perfecting this environment, and it is the only one in Europe that can truly house this magnificent animal, I repeat, there are no other tanks in Europe that can house a squid.”

Someone shouted “WAIT!” in the crowd, and everyone turned around to see Lola being pushed by her father at immense speeds.

They rushed into the crowd, and the father explained their situation. All of the townsfolk were very sympathetic and very welcoming to them, happy to share their love of captive squids. The mayor continued,

“It is such a blessing to share such a wonderful sight, and the entire town is blessed to have you," the Mayor told Lola, “Now, let me see here.”

He squinted his one good eye at the ribbon and began to prepare to cut it, but due to his loss of sight, he instead tripped over the ribbon, and flew scissors first into the squid tank, destroying it, and impaling the creature with his scissors.

The entire crowd screamed, as they watched the only captive squid in their entire continent slowly turn from a gorgeous pink to a lifeless white. Lola and her father looked even more disappointed than anyone else, naturally.

“WAIT!” Someone shouted again, but who could it be? It was Louis.

“The Mayor is a fraud!” He shouted.

Murmuring travelled throughout the crowd.

“I stole the mayor’s monocle,” he said, holding it up.

The townspeople went into outrage, assuming he was the reason for the death of their beloved captive European squid. The mayor rushed over and took his monocle back. The police rushed over and put the boy in cuffs.

“But the mayor is lying!” Louis shouted, “he has hundreds of captive squids in his house!”

The mayor turned a bright pink, and began to defend himself “what are you talking about? That’s outrageous!”

Louis shook his head, “follow me.”

The entire town, now curious, decided to follow the little boy all the way to the mayor's house, into his hallway, into the closet that Louis hid inside of, and down the hole. I will tell you it was a challenge to get Lola down there with the Iron Lung, but they did it.

Down there was something that nobody had expected, hundreds of fish tanks filled with hundreds of captive bred squid. Louis was immediately released, and the mayor immediately put into handcuffs as the townsfolk stared in awe at the captive squid.

Lola smiled for the first time in months, and her father was just happy to see her smile, although he did obviously appreciate the squid.

And as for Louis, he was able to go home that night and instead of feeling the satisfaction from pranking someone, he felt the satisfaction of making someone smile- and to him that was infinitely better, so he vowed to never do another prank again.