Located in a sort-of no man’s land of office buildings and hotels, the Maine Avenue Fish Market is tucked away in a bizarre little pocket of waterfront activity in Southwest. We were there to grab a few fish steaks before the evening rush hour for a Friday night grillfest. And we were hungry.

Newbies to the market, we walked slowly, browsing the wares while vendors coaxed us to stop here or there for a special on tuna or a pound of shrimp or whatever else. This place is like the red-light district of raw seafood. (“Baby, c’m’ere, I got a reeeeaaal good grouper that’ll make you scream!”). Keep walking, and while you’re trying to figure out what exactly the difference is between large and jumbo shrimp (uh, they look exactly the same), you see something called lobster shrimp, a hybrid that reminded us of something from a B horror film—“Mutant Crustaceans Walk Among Us!”

From there, you’ll see more exotica of the sea—tiger shrimp, a zillion types of squid and octopus, all piled high in a gray-blue mass. Then stone crab, blue crab, mountains of crab legs, and lump crab in a dizzying array of containers. At this point, you’re not sure what to do: Do the safe thing, and pick the salmon; get crazy and buy some tiger shrimp; or get the hell out of there before you hurt yourself.

This kind of situation can be dangerous, as the combination of extreme hunger, curiosity, and the promise of copious amounts of food can lead to total irrational behavior. This DCist came very close to being like, “yeah, I’ll take five pounds of lobster shrimp and a few of those squids over there,” and then running out of there with not a clue of what to do with any of it.