Sometimes lack of context can make you interpret a phrase completely differently from how it was meant. A prime example of this is when a word can be singular or plural but spelled the same, like fish, or deer. This specific construct might explain the anomaly of farmer Pluckman, who, for about an hour now, was keeping himself occupied by being drunk and enraged about his sheep. More specifically, the source of his anger was that no one else at the pub understood exactly what he meant when he said that he had woken up that morning to find his sheep scattered across his field.

The other pub goers thought that he was simply getting worked up about a more or less ordinary inconvenience, everyone had seen their herds of sheep break out and wreak havoc on their farms, this was an infuriating thing, but common enough that no experienced farmer would be so afflicted by it. This was of course because they were thinking, as most anyone would, about a herd of sheep; but if you knew anything about farmer Pluckman, which, obviously, none of the pub goers did, you would know that he only had one sheep.

This simple bit of context quite dramatically changes the phrase "I woke up to find my sheep scattered across the field"

A similar thing happened with Tom Fisher, who happened to be a fisherman, and had generations of fishermen ahead of him (with him happening to be the most unsuccessful of the whole family). He arrived home last night, extremely furious. His wife, who was a worrisome woman, got upset to see her husband come home with a frown.

"What is bothering you, darling?" Angela asked.

Tom could not bear it anymore, he turned to his wife and angrily explained his situation at sea. "I lost my fish because the net broke. The net you sewn!"

"Oh no!" Angela exclaimed with guilt. She could not imagine all the fortunes lost. Tom could have came home with dozens of fish! This would not only be the food source of their household for days to come, but if Tom sells them in the market, who knows how much income it could make them! Now, not only Tom was upset, but Angela also had to cope with the deprivation of fish. She left Tom to sit at the dinner table while she turned to prepare the flavorless boiled potatoes for dinner.

Tom however, started to feel better. In fact, he could not have felt merrier! That was because Tom had only caught one fish, and the loss was not some big deal then, since one fish and zero fish does not make too much of a difference. And, as a matter of fact, this called for some celebrations, so he pulled out the beer in the cabinet and had a great drink that night, which left Angela confused as ever.