Final Comments on Fishing

Lately, I have had logjam of things to say lodged prominently in the front part of my brain which makes it nearly impossible to effectively communicate anything clever, should the opportunity arise.

I thought of something clever the other day and when I opened my mouth to speak, something else came out. It's been going about like that lately.

A number of things may be contributing to my medical condition. I'm incredibly busy and I find myself consumed with the things I have to do in order to keep my job, which I enjoy and depend upon for buying fishing equipment and Vitamin D milk and neckties and diapers and strollers and expensive city water to pour out on my front yard three days a week.

I have also reached the deeply satisfied point in an outdoorsman's life attributable to owning a glittery, carpeted, red-and-white-and-gray fishing boat. I have located Outdoorsman Zen, or my inner Ice Cave, or finally released the 12-year-old that's been pent-up inside my chest for the last 20 years. I don't know exactly how it's changed me emotionally, but it's good.

I shot sporting clays recently with my buddy Fred, who is fantastic, and another friend - an older, successful, and entertaining local businessman. Fred, who is nearly always around when something very interesting happens, made a comment about my fishing boat and the man immediately perked up. 

A boat, eh? he said
Yes Sir. 
Is it one of the sparkly kind? A sparkle boat? 
Yes Sir. I said, with pride. It is a Sparkle Boat.

....One of those boats with the rednecks in them and the glitter in the paint that you might use to fish on "The Red Man Trail" with? He snickered into his Peter Millar sleeve.

Yes Sir, I said, sensing a trap. I did not forge ahead eagerly into explaining that the "Red Man Trail" is now defunct and has since been replaced by "The Fishing League Worldwide", nor did I provide any brilliant insight on the internal politics that precipitated that great upheaval.

I knew there was something not quite right about you.
Yes sir. Would you like to ride in my sparkly boat? It goes super fast. 
You know - I think I would!

Everybody loves a sparkly boat. Unfortunately, the sparkles have done little to bolster my fishing skills and I have continued to build an incredibly mediocre name for myself on the amateur bass fishing circuit. I do, however, manage to get from one terribly unproductive fishing spot to the next with great speed and precision - which allows me to fish at least twice as much unproductive water as before. So, I consider the sparkly boat a huge success. If I am going to be a pretty bad fisherman, I at least want to get there quick!

I made my way to the front of the tournament weigh-in line at a recent event with my pitiful sack of skinny fish just as Uncle Buster sidled up with a positively frightening collection of enormous watery predators.

You get a limit? he queried, swaying and struggling to keep his plastic bag full of great green behemoths from escaping and endangering spectators.

Yeeesh! Look at that, Buster! That one just burped a live catfish!

Yeah. I did alright. He rumbled, mustache quivering as he strained to keep the mouth of his fish sack closed against the obviously dangerous animals inside.

You got 5? Tell me you at least got 5. He insisted.

Ah. Errhhhh. I got 4.....I think they might be guppies.

He looked at me hard for a second, slumped his shoulders and stalked off.

BUT THE BOAT RAN GREAT!!! I shouted after him.