Wilderness Blues- Ramblings from the Great Land

   A few days ago I went down to the harbor to do something on the boat and I saw a lot of unusual activity on the transit dock. Upon closer examination I saw that the old wooden seiner the Hollywood sank at the dock. Several months ago I had mentioned to the harbormaster that it looked like it was setting down a little bit. I can't remember what the response was. A week or so ago it was really starting to look  like it was taking on water, but I didn't give it much thought. It was docked right where everyone who came to the harbor would see it, so it wasn't a surprise that it was looking a little shaky. I think there was ample opportunity for the powers that be, either the owner or the harbormaster to deal with it, but obviously that didn't happen. You know that old saying- there's never enough time to do it right but there's always enough time to do it over." ? Well, this was kind of like that. The owner was out getting ready for a se...

Flasher and Hoochies Flashers and hoochies on the job   For my birthday or perhaps Fathers Day, or perhaps both, I don't know, my daughter Jen and her family blessed me with a flasher and some hoochies from Cabelas, the giant outdoors outfitters. You would think that being in the fishing business as they are, they would be well familiar with all of the jargon that fishermen have for assorted fishing gear. However, that isn't the case. Jen went in and asked the salesman where she could find the hoochies. I guess he must have thought she should have been shopping in a sex shop or something from the look he gave her. She had to explain what they were used for and that they mimicked an octopus. I think they call them skirts or some such thing. Anyway, I'm the proud owner of a glow in the dark flasher and two new packs of hoochies that I love. I tried out the flasher on one line, but even though that line was catching fish when I used the conventional gear, when ...

  My apologies to those who follow this blog. The past month or so- well longer than that- but anyway it's been incredibly busy between working on the boat and trying to get out fishing and following up on this book. I've also been dealing with Shingles which I thought would have been ancient history by now, but aren't. The meds I take for them seem to leave me more crabby than normal and not able to focus well. I have had a hard time getting motivated. I'll be glad when I can stop taking anything. I know it's not good to let too much time elapse between posting, but frankly, I  have to make a living and the blog doesn't make me any money. At least not until now! As you can see I have a new book out. It has the same title as this blog, which isn't surprising because I took various posts from the blog, tweaked them a little and sent it down to the publishers. For those not familiar with the book publishing business, let me tell you, it can be a long, dra...

Last week I took my daughter Jen out fishing with me. We always have a good time, and for the most part she seems to bring me good luck. Most probably because she has such a positive attitude most of the time, as opposed to my rather gloomy outlook on life. We had to deal with those consarn horseflies again, but I got my revenge on a fair number of them. If they dare to come into the cabin and up against that side window, they're dead meat. I like to knock them down with the hose too. I just wish it  had about ten times the pressure so that when I hit them with it, it knocked their little mean heads off. I read years ago about a guy in England who liked hunting so much that he loaded his shotgun shells with dust so he could shoot butterflies. I don't like that idea so much, but blasting horseflies would be grand fun. Of course I wouldn't be getting any fishing done if I had some of those dust laden shells.   As you can see, we had a fairly good day, fi...