Fish On! No wait, I just caught a trophy inner tube.

Ah yes, spring in northeast Ohio. A beautiful warm sunny day after a long, miserable, gray, bone chilling winter. And that was just Christmas. Hey, I'm here all week folks, don't forget to take care of your wait staff. Anyway, on such a day as this, the sap starts to rise, the birds begin to sing and the local steelhead send the word to the entire ichthyological community to brace themselves for the annual spawning and Bob's comedy fishing act season. The fever generally starts around mid January when internet articles and magazines talk about how ridiculously easy it is to catch a dump truck full of spawning steelhead, in the Grand River and attached feeder creeks. These articles are of course written by sadistic outdoorsmen suffering from terminal Pinochioitis. Either that or they are congressmen.
A small fortune is invested in lures, baits and other nonsensical equipment designed purely for the amusement of aquatic life everywhere.
Fish #1 to Fish #2: "Holy crap, Joe, would you look at that very realistic and tantalizing fluorescent orange, rubberized worm pulling a windmilling steel blade with hooks coming out of it! Tell me that's not a meal!" Fish #1 is obviously brain dead, or most likely Fishes 1 and 2 soon float to the top of the water as they have both just died laughing. And that's just the beginning of the fun. I can tell you that the local fish have enjoyed watching me for the last few years, trying to land taunting schools of steelhead, most of them halfway above water to get a better look, as I toss lure after lure, line after line into tree branches, shrubbery and the occaisional passing cow. But am I deterred. Not at all. Every spring I spend more and more money to entertain more and more fish before ice sets in.
For example, a year or two ago I came up with the brilliant idea that a set of chest waders would be just the ticket for getting me closer to where the fish were lurking in anticipation of a free lunch. I used these waders once each of the last two springs. Total fish caught? Zip, nada, goose egg, none. I really should have just set fire to my money and been done with it. I have only been talking so far about my luck, if you can call it that, fishing the local creeks. We haven't even began to get into the various, nicks, cuts, bruises and hemorrhaging lacerations endured for this, uh, "relaxation." It is sometimes so bad that the local Red Cross chapter sends out volunteers to follow me around for "tourniquet practice."
This year however, I decided to up the humiliation ante. And don't think the fish didn't appreciate it. This year I decided on this glorious spring day, to put on those chest waders and get into some real fishing waters. And by "real fishing waters", I mean those places where all the fly fishermen, with the lures attached to their hats, and their deftly casting of fly lines into the holes where the fish will be when they are not otherwise preoccupied with the "Bob Show." I'm talking about the spot where Ellison Creek and the Grand River merge. This was a mistake.
To get to the spot you have to wade through the relatively calm waters of the creek to the spot where the river meets and where in most springs, the Grand River is about as calm as Niagara Falls. Picture if you will, the bowling ball in waders, clutching his rod with white knuckles, not so much "wading" as sloshing, sliding, lurching and stumbling through the water, much as a one year old might look on ice skates. Only less stable.
Incredibly I managed to find a spot in about thigh high water not occupied by the rest of steelhead anglers whose number equaled roughly that of the population of China. Oh and by the way, if you want to experience an incredible sensation of vertigo, and who doesn't, be sure to look down at the flowing water as you try to inch your way to your spot. When I finally got to my spot I started casting my lure, which was guaranteed on the package to be "snag proof" and promptly caught a submerged boulder. Come to find out that "snag proof" actually means "snag resistant." Damn lawyers. But I digress. Upon freeing my line I made several more casts toward the river bank, the water rushing and swirling around my legs so that I felt about as stable as Foster Brooks on a bender.
About this time, I come to find that the company that made my waders and that had guaranteed a lifetime "angling pleasure in our leakproof vulcanized waders," actually meant "leak resistant." You really haven't lived until you find yourself in the roiling spring waters of the Grand River, just after ice out, feeling the life ooze out of your right leg. I somehow lurched and slogged my way to the bank of the river alive, and staggered back to my car and died.
I really don't plan to go back out today, but I have heard that steelhead have been spotted holding their cigarette lighters out of the water asking for an encore.

Love
Dad

The Pelican Brief,

Believe it or not, this pelican picture will have some relevance by the end of this entry.

Thanks to a weekend I spent at a lake in Michigan last year, I came into this fishing season thinking I might be tapped to do my own fishing show. I can see it now... "That's not a buoy, that's Bob fishin'!" I say this because the friends we stayed with actually encouraged me to fish in their lake. Not only that, but the man of the house, Larry insisted I go fishing in his pontoon boat. After essentially drowning worms and freezing all morning, I actually hooked a very big fish. A very nice largemouth bass. (Larry will corroborate my entire story, he should I paid him enough). Now, I had never come close to seeing a largemouth bass let alone catch one my whole life. Anyway, with Larry's guidance and one of his lures, I was able to get the great beast into the boat. And by the way, the more I tell the story of it, the bigger the fish gets. This was all I needed. I was, as they say, "hooked." For Christmas I got my usual 37 bottles of Chaps after shave but this year there was more. Gift certificates for fishing gear. I couldn't wait to get my sweaty little hands on a pair of waders so I could get out there in the Grand River at the crack of March, when it is nice and warm in Ohio, and stride proudly and purposerfully to the middle of the stream and start casting my new lures. By the way, Larry had loaned me a Rappala something or other to catch my bass and I now had a few in my own tackle box. By a few, I mean enough to give the Rappala company a solid profit for the entire 4th quarter of 2007. Little did I know in December, I was going to need every one of them within a week of fishing season.

Spring approached, I got all my gear ready, I got my fishing license online, I bought all kinds of lures, bobbers, baits in jars, and other paraphanalia that would assure angling success or bankruptcy. My money is on bankruptcy. Lot of bad puns around here for a quiet neighborhood. Well, dammit, March finally arrived, and I started looking for a place to fish and I discovered that they spawn (from the latin "la fornicate es maximus") in the stream behind my house, which is technically a part of the Lake Metro Parks system.

So, I have been trying my fishing skills around here lately as it is spring and the steelhead are in heat. Several were spotted in the creek behind my house cavorting about, drinking champaign and eating caviar. The heavy alcohol consumption would explain how these critters mate as industrial strength beer goggles are required for the average male to work up any kind of amorous advance toward the typical female fish. Anyway, there is nothing more aggravating than fishing in a stream about 9 inches deep with several large fish less than 5 feet away, jumping and splashing around, while you try to coax them into taking a bite of your latest $10 Rappala lure. Add to that the fact that roughly 1 in every 6,000 casts actually gets your lure into the water, in the same area code as the fish, rather than in a tree, rock, various body parts or an elephant in India, and you have the makin's of a grand old time. Now I know how whiskey got invented. Throw in a 56 year old novice fisherman shaped like a large bowling ball, in chest waders slogging and sliding around on moss covered rocks in the rapids with all the stealth of an enraged rhinocerous dancing ballet in axle grease and you have a pretty good idea of what I must have looked like to the steelhead.

On this comedy of errors went for the entire morning. Cast, curse, slip and slog to the snagged lure, unravel the tangled mess of fishing line while staggering like a drunken Republican, put another maggot on the hook, and re-cast. Repeat the above. So I spent a joyous 5 hours fishing, and in which I made roughly three casts and caught six thousand tree limbs, various underwater rocks and three old boots. The steelhead enjoyed the show and I believe the alpha male has started selling tickets to the other fish.

Having enjoyed such massive success in a creek, I decided to kick it up a notch (There's a phrase you don't hear enough of, eh?) and take my act, er, I mean my gear to the ol' Grand River. The "Old Man", the "Mighty Grand". This, as they say in fishing parlance, was a mistake. Not only were the fish laughing at me, but several other fisherman, passing joggers, and local school field trips were wetting their pants in no time. For those who have not experienced it, donning waders and trying to make to the middle of a river in early spring after some rain and snow melt is a awesome sight to behold. That is it is awesome if I am the sight you're beholding. One of the things I had failed to take into account was something known as "current". I had envisioned a casual stroll out into the river to start casting in deeper water with the nimbleness of a ballet dancer. Wrong! The problem as I see it, is I have a tough enough time getting one foot in front of the other on terra firma. Throw in moss covered rocks, pretty heavy current, waders, and a net (hopeless optimism if I ever saw it) and you might as well have told me to get Congress to actually do something. Anyway, after several hours of this nonsense and once again snagging rocks, trees and innocent passers by I decided this might not be the best use of my time.
Now here's the funny part. I can't wait to do it again! How stupid can one individual be?

So, I do want to thank my Michigan hosts Larry and Judy for being such wonderful hosts in their beautiful home on the lake, and especially Larry for taking me out on his boat and getting me addicted to something that will get me killed as surely as nicotine or heroin. That one bass has got me as sure as a Camel Filter did in my youth. You should know that recently I have thought about taking up a less dangerous activity. Something like "skeet" which merely involves loaded shotguns and moving targets. For some reason Sandy seems a might skittish about the whole thing. Huh!

When I started this entry, the pelican had some meaning in my demented, senile mind, but I can't for the life of me, remember what the hell it was.

I hope the kids get me some ties for Christmas this year, dammit! But don't forget the Chaps.

Love
Dad