Update 5/11

Its been an interesting week and weekend, Fire, Rain, Sun, and nary a fish. And not to forget exams.... 

Well our story begins with a fire. All consuming and devastating but thankfully it was only a materiel loss and no lives. A long day and a hundred kids. Hot coco at 5:00 am. 

Then Exams. Early rising, had some packing, running late, no pencils, can't stay awake... rushing essays. Its all good.

Camping, long drive, indecisive, expensive camp ground, cold and rainy, sleeping in the car, 5:30 alarm. Listen to the rain, sleep a little longer. Then sun, warm but windy, big fish in a little stream. Broken rod... well not mine, buddies, but the loss was felt none the less. Do more exploring that fishing but it was All good.

And another week down and a month to go.

The days blur by

The 11th hour of saturday and it has passed by so quickly. Its amazing to me the concept of time and how we perceive it to move faster or slower depending on future events. If it is something we are looking forward to the time seems to be agonizingly slow and yet for other events the time slips by so fast it is hard to know if those minuets, hours or even days actually existed. 

What is time really but a way to demarcate the present from the past and the future. What is now the present in a moment will be the past and what was the future the present. When it all gets laid out time has no meaning other than an implied importance that we give it. 

An evening on the Salt

After many days of cold and windy weather we finally got an evening that was really nice. And to top it off I was able to take some time and get out of the office and enjoy it. Gearing up with waders and fly rod I ventured down to the beach for some therapeutic casting. So far this year I have not seen the big schools of resident blackmouth in the area nor schools of bait-fish in any large numbers. 

Walking along the beach I did see one small school of about 1 inch fry that probably had no more than 50 to 100 individuals. I also noticed that being as it has been sunny and also relatively calm the bioluminescent alga were out in force. It might be real cool out these right now to skip rocks or swirl the water and watch it light up but I am inside writing this discourse and have not figured out how to be in two places at the same time. 

I walked about 200 feet down the beach to a likely looking place, tied on a size 8 brown and white clouser with a little flash in it and started casting. I had made about 40 or 50 casts when as usual I had the line tangle up in my stripping basket and I had to drop the fly short of where I had intended to. Well it took me only a couple seconds to get the tangle undone but as I started to pick up the line to recast I had a pleasant surprise and a strong tug on the other end.

I brought to hand a nice 13 inch Cutthroat trout. It looked really healthy although it did not have much fight to it and I was able to horse it in to the net fairly quickly with my 6wt. All in all a beautiful way to end the week.

The Cats Out of the Bag

Well, so the cats out. And I guess in a sense its a good thing too. Its hard to keep a secret even though spilling the beans as they say may not be the most productive thing to do. But what comes will and one can only face it and move on. 6 weeks and counting... almost sounds like a country song, and sometimes can feel like one too. I don't think I can play this backwards and get back things that were lost but I guess not all songs play backwards. Besides with some of the crazy things people do with songs I don't know if I want to find out what the lyrics say... hopefully not something like "green cat eating rotting mouse". Which would be a sad state to be in.

What did the mouse die of? Surely not the green cat as one would infer this from the qualifier of the state of the mouse which happens to be rotting. Unless of course the cat has been eating the mouse for such a long time that it has begun to rot in the process and this would then explain the phenomenon of the color of the cat. Green not being a naturally occurring color of the feline species.

But the cat green or not is out and lets see what happens to the rest of the mice.

Anticipation

I have a note... now some notes may not be notable and some are more notable than others. Yet mine is on rather inconspicuous brownish pinkish paper that has more meaning to it since it is an official note. My note come courtesy  of the US post office and they have a package for me.

I have had the note in my possession for the last several days yet have not had the means to collect what I have in store. I have something that I have ordered that I am expecting... is this what awaits me... or have I received something unexpected from someone that forgot to let me know they were sending the item. Is it something fun or a boring bit o' stuff that will add the pack-rattish clutter on my life. 

Be tomorrow already.

Change comes soon

Well its official, things don't stay static for long and the winds of change are once again blowing. It may take me a lifetime of looking back to sometimes figure out all the turns and twists that have happened in my life and how the paths I have taken have crossed mountains and oceans but once again those paths are opening up and its time to dust off those Ol' walking shoes. 

For the last many months I have learnt and grown in ways that I could not have predicted coming in. As with such things it has been not without its highs and lows, valleys and mountains and through it all I came and now stand at the edge of a great sea. Some may call it a sea of knowledge, but to me its a beginning of another voyage that will take me to ports unknown. What I learn along the way will be a natural by product of the journey and what I will need hopefully once I reach that far off destination.

What's up with the Mercury falling?

So its the end of April, on most years many people are looking forward to the warming weather and for many this also means that it is time to dust off those ol' fish'n poles and head out for the season opener. Ah the coming of summer when the birds sing sweetly in the morning awaking you to a day filled with sun and adventure.... Well we are certainly getting the adventure without the rest of the picture. Its cold outside. Today we set a new record in Seattle for the coldest temperature recorded on the 21st of April. 

Now setting new records are something to be proud of, unless this happens to be for being ridiculously cold. Why would we want to even acknowledge this? Its all like a bad dream that wont end. Give us the Sun, Hide not its warmth and radiance from an earth that is withering from the grip of winter. Bring back the days of carefree short sleeves and running ones toes through the green grass without having to concern ones mind of such nonsensical things such as frostbite and appendages falling off from the brittle cold. 

On a tangent... hopefully my only one for tonight... but then again maybe not. I went fishing this saturday. I met up with a gentleman named Chris and the two of us headed to a beach where neither of had had fished before to try our luck and enjoy the freedom of the water. We arrived at the beach around 7:30 am or so and after a few minuets gearing up headed out to wet our lines. 

Chris as it so happened was fishing the salt for the first time or so he told me... this was probably his first time in Washington as I feel that he was a proficient caster and may have fished in the salt in Alaska where he was from. In either case it was odd to be the more experienced one of the two of us when my own experience up to this point has not been to any extent extensive even in the longest stretch of the meaning of the word. 

I was able to point out to him how to spot a rip as the tide was moving and we were able to position our selves relatively in a good place. I say relatively as the fish were there. But being as we were both rookies I think we spent the morning throwing everything but what we should have. Both our fly boxes looked more like what a car salesmen would have been proud to have used as a marketing tool with many different and colorful flies but we were not getting any hookups. In retrospect after coming back and reading more I think we should have been using a krill or euphausiid pattern rather than the bait fish and other streamers we were ripping. Oh well thats what it is to live and learn.

But to bring back this tangent to a somewhat relevant thought to the matter at hand while we were out on the water the temperature dropped several degrees. One could feel the change and see the coldness if that were possible coming off the water and envelope the shore like the hand of death. What is sad about this was that the only strikes we got on our lines was several minuets after this cold front hit and we were so cold we were not able to react fast enough to set the hook. Which we took to be a sign that it was not going to be much prodective after that. 

So I ask again where is the sun and the warm weather. Was the weekend before with its 70 degree spell just a tease to bring pain and anguish to the minds of all warm blooded folk...

Warm up world... the buzz on the street is global warming. Get with the act or at least act like you are going to...