I Know This Place - The Back Country Journal

I know this place

I know every rock

Every cut bank, every sunken log

Every deep run, hidden pocket, and back eddy

Every tree

I know this place

Strangely, I think, it’s beginning to know me


Read the rest at The Back Country Journal.

Case Study

Subject: White male, 57, although if you'd asked him at noon he'd have suggested 77 and if you had watched him climb the stairs an hour earlier, 97. Subject has a charlie-horsed left quadricep, bruised right ribcage, aching everything, and a nagging suspicion that his body has evolved beyond the playing of kid's games. Now if only his mind would. Competitive soccer at 8:00am is hard on old bodies.

Status: Subject is lying on the living room couch with no intention of rising until his body stops aching or mid-spring - whichever comes first. He plans to flip back and forth between recorded Champions League games and live NCAA basketball for the next twelve hours, feeling fairly confident that he has enough energy to press the jump button on the DirecTV remote for that long. A pre-noon anesthetic Newcastle brown ale sits on the coffee table and the manly scent of BENGAY fills the air.

Stimulus: The cell phone rings. If it's not sitting within easy reach - next to the Newcastle - it goes unanswered.

"Hello"

"Watcha doin'?"

"I'm lying here on the couch and I'm not moving for the next 4 days."

"The white bass are running. I'm slammin'em. I can pick you up at the canoe launch."

"I'll be there in twenty minutes."

And the subject, miraculously, is.



Hypothesis: Anecdotal evidence of the recuperative powers of fishing - even the notion of fishing - is compelling. It suggests that the mere prospect of sitting in the middle of a white bass migration with a 6wt and a box full of pink and white clousers, fighting feisty fish after feisty fish, significantly diminishes the debilitating effects of injury and illness. Further studies are warranted.

Alternate hypothesis: The subject is fucking crazy.

Arrival

As I departed our small community early yesterday, driving towards a hoped-for rendezvous with a few Virginia brown trout, I caught Spring sneaking in the front entrance – hidden in the morning fog.

I rejoice in its arrival.

"Artistic"

Full Moon
Bare Trees
Last time for months

Best Intentions
Forgot

Clouds moving in
Fast

No time to dig out the tripod
No time to find the remote
No time to do it right

Just grab the camera
And shoot

Handheld
Wide Open
Two seconds
Too long

Missed it

But wait
Lightroom

"Artistic"

To Do

Finish Splitting Hickory
Scrap Wood to Landfill
Finish Cutting Red/White Oaks
Store Milled Plank
Cover Garden Boxes (Sat)
Mulch North Slope
Patch Garden Fencing

Clean Shower
Wash Dog
Tie White Bass Flies
Northwoods Soccer Offer
Kayak Practice
Workout Plan

Sammy’s Meds
Canine Acupuncture Referral
Frontline/Interceptor

Shim Master Bath Toilet
Mary’s Bulletin Board
Door Stops
Cedar Chest Hinges
Kitchen Drawers
2nd Shower Head Bar
Bath Towel Rack

Physical
Eye Doctor Appt

Wash Car/Truck
Change Truck Oil
Trailer Hitch
Trailer Registration/Insurance
Test Trailer Running Gear

Haw River Presentation
Back Country Journal Piece
Bloodknot Repost?
Getting Old Post?
Recreate Fav Pics
Save Fav Posts (All?)
Photo Bin Feb
Beer Tie Pics/Post?
Trailer Hitch Post?

Samsung vs. Sony?
Synology Server Setup
Computer Backup for Mary
Upgrade GPS Maps
Fastest DSL?
Lightroom 4

Nike Watch Battery
Patch Air Mattress
Patch Marmot Rain Shell Sleeve
Aquaseal Simms Crotch Seams

Toolshed
Basement Workbench/Area
Stain/Seal Decks

Go Fishin'

Pee, No Poop: Notes on the Countertop

We had to be away for the day and our geriatric terrier could not come along. His "aunties" offered to look in on the little old man throughout the day. Before we departed, Mary left a note on the countertop:

Hi Aunties!
Sammy's food is in the little ziplocs in fridge. We've given him meds and will do 2nd dose when we get home.
Thanks & love you,
M & M & S

We arrived home late to find a contented dog and a handful of updates. From Auntie Robin:

noon report -
15 min outside
Pee, no poop -
a little wobbly -

Below it, from Auntie Jan:

Happy Hour Report -
15 min outside
Poop & Pee - WOOHOO!
We sat on side porch a while enjoying the evening - what a day.
(You have salamander eggs in your pond!)

And finally:

Hey Mary -
Unfrozen chicken & carrots in refridgerator.
Caroline

So I sit here with the smell of fresh, simmering chicken wafting from the kitchen and I wonder. Has any little dog ever been better cared for? Have any little dog's owners ever been better cared for? Would I wish to live anywhere else? The answers are easy.

Thank you, Aunties. We, all three of us, love ya ...

... and your notes on the countertop.

The Photo Bin - February 2012

The photo opportunities were few and far between this month so this trio of February images truly embodies what the Photo Bin is all about - misfit shots that fit nowhere, illustrate no particular post or story to be told, but do seem to manifest something worth sharing. At least to me.

The shot above is a stretch of feeder creek that trickles into my home waters, taken on one of my first warmwater fishing forays of the year. The roots that criss-cross this tiny waterway bring to mind an earthy ladder by which I descend the eco-structure from woodland to wetland to river. A delightful descent it is.

This second odd little shot shows the morning sun streaming through our deck railings, splashing tiger stripes against the Old Town stored underneath. I've gone down those steps countless times for the dog's morning constitutional and have never noticed the phenomenon. But the sun's path creeps steadily northward each day and this particular morning held our first snow, perhaps intensifying the effect, so it may not have been as evident in the past. Whatever the explanation, that day it made a bold statement.

And finally, a self-portrait. Actually, this is a tight crop on an image used a couple of posts ago, in Bug Eyed, but I noticed in the reflective dumbbell eyes an image of the photographer in action, trusty Nikon to eye.

Misfits all - photographer included.

Rainy Days

Sitting here on this cold, dull, rainy day, sifting through months of images in preparation for a presentation on fishing my home waters, I came upon this soft, hazy image of another rainy day. A time much warmer and under decidedly more agreeable circumstances. A Haw River moment, tucked under an overhanging tree, waiting for the gentle front to pass.

In no real hurry for it to do so.

The image made me smile and I figured that any smile dredged up on such a dreary Monday was worth sharing. Hope you agree.

Bug Eyed

Dang. Spring’s snuck up on me and the seasonal fly boxes are bare. Seems it's time to get the production line crankin’. Fast.

March. White bass. I need some clouser minnows.
April brings the shad. Clousers again.
May stripers. Let me think. Oh yeah. Bigger clousers.
The largemouth box could use a few too.

Small clousers, big clousers, white and pink and chartreuse and red and gray and orange and olive clousers. And all the combos.

But to start, the eyes.

And, after the first fifty, I'm getting a little bug-eyed myself.

Evidence Photographic

Are these guys having fun? I can assure you that the one holding the fly rod is.
Left to right: Some no-casting old fart, Bob Clouser, Joe Humphreys

For the whole story, read here. And a big thanks goes out to my new friend Jim who sent me this candid shot from last weekend's show!