Fishing Smack-Down

My sister's fiance', Nate, has a cool blog about fly fishing--it's inspired me to write down some funny memories about my 10-day fishing trip to Alaska a couple of years ago....but not today.

What I'm thinking about today happened about 10 years ago when my friend Gar and I would sometimes take a day off from work and go fishing at Lake Grapevine, near my old apartment.

For some reason, we became fixated with catching fish from a long, floating dock that jutted out over 100 feet into the lake. On the left was the mouth of a cove and on the right was a long beach. We never had too much luck in the three or four years that we went out there, but it just looked like such a good place to fish that we just couldn't resist going there and trying it out every time.



One of our favorite things to do was to try to figure out why today wasn't the perfect day for fishing and why we weren't having any luck.

"If it were just 5 degrees cooler"
"We should have gotten here an hour ago"
"Gosh, these minnows are a little big"
"Why didn't you get those other hooks?
"What we really need is for it to be overcast"
"You should see this place in September--I bet they bite like crazy"
"Have you ever seen the water level so high?"

One drawback to that floating dock is that Gar doesn't swim, and the water is pretty deep--this led to a little bit of anxiety on his part. One time, he either drifted off to sleep or was deep in thought when a fish grabbed his pole and yanked it off the dock into the water. I could see it sinking, pulsing under the water as the fish was dragging it away from us. I've seen people jump in after poles in situations like that, but we weren't at that point yet. Gar moved aside quickly and I grabbed the dock with my right hand and plunged my left arm into the murky lake water up past my shoulder to my neck and the side of my head, quickly grabbing the butt-end of the rod just as it was being pulled away out of reach. I handed it to Gar, who just laughed about the goofiness of the event as he reeled in his fish.

One morning we walked out to the dock and there was a boat tied up about halfway down. We looked at each other but didn't even say anything--we were going out on the dock to fish. We said "hi" to the guy in the boat as we walked by in the early morning darkness out to the end of the dock where we started to set up.

To our surprise, the guy on the boat decided to move and anchored a little out from the dock out at the same level as we were setting up, which was a little annoying. Somehow, perhaps because he had a boat and we didn't, he felt the need to start bragging a little bit about all the fishing that he had been doing during the summer, and all the neat equipment that he had. He was really going on and on, obnoxiously, for several minutes. Plus, he started casting against the dock where we were setting up--a little rude.

"Yep, we were out here the other day and we strung up 15 white bass. They're running. This depth finder that we use costs $450."

"Oh, that's great!" Knowing Gar, I knew this guy was getting on his nerves because Gar hates bragging of any kind. Gar is a Buddhist who is very humble and he has always appreciated subtlety and humility.

Here's a funny Gar joke: We're out fishing, and a lady walks by wearing one of those floppy, wide-brimmed hat which, mysteriously, is covered with shiny decorative pins from all different places and events and everything. I mean, the hat is completely covered and looks silly--it must weigh 2 pounds. She walks by and Gar doesn't say anything. About half an hour passes. After all this time, Gar shifts where he's sitting and looks up at me and says "One more pin on that hat and it would be too many, huh?" I burst out laughing and he stoically looks back at his fishing rod before losing it and grinning widely.

So we were a little tired of this braggart, but didn't want to be ugly--we were out to have a nice, relaxing day of fishing.

Just as he starts telling us that his rod costs $150 from Oshman's and his reel was another $100 or so, I hooked the first fish of the day, not a bad size.

As I'm reeling it in on my cheap Zebco outfit, I say, sarcastically, without missing a beat, "Not bad for a $10 outfit from K-mart, huh?"

He kept reeling, now silenced.

When I got the fish to the dock, I unhooked it and was about to throw it back in (we don't usually keep them).

The guy asks, "Ummmm, could I have your fish?"

All bragging stopped at that point.

When the guy in the boat left, Gar died laughing at the perfect timing, and he still laughs when he tells the story.