Quick Downdate

"Downdate" because it's not really going to be much of an update.

Looky there! Behind your backs I slipped right out the side door.

Since I've been gone, I have done all of the following: made plans for a short trip away within about three day's time, had the great pleasure of meeting a fellow blogger who was visiting NYC for his first time, driven through a tornado (not really but it fell two towns from where I passed and it sounds cool to say that I drove through it), went fishing again and this time got totally skunked, and totally ignored anything resembling a blog. For the last, I apologize - AGAIN.

The Outpost will be closed until I can take the time to stop by and visit all of those on my blogroll (so I can also update that) and those I have saved in my bookmarks. This will take some time because I read VERY slowly and I like to try to catch up on a few recent posts.

When I return, I'll be posting some newsy stuff about my fun visit with Don, as well as some other neat things. Oh, the Outpost won't be going anywhere - but I am testing the waters at an all-new site, soon to be announced.

Sorry I can't create a proper post right now, but summertime and new writing projects await.

My best guess is a week to ten days for an actual update.

Thanks for reading and take good care till I see you again!

Weary Hag

It Was An Angry Pond, My Friends ...

Greetings all ... I haven't spent any quality time on the computer in the past four days, so I'll be trying to catch up a bit in the coming week. Ed and I enjoyed a wonderful long weekend together and I hope you all did too!

On Sunday, I really outdid myself. Ed asked if I'd like to go out and learn how to drive (steer, pilot, or whatever you want to call it) our small boat. I thought for a moment, then said, "Sure, and maybe we should bring out a rod or two incase we feel like fishing a little too." Fishing wasn't even the true mission. But Ed will never pass up an opportunity to wet a line, so he brought two rods and off we went.

It was great fun for me sitting in the captain's chair for once! Ed's a great teacher and had me maneuvering the boat out through the thick lily pads and beyond in no time at all. What a blast!

Once we cleared the weeds and pads, I decided to grab the larger rod and give it a shot. The lure he had on it was a wormy looking plastic thing with speckles on it. (quit laughing you fisherman readers!) I cast it out and reeled it in slowly like a pro. Nothing. I cast it out a second time (no lie) and voila! See below ...

Isn't he a beauty? (notice I'm wearing a dress to boot!)

Now, it's not everyday we catch this large a bass out back - still Ed's done so several times. This was my first (of the larger ones) and I have to tell you - it was a THRILL for me! Reading this back I can see that it may be taken several ways, but I don't give a hoot ... there's no other way to describe it.

You can appreciate him a bit more (perhaps) in this second photo. That's a smile on his face, by the way, and shock on mine. He grabbed at that lure the second it hit the water at the edge of the lily pads. He must have been quite hungry. Boy, was he tough for me to reel in! When I finally got him to the edge of the boat, he was covered in weeds and I thought to myself, "Oh, it's not that big after all," but Ed kept swearing I'd caught a huge bass.

Of course, we didn't go out with the camera. Being that we were only about 60 feet from our dock, I said to Ed, "Can we keep him alive till I get us back in and grab the camera for my blog?" He laughed and said, "Well ... if we hurry!" Ed held him under the water and I slowly managed to get the boat back dockside, ran in the house and came out with the camera and the scale (Ed said we might as well make the blog post complete! haha).

Incase you can't read the numbers on the scale, he weighed 5.8 which translates to five pounds, twelve and a half ounces ... a real whopper for our little pond. Don't worry, he's still alive in that picture. He's just a little ticked off for the moment. It's part of the game of fishing. If they want to participate, they have to deal with a bit of frustration now and again.

And to remove any doubt at all (okay, and also to show off), here's further proof.

At the end of his photo shoot and travels for the day, Ed reached down from the side of the dock and gently released him. The beautiful largemouth bass sat for a moment, just where Ed set him into the water, then took off in bass-like fashion - slow and cool. Maybe now someone else can have that same thrill next year (maybe even US again). I don't think he'll be hitting on any wormy looking plastic speckled things this year again though.

After this gem of a catch, I took us all around the pond - I didn't fish much the rest of the trip but I did catch a pretty and healthy perch. I was busy trying to keep us out of the shallows and minding where we were pointed. Ed caught many pumpkin seeds and blue gills - I hogged the larger rod and lure.

Trolling slowly around the pond and stopping on occasion to watch the Ospreys or Hawks flying above, fishing along the way the whole time, it takes about an hour to an hour and a half full circle. It's a perfect little fishing trip and we rarely get skunked (I've come to learn that to be "skunked" means never catching a thing the whole time out).

Oh. And here's one last picture for you today ...

This is a tiny inlet where it's always shady and lots of turtles hang out on the cresting logs. I snapped this picture to show you "the turtle that got away." No really, he was sitting on that protruding log seconds before I took the picture. Wouldn't he have been just great?

*This post title was a take-off on George's "Angry Sea" intro on a particularly hilarious Seinfeld episode. I couldn't resist.

"Last Year I went fishing with Salvador Dali. He was using a dotted line. He caught every other fish" Steven Wright