rps

Something caused this thread to come up on my "unread content" list. Though it may be old, I believe I have pertinent comments. Guides each have different ethics, beliefs and goals. Fair enough. I can only speak for myself, but I have always wanted guides who only picked up a rod to show me how. I have had guides that fished for themselves. I have even had guides who "fronted the boat" on me. I have not been comfortable with guides who fished to increase the take home. I remember only one exception in 60 years of fishing. I once took my father in law on a guided trip out of Gaston's. We were fishing for rainbows. He desperately wanted fish to take to the restaurant to have them prepare for our families. He was not a fisherman. The guide helped me make him happy. As for spots, let them grow. They don't hurt the fish base, they give thrills to many (ever caught a 3.5 spot?), they help make meanmouths, and are the most approachable to novices. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Bayless has a pepper belly, so you can reduce the heat to your taste. https://www.rickbayless.com/recipe/grilled-swordfish-with-molcajete-salsa/

Rick Bayless is one of the experts on Mexican cooking. Look at this. https://www.rickbayless.com/recipe/classic-ensenada-fish-tacos/

Wednesday evening.

Nowhere else to put this, other than stories, and this is too short for that. I just got home from a Celebration of Life for a dear rugby friend, Jim Redding. Former teammates, kids he coached, even players from teams against which he played came, many of them from out of town or country. Almost everyone wore rugby jerseys or Hawaiian shirts similar to the ones he favored. The function started at 4:00 at the Blue Turtle Tavern, and every civilian who entered turned around and left. Maybe they were afraid of a bar full of ruggers. We passed around his ashes and took pictures of us rugby hugging them. Jim left instructions to put his ashes in a Wild Turkey bottle and throw the bottle in a ditch in Creek County. The Wild Turkey bottle was full, so it needed emptying. Sometime tomorrow, when the party survivors crawl out of bed, Jim will find his ditch. The club's foundation had purchased and tapped two kegs. Mexican food was laid out for buffet. At 5:30 I realized that if I did not leave then, I would need to call Nancy to pick me up at 2:00 AM. darn, I am getting old. Addendum: Earlier this evening, I wrote about the memorial for Jim Redding. I want to share a legend with you. Jim will live with us longer that way. One night, I think in the early 90's, Jim and friends exited a dance club on Peoria. Jim saw a person abusing a young lady across the way. Just being Jim he hurried over, grabbed the man and threw him aside. While he was helping the young lady up, the man knifed him. Part of his later in life gravel voice came from that knifing. He was in the hospital in serious condition for some days. The above is fact. What follows is legend. Rumor has it his companions that night made a citizen's arrest of the felon. Rumor has it, the police had to take him to the emergency room. Rumor has it he had broken leg. I don't know the real truth. I was not there. There is a line in John Ford's The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. "When the legend becomes fact, print the legend." We all need each other. We all miss someone. We all need support at one time or another.

Nice fish! Are you using part of a senko as a trailer?

Bravo! Bravo! Author!

At least on Polaroid it isn't out on the web immediately. There is time to kill the person who has the picture.

Eggplant Parmesan.

Been gone from that area for five years, but Ulrich in west Branson always did right by me.

We did a dinner party last weekend. My wife had a birthday. She told me it was her 49th. I think she fudged. We had chicken breast roll ups (roulade). The filling is prosciutto, chive cream cheese, and spinach. We had one roll leftover. Tonight I served it as part of a composed salad.

In the movie Gladiator, there is a scene at the end where Juba, the black gladiator, buries the totems Maximus carried. His words become a mantra for we mature people. "Not yet. Not yet."

I am fine. I am merely posting some things I have written. I found that one of the most effective ways to teach was to write on the same topics I assigned at the same time the student were writing. I just thought someone should read these. EDIT: This was actually written at a teacher workshop somewhere around 2003 or 2004. The instructor was teaching us how to teach writing. As an exercise, she told us to write where we were on the 11th. I scrawled the above. When we were done, she randomly read some aloud. She would read and then discuss where we could use our own writing to teach good and bad. Mine was one she picked. Before she read it she remarked it was too short. She read it. Without a word she walked over to me, handed it to me, and said "Keep that."

It Ain’t All Mary Poppins I want to tell you a story. I will tell my version of the truth. You decide what to believe. For generations, women on my mother’s side of my family have been a bit “t’ched” in the head. Different generations have acted this out differently, but at least one of each generation showed it. Some more, some less. My sister Amanda followed the family trait early and strongly. A childhood baton became a sword. The neighborhood angered her at their peril. In her early teens, we spent eighteen months subject to her obsessive-compulsive behavior. When she entered or exited a room she had to touch and slap the door frame several times. In those days, parents put on brave faces and carried on. Then, one day, the behavior disappeared as quickly as it manifested. No one, not even my father who loved her, understood her, or knew what she was or would be. In her later teens she joined a group of devout Christian teens. We withstood withering pronouncements on why coffee and coke were our escorts to hell. As an adult, Bertie Roberts, another of the group, became my friend and a respected colleague. My sister renounced her. At the same time, Amanda grew to become a beautiful young woman. She turned heads. Amanda persuaded my father to let her go to Oral Roberts University. He paid the first year’s tuition. Before Christmas she brought her smitten boyfriend to meet father and announced they would be married. My father asked them how they would survive. My sister assured him the Lord would provide. Not many months later, my father began to introduce himself as the Lord. The marriage and her quick pregnancy were the start for her “career.” Jim, her husband, dropped out of school and became a tradesman. Amanda set about becoming a member of Junior League, but with no money. Heaven on earth went to hell instead. In her lifetime, my dear sister killed 22 cars. Some died in crashes, others died in repossession. My father and I each had to have one towed. We also bought tires and gas. The first car died when Amanda drove it into the Arkansas River while trying to run over her husband. They divorced not long after that. Another died in a crash with a fire engine while deciding who had right of way. My friend, my groomsman, Joe Clark offered to represent her on that wreck and managed to arrange a settlement that supported her for several months. He created a monster. Thereafter, every wreck, and there were several, was grounds for a new lawsuit. One crash caused my mother to call me. Enraged, my sister had aimed her car at mother and father’s house in the country and put the pedal to the metal. Thankfully for them, an oak intervened. I went out to their house and found my sister with a well busted face. I asked my mother why she had not taken my sister to the emergency room. She told me she just could not. I found out why when I took her. After they took her behind the curtains, sometime later an important looking staff member came out and asked me what role I had in her injuries. I had to tell the story twice before I was allowed to leave. My sister married a second time. Harold had played football at Tulsa University. He did not start but was very large and very genial. He, too, became smitten. About six months after they married, he called me from the Broken Arrow jail. He was on hold for the Tulsa Police on charges of assault with a deadly weapon. When I arrived, he was heavily bandaged on his left thigh. I asked and found out he had been shot. When I asked him to tell me what had happened, I found out they had quarreled, and Amanda had taken his pistol from the drawer and shot at him. When the police arrived, she told them Harold had tried to kill her and she merely defended herself. The Tulsa County assistant district attorney and I agreed the charge should not go to trial. Harold filed for divorce the next week. Some years later, Harold delivered a Mazzio’s pizza to the house and would not let my daughters tip him. When I got home, I had to explain why. It was about then when Joe Clark and I talked about what to do about her. He opined she was like a really good looking, used car you would not recommend to a friend. One day, Steve, a high school classmate of Joe and me called. Steve had an interesting, but checkered, past. When young, Steve’s father had challenged him. If Steve reached 18 without drinking or sex, his father promised him a princely sum, provided he could pass a lie detector test. You cannot make this stuff up. Steve passed, but from that point after, no person in a skirt was safe. When Steve called, his first words were, “Randy you have to do something!” I asked him what he was talking about. “It’s your sister!” Confused I asked him if Danni, my other sister, had had a falling out with Mary Roma, his sister. He said, “No. It’s your other sister!” I asked him what had happened. He told me he had met Amanda at a local night spot. I asked, “And?” He admitted he had taken her home. I said, “No. Tell me you didn’t.” Defensively, he said, “She wanted to.” “Steve, if you had asked, I would have warned you away. What’s happening?” “She slashed my tires and keyed my car! I had to file charges and a restraining order.” I told him I forgave him and felt sorry for him, hung up, and called the same assistant DA. We agreed these charges also did not need prosecution. With her first husband, Amanda had a daughter. Early on, my mother became the grandmother refuge. She and father fed her, clothed her, and taught her manners. My sister began to quarrel with mother over the way mother was raising “her” child. One morning we discovered Amanda had moved to San Antonio with her daughter without telling anyone. Amanda was there nearly a year. She would call several times a month and ask Father or me for food money. Mother finally convinced us to stop sending money. She was right. Within a month Amanda was back in town. Amanda’s jobs lasted no longer than her marriages. One boss wanted her to commit a crime. The next tried to get sex. On and on it went. She never made it to the end of a lease. After served with a notice, she packed in black plastic trash bags and moved. She dragged her daughter from one school to the next. And, every time, the landlord called me to try to collect the money from me. Amanda always listed me as responsible for the rent. My other sister, Danni, and I finally developed a strategy for Genny’s benefit. For 8th grade, we enrolled her at Monte Cassino and paid the tuition, bought the uniforms, and paid for lunches. The school appealed to Amanda’s sense of upper class. My mother arranged for the girl to eat breakfast with the nuns as well. To us, it meant she went to school the same place all year long, every year, regardless of evictions, and she got fed at least twice a day. Shortly after that, Amanda was caught with a forged prescription. I went to see the district attorney and asked him to please prosecute. He declined. He said it would kill my father. When Amanda’s daughter, Genny, married Woodley, the wedding was set in a small West Texas church. My wife and my daughters drove down to attend. My other sister and her husband did as well. It was a small, humble, strongly evangelical, and strait-laced church and congregation. As the ceremony began, Genny’s father, the assassination survivor, began to walk her down the aisle. Amanda erupted, stormed from the pews, and attacked him, claws and all. Dan and I intervened. We managed to lock her in a room in the back. However, after nearly every line in the ceremony, the congregation listened to my sister’s “blessings” in full detail. In the late 90’s, a distant relative with many oil and gas interests died without heirs. My siblings and cousins all inherited small interests in his oil holdings. My sister, Amanda, sold hers immediately. Three days later, her daughter found her in her apartment. The dog was frantic, hungry, and needing to go out. The apartment was full of newly purchased clothes. Amanda was dead and cold. The Benadryl she drank had combined with meds she had taken. Her heart stopped beating. My daughters are neither ordinary nor within the middle range of normal. However, the family inheritance missed them. Thank God.

Saved in the 80’s My mother and father were well intentioned people who loved their children. They came from different backgrounds that had dysfunction in common. Father was raised as a poor depression child without a father. He escaped the lead and zinc mines on a football scholarship. His mother was upset when he left Commerce, Oklahoma as it left no one to take care of her. Mother was raised by an aunt and survived an alcoholic uncle who died by gunshot in front of her. Pretty and popular, her values were based on status and appearances. How they came to marry and survive as a couple is the stuff of another tale. After we three children were born, mother and father decided Christmas would be special for us and look like a Norman Rockwell painting. With no background on which to rely, they did the best they could. The holiday became a torture. I was nearly forty before I ever enjoyed Christmas. Before then, I always wondered why everyone else seemed to go crazy. The first Christmases I remember were spent in El Paso. For several years before I was ten, mother and father loaded us in the car and drove thirty hours across Texas and New Mexico to grandmother’s house. Aunts, uncles, cousins and others all arrived to play roles in a macabre drama. Grandmother directed the soap opera complete with confrontations, betrayals, excess drinking, and slammed doors. One Christmas, my present was twenty stitches from a thrown Christmas tree ornament. The next year my sisters and I received socks from grandmother while the cousins all were given toys. My father declared no more that year. After that we stayed home, and my parents tried to establish their own traditions. Mother read magazines and developed color themes for each holiday. Father became obsessed with the largest tree. The weeks before Christmas were studies in manic preparations. The night we decorated the tree became known as fight night. If the tree even fit in the house, father could never seem to set it up straight. One year he finally set an eyebolt in the ceiling and hung the tree. Mother insisted the ornaments graduate in size from the top down. The packages had to be artistically arranged. The fight wasn’t over until we stood in front of the tree for the annual picture. When I left home for college, I was sure Christmas was a synonym for self-delusional hell. After I married and our children reached the age they would look forward to Christmas, my attitude began to change. By then I had a stocking that said Bah Humbug, but I at least had a stocking. I watched Nancy buy paper and ribbon at after Christmas sales to save it for the next year. I began to attend the Nutcracker each year to watch my daughters be mice. Finally, one year as Nancy came to bed at three in the morning Christmas Eve, I realized something. Christmas is the time of the year when people go out of their way to show they love you. I was forced to admit I needed to stop keeping myself from enjoying Christmas. I still hate Christmas carols in elevators, especially before Thanksgiving, but on Christmas morning every year I’m happy. I always get the same present and that’s just fine with me.

September 2001 On the 11th, I was in Texas to visit my father. He was in a nursing home and could not recognize me. Still, I visited when I could. That night I laid awake and tried to digest the horror which overlaid an already bittersweet trip. As I finally fell asleep, I realized my father was lucky. He had a reason not to recognize the world.

Mother’s Dirty Joke Number Two A man walks into a bar and orders a whisky. The bartender pours him two fingers and slides the popcorn basket next to the drink. He picks up the bill on the bar and turns to the register. A moment later he returns and places the change in front of the customer. As he begins to turn away, the customer speaks. “Say, I’m new in town. What can I find for entertainment around here?” Immediately on his guard, the bartender faces the man and looks him over. “What kind of entertainment would you be seeking?” “Oh nothing like that tone of voice. I mean music, maybe dancing. Something besides a CD list, you know?” The bartender relaxes noticeably. He shrugs his shoulders and tilts his head for a moment. Then he answers. “Well, it is Monday. You can see how slow it is here. All the joints in this area are Thursday, Friday, and Saturday for live shows. Not much choice, unless you’re willing to take the train into town.” “Nah. I don’t want to take the train in. I just wanted a few drinks and something besides radio music. Enough days on the road and even live classical would sound good.” The bartender eyes him again. Finally, looking as if he’s made a decision, the bartender bends over and reaches under the bar. First he pulls out a miniature baby grand piano with both hands. He places the black lacquered instrument on the bar. Next comes a stool. On the third reach, he places a foot tall musician in white tie and tails on the bar. The small man has long blond hair and that unmistakable attitude you see at the concert hall. The man walks to his instrument, flips his tails, and sits. After a pregnant pause, he reaches to the keyboard and begins. For ninety minutes the most beautiful piano works come forth. Chopin, Debussey, and Mozart flow. Between pieces the bartender refills the customer’s glass and when no other customers come in, the bartender joins him for a jar. At the conclusion of the concert, the customer is on his feet, clapping and repeating bravos. He turns to the bartender. “Wherever did you find him? He’s magnificent. ” Before answering, the bartender places the instrument, the stool, and the musician back under the bar. He puts both hands on the bar and ruefully begins. “I didn’t find him. I won him.” “Won him?” “Yeah. You see, one day I was over by the park, on the way back from visiting a friend. The rain finally stopped, and there it was, the grandest rainbow you ever saw. I couldn’t help myself. I turned and headed for where the rainbow ended. As I got closer I hunkered down and walked real quiet. Me and Paddy had downed a few, but I was still fine for sneaking. Finally I peeked over a hill, and there he was.” “Now, I can tell from the look on your face you don’t believe me, but I swear the little green man was dancing there at the end of the rainbow. I remembered all the things I heard while I was growing up. I decided then and there to try and catch the man.” “You found a leprechaun?” “Isn’t that what I’m saying? I found him alright. I got down on my belly and slithered real slow towards him. After a while he danced near enough to reach. I jumped him, and then it began. He may have been no bigger than my piano player, but he was strong. Stronger than anyone I’ve wrestled since I was a schoolboy. We tore up the ground in the park, digging up rocks the size of refrigerators and rerouting the brook and all. I was a grand match. Finally, I tried a throw. When it worked, and he went down, I could not believe my eyes. He burst into tears. He looked up at me and says with a brogue, ‘Now I suppose you’ll be wanting my gold?’ I told him ‘Why sure, I would’ and then he fooled me.” “Fooled you?” The customers question came as if on cue. “He made me an offer. He told me he would grant whatever wish I might have, if only he could keep his gold. At first I turned him down. It seemed a powerful lot of gold. But then he kept making suggestions about what I could wish for. They got wilder and wilder. It finally dawned on me he meant it when he said anything. That was my mistake. I got to thinking. After a while, I told him I’d take his deal. We shook on it, and I told him what I wanted. I just wish he hadn’t been so old.” “Old?” “Why sure. He must have been mostly deaf. You don’t think I asked for a 12 inch pianist, do you?” The customer reaches into his pocket, peels three twenties, throws them on the bar, turns, and walks out without a word.

Mother’s Dirty Joke Number One After a long career abroad, Father Mulcahey was recalled to Ireland by his order. He left the mission in Africa with sadness, but obediently reported to his Bishop for a new assignment. “Francis, you have served the order well, and we feel the time has come to reward you with an assignment closer to your home.” “Ah, well, hardly anyone even remembers me there now that mum and sis are gone. What is it you would have me do?” “Francis, we need you to handle a delicate teaching position. You know we revived Saint Anne’s as an inner-city girl’s school, correct?” The white haired priest nodded but tried to keep any surprise from his face. “Then you also know that we are trying to use “old school” ways to fight off the influences of all this modern culture?” Francis nodded once more. “We think that you, with your experience, are well suited to teach at Saint Anne’s and to serve as assistant headmaster. We would like for you to start with this fall’s term. Will you accept the posting?” “Of course, your Excellency. What will I be teaching?” “Please, Francis, my name is John. We would like for you to teach life and earth sciences. You are obviously qualified in those areas, and I think you can do the girls some good.” “As you desire, your Excellency.” *** On the first day of classes, Father Mulcahey braced himself and briskly strode into the first hour class. There he found a sea of curious faces waiting to see their new old school priest. All were clad in Peter Pan collar blouses, plaid skirts, and Mary Janes. Still, Father Mulcahey knew no one would mistake this lot for the girls of his youth. One girl had what looked like an Insane Clown Posse t shirt peeking from under her blouse. Another had ears that looked as if the piercing machine were an automatic weapon. On a third, Father Mulcahey thought the green hair was a mistake with the red and blue plaid. Placing his notes and text on the lectern, he referred to his seating chart and began immediately. “Mary Margret, please stand up.” Four young women stood. “No, just the first one on the left.” Three sat. “Mary Margaret, what part of the human anatomy, when exposed to the correct stimulus, will expand seven times?” The young lady first looked stricken. Then Father Mulcahey noticed a blush begin to creep up from her collar. Soon her face was suffused in red, and she looked down. Father Mulcahey feared he even heard a stifled giggle. Father Mulcahey quickly decided he did not want her to answer. “Mary Margaret, please sit down. Ann Marie, please stand up.” The freckle faced lass with green hair stood up. “Tell us, Ann Marie, what part of the human anatomy, when exposed to the correct stimulus, will expand seven times?” Beaming at the priest, the young woman gestured with her finger as she answered. “Why Father, that would be the pupil of the human eye.” “Very good, Ann Marie. Please sit down. Mary Margaret, please stand back up.” The original victim hesitantly rose. “Mary Margaret, I have but three things to say to you. First, you didn’t do the reading. Second, you have a dirty mind. And last, you are in for a life of bitter disappointment.”

Why I Read Someone asked why I read so much. “I like it,” seemed so inadequate. Why I can’t think of the clever answers when asked is beyond me. Later I wrote what I wish I had said. I own a record mile, earned on fire scarred feet. I climbed Anna Purna in Tibet and used maggots to clean the frostbite. Newspaper in hand, Ernest and I made the run with the bulls in Pamplona. One night, dressed as a ham, I ran from Tom Ewell’s knife into Boo Radley’s safe arms. Jules flew me across Europe in a hot air balloon after Sam took me down the Mississippi on a raft. Jules also took me to the moon, but I’ve been there in five different centuries by twice that many ways. I’ve become an ace in Spads, Hellcats, F14s, Tie fighters, and on dragon back. I crashed in China once, but to a hero’s welcome. I’ve gone to war in many uniforms, from khaki in the Khyber Pass to kimonos in Kyoto. I’ve worn Union blue, Confederate gray, and cavalry gold. I’ve been so covered in sand or mud that no one could tell what color the uniform was. I’ve fired flintlocks on the Indian frontier, muskets many times, M1’s in Korea, M16’s in Viet Nam, and needlers, blasters, and lasers throughout the galaxy. The worst was Moscow. Both times. On Mars I sang of the Green Hills of Earth. On Dune I smelled the spice and saw the Maker. Dwarves have befriended me, and I’ve toasted in elvish. I’ve seen planet rings that make Saturn’s look cheap and spelunked in ice caves greater than Carlsbad’s caverns. Part of a brotherhood, I quested for the grail, the ring, and the wizard. I have so many friends I cannot name them. They talk to me, sing to me, bark, whinny, and flare. They come to my aid. They give me words, ideas, or hope, as needed. They even play tricks upon me. Merlin comes disguised as Dumbledore, while Horatio is even more clever. She shows up as Honor Harrington.

Catching up.

I had not thought to try that at the lower end of the lake. I do know that from the Beaver dam down as far as Eagle Rock current makes a difference, especially when both are releasing water. On a related note, the releases also affect water temp in the upper end.

All of you need to appreciate something. The attached picture is mine. I took it to show off pot roast. It was the second picture posted on this thread. Compare the quality of the photo to the last ten pages. Presentation and photography on the thread is now amazing. Good on all of you!

Bravo! Bravo! Author!

classic picnic indoors