Tying desks - 1996 to present

A decade of tying desks...same concept, improved lighting.

1995 - Graduated from college, got an apartment in Duluth, MN and fished as I pleased.
Lake Superior Steelhead and North Shore Brook Trout. Not much $ for tying materials though.

1996 - This was an apartment in New Brighton, MN...a tying season in transition. I didn't spend much time here.

1997 - The pinnacle of my fishing career. A bed, stove, sink, shower and tying desk...I fished my ass off as a bachelor.

2001- Notice the sweet desk that my Bro K made me. This is the dining room in our old apartment...I'm not sure this would be tolerated now.

2003 - checkout the multi-drawered desk top addition that my Bro K added to my set-up (disregard the striped pillow case chair cushion in the Capt's Chair...sooo classy).

2005 - this set-up remains the current state of things only I've had 3 years to fill the concrete seams with fly lint.

More History from the "archives"...

These are a few shots of yours truly back in the formative years...
(Hell, what am I saying, these are still the formative years)


Circa early 90's

Circa mid 90's

Sketches etc

I was digging through the basement the other day and came across some sketches...
I'm putting them up because I can.

Stripahs

I made it back out tonight. After a whorl wind tour of Maine, including the town of Machias (where I was told by an employee of one of the local blueberry harvesters that they pick 1,000,000 lbs of WILD blueberries each year!) I fished the mouth of an unnamed (not really unnamed) river on the falling tide and managed 4 stripahs. That makes my lifetime total - 5. The olive and white clouser on an across and down swing got their attention...ever fished for steelhead? Yeah, like that. Fantastic.

Stripers!

I flew into Boston this morning and drove to Maine. I had a tip on a beach so I went.
I bagged my first striper...a "schoolie" technically. I'm pumped. Now I want a bigger one.

Daughter 1

I was talking to somebody the other day who asked me if I was planning to have any more children, and if I wished that I had a son, to "you know take fly fishing and stuff".
Wait until I tell this kid that she can't go fly fishing because she's a girl. She's gonna be pissed.

She's 4...err...I mean 4 1/2

The change....

Anthropologists taught me in college about the process of man's evolution into the high and mighty civilized dickheads we now claim to be, included a change from hunter/gatherer to an agrarian society and from there into the industrial age etc. etc.

For better or for worse I've decided to invent a new society based primarily on fly fishing and gardening. This new societal model requires a fly-rod, an approving wife, some seeds, 10 yards of horse shit and water. (If you ever decide to join me in this societal structure, you will soon realize how important your horse shit and water are.) Although the fly fishing is commonly catch & release and does not provide any nutritional sustenance, the tomato seeds do. AND, with the price of a tomato averaging $43 a pound...I can now afford to drive to my favorite fishing spots (guilt free). I like to think about this and grin while I'm eating a tomato sandwich.

So you've seen the pictures of the fly fishing, here now is the gardening.

Last Weekend...

I took off last Saturday at 5 pm and headed to the big "W". Joining me were Jon Johnson, tent, sleeping bag, 7 & 8 wt + a cooler with a sixer of Sam Adams and viddles that didn't require preparing.
I found smallies on the way down to a nice campsite on a stretch of sand that everybody else decided was too close to the boat landing (1/2 mile). Camp was set and there remained just enough light to make me feel guilty for not being out slinging line. So I did. I found a sand shelf that ran on the backside of "my" island. It ran for 100 yards and flowed from 6 inches deep to the shelf where it promptly dropped off to a whopping 12 inches deep. Nevertheless, 2 smallies and a white bass chose this break as their hunting grounds for the night and couldn't allow the BHD to swim by unmolested.
Herring, summer sausage, string cheese, crackers and a handful of mini chocolate chip cookies was all it took to get me zipped into my tent for 30 minutes of reading before I dozed off on top of the sleeping bag in a temperature range that has been described by others as "perfect sleeping weather". At 1:20 am I slid out of the tent, pissed in the sand and decided that the inside of my sleeping bag deserved further exploration. The temp had dropped to cool. 4:20 am my cell phone rang and JP announced that he was leaving town and would be at the boat launch in 1 hour.
Brewing coffee and dismantling camp followed by a very very shallow water run the 1/2 mile to the boat launch took me a little longer than I suspected it would. JP was waiting on the dock, gear and fresh coffee (for both of us) in hand.
After all was said and done, we landed some decent fish (decent, not big) and learned that 40,000 cfs on a river that usually runs 5,000, changes the locations of your secret spots. I concluded that the SMB's on the "W" like BHD's as much as they do anywhere else. And finally, when you are a 36 year old father of two and you get a night on the river by yourself you could give a shit about things that go bump in the night...because the only things that go bump in the night that have any consequence for you now are at home sleeping in their small beds and Mom's in charge.

I'm going to sell this shot to a religious printing company and bet they make it the cover shot for there next tract, but not before superimposing the words "Jesus is coming" in bold red font over the clouds.

Home...briefly.


JP with a standard issue SMB

Morel Majority

Uncle T aka String Leech and his wife Auntie K were kind enough to send the fam a big ol' bag o' morels. Luckily my wife knows how to follow instructions (graciously provided by the shroom duo) and can cook. So I topped a t-bone with a pile of them and concluded that the t-bone was a handy platform for reducing the distance between the morels and my mouth...friggin taste-teee. Thank you to all of you who allowed me to do nothing and still get the goodness.