I took a day off from cell phones, email, product roadmaps, developers, marketing, strategic partners, and other distractions yesterday, and did some fishing. Coastal flats fishing, is what I think it is - two feet of water, live & cut bait, 360 rods with lines bisecting every point of the compass, and lots of scanning rod tips for bendy, bouncy behaviour. I caught the first one, Kramer caught the last one, I threw in the towel after six hours, two (!only two!) beers, and a ham sammich. Man, was I whipped. One year ago, I spent two days of the week generally outdoors doing stuff and being no worse for the wear than just normally pooped. Six hours in the sun and on the water yesterday had me dog-tired and weak as a kitten. I need to get out more.

You should have seen the two that got away.
Alt. caption: What am I going to do with all this fish in my freezer?

A cool part of the day was the guide - Reel’n Ron. A crusty old salt who knew exactly when and where to be to limit out. Some other dudes were in his favorite spot when we got there - they caught nothing that we could see. When they left, we moved in and cleaned up. Every bit of line we wet was done in about an acre, too…that’s some good guiding…once we got to where we were going, we could have paddled for six hours and covered the area we needed to cover. Kind of funny, that.

The only downside is the long haul to get there and back, especially the back part - left before sunrise and got back after sundown. Two hours of interstate, though, ain’t that hard, even with six hours in the sun. Kramer makes it easy by indulging my iPod singalong. His ears have probably stopped bleeding by now. Still, I think the best plan would be a crappy motel room with a hot shower and a bed for a nap and then an evening amongst the natives at their native watering holes. There’s something about littorals that I enjoy. Someone once wrote about the folks who inhabit the shores of large bodies of water full-time, something to do with the fact that right here at the beach is where they had to stop running, so they’re always kind of agitated and slightly, lightly, crazy. I’m not talking about the Richie Rich’s with their yachts and condos and shoddily-constructed McMansions…it’s the regular every-day folks who roll in and out, and are regularly refreshed, who are forced to finally either adapt to life amongst humans, or grow gills to keep going. I concur with those long-lost sentiments.

The hamburger described by Kramer was killer, and the sweet oddness of getting it at a full-on Mexican taqueria, in a fishing village just, put a little ! on the day.

This Amazon MP3 dealio is not necessarily a good thing for me.

Eternity Road [...] which about 300 persons per day visit.

In a country that will send out it’s children to a desert ghost town so they can drink bleach and burn themselves on hot stoves, and record it all on film, and then show it to a rapt nation so they can sell soap — I think 300 per day is a damn fine achievement for a place like Eternity Road. At least, that’s the way I look at it.

I’m not wrong about this one. Our kids shouldn’t be teevee disaster fodder, yet this is where we are. Francis Poretto shouldn’t despair for readers, yet this is where we are. What now?

This is a representative of the United States government:

I don’t get out much - mostly poker- or business-driven, though, when I do, and I’ve never seen anybody dressed like that. That outfit’s just bizarre — choker-chain with a dangly ivory-inlay iron cross, red leather(?) diagonal-zip jacket with gigantic collar and lapels, hair full of Vitalis. My only possible non-insane explanation is that her boyfriend drove her across town on the back of his motorcycle without a helmet, in the rain, and then someone awarded her a nice medal when she walked through the door and into a microphone.

Via Vanderleun, a worldly gentleman nonplussed mainly by her viscously-tamed hair.

Reloading

A simple, well-written, step-by-step guide for the absolute beginner reloader.

Annals of National Security: Shifting Targets: Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker

Sy Hersh makes his 540th prediction this century that we’re mere moments from attacking Iran.

This jerkoff keeps getting paid to put the same old bullshit out there over and over and over. And the usual suspects are drooling into their laptop keyboards over yet another Hersh prediction.

One day this fool will be right, but even then, he’ll be wrong.