Fishing Trip

I finally got to go fishing this year. Mostly good weather, pretty good fishing (right up until the wind came up and wouldn't quit). It was just me and my dad. Seemed lonely without Scamp, but last summer it was lonely with him there--no energy. Scamp was the ultimate fishing dog in his prime; if we missed a bite, we could count on Scamp seeing it. Last summer, he just curled up and slept in the boat. May he rest in peace.

I drove the boat from the dock to an area covered in willows. Nearly ruined the propellor when the water shallowed more quickly than I was expecting, but I got her in all right. Weather was good for fishing that afternoon, but a pretty bad storm came up in the evening. Dad went out once more while I hiked around, but he came back pretty quickly when the thunder started up again. It was a wet, stormy night. However, this was an improvement over the last trip to Littlewood Reservoir. Then the wind blew all night, 30 mph with 50 mph gusts. Very annoying when you're in a tent.

Next morning, there was the pancake fiasco. I'm gluten-intolerant, so I insisted on being the one to bring the pancake mix, as I actually wanted to be able to eat pancakes. For some reason, Dad decided this meant that I would also bring a bowl to mix up said pancakes. Luckily, I had an extra 1-Liter water bottle and a pair of scissors. Then I realized that I had forgotten to bring any real maple syrup (non-real almost always contains caramel color, which is often made from wheat), so I put mandarin orange segements on my pancakes instead. By this time, my hands were freezing, so I stayed to take the camp down rather than going out fishing right away. I also practiced some taiji meditation and the short form. It's so nice to practice taiji outdoors!

I went out fishing again late midmorning, caught one, and then the wind came up and up and up... so we took the boat back and headed home. Which is where I made my fatal mistake. I asked my dad a question. In my family, we have a saying: "Don't ask Dad any questions, in case he tries to answer them." It seemed innocent enough. He seemed to be having trouble reading the road signs, so I asked him when he'd had his eyes checked last. I never got an answer to that. Instead, I got an off-and on diatribe about how his family and my mom were to blame for his eye trouble, and he had 'almost worked through what they'd done to him' so he might go get his eyes checked sometime soon. He also explained how his mother had been a "dysfuntional human being" and had tried to destroy his personality. (I didn't care for his mother/my grandmother, but I don't think she was quite as bad as my dad claims) I don't know where my dad gets his pseudo-psychiatric babble, but I really, really don't like listening to it. Especially not when I'm trapped in the cab of a pickup with him, and it's another hour until we get home.

On the bright side, it wasn't as bad as his outburst of last June... Remind me never, ever to ask him another question...