It was an involuntary wince when I felt the resistance to my pulling an armload of fishing tackle from the back of the rig. Instinctively I’d bowed like a tarpon angler whose seen his quarry come airborne on a taut line, yet the crack of rod tip impacting something in the bed as it released lacked the rattle of broken –  yet sounded violent enough to trigger a burst of self loathing and profanity.

Only a dental visit makes an angler more repentant … a dangling fly and momentary sloth meeting something damp, oversized and heavy, with a prized rod thrust into Harm’s way and an armload of supplies making its peril invisible.

I got lucky, the overly loud snap of tippet and accompanying violent reverb off the truck bed merely disrobed half a snake guide of thread, and altered the tip top from spherical into ellipse.

… which didn’t slow my swearing any, just made the muttered epithets blanket North America, rather than the World at large…

After a year reacquainting myself with fiberglass, and my renewed pleasure causing me to move numerous rods from the back of the pile to the front, I could scarce afford to start trimming their number with carelessness.

Especially since I’d made the mistake of cracking a catalog and asking myself, “what’s the latest generation of glass going for?”

A house payment, Natch … silly question.

… and whether it’s got a couple of vowels or simply a consonant preceding “glass, “ it’s alternatingly a sharp intake of breath or a headshaking giggle.

After viewing a couple of contemporary catalogs, I figured the “S” meant “Super” or “Superlative” – yet just as quickly changed to – “Stupid”, “Simple” or possibly its owner merely a “Spendthrift”.

“Sudden Chastity” being part of the Mean Old Guy mantra, as we knew a good rod lasts a lifetime and saved the old gear, only occasionally upgrading our tackle with more fashionable contemporary fodder. Naturally, once heeled we feel free to comment on others and how their manhood comes cheap …

Yet from my Ivory pedestal, as I attempted to straighten what was now a damning ellipse, I realized its source was just as damning, as this was proof of my Urban Urchin youth, the unloved pristine Fenwick Feralite, Model FF807, that I’d spied in a curbside dumpster along with a worn Mad Magazine (Issue #50).

The gay colors of the comic book cover had me teetering precariously on the lip of the dirty container, brushing aside rancid can goods, broken lathe and plaster, and with comic in one hand, spying the cork grip of someone’s failed attempt at Gentile …

I ignored the angry screams from the second floor, figuring the same spinster was likely the cause of the rod owner’s premature death, and he wouldn’t mind my repurposing his tackle – nor my thumbing nose at his spouse.

Now some thirty years distant (and suddenly blushing from snooty commentary), I find this rod proof that I was never “to the manor born” – rather I was an ardent gutter snipe angler intent on killing stuff smaller than me.

… which is why I prefer sub-hundred dollar glass from eBay, and never turn up my nose at the creek’s bountiful offerings, including bullet riddled teapots and free shorts.

… and here I was thinking the Jigglicious video was the penultimate found thing …