Category Archives: fly fishing humor

Christmas shopping guide for the Fly Fishing Widow

You’ve survived another long and tiresome year as spouse of an ardent fly fisherman, and while a great many promises were made, most were followed by profuse apologies and much hand wringing, and none were kept …

… and now rather than raking leaves like you asked, he’s expecting you to wait table as his fishing pals help themselves to all the good liquor and your baked goods, while putting their big feet up on your upholstery.

Not cracking the whip last Spring was cause for the suffering you endured last year, and rather than begin anew it’s time the big lout gets his fillings rattled a few times – delivered in that special way that mocks both him and his craft.

whiting_grizzly_saddleAt left is a Whiting Saddle Hackle – these are special bird skins raised for fishing that your husband purchased for tying his flies. He owns many more that he’s hidden from you, mostly so you would not connect them to the large credit card bill he always lectures you about.

Gather up anything with a Whiting label and tuck them away in a shopping bag.

Go treat yourself to a new hairdo from somewhere that sounds French, really expensive. or both. While the nice lady is making suggestions about cut you need, show her the contents of your shopping bag and ask could she put two or three dozen of the longest feathers into your hair as hair extensions. Offer to sell the rest to her for a manicure and pedicure.

iphone_cover

At right is one of those silly “trout skin” iPhone covers your husband insists he really wants for Christmas.

They’re much too expensive, but the size makes a great stocking stuffer, and while he won’t admit it to anyone, the both of you know its more trout than he catches in a year.

No doubt he wants it to look masculine while ordering his, “ iced, half-caf, whipped Mocha Latte, with the chocolate swirly” – but this once you may consider honoring his wishes – by soaking the case in vegetable oil for a couple weeks …

Akin to tucking away a football, he’ll quickly learn not to answer his phone in “Hero” mode, one-handed – given his streamside inability to juggle slippery trout for the camera – and an expensive greased 4s over pavement.

Then there’s the “once in a lifetime” trip that he wants to do more than once.

Last year it was the Seychelles, you suffered mosquitoes and the unwanted attentions of all those unemployed guides lounging around the verandah.

He returned sunburnt and a hero each evening – then drank too much with all his new-found pals and had to be poured into the sack for tomorrow’s early start.

“Togetherness” was what he promised, which you endured while holding his head out of the toilet.

This time hand him a French-English dictionary and when he looks puzzled, remark that once he’s conversational he can think about Martinique, St. Barthelemy, or one of many French colonies for Bonefish, Tarpon, or Tigerfish – and omit details of the bed and breakfast you’re booking in the upper Champagne district.

An angler suddenly faced with the reality that your not changing planes in Paris – rather you’ve booked weeks of endlessly romantic wineries, old churches, and antique stores to visit, will be brought to heel in a manner most befitting.

As the rods fall from his nerveless fingers and he begins to curl into a fetal ball on the tarmac, remind him that you’re tired of reminding him about the lawn each weekend, and if he asks nicely … then maybe …

Us fly fishermen have never quibbled about certain labels

There’s nothing better than Science that fits a puzzle piece exactly into an odd shaped void of unexplained phenomenon, making our lives that much more meaningful …

“This is the first study to establish a direct relationship between fish consumption, brain structure and Alzheimer’s risk," said Cyrus Raji, M.D., Ph.D., from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. "The results showed that people who consumed baked or broiled fish at least one time per week had better preservation of gray matter volume on MRI in brain areas at risk for Alzheimer’s disease."

– via Medicalxpress.com

… giving both us and society one more reason not to limit our kill and farm our limit, and at the same instant neatly explaining why fishermen can’t abide the taste of their quarry, why we’re all destined to have our backsides wiped for us by some truculent male-nurse named “Bruno” …

While embracing Science with both feet, Fly Fishermen have never considered “smartness” of much value, preferring hands unsoiled by bait and pants legs clean of evidence – proof of their pedigree and breeding, never relying on mundane tests like ink blots and Mensa membership.

Guys that stand in cold water are “sturdy”, men that hike miles upstream for small wild fish are “antisocial”. In hindsight, “smart” is the guy that turned us down or had to mow lawn – and while we called him “limpdix” or “wimp” on the way up the hill, on the way back he had bested us morally and physically.

Before you rip into that double Mercury with Cheese, I should point out the asterisks that ensure all the fish death caused by science will be both wasted and pointless …

Eating fried fish, on the other hand, was not shown to increase brain volume or protect against cognitive decline.

Meaning anything made from fish that tastes really stunning or like McDonald’s cardboard will not help you at all, and depending on the source of your new found protein – the chances of you dying of Mercury poisoning or ingesting a tampon are almost certain.

A couple of snorts might make the price of a Sage One more palatable

That left boot full of icy water suggested that my, “It’s fixed!” was a bit premature – and my great idea on how to wake enormous and lethargic fish before Winter’s chill struck appeared to be just as porous …

snakelike_object

Coming from the far side of the siphon pool last week, I’d seen an enormous Pikeminnow and a few large smallmouth at the deep end. Knowing that the biggest Pikeminnow always respond to big bait, I figured to wiggle some ersatz wormlike object through that pool slowly – hoping the bass might inhale the bait as it went by …

… mostly because as the water grows colder most bass stop chasing food, preferring to husband the calories and let the bait come to them. Pikeminnow don’t seem to care about water temperature, which ensures their continued dominance of the food chain, and like them whichever proved hungry would be fine by me.

But I’d missed my chance, and releases from the dam combined with morning’s chill makes the water colder and put a cork in the bass fishing. Even Little Meat opted to wait on the bank instead of treading water nearby.

foodClub1

I caught quite a few smaller fish on a variety of small nymphs, but after sloshing around the creek for a couple hours, the sun’s warmth proved a bigger draw and I opted for the high ground …

“High” being entirely prophetic given the sudden resurgence of “huffing” and the constant reminder that kids and their brain cells are on divergent paths.

Love that Easy Off!

It was no different for our generations other than we had a bit more self respect, opting for aged model glue or teasing nitrous from the whipped cream cans instead of huffing a 12-pack of oven cleaner.

Most of the time it ended badly, with some dimwit flooding both sinuses with pressurized dairy products, but we had respect for the woods and policed our empties, versus leaving them scattered as evidence of our misdeeds.

If memory serves I dropped model making and the dairy industry for fly tying, suggesting it may have been drug use that made brightly colored bits of feather and standing in the rain so appealing …

What’s your excuse?

Damn few called – and even fewer chosen

We’re never going to be confused with The Most Interesting Man In the World or the thousand dollar jam he’s pimping – but there is that special something that sets the Singlebarbed reader apart from mainstream fly fishing – or even your average serial ax murderer.

On stream or off, it’s that special flair that makes us human yet more so, in some indefinable way – larger than what surrounds us …

One of the Eberle clan

… the impossible lie for some, yet not to our readership – which sees the “possible” when others see naught but hardship or disaster.

Psychologists have a long winded term for it – and while I’ve forgotten most of the syllables other than “-complex” it’s sure to be flattering.

There are no boundaries to a fly tyer’s depravity

A box of Twinkies inhaled in a moment of weakness, $3.49 …

twinkie_golden_delicious

New sneakers that motivate “Fatty” to walk twice as fast to shuck unwanted flab, $65.00 …

Merrill "Felony Flyers" walking shoes

… an inattentive bird owner who puts a $4000 parrot with his ass hanging out the window …

A handful of Blue and Gold Macaw

 

Fly fishing upstaged by real guides and real guns

puttheroddown1 I warned you often enough, instead you listened to those lesser prophets who insisted girls would adore you for staring at their anatomy, now they think fisherman are all creeps, and have chosen hunting instead.

Legions of taut and bronzed, out of work, single-parent, womenfolk tasked with raising both flavors of offspring, newly interested in the out-of-doors and wilderness adventure, and can vote – and because of a couple out of control fishing websites – and your instinctive leer, they’re lost to us forever …

I’m not so sure I buy into the rationale for the sudden trend as published, with the economy teetering on the brink most parents will insist that food on the table pales in comparison to all else, especially where children are concerned, and a shotgun and a couple cases of ammo might be a better investment then gold, given how much easier it is to train in weapons, purchase some, and than take someone else’s doubloons at gunpoint …

Hunting implies dusty trucks, battered coolers, sharp knives, and guts; a oneness with your surroundings that only death and the controlled napalm that an aging GM heater can provide.

“Ma’am, I’m pretty sure you were low and away on that last shot, I believe you vaporized both his nuts. Rather than chase that high-pitched keening Wildebeest, who’s in obvious pain – and liable to be really pissed into those brambles – why don’t you and I retire to the truck for some hot coffee, while he bleeds to death in them bushes?”

Meanwhile you’re urging her to wade a bit deeper into cold water – and if she’s really patient and attentive she’ll get to remove a barbed hook from her icy and slimy quarry, while imbedding it into her wrist when it leaps to freedom …

With the main event being a guide lunch that someone stepped on, whose condiments are ageless, and meat unidentifiable …

All fly fishing can really offer in comparison is some sweaty handshake with a well intentioned,  “if you catch it you’d better let it go” admonition – which doesn’t put much food on the table, and a “OoO, wash your shoes as they might track nasty into the creek “ – which is what she told her kids, but they didn’t listen.

Both are suited to a nasal, high-pitched delivery which can be hampered by the intentness of our stare at Miss Bronzed & Heaving’s upper torso, who is pretty tired of our admiration, and would love punctuating our fantasy by ratcheting a live round into her newly oiled sidearm.

… which warms nicely when fired repeatedly …

I’ll finally get to know whether Great Blue Heron tastes like Chicken or not

Guy_Fawkes It was painful watching the Republican debates the other night, what with each candidate insisting they’d remove any regulations that slowed job growth. It appears our rivers and estuaries will be drilled like a root canal, most migratory species extincted, and a steady runoff of industrial waste and toxins into whatever you fish most …

… and all them students clapping merrily as if they’d heard profound for the first time …

Democrats aren’t any smarter and it’s liable to be a tough couple of decades if the pursuit of jobs and deregulation meets the Son of Global Warming.

While us fishermen mill about in disarray, given all our hard-fought environmental protections suddenly under scrutiny, and most of our conservationist bodies still fighting over felt soles and “who stepped in what” we might have to form our own clandestine “Occupy The Esopus” movement – with what remains of angling’s lunatic fringe …

Which aren’t as plentiful as they once were. Caring for the fish was overtaken by “caring more about your rakish figure in outdoor duds” – how the thousand dollar fly rod and the Cafe Mocha neutered most of our real outdoorsy types, them that lacked a full set of teeth or most of their frontal lobe – and thought like fish do. The rest of us didn’t help as we gave them the cold shoulder thinking they gave the rest of us a bad name.

“Old Timey Conservation” meant if you found 12 sticks of dynamite on the creekbed we might’ve drawn short straw for which dam to make porous, or showed some real ingenuity by making the casting club pond manager decide to lengthen the club’s ponds (with a bit of Fourth of July pyrotechnics) to accommodate a Spey class…

… but to merely give it back to the law, that’s a waste.

The damn environmental element isn’t mad enough yet to understand that what you tracked onto the kitchen linoleum with your contagion-bearing felt soles could soon be the least of your environmental worries.

Here’s hoping you all listened closely.

It is us spreading it, mostly it’s you doing the clicking

Deep down I couldn’t shake the feeling that with all its soiled nooks and crannies the Internet was somehow connected to the spread of plague …

How Didymo spreads You going to click the button?

It’s not the wading boots, Meathead, it’s the spread of broadband and the cell phone you can no longer do without that’s despoiling our watersheds …

Intent on looking up the correct spelling of “Paraleptophlebia” and that big “Download Now” button throbs fetchingly, and you get sucked in like a Carp for an Spicy Peanut boilie.

Naked women with big boxes of free flies simply don’t exist, even if the Internet claims otherwise …

It may be time for us old guys to face fly fishing’s new music

frenzied_sweetcorn I’m rethinking all the bustle and commotion over how we’re no longer practicing something our Poppa once did. How our doing without Twinkies and store-bought Latte makes today’s outdoors an expedition on par with Shackleton’s Voyage, extreme survival, mere fishing transformed into an adrenalin-fueled primeval.

Competition and adrenalin is what we truly crave, fishing is just a means of getting there …

Fishing lacks the broken bones and has no contact between anglers, no pads or face masks, and doesn’t look much better under the hot Klieg lights of television, with few saints and less demigods – and no one trading paint in the pit area…

But they may have a point.

My generation picked fishing so we could decompress from both family and work – preferring the solitude and silence the Great Outdoors offered to heal the soul so we could return to the Big City fit for another grueling tour.

Somehow the “Rest and Relaxation” became today’s competitive and arduous, compliments of youth-oriented marketing and a generation that measured their worth in how much they owe versus how much they bank.

But that’s merely sour grapes, given the ability to “unplug” is fast disappearing, complements of satellites and broadband, and “them as inherits” might have had the right idea about the woods all along…

Most of the Pristine is on its last legs and requires tackle that can ferret out those few remaining fish from super-deep or super-fast, neither of which fly fishing has been any good at …

… which may explain why 3/8 ounce jig heads are considered flies, given that this new fishing lets us bring guns to gun fights …

I think I’ll dispense with the closetful of high-tech fabrics, the illegal SWAT gear, and those hideously expensive fly rods, which will get us clear of the adrenalin junkies who insist matching the hatch involves base-jumping with Mayflies …

We can watch them plummet earthward while we rest easy in our lawn chair and reacquaint ourselves with inexpensive rods, cold beer, and the new bait fishing …

AintDaddiesBait

That ain’t anything your Daddy fished …

The new EXTREME bait fishing made so by enormous amounts of Soy and your propensity towards flatulence …

The only real difficulty will be humping that cooler down from the parking lot now that we’re done with all the deprivation and Mother Nature crap. Fabric-based solar panels will energize our civilized comforts that accompany us back to the creek. Cell phones and Microwaves, televised football blaring while we ignore the rod and reach for a double fistful of those Spicy Peanut numbers – followed by the White Chocolate.

Poppa never had it so good. Potted meat and soggy bread, branch water and a long hike upstream to get away from us truly comfortable and well-rested angling types …

Just the Feathers, Ma’am. You can cook or bury the rest

Even a muppet gets careless In traditional ass-biting fashion the Trout Underground  has done me “Short Cast” dirt, flinging our entire editorial staff me under a bus for the quick chuckle, not realizing that I would be horribly offended at the notion of any woman assaulted by a frozen furbearer.

“Road Kill” now somehow synonymous with the “Singlebarbed Experience,” versus our association with any of the finer elements of our sport; like finely honed titanium, polished nickel silver, or the fine micrometer taper of a weak-walled, hollow Asian grass, that when dried was flamed by craftsmen scared to inhale … as they weren’t Man enough to flex Carbon fiber …

conservationist … given that my worst offense would be breathing new life into something crushed, lifeless and a rapidly bloating eyesore – should’ve bought us martyrdom versus the “hyuk-hyuk” bull’s-eye on our rear. Making it doubly painful knowing those whose aberration includes running them over repeatedly until tender and eating the remnants are, “conservationists” instead of blogdom’s laughingstock.

‘I used to cut up dead animals to see their insides and when I did all I could see was fresh, organic meat …”

Burgeoning ax murderers from the sound of it, and my worst merely skinning it downwind of its former owner – without permission, and without last rights, naturally.

I figure living in that mansion on the hill, overlooking his personal trout stream – and knowing I was travelling lent him courage …