Coming in Hot..

  

My youngest granddaughter, Miss B, (who has CP) has a new ride! Thanks to the generosity of family and friends, and the expertise of Recumbent PDX, in Portland. My Sean said that thing really hauls and that she has crashed once already, from coming in too Hot. She and the bike are fine. She should get many years of good use out of it. Yay, Miss B!

Dad and Ol Ugly are on the road to Ideeho to go Salmon fishing with my brother.  Buzz and his wife drove down to pick them up Tuesday.  Hopefully, Dad will catch some salmon from Ol Ugly, and have a great Thanksgiving with that part of the family. 

I told Dad it might be wise to have the local padre up there bless that damn boat, before they put in, just to be on the safe side.

This is the first time I have not had Dad around other than a day or two in the last three years.  Willie and I  miss that ol coot already. No one needing this or that or ringing his Donger* for his daily coffee milkshake. It is feeling strange.

 *Donger (a cowbell with a handle)

  

 made by this Ideeho nephew.

In other news:

 I've renewed my CCW permit for another two years. That means I took the classes, got recertified, got interviewed by the detective, and paid all the outrageous class, city and state fees.  I agree with the necessity of vetting, I don't agree with the frequency, or the cost.

 My granddaughter Ali has invited me to be part of the party when she picks out her wedding dress this week. I am really looking forward to seeing the girls and taking part.

A cousin and I are going to hit the range for some trap time, as we both have new boomsticks.  He has moved back to Cali from Texas to take care of his dad.

I have been in Warrior Granny Yoga, with the other ol ladies, for a while now. And just the other day at the end of a long grueling circuit session, one lady (retired school teacher) laughingly said to me... "you are like the second grader that needs to be seated right next to the teacher, because she never knows what you are going to do next!"  I will take that as a  compliment to my enthusiasm for life, and coming in Hot...

   

Pray'n... update

Dad is 91 today... and is now on the river with C fish'n for salmon.  (I didn't get to go this time due to a repairman coming to the house, damn it.)  C and I loaded up Ol Ugly and away they went. Thank goodness C got back from DC in time to take Dad. 

Happy Birthday, Catch a big one Dad!

UPDATE:

Dad and his fav Twinkie snack

They got back in one piece, but no fish.  Dad enjoys C so much that he seemed okay with that.  After dad had headed inside for his chair, C and I put the cover back on ol Ugly and had a little pow wow about Dad's fishing.  Result, I've gotten Dad a guided fishing boat trip for next week, and hopefully that will end his dry spell. 
Thank you all for the great birthday wishes for Dad, I will be sure to pass them on to him!

Salmon fishing part 5...

I went to the local go to guys last week and said "Please teach me what I need to know about fishing for salmon. My Dad is 90 and really needs to catch one."  A large chunk of change later I had all the tools and some of the knowledge.  

Dad and I went out in old Ugly again Monday. She is home from the boat hospital, finally. They didn't hookup the fish/depth finder, but Dad said we didn't need it cause he didn't think it worked right anyway.  Well when the river is this low it's sorta nice to know when you are going to hit a gravel bar.  Thankfully the river is clear so you can see the bottom and sorta gauge depth from that.

Jim, a girlfriend's guy went with us.  He was practically raised on the river, so was a lot of help.  Taught me a bunch of tactics for boondoggling, and drifting, and handling ol Ugly.

 

Jim perfecting the art of the birds nest...

We didn't catch anything, but Dad got some good bumps.  He was fishing with roe and Jim was using a sardine wrapped flat fish. We had salmon jumping around us, and could see them swimming, so it wasn't like there were no fish.

 

Dad fishing....

Dad went again today and took a friend of his, D. I couldn't go as I had a conference call coming from the doctors. 

They didn't catch anything, but had a good time according to Dad. 

Later in the evening Dad was raving about what nice a guy D is and how D kept saying he wished I could have come with them.  I swear alarms went off in my head.  Next thing I know Dad says, "Oh, by the way he wants to date you."  "He said he would see you tomorrow night at the poker game here."  Date! I haven't been on a date in years, well except for the short kilted guy in the shiny shirt...sigh... 

 

Water hazzard...

How hard can it be... Five times I have gone fishing with Dad, and I forget to say the "please God let Dad catch a damn fish" prayer before we get started. Maybe I should leave out the damn part.

 

C had returned from new squirrel vetting in DC and a vacation with the wife, so he came along. Turns out he is a great deal more into first class accommodations than we can provide.

We launched and I was driving down river when the motor started sounding strange, and then died, dead.  While C was tinkering with the motor, with Dad giving directions, the viking was paddling for a gravel riffle near shore against a 6 mph current.

A blown fuse, which was replaced with the emergency fuse, which promptly blew. Short somewhere! C decides he will walk out to a road, call a friend for a ride back to the boat dock and send someone to get us.

I get Dad situated and as shaded as possible, while holding the boat in place. A couple of hours of standing in knee deep cold water was doable.  I spent the time listening to Dad's tales, and turning over rocks to see what creatures there were, found my first leach, some hellgrammites, and assorted other creatures I did not know. Watched salmon jump and a falcon hunt across the river from us. He was amazing to watch, but having no luck either.

A guide boat came by and said to call the sheriff's dept, and they would send someone to tow us back up river to the dock. Hello, why didn't we think to do that. I got on my cell and called the sheriff's dept. and a short time later the Sgt shows up with their boat, and tows us back to the dock.  The Sgt was great, as it was not an easy thing to keep his boat in position and to get the tow line tied off from our boat in that current.  

Against Dad's directive, I had untied the anchor from the line before hand. It would not have been nice to put a ding in the sheriff's boat or the Sgt. by throwing the line with the 20# anchor still attached.

C had caught a ride with friends, and met us at the dock.  We put ol ugly back on the trailer and headed home. Ol ugly is now resting comfortably in the boat hospital getting a complete overhaul.

As for C, he does not appear anxious to go with us next time, geez, where is his sense of adventure... 

Adventures with Dad...

Not even a glass of wine, candles, and bubble bath can take away from the on going adventures in fishing with Dad.

He was bound and determined to be on the river salmon fishing yesterday.  With sardine wraps on the flat fish lures done, gas in the fuel tanks, battery charged and his one beer in the cooler with my water bottle, off we went. Got on the water and hauled ass down river to a spot he heard was hot. Of course everyone else had heard it was a hot spot too, so we were knee deep in boats of all shapes and sizes.  Dad's boat is so old & ugly everyone assumes we know what the hell we are doing. If they only knew, the probability of the tall white haired Viking driving the jet boat cutting their lines as she zooms by is higher than they think. 

Dad struggling to put the lures on as we are speeding down river, casts out and nearly goes over board. He hollers at me to put my line in and slow troll back up river.  "Nope, you fish, I'll handle the boat."  There are other boats to dodge, as well as debris in a fast current.  The ol bastard smiles and says "Ok, I'll just put your line in for you!" 

After four hours of not one single bite, and watching the other guys pull in salmon and steelhead Dad says, "let's take'r in Sis, there aren't any fish here."  

Back at the dock, we put her on the trailer, tighten down the gear, and Dad speeds out of the launch site, only to slam on the brakes mere inches from the big bump going out the gate. As I'm pealing myself off the dashboard, I remind him that it would be nice if next time he gave a bit of a warning before he does that.

So there we are traveling North at speed on I5 to get to our off ramp when there is a Boom, Crunch, Bang!  "Dad, pull off on the shoulder, and turn on your flashers, I think we blew a tire on the trailer."  "What?"  I repeat myself, and he gets her off into the breakdown lane.  He starts to try to get out of the car and take a look see.  Traffic is heavy and fast.  "Oh Hell No, stay in the car!"  I get out on the passenger side, yep the whole tire/rim has come off the single axle trailer.  Get back in, still telling Dad to stay put, call the tow company and get that started.  Tow shows up and says he can't fix it and will have to put it on the truck and take it home for us.  Fine, let's gett'r done. Ol Ugly is back home now, parked, and waiting for a new axle and a few other repairs.

Oh, how could I have forgotten to tell you about the highway patrolman that came and talked to us, went in search of our wayward tire, came and talked to us, expedited the tow, came and talked to us, and used his flashers to slow up traffic til we could get off the freeway.  Well, he came and talked to us because Dad kept chatting him up, asking him questions, complementing him on his hat! All the while I'm staring at Dad with a "What Are You Doing Look?". When the patrolman went back to his truck for the last time... Dad turns to me, cocks a wizened eyebrow and says, "Nice looking man, about your age..."