Fly fishing

Well, I got wiped out the second night of poker.  I got more interested in playing than winning.  You have to sit out a lot to win.  But I am still well ahead for the weekend.  It was kind of a bummer not to be able to clean and eat any of my own fish.  The Madison River is all catch and release.  Scott, the chef, did get some farm raised trout from down the road, but it isn't quite the same.

They say that stereotypes come into being typically based on some grain of truth.  I think there is more than a grain of truth to the stereotypes about salespeople’s personalities.   I know there is a significant statistical trend for Engineer’s personality traits.  I must say, sales guys are fun.  I also should say that I am glad I hang out with the sales guys on this trip once a year and work with engineers every day.

This trip was strange, my voice started going hoarse and then just about disappeared the second day.  It has been getting steadily better since.  I didn’t have swollen tonsils or aches or soreness or anything else other than my normal allergies to make me think I was sick.  It would be strange if allergies causing me to breathe through my nose at night were enough to make me that hoarse.

I would try to talk and sometimes wind up sounding like the Elk outside, just not as loud.  This actually happened to Murray when she and I went to her high school reunion a couple years ago.  I suppose I am not allowed to say which high school reunion.   Perhaps it is some perverse punishment not being able to talk when you get up with people you haven’t seen in a long time.  I suppose she and I might have been terrible listeners in a past life.

One guy brought his dad who had been a narcotics officer in NYC for 20 years before moving on to open a store.  I asked him if we had a shot at winning the war on drugs.  Very quickly he said no.  He mentioned it pained him to say that after all that work, but that he thought the only way to get rid of the crime was to legalize it.  One more data point I can use to further entrench myself in the Libertarian echo chamber.

Oh yes, and I suppose I should mention fishing.  I caught a 19” brown trout on the second day.  One day I caught 13 fish: rainbows, browns, and whitefish.  This is my best haul yet.  I would like to think I am getting better, but I doubt it.  I also caught a lot of bottom.  This is fly fisher slang for snagging.  Normally I dig a bit bottom, but on the river it just meant lots of sitting waiting for the guide to put a new fly on my line.