My twin brother Troy and I have attended an annual get-together with our Green Bay high school buddies every year for something like 18 years now. It was always a camping trip, in the early days with 20 people or more but that gradually dwindled as people interjected silly reasons not to attend, like moving away or having kids or no longer enjoying sleeping on the ground unshowered for three days.So finally it’s down to the core four—namely Carl, Randy, Troy and myself—and as of last year we don’t camp anymore, we fish. This year’s location was the majestic Lake Onalaska in La Crosse, WI. A cold front rolling in on Friday disturbed both the fish and us, although we managed to pull in enough smallmouth bass to fry up a delicious dinner that evening, along with the perfect digestifs of Captain Morgan’s, whiskey and Grain Belt Premium.
We drank and played poker until we couldn’t distinguish the card suits any longer, approximately 3am. Anaconda (as popularized by my friend Ron at work) is actually the best poker game and should replace the monotonous Hold ‘Em on ESPN. Music du jour was The Killers “Sam’s Town”, which I had earlier panned as a sophomore slump, but after 65 straight listens acknowledged that it’s pretty good. I was the big winner in poker raking in $6 with everyone else losing $2 each. Unfortunately that’s where my luck ended.
I suck at fishing. A grand total of zero fish caught over two years. This trip Troy pulled in 3, Carl 2, and Randy a whopping 11. Seeing as we were all fishing the same lake and often the exact same spot, I must admit that there is a fair amount of skill involved and in my case, sorely lacking. Lying down in the boat for 30 minutes on Saturday afternoon to assuage my hangover didn’t help my odds. And for the first time in 18 years, we didn’t booze again on Saturday night, an ominous sign that we’ve become OLD in our mid-thirties.
My big trick will be attending next year’s Wisconsin fishing extravaganza from Switzerland, but I promised to appear somehow if everyone promised to visit Europe before 2010.
3 comments:
Can't believe you guys have been doing this for 18 years! Can that really be right? Seems like just yesterday that Larry parked his bike in the kitchen and the five of you were making those crazy movies in the basement. I wonder what happened to Heath, Keith and the rest of the gang?
On the fishing, maybe you should have cranked out the wetsuit and snorkeling gear instead of the fishing rod, huh? Randy caught 11 fish? Really? Impressive.
I just read your previous post concerning the pontoon boat. Are you really saying that pontoon boating is more fun than the death defying 22' Marti Ann (Only problem, "death defying" was a true description of our boating adventures.
Capt. Bob
Randy only caught 11 fish because he poured gas on our lures.
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