Another bluegill comes through the hole on Sunday

January 14, 2013 – Monday

0 degrees/clear/calm

Pentoga Road

The heat coming off the fire in the stove feels mighty good this morning. The room temperature was 53 when I awakened earlier… just a bit nippy.

Sunday turned out to be a good day once I uncurled my body from the fetal position and crawled from beneath the desk. I needed to go to a happy place, somewhere that would make me feel better. I headed out the door for the lake.

           

The wind was blowing and it was cold. I loaded the four-wheeler and putted a mile down the road and out onto the ice. Since all the snow had melted, the surface was like a piece of expensive, very slippery, glass and the machine refused to turn either left or right. Finally, with some finesse’, something I’m not known for, I learned that I could steer the machine by leaning in the desired direction.

The Clam became a giant parachute in the wind and with no snow to anchor the base, I fought the heaving tent more than once. At one point, it shifted, knocked the small propane heater over and onto my ultra light rod, the one I’d just purchased last week, and melted it in two. I might have reincarnated some of Grandpa Pennington’s more colorful language and used every word I knew.

But the god of fishes everywhere rewarded me for my patience. In the end, I caught fifteen decent bluegills and one nice crappie and was back home before 10 AM.

Strange, there were four NFL playoff games this past weekend and not one of my favorites won. Naturally, there was Green Bay, but also Seattle fell a few seconds short, Texas was no match, and Denver blew it in double overtime. Other than a couple more games and the Super Bowl, it’s probably a good thing my football season is over.

I went with Sargie to have supper with Mr. Milligan. We enjoyed spending the evening with him.

While in Iron Mountain, we stopped by Walmart and I purchased a new ultra light ice fishing rod. I put the reel on when we arrived home and readied it for today’s action.

Luke's long-time good buddy, Abe, with a nice bass caught Sunday morning in Maine. At one time yesterday, Luke and I were a thousand miles apart, both on the ice, and sending pictures back and forth of the fish we were catching.

Today is the first day of classes for spring semester. No doubt, there’ll be one or two who turns in their first assignment early. With 26 students in one section, I hope they do. It is going to be a lot of reading, especially since I have more than one class this semester.

I’m heading to the lake at first light this morning. After yesterday’s success, I’ve been rejuvenated with the ice fishing bug, not that it ever left, and hope to catch a large mess and be back home before noon. I want to take my walk, no doubt, there’ll be an assignment or two coming in, and of course, there’s that pesky afternoon nap to fit in somewhere. A man’s work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road…