Finally--A Day on the Water

Back in 1947, Tex Williams recorded a chart-topper entitled "Smoke! Smoke! Smoke! (That Cigarette)." Some of the lyrics to that Western swing novelty tune are as follows:

Smoke, smoke, smoke that cigarette

Puff, puff, puff, and if you smoke yourself to death

Tell St. Peter at the Golden Gate

That you hate to make him wait

But you just gotta have another cigarette.

My fishin' buddy, Jim Bauer, doesn't smoke, but he does fish, and I'm here to tell you that he has been going through a form of withdrawal akin to a man who hasn't been able to wet a line for a good spell now. In his case, Oct. 17th marks the last time he was on the water. His symptoms have gotten so bad it's rumored that he's been begging mutual friend, Skip Schaible, to give him some of his "fishing pills" (see accompanying photo of the bottle).

OK, so maybe that was a feeble attempt to instill a little humor into this piece, but after all, laughter is the best medicine, no matter what ails you.

To get back to reality, I'm happy to report that Jim finally made it onto the water today--without taking any pills or ever reaching the point where he was choking anyone. How do I know this? Because I received an email from him this evening, with a fishing report included.

He hit the water about 10 o'clock this morning, when the water temp read 67 degrees. It had bumped up to 69 when he came off the water about 2:30.

In those 4.5 hours, Jim caught two fish: a largemouth (pictured right) that weighed a pound even and a striper that weighed 1-11. He found the largemouth below the bridge with a wakebait. Said Jim, "He smacked it when it hit the water and went tail-walking and jumping just like a big 'un." The striper, meanwhile, hit a Thin N crankbait above the bridge.

It turns out Jim had lots of company today, mostly in the form of water skiers. Can't say I'm surprised at that, given the warmer temperatures we've been having around here. He also ran across Bob Glass today, as well as Ray Scott and a couple of live-bait fishermen he didn't recognize. Ray told Jim he had caught some panfish.



It would seem that today's trip to West Neck may be signaling that Jim would like to have a little more of the same. As he noted in this evening's email, "Might try it again tomorrow." So, I'll keep watching to see if another fishing report shows up in my email then. He said the report very well may come from Scope, where he'll be attending an Admirals hockey game. As a season ticket-holder, he never misses one of those.


Here's the striper Jim boated today.