Sep 5 2010 10:55 am
I swing for kings, kind of
Lisa found the house amongst the others because all the lights were on and all the blinds were up and all the people were everywhere inside. The house sat at an odd angle to the street and she parked near where she thought the front door was but it turns out it wasn’t the front door and it turns out the sidewalk was uneven and so she tripped and almost broke the bottle of wine she brought but instead caught herself awkwardly on the grass and her purse fell off her shoulder and spilled a little bit of keys and makeup and then that door wasn’t the front door at all it was the back door and she opened it and squeezed passed a washing machine and then a dryer and popped into a narrow hallway and followed the sound to a larger room and when she turned the corner everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at her. The wind blew off the lake hard and made the house creak in the silence. Lisa thought, why isn’t there any music playing?
She turned red, looked down, and mumbled something about where she parked.
After a few seconds Harrison said with his loud voice, “Don’t worry about it Lisa, come on in, what’d you bring? Nice…” and put his arm around her and turned her towards the kitchen and continued to talk but you couldn’t hear them because they were walking the other way and everybody else had started talking too.
Frank was from Muskegon and got hepatitis C when he was eighteen after he got a pine tree tattooed on his leg. The guy across the table was from Wisconsin, somewhere near La Crosse apparently, and gesticulated with his cigarette and slurred his words and took intermittent sips of beer as he held forth on Wisconsin’s superiority. “The Lions? Really? Shit dude, the Packers have won more Super Bowls than the fucking Lions won games last year. I mean, that’s pretty fucked up.”
“You’re from La Crosse. I’m probably more of a Packers fan then you are. When I was kid we got all the Packers games on TV because we were so close to Green Bay. What the fuck did La Crosse ever do? Flood?” Frank was getting pissed off. This guy had been bashing West Michigan for about ten minutes. “I bet La Crosse smells bad all the fucking time and smells really bad right after a flood. If West Michigan is so bad what the fuck are you doing here? Go back to your goddamn cows and stupid fucking cheese curds. Or maybe you should move across the state, become a Lions fan, and live in fucking Royal Oak. You’d fit in.”
“Grand Rapids is cool, but Muskegon? Dude, what a piece of shit this town is. I don’t even know why I came out here with you guys.”
Frank closed his eyes and shook his head slowly and rhythmically at first then faster and faster until he almost twitched. He stood up abruptly which made his chair scrape loudly on the floor and he kind of tripped over it as he turned and walked away from the table.
Frank was thirty four years old and scared of Lake Michigan.
Sep 2 2010 1:19 pm
get him in there
It’s a rotten persistence that keeps my spirits lifted. A hard rain is gonna fall. Then it did. And all those kings didn’t push right upriver because apparently hard rain does not equal high river in early September.
Kind of like how high blood pressure does not equal more exercise, which is more less obvious depending on your blood pressure I imagine.
I’ve fished for kings about 10 of the last 12 days. I’ve hooked 12 fish and fought some of them for a fairly long time, but not one of them made it to the boat. Extremely frustrating. Then yesterday, after Steve’s nine year old son Mitch put a king in the net, I knew it had to be done and finally landed one of those thick bastards. It was occasion for some not minor celebration. I’m loud. Nice camera work Mitch.
Aug 29 2010 7:00 pm
salmon and the Phillies
It’s like losing four in a row to the fucking Astros. I’m the slumping slugger going 0 for 10 in the middle of an eight game home stand. The Stumper comes up and in the first three hours sticks and lands one on the fly. The knuckleballer bats a thousand because he only bats once in a blue moon. It’s the goddamn American League around here.
Raul Ibanez looks like a turtle without a shell. We can’t win one against shit but bring on the best in the west and we sweep ‘em. I guess steelhead season will be good to me.
I discovered Nelson’s Frontier Market the other day: Thundersticks, Maxima, Daiichi and Mustad, homebrewing supplies, clam juice, cereal, and by far the largest selection of craft beer in Ludington. They even stock one of my favorite double IPAs all the way from Pennsylvania: Stoudts DIPA. Sure it’s $16 a six pack, but you get what you pay for. Every DIPA should be so well balanced, so juicy and plump. Kind of like Alexis Texas drinking grapefruit juice in a grove of pine trees in the middle of a pretty intense logging operation. The backhoe operator stops his rig and stares.
I also discovered that Great Lakes whitefish is as meaty as sockeye and about half as expensive so you don’t feel so bad about eating it fried.
Aug 25 2010 10:27 pm
the salmon crazies
It’s like a Haiku
incongruous: autumn day
and whirring chainsaw.
I know, I know, I’m blowing your minds with nontraditionally punctuated haikus, but that’s the kind of thing that happens when you get the salmon crazies. It begins with a low buzzing on day four, near the back of your thighs around midday, and despite the strong northerly winds and finely stained water high from recent rains it culminates in an ironically dull pain at your shoulder where the treble went barb deep and old Dr. Steve had to rip it out with pliers. That man has a soft touch. I caught a walleye.
Aug 23 2010 5:32 pm
sara's salmon
The Pere Marquette River winds its way like a snake possessed, charmed like so many cobras in the thick woods and with about as much regard for your face. I’m not supposed to name anything on the river because everything already has names but I don’t care. I float down that river like Saul fucking Kripke, ostensioning the hell out of every bend and riffle. Shit, I even name the log jams. And anyway the damage is already done: there’s Loretta’s Bayou and the Skunk Cabbage of Life hole, two names I’m rather proud of and I’m sure have spread far and wide amongst the Pere Marquette fishing community. And I’ll be honest with you, they probably didn’t have names anyway. They ain’t exactly no Waddell’s. Furthermore, it’s not like we’re working with a terribly sophisticated theory of meaning, so I do what I want. Perhaps when I utter “just below the spot that looks like I think the Deschutes looks like” I mean to refer to the Pump Hole?
Shit. I don’t even call the stuff in the river that flows H2O. I call it XYZ. Deal with it. It’s like Twin Earth around here anyway.
And so I wait. I touched a hot salmon last night for about thirty seconds on the devil’s tackle but then he spit all six hooks. Then this morning there was nothing. They just aren’t in yet. But Gregg is coming this weekend and we will fish hard and I will have a beautiful fresh salmon for Sara. My obsession with female semi-pop singer-songwriters is persistent if nothing else. I hate to break it to you babe, but I’m not drowning. I’m drunk on the High Life.
