Gone Fishin' Part 1

A pretty steady rain started yesterday about the time I arrived at Antwerp High School for my final school football game of the year....I still have the Youth Tournament games all day on November 7th. The rain continued throughout the blowout Junior High game, won by visiting Tinora 48-0...Antwerp Junior High had a flu outbreak affect the team, and they were indeed undermanned...I kept the clock on the field as side judge, and we kept the game moving along, especially when it got out of hand in the second half.

With football officiating out of the way, for the most part, I turn my attention the coming basketball season. Our first association meeting is in Van Wert tonight, and I begin the scrimmage season, when we return from our family vacation in Wisconsin come mid-November. I need to hit the incline mode on the treadmill however, need to get the aging legs and calf muscles in shape...do not want a blown leg like last February, which sidelined me for the final couple weeks of the season.

Basketball is a much different animal to officiate than football or baseball...your legs and lungs get a workout, especially in doing boys JV games and even the lower levels, where you work a 2 man crew, instead of the 3 man as when you are officiating the Varsity games.

Getting Ready for Steelhead and Salmon___

Getting the gear, clothes, and food around for the trip to Oscoda, Tawas City, Michigan, where the Au Sable meets Lake Huron. Nick and I decided to leave around noon tomorrow...giving us 3 full days to try our luck....the rains that hit here yesterday and this morning, were going from south to north, and hopefully put enough in the stream up north to push the Steelhead and Salmon, we are looking forward to having a good chance at success this weekend. Not sure if we can top last year, but I think we are a little more sure of ourselves{last year was the first in 25 we had done this trip} this time around. I am ready...we will also supply ourselves with a supply of good hand-rolled cigars, a bottle of Drambuie, and a few 6 packs of beer. The other challenge will be staying close to my Diabetes 2 Diet, which has seen me lose 19 pounds over the past couple months....another 10 or 15 to go. Keeping the Blood Pressure and Blood Sugar at reasonable levels is also something I would like to do...but I still plan on having a good time, and eating well.

I began fishing at a young age...usually following my dad, Stan Houseworth, to his nightly fishing outings to the Venice Jetties on the Gulf of Mexico, near our home in Venice, Florida. Dad was a life long outdoorsman who loved to hunt and fish{much to mom's pain I am sure at times}...almost to a fault.

I had pretty good success as a youngster in South Florida, and if the truth be known, I was much more successful as a kid fishing, than I ever have been as an adult...having the old man around to help me with the ropes I am sure helped. Once dad died in 1972 I continued to fish, but never with the gusto or success, that I had as a kid. I have fished oceans, lakes{including the Great Lakes}, and rivers, from upstate New York, Florida, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan, and a few other states, and northern Canada, in my life...I always like getting out on or near the water, whether successful or not.

Tomorrow I will post a short blurb before we head out...then hopefully back Monday or Tuesday with a report on our "Success".

back later>>>>

Photos-top left/A collection of fishing rods ready for the trip. Back in 1951, when at 2 1/2 years old I envisioned myself as a great hunter, with a Red Fox dad had dispatched, near Scott, Ohio...I gave up hunting back in the late 1970s...still support that right, but just don't have the heart to do it myself anymore. In 1957 me with 8 pound Red Snapper that I caught off the Manasota Bridge near Englewood, Florida. Big Brook Creek near Rome, NY, where I learned to fly fish for trout back in the early 70s while stationed at Griffiss Air Force Base. And finally Stan Houseworth with a 100 pound Jew Fish that he caught off the North Jetties at Nokomis, Florida, in November 1956.