License to Thrill

My son had his semi-annual heart checkup in Missoula, Montana a couple of Fridays ago.  He was born there, but we moved away when he was 4.  We enjoy going back to visit.  It still feels like home. 

Sometimes I'm a slow learner.  In 2015, I was fortunate to be able to fish in Montana on four separate occasions.  We have plans to spend nearly 10 days in Montana and Yellowstone in August this year, and I'm starting to get a little giddy about the two-day trip my wife booked for me on the Missouri in April.  Fingers crossed that she's coming along.  After my day on the Big Horn River last year, I did a little math and realized that I should have just purchased a full-year nonresident angling license for 2015.  Turns out it would have been cheaper than the daily licenses that I purchased as needed.  With this in mind, Mrs. Fading Angler and I picked up shiny new full-year 2016 fishing licenses when we were in Missoula.

Sure, we could have bought them online, but there's nothing like having that fluorescent yellow piece of waterproof "paper" in your wallet.  It's my license to do what I do.  Rather than:

Bond. James Bond.

You get this:

Angler. Fading Angler. 

 Women may not swoon over me and fish may not fear me, but my drink will always be shaking.  Err, shaken.

Getting Back Into Rhythm

 

Just got back from a quick, non-fishing weekend trip to Montana.  Spent the night near Craig and had dinner with Joe and Lindsay Bloomquist of the Missouri River Lodge.  My wonderful wife booked me a spring trip in mid-April, hoping for a repeat of last year's April awesomeness!  Got really confused (and slightly jealous) seeing 15-20 humans compressed into very close proximity on one tiny stretch of the Missouri River just north of Craig.  Almost nobody anywhere else on the Mo'.  Huh?

Visited Blackfoot River Outfitters in Missoula, as my wife insisted I carry a wading staff now.  She's wise.  BRO is having their spring sale March 5th.  20% off a Helios 2 is damn temping, especially after I got to use one in 6 weight on the Big Horn River this past September.

Time to start writing again, and maybe consider a winter trip down to some little creeks in the Driftless down in SE MN.  I might wait until the daily high temperatures get back up into the 20's.

More soon.  We hope.

The Largest Lawn Trout I Have Ever Seen

I recently discovered another kindred spirit in the blogosphere:

The Unaccomplished Angler

While skimming some of his writing, I saw several mentions of lawn trout.  I said to myself, "Lawn trout?  Inconceivable.  I don't believe they exist."

And then I remembered that I've seen them hunting in a pod, near the carousel in Missoula, Montana.  I managed to snap a quick photo of one before I bravely ran away...

I think I'll have to try my luck with some lawn casting this evening.  I'll have to let the cats out, too

Gravity

Shall we wax metaphorical for a moment?  If the future is like the sun, then I can confidently state that I'm living under a cloud layer.  Occasionally, a brilliant shaft of light penetrates the gloom,  but cold half-tones and thunderbolts are my future forecast.  Call it a low spot, but I seem to have given up most of my hope for the future.  The alluring radiance of the future has become obscured by the fog of a progressive, degenerative neurological disease with no cure.  As Parkinson's Disease gradually slows me down  physically and mentally, many of the things I used to dream of no longer make much sense.  So what does make sense?  I tell myself that I should hold tight to something I'm passionate about, pursue it with as much energy as I can spare.  So why fishing, and why fly fishing for trout?