Timely submission from Castingoutloud.

Send yours to wook@busterwantstofish.com

Yep, must be a Mac

from Warren R in South Africa

send yours to: salty@busterwantstofish.com

So it seems that the American Museum of Fly Fishing has found itself in a public relations pickle. Invited Cheney to speak and everything went KABLOOM, and then the Dick didn’t even have the courtesy to turn them down. Hoisted with their own Boga. Bad days. Crazy days.

But jeez, it’s a gnurly little museum and we’d hate to see it consigned to the ever-filling dustbin of Things That Should Be Cool But…you know? So to offer a helpful hand the mad brains at Buster Labs (boiler room, left past the incinerator, put lotion in basket, ask for Epol) have schemed up a way for the AMFF to gracefully put down the Dick and back away with their reputations intact…by making them a donation they can’t refuse. And this way, they get a dinner speaker AND an exhibit in one neat package. Brilliant, no? AMFF, we give you

The Hideous Jabbering Head of Theodore Gordon

Hello! The great charm of fly-fishing is that we are always learning! Hello! Thank you! The angling fever is a very real disease and can only be cured by the application of cold water and shooting your lawyer friend in the face! Hello! It is the constant – or inconstant – change, the infinite variety in fly-fishing that binds us fast, but it is not a sufficient basis for a sound, comprehensive energy policy! I think they’re in the last throes, if you will, of a sport that is never the same on any two days of the year. Thank You! Hello!

It, uh, just sorta goes on like that. Epol can certainly probably get that fixed up by the fall, at least long enough to deliver a speech. Then the AMFF can just put it under glass and presto, instant tourist attraction! Just imagine all the big fat Orvis customers students of our noble pursuit arriving to have a word with the reanimated jabbering head of the father of American dry fly fishing! They’ll have to hold another fundraiser just to afford all the new parking they’ll need!

Here’s the good and bad thing, though…to be perfectly honest, it’s a little bit unstable, and the quicker they get it under glass the better (and keep the fluids topped off). Which is why they really have no choice but to cancel the Dick. Really, what’ll it be, a once-in-a-lifetime procurement and a historic speech by a luminary of the sport and a marvel of mad science, or Dick Friggin Cheney?

That’s right.

Anyway, are we awesome or what? Buster is confident that we will, in fact, be greeted as liberators by the AMFF. And they are welcome.

Call for submissions: whip up a custom rig. We don’t care if it’s a photoshop masterpiece, amateur hackery like this one or an MSPaint scrawling, let’s see em. C’mon, it’s fun. Help us out of the last cold hard stretch of a long northern winter.

Of course, if you have a real actual boat with a real actual wicked cool paint job, go ahead and show it off. Though you’re probably too busy fending off your pack of sex-crazed groupies to bother.

Here’s my entry: the P-40 Flying Tiger Trout! You know you want one.

Send yours to wook@busterwantstofish.com

AMFF to Average Anglers- Go Fuck yourself

“Moments ago we spoke with Cathi Comar, the executive director of the American Museum of Fly Fishing, and learned that the Museum has gone ahead with their invitation to former Vice President Dick Cheney to attend their annual fundraiser dinner in the fall… ‘Although we work with conservation organizations,’ she said, ‘conservation itself is outside of our role.’”

Hat tip to Midcurrent for the update.

Reminder: NOLA still needs a lot of work.

Link to Musician’s Village.

Already it looks like our natural resources are gonna take the biggest hit during the recession.

From WDFW news release.

WDFW advises employees of likely job cuts
OLYMPIA-Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) managers this week are advising more than 100 employees their jobs may be eliminated to meet an expected multi-million-dollar budget shortfall.

A total of about 170 positions are affected, although some are currently vacant. The cuts will affect field staff- including hatchery personnel, enforcement officers, biologists and outdoor educators-as well as business operations such as financial management and computer support. The job cuts are spread statewide, throughout department programs and all levels of the agency.

The lay-offs will begin in April and be concluded by end of June, when the current fiscal year ends, said WDFW Deputy Director Joe Stohr. The workers that will first be affected are being advised now, in response to requests from employees for early information, he said.

The lay-off plans are based on an anticipated funding cut of more than $30 million from WDFW’s $348 million, two-year operating budget. Gov. Chris Gregoire called for reducing WDFW’s budget by $30 million in her proposed 2009-11 state budget, and directed the department to reduce spending by more than $5 million in the current fiscal year. The department’s final spending plan will be determined when the Legislature passes a new two-year state budget.

Staff cuts are being considered as a last resort, after department managers pursued efforts to trim other spending, increase recreational license sales and restructure agency operations, said WDFW Interim Director Phil Anderson. With personnel expenses consuming about 80 percent of the department’s budget, other measures are inadequate to address the shortfall, he said.

“We made every effort to reduce impacts to public service and to our employees, but there’s just no way to absorb a funding cut this large without a lot of pain,” said WDFW Interim Director Phil Anderson.

In planning the staff cuts, department managers attempted to preserve core services, which include conserving natural resources, providing sustainable fishing, wildlife viewing and hunting opportunities, and maintaining professional business practices, Anderson said.

They’re cutting enforcement officers but “maintaining professional business pratices.”  WTF???  If there is one thing the Department of Fish and Wildlife (in any state) should be doing it’s protecting the got-dam fish and wildlife.  FOR WHICH THEY NEED ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS!

“Salar, the Leaper Pt. 1″ with Lee Wulff:

& Pt. II

Can you smell the wool and waxed canvas? Old timey as hayull.

And the latest in the, “We Can Neither Deny Nor Confirm That Darth Will Be Appearing At Our Annual Dinner” Dept:

*** Money detail: In 2008, in the towns of Brattleboro and Marlboro, Vt. (less than 50 miles from the AMFF), the citizens of those towns voted to indict George W. Bush and Dick Cheney for  “crimes against our Constitution.” The indictments went into effect upon W. and Dick leaving office, which is to say, both are now “wanted men” in those  towns and police are authorized to arrest them on sight. Troof. We’re not making this up.

Now this begs the question – is the AMFF really so clueless that they would invite Big Dick, knowing that in towns less than 50 miles from the Museum, he’s been indicted for serious crimes against the Constitution?!? Or do they just not care? Either way, the Museum continues to be, “unable to confirm nor deny” that Cheney will be appearing at their annual 2009 dinner…

Btw, if you’d like to share your thoughts about Big Dick appearing at the AMFF, you can contact the museum’s  executive director, Catherine Comar, who, at this point, has taken a firm stand on only being able to confirm that she cannot deny that Dick might be there, or he might not be. Any bets on whether he’ll appear via secure tele-link from an undisclosed bunker location?

The sprang is almost here… just a few weeks away. About two, if I’m counting, here in teh Alabam. The bass will be in their pre-spawn frenzy and prolly haven’t taken a gander at a fly or lure in quite some time at the places I mostly frequent. That being said and all, I need to start getting my shit in order. I’ve started to go through boxes, organize flies, and get to tying things I’m desperately in need of….basically all the stuff you’re supposed to do in the winter time. Hunting season kinda gets in the way for me.

I’ve got an old arse Star Inflatable sitting in my garage that hasn’t seen water since October. And I’m really feeling like a looooser over this fact. Normally I would float a few places in North GA and Western NC this time of year and then start hitting my locals first of March. I need some help. Ol’ Big Blue, as we like to call her, has a bigass breach in her hull. It started two years ago when some old adhesive loosened. Then last Fall, the aforementioned October float, she came busting out the seams. I had a couple rolls of duct tape, in matching royal blue, to hide her cleavage till we could make it to the boat ramp. Anyway, I need some advice for anybody who specializes in hypalon magic. Like I said she’s an old girl, has a bladder system…so the repair wouldn’t have to be perfect. I just need some adhesive and/or some technique that will get the job done. I’ve tried two adhesives over the last few months that didn’t work. I’ll throw in some Buster swag and/or other goodies to whoever gives me some damn good advice and instruction. As always, smartassery will not be frowned upon.

Six weeks ago it was two feet of snow and a forecast for warm rain. Two nights ago and it’s been four weeks of cold, bony rivers and flat-lined gauges. It’s hardly any wonder I’m only getting around mentioning this now, but I have found it a good climate for investing in 16oz. cans of Hamm’s. And I will say that I’m not afraid to add another flame to the page.

It’s not really a penchant for violence, or a wish to do harm to others. It has nothing to do with reasoned cause and effect. It isn’t even a desire to exact revenge upon those who I feel have wronged me in a personal sense (like the soccer-mom who didn’t know how to pilot her oversized SUV, shattered my doorhandle in an icy parking lot and fled) or in a general sense (like the health care system that has plunged me into credit card debt to pay for surgery despite the fact that I pay an exorbitant ammount to my insurance company every month), it’s a desire for pointless destruction.

Perhaps this can be blamed on my gender. My abundant testosterone is vying for control over my actions locked in a cage match with my rational thought (wait, I don’t think rational thought would allow itself to become involved in a cage match). It could also be my age, Men in their thirties, while not purely following their groinal divining rods like 18 year olds, still find themselves led by irrational urges (not only the sexual). For examples we need only to look at those who participate in looting and other self-destructive activities during the pandemonium of riots. It’s not usually the matriarchs of the community smashing windows and taking bricks to foreheads, it’s men like me. The riot is not the reason we destroy, it’s just the catalyst.

I’m not actually going to do anything about it. I’ve broken enough shit in my youth purely out of the desire to see it break. The same thing always happens: the act of breaking is not as cool as I thought it would be and then I am left without the use of whatever it was I broke. This is a trend I’ve watched in myself from childhood. I used to enjoy, no LOVE, the idea of blowing up my GI Joes with firecrackers but after I blew them to bits, I didn’t have them anymore, the game was over. Worse was when my mom saw me do this once and decide I must not like GI Joes anymore since I was attaching explosives to mine and gave my collection away to one of her friend’s sons.

In college I discovered a week before graduation that, due to a clerical error, I would not be graduating. I had family flying out from Hawaii, I was seething. At that moment, all I wanted to do was put my fist into a wall with all the force of my shoulder behind it. I knew from experience however, that this act would hurt and probably do some extensive damage. Punching a wall was not the answer and yet I had a burning need to physically manifest my anger. I tried to be reasonable, I punched the shit out of the couch. Unfortunately, I didn’t hit the cushion directly and caught the edge of my pinky on a beam of wood hidden beneath the flowered upholstery. I snapped the last joint of my little digit and was left with a broken finger AND no impending diploma.

I’m not sure what the moral of this is, except maybe, don’t trust my instincts.

THE P-51 DOUBLE BUNNY: prop drive + Red Devil color scheme =  a heavy stringer.

Another fine offering from Married to the Sea:

“In these sad and ominous days of mad fortune-chasing, every patriotic and thoughtful citizen, whether he fishes not, should lament that we have not among our countrymen more fishermen.”

- Grover Cleveland, 22nd and 24th President of the United States

(Herbert Hoover fishing at Brown’s Camp in California, 1928)

“Fishing is great discipline in the equality of men – for all men are equal before fish!”

- Herbert Hoover, 31st President of the United States

“As President I was able with the stroke of a pen to save a hundred million acres of wilderness in Alaska. This is the kind of thing that is gratifying to a President, but to be on a solitary stream with good friends, with a fly rod in your hand, and to have a successful or even an unsuccessful day – they’re all successful – is an even greater delight.”

- Jimmy Carter, 39th President of the United States

“A dolphin we catchd at noon, but cou’d not entice with a baited hook two baricootas, which played under our stern for some hours.”

- George Washington, 1st President of the United States (from his time in Barbados at age 19)

“I think I need to learn fly fishing. Get some waders, go out there, clear my head.”

- Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States

In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s President’s Day. Without a long history of Presidents who hunted and fished, we wouldn’t have the unique legacy of public lands that we have today. Give ‘em thanks by getting out and enjoying them as they were intended, and defend them with your life, for nothing less is at stake.

from Derrick C

send yours to salty@busterwantstofish.com

Scene: A sun-dappled sidewalk is visible through the slightly frosted window. A bearded man with eyes at half-mast reclines on a couch. His left leg is heavily bandaged and sits upon a stack of pillows. On the white glass-top  coffee-table beside him is a sprawl of pill bottles, empty juice glasses, books, stacks of paper that read “post-surgical instructions”. His cell phone rings, breaking his intent concentration from a decade-old Simpon’s episode. It rings again, he appears confused.

Gaper: “Hello.”

Asshole 1: “Steelface!”

G: “What?”

A1: “Steelface mission one accomplished. I catch many inland steelfaces and now it is time for coastal mission. PACK YOUR BAGS SON!”

The glazed marbles sunken into the bearded man’s head sharpen into a moment of seething clarity. His jaw works dumbly for a few seconds, a gasping fish face.

G: “Dude, I got out of surgery like six hours ago.”

A1: “What?”

G: “Didn’t you get any of my messages? I left you like four messages. I can’t go to the coast, I blew out my knee”.

A1: “Shitty (slight pause) so anyway, you should have come with us. Danny got the biggest hen I’ve ever fuckin SEEEEN! It was like thirty eight by like twenty two, the goddamn thing was like eight inches wide. Big, big fish. We were smoking them, the bait-chuckers were coming up to us and asking what we were using, it was stupid. Seriously, you should have come. So wait what’s up with you?”

G: “I tore my ACL.”

A1: “Yeah that sucks, so anyway, I got to take care of some shit around here and then I’m off to the coast tomorrow, you should meet me down there. We’re going to ravage some chromers, I know you have some stuff going on or whatever but seriously, dude…chromers.”

G: “I’m uhhh. I’m… I don’t think I’m going to make it.”

A1: “I told Danny you would find an excuse to puss-out. We’ll email pictures. Later.

Bearded man stares dumbfounded at the phone in his hand, looking at it like the two-faced whore messanger that it is. He opens a bottle, shakes out a couple more pills and downs them with a long swallow of lukewarm water. 

G: “Assholes.”

oh, it’s a classic all right…

So Buster’s got this good pal named Gaper – you might’ve heard of him, he wrote some stuff once about a thing. Anyway, Gaper recently had a little winter sport mishap.

Wait no, that’s not right.

Close enough. His knee’s all blowed up so it’s the knife for him, which will leave him largely immobile and heavily wasted, so we’ve shanghaied him into the ranks here at Buster. Because we’re not above taking advantage of the addled or the infirm. Or our friends.

And believe us, the amount of overlap in those three categories is so goddam reliable you could set your watch by it.

What this means for you: More stuff to read. You win. No whining.

What this means for us: More incentive to slack and go fishing (yeah yeah we know, as if we need it, shut up).

We’re pumped. Gaper’s a helluva writer and he’s pretty damned funny even when he’s not medicated. Whatever it turns out to be, we’re sure you’re gonna dig it. Welcome, brother.

So WATCH THIS SPACE for Gaper’s painkiller-fueled musings about stuff. And fishing. And stuff. COMING SOON!

Somethings in life are annoying, while some things are mildly amusing. Watching someone get pranked with a live mount cougar is fuggin hilarious