Friday was meant to be a jet-prop guided tour of the lower canyon, a long-anticipated day on an old beat with a bigger, faster, shinier new program. teary eyes, wind-stung ears and first passes through any and every bucket we fancied on a section of river given up for stale by the hurried and scurried masses of Septober.

it’s just that errant drill-holes, sketchy drain plugs and burnt out bilge pumps sometimes happen. and happen to have happened all at once. Thursday. shit. i hate sleds anyway….

so plan B, ’cause once it’s on there just aint no turnin’ it off.

a little more driving. a lot more walking. some amped-out dogs instead of please-don’t-leave-me-at-home-with-the-cat sad eyes. on up the tracks. cold graphite fingers. colder steel and frozen tar. nasal drip. the point and flush of a single quail. around the long, blind, speed-banked bend and “HEY! GET THE HELL AWAY FROM THAT THING!!!”

perhaps little Pepita Stankita thought she could stop the Burlington Northern with that ass? i don’t know. we welcomed the gruesome display as an omen; skunk not just conquered, but fully fucking divided.

it woulda been the chance of a lifetime to chef up a sampling of polecat stew, too, since the relative scarcity of stench indicated CENTCOM must’ve come separated before any signal reached the deployment sector command receptors. still, i’m pretty sure some things are best left to wonderment.

so theoretically any hex was off, “proper.”

the morning’s chilly river pushed back hard and stingy, unabated by the frigid air. a romp of otters bobbed and rolled in an eddy. the slow, low-tracking sun poured warm over our backs, and Darin cracked the ice just past noon in a tiny little piece that hardly seemed worth a shot. his first of two for the day.

such the predator. i’m pretty sure he’ll be racking this dusky fella up in the Little Chief. god i hope so.

an iffy, trouty pull in another sneaky little green trench, sandwiches and Jubel Ales, a short drive south, knackered dogs asleep in the rig, and evening’s shade oozing cold fingers down the western wall and across the sagey, shimmery bottom. we’re both on the board, at last, after the dusky brat’s full-figured older sister eats my Halloween leech in the edge of a pushy tail-out and meets with crimsoned destiny.

she didn’t give up easy. took me down 100+ yards through a large riffle/rapid and into the run below. winded me. a heavy, spirited fish i would have guessed was wild.

here’s the fat girl, post-shampoo rinse.

hells yeah, call it a spa day.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 3rd, 2007 at 2:40 am and is filed under very supersticious, Sunrises And Sunsets. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.