Why this blog sucks so badly.

Thursday morning I received full nephrectomy of my right kidney.

It was growing an approximate 2" tumor across the top of it. They found it as a byproduct of MRI scans during my bout with bi-lateral Bell's Palsy, itself because of Lyme Disease. They assumed it was a cancerous, Stage 1B Renal Cell Carcinoma because it had the outward appearances of such and because that's the cause of my mother's death, which is evidently considered by some to be a hereditary problem. However, official results won't be back until sometime next week from Pathology.

The good news is that they're confident the whole thing has been removed, and no further treatment will be needed for this incident. My light reading says its a 90% Five Year Survival Rate, and while I'm not exactly a gamblin' man, I'd say 9 outta 10 is almost a sure thing, so I'm not sweating it.  The bad news is they told me to expect pain, discomfort and to "take it easy" until sometime well into the second month after removal.

You can expect an almost useless blog devoid of useful the past amount of even moderately useful information to continue into the future. Sorry 'bout that.

Update, 9/14: Renal Cell Carcinoma was confirmed to the tune of a ~5.5cm tumor. It has been excised completely, with no signs of spreading outside the margin of the kidney, and no sign of spread via the blood. That's it, boys and girls, I'm clean. Fuck you, love me.

An introduction to the casual vacation shore fly fisher: Part Final, Where to cast.

So, you've been told by one opinionated jackhole on the Internet what you need to casually enjoy fly fishing your summer beach trip, what you need to gear up with, what you need to tie on, and now, finally, where you need to fish it.

Water. Shit, that was easy. No? Fine, fine. Moar words. I can do that. Ask my wife, you can't shut me up, and yet it took me awhile to sit down and write this because its hard to not sound like some sort of grandiose jerk who knows all, and I don't. I do, however, understand the concept of keeping it simple and just going out there to give it a go, and sometimes you don't need to study books, build a home astrolab, or sacrifice virgins to Cthulhu. Sometimes, well, you just need someone to kick start your brain....

So, the thing is that ocean's a big fuckin stream, and, unlike the trouts, the fish are transient. This means you need to find a place where the fish will likely be, at a time they'll likely be there. The other thing is, as a once-a-year sort of guy, you don't have the advantage of learning the ins and outs of what you're doing because for the other 358ish days of the year you're knowhere near the surf, and thus you look at this all from the wrong angle, and you're gonna need to tilt the odds as best you can in your favour.

An introduction to the casual vacation shore fly fisher: Part 3, flies. Well, streamers, mostly.

Yes, there's weird shit in there. Never used 'em. A weeks
worth of snook fishing was done with the simple Clouser.

So, you've got a clue as to what to take on your trip, how about what to throw on your trip? Guess what. Its even easier to get bit straight. Frankly, I could make due with one pattern and feel well armed, although generally speaking my hired gun tends to suggest two patterns for subsurface, and everyone loves top water, so let's make it a total of three.

I know, I know, you look at books that have page after page of really awesome looking flies, but when it comes down to it, sometimes you just make shit needlessly complex for yourself. This is something that I continually rail against, even if I often skip my own advise. Rather than getting lost in the mess, just keep it simple and concentrate on a few simple patterns that work. Simple, effective streamers. Sure, sure, some times you'll want shrimp, crabs, or who the fuck cares what else. That's your problem to figure out. I'm just dealing with simple shit, and all fish eat baitfish.

So, three simple patterns. Beyond that, fuck it, you're just gonna vary size and colour. And weird shit you saw on the Innernets that you really, really want to try. That's cool. What the fuck, we're fly fishers and possibly tiers and dumb shit's what we do, just ask our spouses/children/non-fishing cohorts/stoner-kid-who-witnesses-us-flailing-at-surf-at-3am.

Anyways, three simple patterns, right? Right!

The Eurythmics: Whatever ever happened to the dude from that act?

HARRY FISHER, THE MORNING CALL / 8/28/11

...And so ends another hurricane, with only a little bit of trailing rain and wind left to swing through, but the worst is over.

Y'know, I expected much, much worse. I lose power in my house constantly, as we're a little part of Bedlam who's underground wiring was evidently completed with left over speakerwire from Radioshack. Imagine my surprise when I woke up in the morning to...power!

All that, and nothing ripped off my house. Even my shitty gutters stayed up!

No feeshing today, of course. Not that I expected shit, why should this weekend be any different than any other fucking day this summer?

All the local creeks are blown out, as suspected. Monocacy flooded the piss out of the Historic District again, should've pulled Johnson Dam out like TU's been riding you assholes to do.. pfft! I was also counting on massive rainfall to blow out the step dam in Illick's Mill, but with a mere 2000CFS at crest, it probably won't smash it out like Ivan or Bob or Mufasa or whatever the fuck that last big one was.

At least I can throw out the multiple old soda two liter bottles filled with water and frozen, now. In hindsight, it seems silly except, again, I always loose power. I needed ice, dig? What the fuck, did PPL actually fix this shit, finally? Fuck, I'm bored and my kids are monsters.

Today would be a good day to fly my kite. Yes, I'm aware of how fucking lame that sounds, but seriously, its fun. Fuck you.

Oh, and the lame saltwater posts will resume shortly. Like anyone cares. Hell, I don't even care.

An introduction to the casual vacation shore fly fisher: Part 2, stupid exercises in tackle excess.

Many failures, some successes.

I remember the year after I picked up spin fishing the surf, I decided I'd pick up a fly rod and give it a go. Shit, I was practically swimming in croaker, and the thought of blues or stripers was pretty intense. Furthermore, I'd chartered a guide for a four hour jaunt into the back bays of Cape May, and I wanted to go with my own gear.


So, I went to our local Cabela's, walked into the Fly Cave, or whatever the fuck its called, and said, "I'm gonna fly fish for stripers on the Jersey Shore."


They handed me a 10wt Cabela's branded broomstick called an XST and their big shiny XSS reel to go with. WTF did I know about this, all I knew is it was all on sale  and seemed like a no brainer. They also sold me on a mighty costly intermediate sinking striper taper line and out the door I went.


This was about as far from the moderate action 4wt and WFF lines I'd been used to. In fact, I had no fucking clue what I was doing. A good friend and awesome caster came down and helped me out a bit, and with practice I was able to consistently hit about 60'.


I went out, proud and prepared to do battle with the mighty striped bass of late August.


Those of you with my then-level of experience don't realize why everyone else is laughing at us.