Penny The Cat

Perhaps you recall my coming home on more than one occasion to fly tying materials strewn far and wide. Predatory release at my tying materials, and mine, expense. Penny the Cat was at it. She is so on alert, hyper vigilant. It is seldom I see her snooze although she disappears for much of the day, beneath the bed or hiding in some cranny snoozing. But, every once in awhile she comes out of hiding to plop down and snooze. My wife captured this shot today…Penny in a trusting, restful pose.

Penny the Cat and Harley the Maltipoo chase each other often. One baits the other into attack. What is interesting is Harley for such a little butt is quite Alpha like. Yet, Penny thinks nothing of rousting Harley out of his high spots.

Big Dog & the Sun Roof

I’ve seen dogs, sitting in the back of pick up trucks, even a convertible, or usually staring into the wind out a side window. I have had them standing on the bow of an Alaskan fishing boat. But. this big dog had a most regal position yesterday. I was driving along beside him, attempting to snap the shot and not rear end someone. He had been much higher, staring straight ahead. He was lowering down here as I snapped the shot. He and the driver must be very frustrated in the rainy season.

Animal Rescue: Bird Man of Gresham

Just part of the job, of late, is rescuing birds stuck here and there.

It seems that whenever Tony Muncy turns around of late he is doing a bird rescue. Whether on the ground or three stories up on a wobbly ladder, he is extricating the birds from some sticking point. Good job Tony. 

Einstein Was Curious (I Can Read Tumblr)

I Can Read's Feel Good, Motivational Imagery

Cooking: Show off with Chocolate Mousse & Whipped Cream

Perhaps a simple Valentine’s Day, stay at home, showing off your culinary skills dessert…Chocolate Mousse. If not tonight…perhaps soon.

“Like other emulsions (vinaigrette, aioli), it works as if by magic. As you whisk, microscopic bits of water get suspended in the fat, thickening it and making it seem creamier. Then still more air is whipped into it and the cooling chocolate crystallizes around the air bubbles to make a remarkably stable foam, a.k.a. mousse.” (how to and whip cream too)

Always a simple and elegant dessert. Put down your microbrew and consider impressing that special someone with this light and fluffy fair

http://shine.yahoo.com/shine-food/genius-recipe-two-ingredient-chocolate-mousse-173200947.html?_sr=1

Spell Check for Public Employees

“An embarrassing spelling mistake outside a school in Manhattan’s Lower East Side reportedly remains unfixed months after the error was made. The word school was misspelled as “shcool” on Stanton Street in front of Marta Valle High School. The error was made sometime last summer…”

I, for one, need to repeatedly review everything I write. There is always an error in grammar or spelling.  I wonder if anyone on the public work crew recognized the error (you know there had to be more than one on a public work crew)? And, is crossing XNG now? 

Fly Fishing: You & ‘God’ (Don’t spare the rod…..)

A peaceful August day on a small stream, not another person in site, although someone else had communed with the site before. (SwittersB)

“You must not use this aforesaid artful sport for covetousness, merely for increasing or saving your money, but mainly for your enjoyment and to procure the health of your body and, more especially, your soul.  For when you intend to go to your amusements in fishing, you will not want very many persons with you, who might hinder you in your pastime.  And then you can serve God devoutly by earnestly saying your customary prayers.  And in so doing, you will eschew and avoid many vices, such as idleness, which is the principal cause inciting a man to other vices, as is right well known. … Also you should busy yourself to nourish the game in everything that you can, and to destroy all such things as are devourers of it.”  source

I know, a touchy subject for many. “Oh God, don’t talk about that.” 

Nothing shows how enamored, addicted or committed one is to fly fishing than being cut off from it because of life’s travails. Sooner or later some form of important distraction, duty, emerges that decidedly pulls you from, turns you from the sport. The rod is removed. It isn’t even in view.

Health (your’s/other’s), (plug in here what you consider to be a significant enough demand to put down the rod). I can’t think of many commitments that would seriously deny me my ‘religious’ fix in the elements. Yet, for me, the last few years have been crushingly demanding because of family health issues.

The nagging, crawly feeling of withdrawal from the rod, the fly, the water has a profound grating effect upon the brain, the gut. I don’t like the feeling and there is no other distraction for the supreme distraction. I was talking to someone the other night about the demands of hospice care giving ( the second in two years), of the extended vigil, of life on hold, personal poor health. I said I was over loaded and did not have the energy to do the most healing of actions…go wet a line.

Son's tat...Vesica Piscis in a Triquetra (SwittersB)

The discussion evolved into the critical juncture of what does it mean to mean to fly fish…why the obsession, the edginess when denied? Because it is more than just escaping life, escaping commitments. Fly fishing, for me, is putting myself into a place, a mindset, where on many occasions you can make a commitment to self, to family and loved ones, to a higher purpose. I have never been one for the pew, the walls, the man standing between me and that cross on the wall behind him. If there is to be a connection on some level, for some solace, than let it be knee deep in a stream, rod in hand, mind open to all about and then maybe we can see something that puts us at peace. 

See now, that wasn’t so awkward was it? It connects within you on some level….call it what you will…

Etta James R.I.P. ‘At Last’

ETTA JAMES’ AT LAST LYRICS IN MEMORIAM

Fly Fishing: Old Gifts & Pay It Forward

For me, this time of year is often a time of sorting fly boxes. Rearranging, noting what needs to be tied, mentally giving priority to those patterns that seem to work, or at least did the last season or two.

I recently have come across some old fly boxes and old hook boxes that have a few experimental or forgotten flies in them. The above fly was found in such a box and I immediately recognized the fly. I originally had two such flies, the other long lost. The beauty of this fly is how it came into my possession on Laurence Lake (Oregon).

It speaks to the intent of this post: some fly fisher took the time to give me a couple of his hand tied creations as he came off the lake. By doing so he gave me a wonderful experience and planted a seed to pay it forward.

He’d had a particularly good day’s fishing. I had been struggling against the winds and really had no sense of what I was doing. I exchanged pleasantries. He asked how I was doing and I was honest. He was kind enough to pull out a tin box that had held cough lozenges, but now held his loose flies. He presented me with two yellow bodied, red tailed flies and told me the where, how and having given me the what, told me to have a nice afternoon. And, I did. 

That kind of generosity has happened to me quite a few times and I have paid it forward every chance I get. Gentle pleasantries and when I see a receptive person, I pass on what ever help I can plus it almost always includes a few flies.

Chili & Snowflakes

As you may know, if you come by here now and then, I rarely promote food, bebidas or music. I have even fallen away from the curvaceous promotions of old. But, last night I was led to believe an Arctic Express might be bearing down upon my back yard, so I developed a primal appetite for meat and decided to throw in a few legumes. I browned up some ground chuck, boiled up some pinto, lentil, black, navy and kidney beans in no particular proportions (yes purest, I added beans to the mix). Added to the mix was cumin, dried chipotle, lots of black pepper and a touch of tomato paste. Mixed all together, it was perfect this morning as I watched the snow swirl and blow. Meat!

No, the Kiwi's are not involved. SwittersB's Chili Con-Coction

Of course, the snow has stopped for now (I am one of those rare Portlandian’s that love snow and don’t panic when a half inch accumulates). An aside, do the news crews that standing in Troutdale at the mouth of the Gorge or at Sylvan in the West Hills feels like the blithering fools they appear to be?