some good news

First, Ted Stevens was found guilty of fraud on all seven counts. He faces up to 35 years in prison, but he'll probably get no time. Either way, he is officially tarnished, which is good.

The next bit of news is much more directly related to my well being. I had Steelie out hunting for the first time yesterday. I can't afford a license so I brought him along with a couple buddies for Quail and Grouse in the coast range. Mainly I just wanted him to get comfortable with guns blazing. When we started I kept him 50 yards or so from the guns and had them shoot, then moved him to within 20 yards, then within 10 feet. He barely flinched when he was up close, his ears were up and he was looking around trying to figure out what was going on. Then I threw a pheasant wing that I taped to a stick (for distance), he got all fired up and pretty much stayed that way the rest of the day. At the last spot we walked we flushed a covey of about 15 quail. 5 shots were fired and he was staring at the birds the whole time. The bank was a little steep for him to be comfortable on, but I brought him up anyways so he could see the downed birds. One of them did the dead bird wing flap and that spooked him a little, but he recovered quickly. When we were back on the road I threw the bird for him to retrieve and he did, flawlessly. Before we headed home we stopped at a spot we had seen birds in earlier. There was one quail on the road that ran into the ditch and flushed too fast to get a shot. Steelie didn't see the bird, but when he got to the scent he got super birdy and I could barely call him out of the ditch, he was determined to find that bird. All in all, an awesome first outing for a 4 month old. He is amazingly controllable already and I'm pretty excited to see how he'll hunt next season. Til then, I'll keep him busy as an alarmingly effective (so far) good luck charm for steelhead.

"Steelhead!"

Upon review of my last two posts, it was determined that I needed to go fishing. So a fishing, we did go. The camera took the day off, the lazy bastard. But that did not interfere, for the steelie dog was here (there really). Now I'm enjoying a grizzly and a stomach full of steelhead. Clearly, life is good.

sorry...

but i just can't help myself. with a big move coming up, there has been no fishing to speak of. so i've been keeping myself busy surfing the tubes. i give you a word from mr. strang.

"Steve Strang, publisher of Charisma magazine, a Pentecostal publication, titled one of his recent weekly e-mails to readers, 'Life As We Know It Will End If Obama is Elected.'

Strang said gay rights and abortion rights would be strengthened in an Obama administration, taxes would rise and 'people who hate Christianity will be emboldened to attack our freedoms.'"

this is very illustrative. but first, i don't hate christianity at all, i just don't agree with it. however, when obama is elected it will not embolden those of us that don't agree to attack freedom of religion or any other freedoms that you have as a christian. it will, however, embolden us to stop the government from turning christian beliefs into law therefore imposing them on the rest of us and taking away our freedoms. i really hope those days are over.

again, my apologies. this is supposed to be a fishing blog, kind of.

impending cranial implosion

This election needs to happen already. Every corner of the internet's tubes are clogged with McBama. Ted Stevens is probably turning in his grave, errrr, I mean defendants chair (note: Stevens' movement may also be accounted for by the attempt to relieve pressure on his hemorrhoids, a terrible case of which he has, from being Big Oil's bitch for soooooooo long).

Happy 14 days to go!

steelies and chanties and coho, oh my!

Its been damned busy around headquarters lately...I'll let the photos speak for themselves.