I Felt Bad...

About the Stalking.

I'm out of town. Back soon with wise man tales of adventure. Till then...

Chaquita has stalked up a squirrel. Whoops there's that stalking again.




Cathy likes to take pictures of their faces. Is that some kind of stalking?












On no that guy. He will stalk anything.

Stalking...

Stalking just aint what it used to be. Ruined as it be by caller ID and ever falling prices of home security monitoring systems. So yesterday I hearkened back to the olden days. I tried to get a feel for what it

must have been like for an Indian to stalk up on a herd of buffalo somewhere out on the great plains. Lucky for me I have a herd of buffalo right next door. Some places people will pay a fee to stalk up something like this. Besides, this herd is basically underutilized. I have only been using them to tell if the fish are biting. Buffalo stand up,fish bite.Buffalo all lay down, fish not bite.

There's some now. Let's see if we can get a little closer.

Right up to them. Old Chief Mudbelly peers right between the trees as he shoots with his trusty bow and kodak.

Wait a minute, What's that coming, quick, hide.

Looks like another large animal is working the area. Careful, be quiet, be sneaky.

Look out folks we scared him. Run Away!

Those old stalking habits are hard to break.

News From Little Rock...

Mary competed in a TKD tournament in Little Rock, chauffeured there by Rose, because we had to work and the results are fantastic.

1st in sparring and weapons and second in form. Mary has had a very good TKD month.

It's on to the world championship, held in Little Rock this June.

End of the Week Stuff...

I know you wonder some time when you look at these pictures, well there is a photo of Cathy with a big fish, Carl kicking someone in the head at a tournament, do they ever get their picture made together?

Here's your answer.

Pop and Geneva Visit...

Pop and Geneva came down and set up the camper at Hanks's Creek. Here is what Camp Catfish looks like.

We noodle fished again. Slower today, had a little trouble catching good live bait.


First fish of the day was the biggest. Did not weight but I am guessing 3-4lbs.











Not a bad day, just enough for a good fry.
Coup;e of nice crappie in there.









You know the rest of the story, swimming in our bellies. Geneva cheerfully puts up with a lot of trials and tribulations to enjoy a nice meal.

TKD in Dallas...

Went to a tournament in Dallas this weekend. Here is a picture of Mary and a couple of other students from our school. Mary place 1st in sparring, second in forms.







Here is Morgan, he is getting the competitor packet ready as he judges in a ring.












Mary doing forms.

I placed second in forms. I lost my first sparring match so I was out of the running there. Not much sparring practice since the eye surgery. I guess it's just as well, maybe I am getting more graceful in my old age.

Who Done This?...

Seems like that is a question I have asked many time throughout the years of raising four kids and except for the big white dog of course, providing shelter for numerous pin headed canines.

So now with most of the kids out of the house and the two resident pin heads totaling about 20lb combined weight, not really enough to do much damage, I ask that question again. Who done this?

What you see is damage to one of my flower areas from an unknown source. This shaded area has a couple of azaleas, Indian hawthorn, and here you see the shoots of some bulbs that look to have been used as a bed. No real damage here, the flowering done they are just waiting to be cut down by the weed eat to do it all again next early spring. One thing that may be lost is an Easter lily that has been coming up and blooming for some years. It hasn't done it's thing yet so I don't know if it can recover, the stalk is broken and the plant lies on the ground.

This really looks as if something about 6 or 8 feet tall laid on the cool green stalks and crushed them. This looks like such a cool comfortable place I almost tried it on for size myself. So I ask again, who done this? A swamp ape? Aliens? Buford and Brenda? Those thing loom large in the lore of this blog, popping up to inhabit our dreams and visions, to provide explanations to the unknown and to provide that ever needed re-enforcement that no, we don't know all and there are things out there that are hard to wrap our weak minds around.

Who done this?...

Sam Rayburn Odds and Ends...

In case you wonder what all this noodle business is about here is what they look like. Take one of those kids swim noddles, cut in four equal pieces, tie on a drop line, a sinker and bait with your favorite. I noticed an ebay search for cat fish turned up folks selling these.

Note the store bought one on the left, got it for my birthday. Catches fish, a little buoyant so it must be watched closely because it might not get jerked under as violently as the noodles. In Texas these things got to be mostly white and have your name on them. Might be a good idea to have the date to keep the game warden honest.

These mud hens ignored the heck out of us and were busy diving and feeding away in this shallow area. During duck season there is a bag limit of 15 on these guys. Supposedly they have a huge gizzard, I mean a whole handful each bird that is said to be tasty. I suspect the rest of the meat tastes about like what ever it is they are scooping off the bottom. And no, there has never been one of these birds or any part of one of them to swim in my belly.

Ok here is something serious. An invasive plant Giant Salvina has been found in Rayburn. This is a plant that was sold in the U.S. for aquarium use. It grows fast and kills a lake by covering the surface with a mat that prevents wave action that produces O2 exchange. Gets from lake to lake hung up on boat trailers and in livewells. There have been some Texas lakes to have areas closed off by a boom system to prevent the spread by wind and waves to uncontaminated areas. I have seen pictures of Lake Bastineau in Louisiana that show what looks to be a grassy pasture where the water should be. Only know thing that eats it is some type of weevil. We need a lot of those things fast. I look for some serious countermeasures. Fishing is big business from an economic standpoint in this state. Picture take at Hank's Creek Boat ramp. I am sure this sign is at all boat ramps by now.

More Catfish...

Whoops, that's a bass folks. Are you supposed to keep these?

The white specks in the background are our floating noodlelines. The land you see is an island, really the top of a hill with very deep water close by. On the right hand side you can see the remains of an old logging tram from the glory days of East Texas logging that ran up to the top of the hill.

The catfish whisperer. Note the equipment. Net, noodle in the net and the stick with a hook on it. Eyes constantly scanning the horizon for bobbing noodles. The right hat is ever so important and of course the one element that does not come across in these photos is the loud pounding rock music emitting from the speakers that just seems to make the fish jump in the boat.




Of course we have the tub shot. big fish were a 5lber and two in the 3lb range.









Came right home, got out the iron skillet and blackend up several of these boys who now swim in my belly.

Prom Night...

Last night was prom night. Here is Mary and her date, Scott doing the mandatory parent visit and pictures.

Scott seemed like a very nice young man, polite, on time, good manners. These young people were able to past the drug test I required them to take to be permitted to attend, both before and after the prom. Great job kids!


The theme to this years prom was "Hairway to Steven."
That kind of sounds like there was a middle aged committee of faculty advisers that did not have dates to their prom in 1974.











Full length shot. The styles are short for the girls this year.

Squirrel Attractors are Out...

Each year Cathy does a great job of fixing up some mixed planters of various blooming things that sit on the deck railing and considerabley brighten up the area.

Only problem is that the also do double duty as squirrel attractors. Seems the pesky critters get bored and find out that the soft potting soil makes for easy diggings. Good thing they don't have bodies to hide.

Part my fault, the diggings. When I was laid off work in 2003 and was sitting around the house charting a new journey and playing switchem I cultivated the squirrel population by feeding sunflower seeds. Some times the squirrels come right up in the garage when I have forgotten to feed and help themselves to the bag of seeds that sits there. The dogs spend a good bit of time in the garage also. They are small dogs, not much bigger than a squirrel. I suspect some type of arrangement has been worked out. Maybe if I ever get a chance to sit around playing switchem again I'll figger it out.

Anyway, if you are at my house, (and that's another reason for this blog publication, so you won't have to visit and sit around looking at flowers, squirrels, playing switchem and just really get on with living your own life) don't smell these flowers. They are dusted with some kind of pepper spray designed by my wife to discourage diggings. Seems it works because this week it's so far so good.

There is one of them now, I think that's Speedy, or Spankey, Sparky, maybe Smelly and I think he has bodies to hide.

Catfish!...

First you start with some wild red horse shiners caught in a cast net at the boat ramp.

Then you bait your floating noodles with them and start yanking in the catfish.

Here's Cathy with Mr. Big for the day, 11lbs.

Final total 12 catfish that weighed 35lbs all together.

The biggest 4 went 11, 7, 5 and 3lbs respectively. All fish caught on the floating noodles between 11am and 2pm in about 3 to 7ft of water.

Made about 13lbs of fillets in the freezer, soon to be swimming in a belly near you.

It's Time to Get Excite...

That's what Borat would say if he were going to the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival. He probably is, it is the number one place to be the last weekend in April, first weekend in May for live music.

Here you see our tickets. We are only able to attend Thursday and Friday of the second weekend but it looks great and there are so many great night time shows it's hard to make a pick. We bought tickets for a George Clinton P-Funk show and that's just to get us started.

If you want to know what's going on check out the world famous cubes.
Performers are usually announced early in the year, but things get excite when the cubes with the festival performance times come out the first of April. Click on May 1st and second to see who is there when we are there:
http://www.nojazzfest.com/
For night time club shows check the world famous jazz fest grids to see what is going on all over town:
http://www.jazzfestgrids.com/

getting back to business...

Been warming up to getting back to some Taekwondo after my surgery this week by teaching a couple of classes. Getting harder and harder for the champ to make a comeback these days, but you know what they say, the older you will get...



Here are some pictures a parent at the school made the night of the Halloween workout and recently they were passed on to me.

Here Mary is turning Japanese.

You know this guy, El Gato Negro. He's a famous wrassler.

Tiny Tiger class with instructors.