"...and another huge endorsment coming from...where?"

With "super tuesday" just around the corner I feel that all my undecided voters out there need some guidance from their friendly 16 year old high school punk, me. Sure, I have never experienced the nervousness and anticipation of casting your ballot. Yeah, I don't know how to apply for an absentee ballot. And its true that I have never been a victim of voter intimidation at the local polling station. So how can I make a heartfelt presidential endorsement? Bitch, I don't need reasons.

But seriously, what does a high school know about politics? On the whole, jack shit. That's right, most of my friends don't care and there are girls in some of my classes who probably can't pronounce politics (pahl-i-Tiks). But the select few of us out there care, and care deeply. Somehow I still have quite a bit of free time even with swimming and the devil work assigned constanly by teachers. MSNBC, the Daily Show, newspapers, and that stupid AOL homepage newfeed all give me a constant flow of updates from the torrent that is the river of American with a capitol 'A' politics. In fact I would argue that I'm much more up to date than many would think. For instance, do you know who Bhutto was? Do you know which candidates won Iowa? How many have died in Kenya? Ohh, you don't know? Just ask me.

Now the important part. In the wake of the much influential Kennedy endorsement, I felt the nation could no longer wait for my own opinion as to who could best kick ass. Many factors come into play, such as the economy, wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, healthcare, enviornmental responsibility and the concern of electing a candidate who is way old. So John Mccain, you're a great guy, but your commitment to the war and extreme 'old' just don't do it for me. As for you Romney, honestly I feel no allegiance to you at all even though you're from MI. And while your business background could help economic concerns that are more really than concerns, I just don't like you much. Hillary, what can I say? I bet you'd do just fine, although on some occasions you do seem to be a bit bitchy. I just think that barack could do better. The image of change is an apealing one, and have you heard him talk? If he told me to jump off a bridge I might just do it. His policies and my ideals mesh, and thats what you look for in a candidate. So if I could cast my ballot I would definately Barrack the Vote. But I can't, so it doesn't really matter. Remember, "Only those who aspire to be slaves take no part in their government". Word.

Just an FYI, I totally called Huckabee and Obama in Iowa. You gotta like Huckabee too, he's gives a good vibe and the whole southern baptist thing doens't really concern me that much, but like I said, that's just me. Word x2.

the third first day

(kid rock, a famous but controversial m.n.r.)

so after those bitchin' finals that were deemed necessary all last week, I'm back to it- but with new classes!?!? Whooooaahh, I know, semesters are crazy. Almost as crazy as getting the same spanish teacher for a second semester in row who you don't...get along with. But anyway, the highlight was definately MNR. That's Michigan Natural Resources for all you ecological laymen out there. A class devoted entirely to Michigan's natural world with a teacher who enjoys his job, what more could I ask for? I didn't even get homework in that class, what a guy. The last thing we did after ) decided to explain his cell phone policy for a half and hour was to go over the first five animals that would be on our quiz. 1) American Robin, novice stuff really. Although the bird's call is fair game on a test, but I'm not worried. 2) Ruffed Grouse, intermediate difficulty, although I was the only one in the class to modestly and with a sense of embarassment say, "yes i do believe that is the ruffed grouse". 3) Red Winged Black Bird, we listen to the call and after el maestro related the call of the bird to spring I knew exactly what he was talking about, and could feel that warm breeze and lack of brown slush in the streets. 4) Racoon. I learned all I needed to know about this clever mammal from "The Great Outdoors". If you don't know what I'm talking about you haven't lived. 5) Wood Duck, once again, the only one who knew it, but I mean c'mon, its a wood duck.



Another highlight was the description of the trip up north over a weekend in May to help the forest service count grouse in the woods. You know how cool that is to me? That's like season tickets to Tigers' games along with your best friends and all the ladies, and somehow working a camio by Bill Murray in there.

On second thought maybe not, but counting birds in the woods is still pretty cool. And equally as cool was when he said, "Ya, fyi to all you juniors out there, when the seniors leave we'll be spending most every class at Maybury". Double score. Do I even need to explain this gem? I think not.

(ohh, and while looking for a picture for this post I stumbled across UofM's School of Natural Resources and Enviornment. aaaahhhh, shit, better watch out now, clay's narrowing down his college search!?!?!) Word.

my first...

my first snowfight

and my first degree

and my first inside-the-parker
and my first swim meet
and one of my first "big brothers are cool" moments
my first time giving into peer pressure and my first motocross

and my first brown trout

I haven't added too many pictures lately, which I realized needed to change. And since nothing too important has happened lately I decided to add some old family classics. Hope you enjoyed. Word.

walter is gone...as is the happiness

I realize that most posts lately have related to swimming, and at first glance this one will too, but I promise you that this issue reaches deeper than doing laps, this is an issue about respect.

Last night at Walled Lake Western High School, our mascot and boy, Walter, was kidnapped. Some punk ass bitches came in through the fire escape door, grabbed the camel, and dashed out the door. The divers, in a case of totally unexpected heroism, sprinted after the perps outside into the arctic abyss wearing their speedos and managed to get the licsense plate of the truck.

So who is Walter? Why is he so important? I'm sad to say that I can't even give you a good awnser. You see, Walter is a plastic camel who has been an integral part of our team for years. Alot of years. Walter has been on the team way, way longer than any else. I suppose that makes him around a six year super senior. He is brought to all our meets and even shows up to some practices. As with most cases, the true history about how Walter first came onto the team has been modified over the years. But this is what is known for sure: About eight to ten years ago, one of the seniors in an act of bravery stole a camel from a nativity scene. I know what you're thinking, and it was the camel okay, not like he stole baby Jesus. Anyways, Walter found his niche on the team until he was kidnapped by Stevenson. Those bitches. Of course we got him back, I guess. Anyways, that was all before my time. But this is the defining moment of my, and others like me, swim season. How we respond to this travesty is...a big deal.

Dually noted by Rich. Although at pratice today he didn't specifically adress the Walter incident, we could tell what he want. "How stupid are these kids? Show up to the San Diego Zoo and start putting their fingers in the cage. They keep messin' with us, and you know what? Someone's gonna get their arm bit off." Just remebering that epic current event style speech makes me crave uncooked red meat.

So let me conclude with a message to the individuals who have done this. You've taunted the tiger. The tiger is pissed. The tiger is gonna bite your goddamn head off. We're the tiger, and we're not leaving our boy behind. Consider yourself warned.

wildcats = sucky mascot name

Tonight we swam Novi and beat their asses like Seabass would have had he caught Jim and Jeff at that diner in Dumb and Dumber. Anyways the meet was such a big deal that I decided to wear my bow tie to school. Literally, I walked into the main enterance and women immediately jumped on me, grabbing and touching. My tie is that 'hot'. I watched about 4 youtube video tutorials and took alot of trial and error time to finally figure it out, but next time I'm at a wedding I'll have it all down. So ya, the tie was sexy.

But I digress, we kicked Novi's ass, really bad. We may have 1-2-3-4'd every event. Seeing as how we're the only team that is capable of beating Novi sports, we take full advantage. We domesticated and declawed them, at home. Word.

'tis the shiz

Wow. What a monday morning, beyond words. A roller coaster of emotion, ending in that all disappointing slow and steady trip back to normalcy. An email was sent out to the team on friday saying, most importantly, "NO AM practice monday". Reading this Sunday afternoon, I felt I could now put off the starting of my English project that was due today off until Sunday night. Well Sunday night comes around and I get a call from one of our captains, "ya, we have practice tomorrow morning". Shhhhhiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit. I collapsed on the freezing wood floor to gather myself. It took a while, but I finally got up, finished my other junk, and went to bed, where I proceeded to roll around for about two hours thinking about how bad it is that I can't fall asleep.

4:42- I wake up and look at the alarm, frustrated that I'm going to be getting up in 3 minutes and decided to space out.

5:05- Walk across the salt and trash tundra that is the NHS parking lot in the 12 degree plus windchill heatwave.

5:22.38- While stretching on the mats, Rich says we're starting to taper. Holy Shit! Taper! Taper is the shit, its the most fantabulous time of the season. We swim virtually no distance, not very fast, and no more morning practice. This morning was the last morning practice of the season. My happiness was beyond words.

5:35- Fire alarm goes off. What the hell? Its like 2 degrees out and there's a fire? Must have been some punk ass freshman. Rich went out to find out was causing this damn annoying strobe and horn thing to disturb our practice. We continued to warm up and I thought about who I would be willing to sacrifice to the flames should we somehow not have enough room in the pool for everyone. A certain few came up, and many dumb ass freshman. We were told to "sit tight" for a second in the confusion of that early morning. He comes back five minutes later and says, "Hey, what's that hallway over there? Ya, well there's a river in it. Ya man I know, it was like a torrent coming from these broken pipes. There's no way you're having school today". While hearing about taper was great, being assured that school was going to be canceled was a step up to legendary. Everybody in the pool started yelling, thanking Jesus Christ our Savior, clapping, and in some cases even crying. It was one of the happiest moments of my life.

6:30- After finishing practice we sent a freshman out into the hallway in speedo and all to check if there were people in the halls. "Yes". Damnit, we were so close. There's a river in the middle of the damn hallway and we still have school? Shit. I needed a great shower session to relieve my stress.

6:30- 6:36- Waited for the shower (Neil) to warm up. Ohh, I know why it took so long, because all the damn water is in the hallway. Shit!

6:30-6:45- Attempt to shampoo/condit. in the ice cold turned scalding hot water. Extremely frustrating

6:46- Vented anger by killing a man

7:00- Get dressed and go to class. So close.

To make matters worse, Bob, our assistant coach was at practice today as well as Rich. This is never a good sign due to the fact that all Bob does is yell about streamlining off turns and other technical stuff like that. Needless to say as I meandered onto the deck trying my speedo and looked up to see Bob, I could only say, "aww shit, what's up Bob" "Hah, not too much Clay" He was holding a water polo ball, and I had to ask, "we playin' water polo today Bob" "Hah, nice try". It was then that I knew I had to steal Bob's ball, he was enjoying it too much. I snuck up behind him and tried to strip it out of his burly arms. I almost had it until something hard hit my lip. "Shit Bob, your class of '96 ring cut me. I'm bleeding all over, I can't swim today Bob" "It's class of '92" "Shit, you are old". Then I swam a bitching practice. The end. Feel free to share any past or current monday stories. Word.

-1

Today is a bittersweet reminder of what used to be. One of my three remaining anglefish died today, or possibly any one of the last couple of days. While it was sad to see such an old fish die, I don't think I'll miss him. Maybe that makes me a horrible person, but maybe not. I've had that fish longer than Rocky. Five years and all that damn fish did was sit in the corner of the tank. A beautifully decorated tank with tetras and plants and rocks and other anglefish, and he didn't do squat. Maybe if he'd have played fetch or something like Rocky does I'd have felt a little worse this morning as I scooped him out of the tank. Not too many memories with that guy.

Anyways, if I had to guess a cause of death, I'd say he literally froze to death. The icebox that is the basement combined with the 8 degree highs we've been having in lovely metro detroit to kill my fish. It's probably a little warmer in the Amazon. Good thing it's trash night tonight. Word.

shit, finals!

Normally I try not to use exclamation points in my writing, they just seem to represent some forced sense of excitement. But the title needs one to reinforce that this time around a lackadaisical 'shit, finals...' won't suffice. No, no, these are junior finals. The bitchin' kind.

My English final is some project that we got to design ourselves based on one of the units we focused on throughout the semester. I chose to create a portfolio on actual utopian societies, but the important thing is that we get to design our own rubrics as well. So today I was supposed to have all my pages of drafting done. I had my introduction, half finished. My teacher was like, "Clay, where's the rest?" "Hey Mrs. Besco, chill out, I'm working on it" "But the project is due Monday" "And today's Friday...were you trying to make a point?" Ohh I wish I could talk to teachers like that, but that is in the realm of fantasy my friend. Anyway, the standard other stuff: Chemistry, a.p. European History, Algebra 2, Spanish 4; you get the idea.

Speaking of euro, we had an excellent day today in class. Most likely because over half our class was on a field trip to the DIA. I didn't go because of some other tests that I would have missed had I went, and I just don't like art that much. So I thought we would have a sub and a review packet to do, but alas I was wrong. The seven or eight of us sat in the classroom unattended for roughly 90 minutes playing gameboy and watching 'beerfest' on muscles' iPod. Best day of A.P. European History ever. Who cares about Napoleon and the rise of French absolutism anyways?

One last thing worthy of note, we hit up Asian Buffet after the meet last night. Normally, well, it leaves your ass on fire, but the stars were aligned last night, and the general's chicken was delicious and extra saucy. The highlight of the dinner was not the freshman eating wasabi, but rather the fortune cookie game. If you've never played before you're missing out. Crack open that cookie, read your fortune, and then add '-in your bed' to the end. I won with a "You will quickly start a popular business (in your bed)", or I was winning until A.J. pulled the same fortune. Good Asian food is hard to beat. Word.

5 hundo

Listen up playas, meet tommorow against Canton. In case you didn't know, the Chiefs are all douchebags and give a bad reputation to all native american tribes out there, almost as much so as last years' Atlanta Braves. Anyways, I'm swimming the 5. That's right, 20 bitchin lengths of that damn pool. I normally swim 1/10 of that. By my math, if I go a :25. in the 50, that times ten is 2:50; a new world record. So, if you want to see history made in swimming, I suggest coming to the meet at 7. I hope you didn't believe me about the w.r., if you did you obviously know nothing about sports in general. But whatever, the point is the 500 sucks, big time. I swam it once as a freshman, and since then I have somehow been able to dodge the elephant tracer round that is the 5 hundo. Tommorow that bullet will hit me square in the face, and my chances of surviving will be quite slim. If you were planning to come to the meet, don't bother; we'll win by at least 120 and I'll swim my worst event. So if you were planning on flying in to see me swim, well I hope you bought flight insurance.

In more important news, Sylvester Stalone is back with RAMBO. The one time Chuck Norris who sadly is now more washed up than Gary Coleman is back for a way too unnecessary conclusion to what would have been remebered as a great series. With that being said, will I still see it? Of course, the midnight showing no less.

But anyways, I plan to Rambo my 5 hundo. It's a verb now, spread it. Word.

what I've learned

This morning I was overcome with the typical "shitty" feeling that I have come to know well during swim season. I feel that "shitty" is a proper adjective to describe monday mornings due to the simplistic animosity that floats through my mind as I climb out of my flannel sheets and sleep walk towards an hour and a half of pain. Pain that is as dependable as Billy Mays doing infomercials, that old guy from liberty medical pronouncing 'diabetes' wrong, and as dependable as the Lions falling short of weak expectations. I know all sports sucks in their own ways, but consider this: 1. Swimming is the only sport where you must control your breathing (as in not breath. Seriously, try running in gym and only breath every 10 seconds). 2. Unless you sweat it all out dancing at the Italian American Club on saturday nights, it takes at least a week for that exclusive chlorine stank to come go away. 3. Shit, I'm too tired to think of a third. But the point is that swimming, just like other sports, sucks. I have never, ever, looked forward to a swim practice. Not once. But this year they've been much more bearable, because I've just given up. Quit? No. I've given up the freshman dream of mythical 'fun practice'; a practice where we stretch for an hour, warmup, then cool down, and then play some dodgeball with Keira Knightly (I love dodgeball, and Keira Knightly is hot. Best of both worlds). It will never, ever happen. So why fantasize about it? The sooner I realized I will never have fun the easier practice became. Practice sucks, its not gonna change, so get used to it. Work blows, probably always will, so do something fun for lunch.

And that's exactly what I do at work. Race Toby and Josh to McDonalds, buy my #2, and haul ass back to the shop where I can listen to some way unintelligent but nonetheless thought provoking conversation that makes me feel good about myself.

But I digress. The point of this post is utterly nonexistent, except for the fact that I listened to "Soulshine" by gov't mule this morning when I woke up, and I must say it made that it made my death march much more... positive. If you haven't heard it give it a listen. Word.

Florida, 3 of 3

Not too much to say for this one, but I saw some pretty cool stuff on the trip, and just thought you may like to see. For instance, one day at the beach beds of sargassum weed floated up, and I saw countless different species, highlighted with:a craba shrimpanother crab species, freakishly small, in the crease of my fingers an extremely small fish

and the highlight of the day, a seahorse.

So Jeff Corwin, cut the shit and start returning my calls. You've seen what I can do, and I know you want to take me on for whatever job you need done, just give me a call buddy. In addition, I went to John's and we saw a whole family of iguana's that just hang out in the seagrape there, obviously pets at one time, there are now iguanas of all size, including two 4 footers.

Corwin, call me. Word.

Northville v. Stevenson

Last night was the most important meet of the year, Northville v. Them. So why is there a picture of Chuck Norris, I mean he didn't fly in for this meet? Well my friends, if I had to metaphorically draw what our attitude and mentality looked like last night, it would be this stunner above. Two machine guns with rawhide straps; cut off sleeves; look of determination that's near constipation; a big, hot, nasty American flag; and of course the denim shirt unbuttoned to the belt for maximum sweaty sexy. In fact, the talk we got while stretching out before practice wednesday blew my mind. Rich was pacing in front of us explaining that underestimating that team down six mile was the worst mistake we could make, and that we'd have to swim the best meet of the season to beat them. Then out of the blue Rich said something to the extent of, "This is a twelve event meet, you do not let them back in at any point. When they pull themselves out of that pool, you put your cleats on and drive them through their skulls." Yikes. I almost started laughing, which totally would have ruined the depressing mood. I mean it just sounded so exorbitantly violent. I don't even kill spiders, how am I gonna shove a spike through a kid's head? Anyways, we didn't need to.

Although we lost the medley relay despite my :22.8 split (bitchin' fast), we were ahead the whole meet, although only by 2 at diving, which made it way too close for comfort. In the ultra competitive world of high school swimming, 2 points is practically nothing. The highlight of the meet was that of the 20 or so girls who timed for us, about 18 must have had "we love northville boys swimming" shirts. Score. They may as well have said, "I come to meets to check out the dudes", but that may have been too obvious. I even saw them being passed out at school today, which means we're spreadin' the love, groovy. Anyways, the only bad part of the girls timing is that you're walking around in you're speedo the whole time. Maybe you try to change the subject off your bulge, example: "Hey Megan, did you do the Spanish homework?". For me that generally doesn't work, so yesterday right before I hopped up to bend over on the starting block I said,
"Hey Lindsay?"
"Yeah, Clay?"
"Don't stare at my ass, okay?"
"Haha, okay..."
Then I went a :52.6, so regardless of how baggy my suit happens to be in the ass, I probably will kick your ass. Wow, that's really cocky, but hey, why not?

We went out to Red Robin and I had a great Red Robin Bacon Cheeseburger with amazing Freckled Lemonade, making sure to slurp the chunks of strawberry through the straw in a very suggestive manner. Anyways, on the way home it was raining like a bitch, and dark. Not great driving conditions. I had to drop off some underclassmen, so I told a.j. to put on some good music and tell me how to get to his house. He chose "Crazy Rap" by Afroman, a solid victory song. So as I was focusing on driving through a.j.'s hood, I unknowingly said the whole verse of the "Met this girl from Michigan, can't wait 'till I f*** that chick again". SHIT. The streak came to an end. 16 years, 10 months, and 11 days without saying the f-bomb-gone. SHIT. I don't know what I have to live for anymore. Ohh wait, another Stevenson ass kicking, never mind. Word.

bowling, anyone?

After 12 games of thoroughly spartan football games this year, the crescendo that is fourth quarter losses and broken dreams built up into an undeniably electric Champs' Sports Bowl. Yes, the Champs' Sports Bowl, the creme de le creme, the holy grail, may I say the Jessica Alba of college bowl games? I had the pleasure to see this historic game. Historic because of the Chernobyl degree of suck that plagued Brian Hoyer through his entire 'game'.

The three hour drive from Jupiter to Orlando was quite uneventful except for the Stover family classic driving game that we played. I challenged Brady to a game of 'cows', and after Mandy laid down the rules, we battled. We modified the game rules for Florida wildlife, and concluded that cows=1, assorted water birds=2, alligators=10, and florida panthers=300, while any roadside memorial/cemeterry lost you all your points. I could tell I would have to step up my game and count as fast as I could with my eagle eyes seeing as how brady saw about 4 panthers in a quater mile.

Finally we arrived in Orlando, and, well, it wasn't that great. Not quite a family fun park if you know what I mean. After close to 4 hours of dry tailgaiting, we made our way to the stadium and up to our seats.

I fully expected for B.C. to beat us into a pulp, as did the 300 or so B.C. fans at the game, those cocky bitches. Anyway, the State side of the stadium actually started to shake as sparty led the team out of the tunnel. I'm not sure I could have yelled louder if I wanted to, especially after the first, "first down, biiiitch". Somehow MSU was winning most of the game, but as any experienced State fan will tell you, there is a constant fear of that the stone foundation that has been laid for the past 3 quarters will crumble into a shitty, demoralized heap of shit.

So who dropped the duece in this game? Mr. Brian Hoyer with 4 INTs, 1 fumble, and 11/36 passing or something like that. Needless to say we lost by 2 or 3 points or something like that. It looked so promising. I liken it to that fake cake in the kitchen. You know, the one on the platter that's just there for decoration but you think it's real. You get so excited about this slice of cake you're about to have because the chocolate looks so good, and then you cut into it and it's fake, making you feel embassed about even thinking about taking the cake. I was embassed that I thought we could win, so close but yet so far. I got a bit frustrated...

We lost, and I really don't want to even think about it anymore, it's that sour to me still. Ohh, and it didn't help that we pulled a mini Florida State and had 4 or 5 players accademically ineligable for the game. I mean shit guys, study for your finals, its not that hard. You get your own tutors for being on the team and you still can't pass, can't pass, your finals? Shit guys, I mean shit. Better luck next year guys. Word.

future career? yes, please!

If you don't know me, than you probably don't know that fishing is sorta my thing. What overpriced cars are to some, and Grey's Anatomy is to others, fishing is to me. Not quite an obsession, but...well, maybe. I don't want to talk about it.

But I will write about it. In my six or so days in florida this Christmas break I went fishing twice. The first was to the infamous Juno Fishing Pier. The place where multiple times I have spent hours watching the little Vietnamese men around me pull up fish as I do seaweed. With the exception of one trip I have never left the pier with that indescribable feeling of pure luck and gratitude that the nine inch bluefish decided to bite my double hooked line instead of the hooks of identical bait around it. What I have left with each and every time is sunburn. As you can tell, not too many fond memories of the pier. And why should there be? All that happens is that I get harassed by seagulls and pelicans, step in bird shit, and up smelling like bait, and catch absolutly nothing. But somehow I still love fishing.

Anyways, this time was different. I was going with the father-son fishing team of the century, John Arthur Syverson III and John Arthur Syverson IV (John and Mr. Syverson for short). As I was saying, they love fishing as much as I do, and Mr. S. knows all about saltwater catching. At least that's what I thought, until we struck out again. At the end of the day we asked the vietnamese man in his camo jacket what we were doing wrong. We had to buy him off first with leftover shrimp, but we got what we needed to know, "Your hook too big, and line too fat". Shit. We had no chance all this time.

But I wasn't about to let one bad experience of the fishing capital of the world deter me from the work that needed to be done. Catching fish.

The last day of the vacation I planned to wake up early, 7 o'clock, and go fishing. However, after a totally dry new year's eve celebration, and much other demanding activity of the sort, I accidentally slept in until 8:30. "Shit, shit, shit". I tried to sneak out of the house, but Dad spotted me with my fishing gear. "You gonna go swimming later then?". "Ahh, maybe, I don't know." "You know you're supposed to, You're not doing what Rich told you". "Alright". I trudged into the bathroom to put on my speedo and get my swimming shit together, went across the street to the pool, put in a solid 40 minute workout, and called it a day. After all, I had work to do.

Still in my speedo and a pair of shorts, I grabbed my gear and headed to the dog park. But clay, there's no fish in dog parks, are there? Good question loyal reader, not usually. But this is perhaps the nicest dog park I have ever had the privelege to experience. About 2 acres of native florida wilderness proctection area thing, a nicely fenced, two section dog area, and jai-lai courts for whatever. Ohh, and it backs up to the intracostal, the system of inland saltwater waterways and channels that border the ocean all along the coast. The previous day I saw a manatee, and that was my main reason for coming back. The chance to see the fatest, clumsiest, most unevovled animal on the endangered species list that for some reason has a special spot in my heart. Sappy, in know. No manatee this time, just sweltering heat and lots of big, big boats.

I tied on a DOA shrimp to the end of my line, naive as that sounds. I didn't know what I was doing, but after much Discovery channel I knew that fish loved the mangroves. Second cast I pulled in the shrimp as saw about a one foot pufferfish chasing my lure. "Haha, this is gonna be a fun day". About the fourth of fifth cast I tossed the shrimp out there and 'jerked it' right along the mangrove roots. All of the sudden something pulled back, and hard. I 'jerked it harder' and something silver came out. It jumped high out of the water and I honestly thought at first that it was just a giant minnow, how stupid of me. After a solid fight I pulled in the 18 inch barracuda. Awesome.

So awesome that in my panic to get a trophy shot it almost bit me. All I'll say is that if it bit me I would have 'leatherman'd' that ho.

I know I look constipated in that picture, but I wasn't. I was sweaty, and sweaty is sexy.

After my barracuda miracle I was fishing purely for fun, I had the "nothing to loose, everything to gain" attitude. I caught nothing for the next hour and a half but that was fine with me. The couple that came while I was there did. The man was at first a little hesitant to get in the water, saying, "Shit, shit, that's cold. I ain't puttin' my foot down in that. Shit man". "Just give it a minute boo, you'll be hot in a second". Within two minutes of fishing he pulled in a nice pompano. He put down his cigarrette thing and unhooked the fish, dropping it in the bucket. I told him I had to leave, because I did have to be home. "Alright man, I got to go, but good luck to you." "Ahh, we just came from home. Left the kids and came fishing. This is our time, our time, haha. Well good luck to you too little man." The 'little' man wasn't necessary but I knew he meant well. Goodbye beach and new friends.

That was, for many reasons, possibly the nicest, most gangster man I have ever met.