The Summer Madness Begins

The madness of the crowds will begin this weekend. The annual neighborhood garage sale is on again. Mike,Susan and Caite are coming for the fun. Dianne will be working Saturday and Sunday morning, so she will miss the Garage Sale fun. :-(.  I think there will be smoked drummies and a fish fry in the offing.
We managed to get on the water Monday for about 4 hours. We quit one fish short of the 6 fish limit. We ended up catching 11 total. 2 short fish that went back and 4 slot fish that went back. All fish coming on an orange Gum Drop floater jigs with a stinger and a leech.Rig was fished off a bottom bouncer and a 4ft lead. I guess I did catch one on a crawler. Orange is not usually a good color for me on Big Spirit but it was Monday.
I am finally getting some time on the Humminbird 998si, it is an awesome tool.

GRRRRR

Got to whine a little. I have spent an average of an hour and half, four days this week talking to support technicians trying to figure out an issue on my brand new notebook computer. Man I hate it when stuff doesn't work properly. Oh well, they are calling me back tomorrow to see if the fix the tech did today has stuck.It is kind of cool and kind of creepy when the tech takes over your computer and you see the cursor on the screen start moving, seemingly on its own. Will see in the morning when I start the  puter up, if the fix is still working.

Dianne and I got out on Big Spirit yesterday, tried to fish, difficult, wind 20mph with gusts to 35. Rockin and Rollin!!! Managed a pretty good northern and had another good fish come off. We were only out about 2 hours. Wind beat us up and we came in. I must be getting too old for those conditions. I used to relish the challenge of being able to fish and produce in that kind of wind.

Walleye Opener/Not In Attendance

All the reports from around the area, indicate that the walleye opener was a huge success. They had about 600 more entrants than last year. Amazing what a crack at 30 Grand will do for the sign-up. Apparently the bite was really good on Big Spirit. Bare hook an a crawler, trolling cranks, casting cranks, pitching jigs, you name it.

I did not participate. Dianne and I were privileged to attend our oldest Grandson Stefan's graduation from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. Wow, where does the time go. He graduated with Distinction, majoring in Mathematics, BS in Education and Human Services. Hope I got that right.

We enjoyed a fabulous lunch at Lazlo's in Lincoln, with Stefan and his fiancee Clair.,Dad,mom and sister Mike,Susan and Caitlin Elser. Grandpa John and Grandma Maxine Elser. Great Day!!

Time Well Spent (on the water)

Well, my bride and I took a little excursion on West Okoboji to test the new upgrade I downloaded to the Humminbird 998csi. Everything worked as advertised (whew) I am not sure I like them taking the Auto Sensitivity from the side imaging . But, you need to tweak it constantly anyway, so I guess it is all right. It looks like I am going to like the new waypoint, route,track management window. Looks complicated but will work through it. I used the Snapshot for the first time. I ran to my waypoint marking the Ice Truck in Smith's Bay and after about 20 minutes, I was able to get a pretty good sideimaging picture and recorded it on a chip. It isn't as good an image as Rick Dicus got so I will try to get a better angle the next time.
Didn't do any fishing to speak of, spent all my time learning the new electronics.
Well, I lied we pulled cranks for about 45 minutes in Upper Gar and Minnewashta, nothing caught.