Take the ride as far as anyone can go

Well hello there. Did you miss me? Thought so. If you're curious, here's what I've been up to while I've been neglecting my blog:

- Took my kids to Slide Rock State Park in Sedona.





- Started a new job, teaching part time at a small college here in town.

- Saw Cracker play at Wasted Space at the Hard Rock. Good concert. They played for two straight hours. And that's not even counting the opening band, which was . . . one of the members of Cracker.

- Defended my dissertation. And passed. But you already knew that.

- Spent a few days biking in the mountains of Utah, and spent the evenings soaking in a hot tub on the deck of the cabin. There were some beautiful fall colors.






- Visited my grandparents.

- Had a paper accepted into a good scientific journal with minor revisions.

- Went flyfishing.

If she wants to dance and drink all night, well there's noone that can stop her

**Edit**
If you're looking for the lyrics to Thrash Unreal, click here.
**Resume post**

About a month ago somebody made the comment that I've lived in Vegas too long (sure I was talking about how to dispose of a body, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything). While it may be true that I've lived here too long, weird stuff also happened to me before I moved here. I've told you about the time I picked up The Hungarian, but he wasn't the first stranger I'd ever given a ride, and it was only slightly more uncomfortable than the first time.

It was shortly after my ex-wife and I had separated, and I went on a weekend flyfishing trip to the Green River to try and get my mind off things. It was early in the spring (my favorite time to fish the river), and I was on my way home. About a 100 miles from home I passed a truck with its hazard lights blinking. Since it was in the middle of nowhere, and it was getting dark, I looked around to see if I could help, but didn't see anyone. I kept driving, it got dark and started snowing. About 20 miles down the road, as I was coming up on a small town, I passed a shadow on the side of the road. Figuring that this was the driver of the broken down vehicle, I stopped and a woman got in the car.

Her: Thank you so much!
Me: Don't mention it. Is that your truck back there?
Her: No.
Me: No? Then what are you doing out in this?
Her: Oh, I'm coming from that trailer park over there.
Me (noticing the trailer park for the first time): Oh. Do you live there?
Her: No. I just came from having a threesome with a girl from work and her husband.
Me: Um, really?
Her: Yeah. She's been wanting to fuck me for a long time. So, I finally agreed to do a threesome with her and her husband, and then she goes and gets all pissed off and starts fighting with him afterward.
Me: . . .
Her: The original plan was for him to pick me up and then take me home afterward, but after they started fighting I just left.
Me: Ok, so where do I need to take you.
Her: I just live on the other side of town.
Me: I'll take you home so you don't have to walk in this.
Her: Thanks.
Me: No problem.

Uncomfortable silence

Her: So, do you party?
Me: No.
Her: You don't drink, or do any drugs?
Me: Nope. I'm a good boy.
Her: Wow. So there are still a few of those left in the world.
Me: Yup.

This was about the time that we started getting close to her place, so the conversation stopped so she could give me directions. I dropped her off. She tried to get me to come in for a drink, but I declined. She may as well have been asking me, "So, which STD would you like to contract tonight?"

My only question is, how come the girls in stories like this are never attractive? If she had been, the ending may have been a little bit different.

So far away but it's so easy to see

This is one of the best pictures ever taken of me:

I came across it as I was going through some old photographs at my parents' house last weekend. Flieswithoutwings took it one day when we went to the river in order to try out my new (and very first) fly rod. I don't think we were successful in catching any fish that day, but at least we got a great picture out of the deal.

Ocean Man

When I was an undergraduate I worked part time in the fishing department of a sporting goods store. It was a relatively easy job, and it allowed me to justify flyfishing a couple times a week rather easily (as if I really needed much of an excuse to put off studying if there wasn't an exam looming in the immediate future), so even though the pay wasn't all that great, I enjoyed it immensely.

When you work at a place like that, everyone that walks through the door assumes that you are an expert* on everything the store has in stock. I learned how to flyfish 15 years ago, but I'd hardly call myself a flyfishing expert, let alone an expert in all types of fishing. However, in such a situation you hear enough from co-workers, customers and sales representatives that you do get an idea of what the quality products are, and which ones are junk. It was only because of this that I felt comfortable talking to people about what products to buy.

One day a woman and her son came in to see about purchasing a new reel for him. The son was in his 30s, and had an obvious mental handicap. The woman explained to me that her son really liked to go fishing, and she needed to buy him a new reel because his old one had broken. She went on to say that she didn't want to buy something cheap because he would break it very quickly if she did, but also that she didn't want to spend a lot of money because no matter what she bought, he would probably end up breaking it anyway.

I showed her a couple of reels that people seemed to be really happy with, and as I was explaining the differences to her, her son kept bouncing up and down in the background yelling, "I BROKE MY 'NUTHER ONE!"

I continued on and was somehow able to keep a straight face until she left with her son and his new reel. Forget moving out on my own, forget my divorce, forget moving 350 miles away from my kids, not bursting out into laughter on that day is the hardest thing I've ever done.



*I, on the other hand, correctly assume that most salesmen are not experts. After all, a true expert would be making a LOT more money doing something other than working in a retail store for little more than minimum wage. No, salesmen are only interested in making a sale, and are going to tell you whatever you want to hear in order to make that happen.

You're back in your old neighborhood cigarettes taste so good

I'm back, did you miss me? Shut up, you did so.

My trip was nice. I was able to con my brother into joining me, so that made it even better than if I'd gone alone. That said, what was quite possibly the highlight of the trip happened before I even got to his house when I came across a burning semi on the freeway. The trailer was full of sheep, and emergency personnel were doing their best to evacuate the trailer, but there was still at least one that had caught fire. I can assure you that you simply haven't lived until you've seen a charred sheep standing on the freeway, staring at the flames that had so recently ignited its wool. In fact, I was so busy looking at the charred sheep that I nearly ran over the off duty police officer that was directing traffic. It's probably a good thing I eventually saw him.

I spent the first night at my brother's house, and we left early the next morning to drive the rest of the way. When we finally arrived I realized that even though neither I nor my family has lived in the area for ten years, I always feel as if I've returned home when I see this view:



We fished the Green River for the rest of that afternoon and the following day. The fishing was slow but I was able to catch a few. I was hoping to have one of those 50 fish days that people often have on that river, but it was still fun to get out there. At least for me. My brother would probably tell you something different. It was one of the few times that I've actually caught more fish than him. In this case, it was quite a few more.

Here's a picture of him getting skunked:



And another:



The original plan was to fish the Green River for two days and then go back to Salt Lake City so I could spend two days with my kids. However, my ex-wife called to tell me that the kids were grounded because of their grades and that she was making them do homework all day Saturday. Plus, Shooting Star and her sisters were visiting the area, and they convinced us to stay an extra day and float the river with them.

Not all the pictures I took turned out good, but you can see why this is one of my favorite places in the world.





I did spend Saturday night and all day Sunday with my kids, so I'm not as horrible a father as I could be. I also spent some time hanging out with Flieswithoutwings and some other old friends. I didn't want to come back.

What it takes to wanna be a man

I got a letter from my sister-in-law the other day. She said that she and one of her neighbors were looking through some pictures and there were a few of me. Her neighbor asked if it would be alright if she wrote me a letter. She and my brother decided that "it wouldn't hurt" and that I "might like a pen pal." In other words, they're trying to set me up with this girl.

There was a letter from the girl enclosed. She is a year younger than me and has three kids. She likes to "read, garden, fish, hike, camp, and would really like to go hunting someday." She then told me about how much she likes to fish, can bait her own hook, clean and filet the fish, but never learned how to cook them. That's great and all, but personally I think those are talents that she should share with someone who fishes with bait.

(You see, I tend to be a bit of an elitist, and by that I mean I'm an arrogant prick, and by that I mean I'm better than everyone else. I enjoy flyfishing , but that's about it. Fishing with anything else is boring, and fishing with live bait seems a bit like cheating. So in summary, flyfishing = high class, bait fishing = white trash, I = awesome. Anyway, on with the story.)

At the end of the girl's letter she told me that she had enclosed some pictures of herself and that she hoped I liked what I saw. Sure enough, there were three pictures in the envelope, but I didn't exactly like what I saw.

I think I'm going to have to explain my rules for dating to my brother. Also, I have to add one more rule to the list - In order to consider dating someone, I must be able to look at a picture of them without recoiling in horror while fighting the urge to vomit.