Correction

On March 13th, I think it was me who went south, more than the world. This statement I failed to further inform myself about:"We're far from the end of the pandemic. More than 675,000 Americans died from the Spanish flu in 1918. Approximately one third of the world's population was wiped out."
In all of China's much larger population than ours, only some 3200 people have died from coronaviuus. Worldwide, the death count is only some 8000, and the virus has been in China since late last year.

It's not that I believed hundreds of thousands would die here, I didn't quite, but I dared to use that figure to give the post a heavy tone, and now I feel as if it were a crazy move on my part, since days later, it left me vulnerable to some TV newscaster's "worst case scenario" of 2.2 million Americans dying. How, when since late last year, only some 8000 have died globally? How is that likely? Don't have time to research and try to find out, but it doesn't seem likely.

While growing up, the phrase was, "If you think the world is crazy, it's you who is crazy." Things haven't changed since then. I stepped off into the deep end on March 13th.

Getting Serious at Bedminster

Some people have told me I should run for President. Can you imagine a supermarket food-prepper getting elected? That's like a "nigger" in charge of a 19th-century South Carolina plantation. Some have wondered what the f@#! I am doing in that job, but as it turns out, it's a very good one, because among essential services. I will continue supporting my family on less than 15 bucks an hour, while--unfortunately--many Americans will be strapped. For all we know, we may see soup lines.

A janitor there had $700,000 in stocks a few weeks ago. No, nothing like that now. But the point is, I'm not the only one who, after he lost his corporate job, found no one would hire him because of his age. Companies routinely break the age discrimination law. When on unemployment, I went to some seminars offered, and the speaker told us they do. The janitor has a story similar to mine.

And more. I voluntarily stayed in a low position with the credit union. I had more than option to climb the ladder; it was encouraged, and my performance evaluations were beyond "meeting expectations." I was subtly frowned upon for not reaching for better, but on the road, I not only had time to quickly write thoughts on notebook pages, but time to shoot photography and fish on lunch breaks, a practice I found not only filled my life with inspiration, but made me much more willing to do my job well. And, in fact, I became superlative. (I never quite got over making the mistake of giving a bag of interoffice mail to the wrong branch on rare occasion, however. Then I had to race back and correct the mistake, but there was always time.) You wouldn't understand why that was better than advancing and making thousands of dollars more each year--as well as retaining employment rather than getting laid off--unless you can understand the ambition of a writer who is fully committed to every advantage he can gain for that career, rather than for a conventional career.

(It's theorized that average IQ cannot understand IQ above 130.)

An evening like this one at Bedminster Pond with my son, Matt, is a great equalizer. If my IQ were over 200, it wouldn't have made any difference, perhaps. Not in terms of a catch. I did see a small sunfish. Matt pointed out a snapping turtle that had just surfaced. The evening lacked that certain punch bass need to overtake a spinner. I got a couple of bumps that might have been bass knocking it. A Rapala Husky Jerk--suspends--would have been the choice. If the water were clear. I knew that maybe even with it dingy, the plug might work, but I got into the persistence of trying to tease one of those bass, maybe bass, knocking the spinner, to commit. I knew all along the chance was about nil. Maybe not nil itself. Especially with the light getting interesting.

We did begin on the sunlit side. Shallower. But there was no sunlight on it. I got the notion that maybe the deeper shaded side would offer something. It did result in more interest from both of us. And for me, the feeling that it mattered cleared up some uncertainty about life.

Matt told me he felt better out there. He remembered Lake Musconetcong. Topwater fishing for the pickerel. Wants to do that again. I don't know if many pickerel have come back after the chemotherapy the lake got for water chestnuts, but perhaps they have.

Summer

Counting the Dead

Going to try and fish Bedminster Pond with Matt after I post the following. It's not very mild out, so the chance of any catches is little. I haven't ruled out rigging up fly rods and fishing the river instead.

About a week ago, someone at the supermarket pitched me the idea that the pandemic could be biological warfare, planned and executed in the interest of worldwide authoritarian dictatorship, beginning with Putin. I don't believe this is the case. Pandemics happen naturally. I noted the Spanish Flu in a recent post, from which a third of the world's population died. This pandemic won't be as severe, if I have the death percentage correct, but many of us will die, and all the likelihood is that it will have essentially been due to natural causes. It would have helped if tests were widely available, but agency set in place to deal with a pandemic--put in place by the Obama Administration--was gutted by Trump.

If everyone were tested, why lock down? Those who tested as carriers could have quarantined. At the least, we would have had more control in combating this disease from Day One of its emergence in China.

"2.2 million people in the United States could die," news flash just now. In 1918, 675,000 Americans died from the Spanish Flu, but the population was much less, so even if two million of us are soon dead, the percentage isn't quite as high. Rather than to quibble over that, the news now is staggering.

The news also reported Trump as saying he always believed this a pandemic. Yeah? He was reported only 11 days ago or so as saying it's a conspiracy of the democrats to lower his re-election chances. Not long thereafter, I heard him mumble on TV like a druggie that this would soon pass, as if it were nothing.

I will be posting. My mood is somber, and for all I know, it may tend to remain so. I wonder what nation we will re-emerge to find? How many months or years from now?  I am informed there may be a vaccine available in a year and some months from now, so possibly it won't be much more than a year. We suffered a fairly serious economic downturn not much more than a decade ago. This one, I think, will be much worse, but markets will return, of course, if any of us is to survive. America is resilient. America is the toughest nation to ever stand on the face of this earth.

If you catch a whiff of death's stench, remember who you voted for in 2016. If you really are confident in that vote, you know you made a good choice. Confidence is not evasiveness. As we witnessed Republican senators not long ago, we saw them dodge.

America is great. Great enough to suffer damnation. And come back.

I wish I could find more confident words than those, but I don't have them now. What I face is something I know I may not recover from, though I believe I will. I just feel very put out. I worked very hard to get my life back during what has been a most chaotic winter for me. True--good thing I got my equipment in order before the lock down. I would have been screwed. But no sooner was I finally feeling hints of normality, than this pandemic came down on us.

Part of what sucks so much is that even with the economy as good as it was just weeks ago, who among us was full of confidence and life?  I'm speaking for myself; maybe you were full of confidence and life: I did see some photos of outstanding catches on Facebook. Are we to give up and not even care to return, because life sucked anyway? Maybe we'll explore the depths of depression in the interim, and find life calls us back in spite of ourselves. Not very appealing, no, but speaking for myself again, I sure know I can't get cheerful over TV ads, and rarely have got cheerful over them, anytime. If I controlled the TV in our household, it wouldn't be on as much, and in any event, maybe people will wake up about how childish and ridiculous so much marketing is. Not to talk down children, but ads behaving like 13-year-olds jacking off for the first time aim at adults. 

Lenny, Hope You Read the Blog from Home

I'll be posting. Don't know if the state, etc., will send any press releases, but I'll come up with some content.

Take it the club is closing?

How Can We Call These Men Leaders?

Above that odd log, deep in the background, a couple of anglers fish. They caught nothing.

I spent a couple of hours last night preparing for Tilcon, but I abruptly stopped when Matt called upstairs to tell me he had a fever of 101. (No, not nostalgia for entry-level university courses.) He had just finished getting Lightroom up for me; all that's left to do with the computer is work out a few remaining loose ends; the camera works fine; apparently there never was a problem with it, so I'm embarrassed before Nikon USA for sending it in for warranty repair--I told Matt to sleep and see what the temperature is in the morning. 

It was 101, so we cancelled on Tilcon. Anyhow, I got gear in some order for any coming outings.

Morristown Memorial Hospital screened Matt over the phone. Very little chance it's the virus. New Jersey Department of Health told us it's OK I go to work. The prospect of two weeks off did not feel right. I like a check at the end of the year for all of my sick days, unused. And I do not like to deal with the state for unemployment insurance. You don't get your full paycheck's worth, anyhow.

We're far from the end of the pandemic. More than 675,000 Americans died from the Spanish flu in 1918. Approximately one third of the world's population was wiped out.


With temperatures in the 60's, I expected Bedminster Pond to be on fire. I did catch some bass. Little ones about six inches long. Three of them, like last time, though I fished a full two hours. Lost a crappie bigger than the bass. Used in-line spinners again. Fished the sunny side. Water's warmer there. The best moment was getting a camera shot I especially like. I felt for a moment as if I might return to normal, confident reality.

But of course, just as I get my life back in order, mass death descends upon my countrymen.

What does fishing matter in the face of impending disaster? KC at the supermarket insists life goes on. It does, and it's important to maintain normal activities like fishing. But to turn a blind eye to what's happening to our country is not patriotic. Fishing is a way to gather thoughts.

I will survive. I can't promise you more than that, but I'm confident I will, and my wife and son. But if America has any value at all, other people besides myself and my family matter, too. Some I don't like. For example, I didn't like the demeanor of national leaders on TV today. OK, OK. They were being somber. But frankly, something all too clean about them, while they misled us about facts on the ground, appalled me. Nothing about their behavior fully convinced me they care. And this is the country they supposedly lead.

Facts on the ground. Pence said you can go to your doctor and request a test. But that is what I mean by misleading. What's the point, but to learn you can't get a test? My wife spoke to the New Jersey Department of Health. There is no availability here.

How can we call these men leaders, when they will not speak to us?

Providence

Two Trips Planned

Tilcon with my son Friday. Tilcon with Oliver Round on the 24th.

Friday depends on the two of us getting Lightroom up and various problems I have with this new computer sorted out, including printer connection. Plan on doing all this by night. I told Matt he gets my old computer--he sells mother boards and such--and gets a new jigging rod for Florida as his reward.

Looking forward to these outings. Salmon are the main concern. But so far, I feel as if life is too complicated to get there. You don't give in to such feelings, if you want to move ahead. You get the gear in order, go, and find it's the best thing you could have done. Even today's short stint at Bedminster Pond reminded me that the best thing to do for anxiety and depression can never be contained in a pill, but will always be getting outdoors.

Bass Astir

I had time to get out and fish Bedminster Pond for about an hour. I had gone to my study while my wife tried to connect my Optimum email to Microsoft Office 2019 Outlook. (It took her three hours, but she did it. Optimum sold out to Altice Mobile, and we now find the service awful. Optimum service used to be golden. My wife got my email up. I have very low IQ for that sort of thing.)

I figured it was a good idea to be gone so she could work in peace. I took Sadie along, no hesitation, but Trish did say, "If you don't take her, I'm not doing this." Earlier, we took a hike at Round Valley, and she wanted to go all the way to the ramp and back. I was halfway miserable after these nearly two months of chaos since Florida, since apparently my Nikon D850 needs to go back for warranty service again, as if they did nothing after I sent it back to them two weeks ago. (I might be wrong. It might be that I'm so mentally freaked out over everything, I couldn't judge the reality, when perhaps nothing was wrong with it.)

All said, though, Round Valley this afternoon resonates well with me as I write now, because on the whole, it was a good time. Especially remember the sound of a pileated woodpecker hammering a hollowed tree. That was amazing.

I took my D7100 to Bedminster Pond--it seems to have the same problem as my D850, which is absurd. I'm wondering also if my eyes have got really bad. Mostly, I must be a little nuts from all the anxiety of these months. I also said stuff at work I definitely should not have said, but at the time,  it seemed right. Problem is, it wasn't right. Hope things go OK there tomorrow.

So I went fishing again. And it kind of felt as if reality is still somehow there. I had gone to my wrecked study, which I'm beginning to put back in place, sat down, strung up my favorite St. Croix, tied on a ball bearing swivel (I found only one, somehow only one, in a bag in my plug box, where snap swivels are supposed to be, at least that much checked out), and then I snapped on a knock-off CP Swing I made when I was 17 years old.

At the pond, I realized it was really a good opportunity to fish a Rebel Minnow on the surface. Calm. Warmed. Some fish swirling. But I fished that spinner slowly, and caught three little largemouths from about four to six inches long. I missed one hit from a bass that might have been nine inches.

Got a photo of my first bass. But before I left the pond, I realized I had shot it in RAW, figuring it would have been wise to select RAW+JPG so I could load the image files and simply upload the JPG here on the blog.  I'm a long way yet from getting Lightroom up.

Not in mental shape right now to get things like the right file selection on my camera right. Just the same, it was nice fishing.

18-Inch Largemouth