I would never trade my amazing friends, my wonderful life, my loving family for less gray hair or a flatter belly. As I've aged, I've become more kind to myself, and less critical of myself. I've become my own friend.

Sure, over the years my heart has been broken. How can your heart not break when you lose a loved one, or when a child suffers, or even when somebody's beloved pet gets hit by a car? But broken hearts are what give us strength and understanding and compassion. A heart never broken is pristine and sterile and will never know the joy of being imperfect.

Even the worst day fishin'.....

It has come to my attention more than once since getting the boat that I really don't even care if I don't catch any fish. I just truly enjoy being outside on the water with my friends! That's what I'd like to do at least twice a week for the rest of my life! And I hope my life isn't that much longer, just that much more relaxed!

This past fishing trip wasn't packed with fish stories, but it was a nice day out and we enjoyed ourselves and had a good time as always.

Here are a couple of pics I took as we were docking and getting ready to pull the boat back on the trailer. This was in the launching area. I named these photo's "Find Waldo"!

You can see Ol Salty right in the middle of the pelicans!

Not sure if we'll be going out this Friday. But if we do..... I'll see about getting you all some good fish stories! If we can't make them happen we'll make them up!!

Keep it REEL!

Taking a day off from fishing against my better fishing judgement! The moon will be full Monday or Tuesday and it's currently sharing our daytime sky and I can't help but think the tide just may be right for some good fishing! Sometimes we have to put our toys away and do grown up stuff. So, I don't know what I'm gonna do while my friends are doing grown up stuff!! I'll be back next week I'm sure!

Friday September 5

What a beautiful day to go fishing! But I haven't really seen many days that weren't good enough for fishing!

Today it was just Christopher Leslie and myself on board. Leslie hasn't been able to go with us for awhile because her kids have been out of school for the summer, so her last time was when we went tubing!

So.......... We started out going deep! We went past the kelp beds off the point and drifted through there for a little while. Chris caught the first fish there, it was a calico bass or a kelp bass, most fish have many different names. There is even a Yellow Tail and a Yellow Fin, both different but both are tuna! Unfortunately we probably won't see either of these tuna on our boat because they don't hang out where our boat can go safely! Whenever we "go deep" I always think, "This is it! I'm going out and I'm not stopping till we get to the islands!" Then I get just a little further than the last time and I turn around and find a spot to stop! Today was no different! I would like to go up off the La Jolla coast where some of the fishing boats go, but I don't know the area well enough to know of a launching area. Oh well! I guess we'll just stick to what we know untill Nemo gets up the nerve to go just a little further!!

On with today's catch! Among Chris's tags he pulled in a Mantra Shrimp! They are also called boxing shrimp and have been known to punch out the glass in an aquarium!

I don't know if I talked about the first one I ever saw. Earlier this year we were out in the bay and I started reeling in and realized there was something dragging my line. When I pulled it in it was the most interesting colorful thing I've ever seen! We were all mesmerized by the color and the oddity! That day there was Leslie, Chris, our friend Kevin and myself.

Kevin took this thing and pulled the hook out and held it for pictures and even licked it's under side where it was blue and yellow and pink and very vibrant and mesmerizing! Then when we were all done looking at it and laughing at Kevin's silliness he threw it back and we moved to another spot asking a nearby fisherman what it was. These are his words....

"Don't mess with that! They're poisonous!" I still laugh when I think of Kevin licking his belly! We all looked at Kevin and Chris took his vitals just to make sure! Kevin started spitting over the side then he said.... "That's a shrimp?! I'm allergic to shrimp!" Still laughing! Now you know he had to turn out ok if I'm still laughing at it! It was just one of those funny things!

So, anyway Chris caught one today and his was bigger than mine as was the one Vicky caught Monday. But we actually got Chris's in the boat and got plenty of pictures!! He also caught a nice size Halibut and a couple of bass. His total for today was four.

Leslie was the first one to catch something once we moved back into the bay. She caught a small halibut and a few bass and one cute little sculpin!

Do you remember me saying anything about the sculpin are poisonous? They have venum glands on the tips of their fins. They are ugly fish, but when they are so little you can't help but think how cute they are! He was released without harm! She caught a total of five.

As for me.... I was skunked for the first half of the day and then as soon as I changed my lure to one of my favorites I was able to get the F, G, H, and I fish right close together! I ended up with seven total, (the most!)

I got a nice halibut and a couple of bass and a little baby halibut that was as cut if not cuter than Leslie's sculpin!

All in all it was beautiful weather, beautiful people, cute fish and a fun day!

Let's all try to have a REEL good Fall!!

It was a spinnin' good summer!!

Until next week...... Fish On!

Labor Day Special!!

I couldn't ask for a better day fishing!! This was one of my favorite days this summer!

Lori, Vicky and I went out on the bay and caught 33 fish in all! Among those 33 fish we had Vicky catching a big blue shrimp like the one I caught a few months ago but hers was bigger! She pulled it up not realizing she had something on her line and when it came out of the water she paused and asked what it was! I got all excited because when I caught mine I didn't have my camera and was unable to get a good picture of it! So the first thing I did was grab my camera to take a picture and the darn thing wriggled his way off the hook and got away! But also among today's 33 Lori caught the biggest sand bass I've seen so far!! He was a biggie!!

I didn't get any pics of my fish today except for this sculpin. He wasn't all that excited to be on the boat with us. They usually don't share our entusiasm!! But this is a pretty good picture of a sculpin, his dorsal fins are sharp and ready to attack and his face is all puffed up and ready to spit! They're entriguing fish, but ugly at the same time! Some of them really put up a good fight!

So, it was a great day on the bay, this was Vicky's second time going with Lori and me and this time she out did us on the fish! She didn't catch anything her first time out so this time we were all rooting for her and she came from behind and passed me up for the most! I got the first and Lori got the biggest so we all broke even.

I had the most for awhile then Vicky caught up with me then in the end she just passed me up!! We all had a great time!

Until next time............... Keep on reelin'!!