Election 2016 .. Hillary or Donald ... doesn't matter, LOVE must prevale!!

Hate is NEVER an answer!!!

OHHH WOW good morning my friends and faithful readers. before I begin I just want to say I LOVE you all. I do not categorize my friends by their political leanings or religious beliefs. I do not categorize my friends... if you are my friend (FB or otherwise) it is because I believe I have seen something in your character (or FB posts) that lead me to believe that at your core, your heart, you desire to be the best person you can be and not just for yourself but those around you as well.

For those reading this (because you are my friends and I know your character), this election season has been the most difficult in our lifetimes. We have had to bare the nastiest political ads, the most uninformative debates and the most divisive candidates in our countries history. ALL of us are either completely stunned and broken that our candidate didn't win or we are excited to see an upset in the election that could never have been seen by anyone watching the "polls" on the mainstream media. I sat up last night until 2am watching to see if they would call the election. I watched FOX news, CBS and CNN and one thing was true throughout... NOONE actually saw this coming. Now I understand that if your candidate won you are saying to yourself "well I saw it, I knew he'd win" but I am talking about the general media understanding throughout the country. I heard M. Kelly loosing her mind trying to understand "how this happened" even though she is a Rep. supporter. I watched as the Clinton crowd fell silent and defeated during the later part of the evening. I think this election really showed us that the mainstream media can do all the predicting and polls they like but as one commentator stated "the only poll that counts is the one on Nov. 8th".

Just so that you all understand that I am not a hypocrite I said the same thing when President Obama was elected. I made it clear then that even if you do not agree with his politics or him as a person it is the duty of EVERY American to honor their elected officials (just look back at my FB posts you'll find it).

We all need to keep in mind that this election was NEVER about who would be the best president of the 2 candidates. This election was never about picking the savior of the free world. It was about choose who we believed would screw the country up the least.

To the President of the United States -
"Mr. president, thank you for serving your country the best you knew how and trying to govern a multitude of peoples that did and did not agree with you. every job has it's challenges and you may just have the greatest in all of our great nation. Many of us may not have agreed with you on many of the things you chose to do while in office but there are many that did agree with you and I can respect that. I can respect their point of view even if I do agree with them. Even though I may not personally agree with your politics and the choices you have made, as you vacate the White House I pray that you are able to look back at your brief time as the leader of the free world and be proud of your accomplishments even if others are not. I pray you can find peace after having the highest job in the nation. but Mr. President please know that this is not the end of your time, know that this may not have been the greatest accomplishment of your lifetime. Seek out God, the lord Jesus Christ STILL stands at the door and knocks. Do you hear him? He loves you and wants to abide with you in eternity. Turn to him and he will forgive your sins and save your soul. You see Mr. President, that office is not the greatest thing you could ever achieve, salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ is far more important. I wish you the very best in your remaining days thank you again for your service."

To Secretary Clinton,
Mrs. Clinton, I know how frustrated you must feel right now and I "feel your pain", all jokes aside I truly can't imagine to have come this far and been so sure of something all to have the rug pulled out from underneath you. I am sure you feel heart broken and betrayed. Rest in the knowledge that your fight has been an inspiration to all the little girls out there who now can believe that it is possible for a woman to be President. I do not believe you lost because "The country is not ready for a woman President." I believe you lost because our country needs something different. I am not sure I am able to properly articulate what that is right now but we need to shake up things in our political system and we believe Mr. Trump will do just that. As an American I would like to ask you to hold your head up and stand before our governing body and give an account for why you chose to act so callously with confidential documents all the while knowing that there are currently men and woman in prison for doing the exact same thing that you did. I pray that as you have been an example to little girls out there of what a woman can truly achieve in America, that you will continue to be an example to the men and woman of our armed force and our gov.t that know full well the consequences of their actions regarding national security.
Mrs. Clinton I know fully how difficult your life has been, I have watched on national television as your husband confessed to being unfaithful to you and your family, I watched (as did all Americans) as you stood by him and supported him after that day. I watched as you rose to Secretary of State. I believe you have the best intentions for our country but many do not agree with how that must be achieved. As you watch the media try to explain to you and the rest of the country why you did not win, please reach out to the only one who can give you peace and understand, repent and turn your heart to God. Jesus stands at the door and knocks, will you open that door and allow him to change your heart. I and many Americans wish you the best as you make sense of this election and the coming days and years. Thank you for your service to our country.

To the President elect -
Dear Mr. Trump, WOW what an amazing upset you achieved last night. It has been stated on almost ever mainstream media outlet as being one of (if not THE) greatest upset in American history, I do not personally know how true that is and I am not sure it really matters. what I do know is that you have a VERY long and hard road ahead of you. I have studied your life and you have had great success in your business' and personal life but you have not had to govern the masses. You have not had to listen to many people tell you no and this may prove to be very difficult for you. I and many other throughout this great country will be pray for you. You must be strong and hold your head up as you admit that you may not like doing a particular thing but you and your administration believe it is what is best for our country. You may have entered this race as a dare or a joke, never believing you could actually win but Mr. Trump there are millions of Americans that are counting on you now. you said "let's make America great again" and we are expecting to see you do just that. you have promised to repeal "Obamacare" and many of us need that but as you do so please do not forget to consider the hundreds of thousands of men, woman and children that were unable to even secure healthcare for themselves (or their babies) before "Obamacare" came to be. I pray you seek God for your answers as he is the only one that can foresee the results of the decision we make. The Lord Jesus Christ stands at the door and knocks sir, do you hear him? He desires to know you and have himself known in and through you. will you answer his call? being President may be the brass ring of our human world but it would be a tragedy to have achieved all this and leave this world for an eternity apart for God. I, in concert with the rest of our country, wish you very best and we WILL be praying for you.

To the next set of candidates -
Thank you for being willing to stand in the public forum and be tried in the court of public opinion. This is going to be a very difficult time for you and your family and we know that. hold strong to your convictions as those belief that brought you to this decision. Please keep in mind that you are electing to be a representative of something greater than yourself. Tell the truth at all times we are tired of the lies. Do not concern yourself with the trash talk of your opponent and do not stoop to that level. Tell us how you plan to make our lives better. Tell us how you plan to change the wrongs within the system. Do not fight with your opponent we already know you don't agree with each other we do not need to waste 2 hours watching you in a debate all to walk away with no more understanding of your political policies that we had when it started. Tell us who YOU are. Tell us why you are the best option for leadership not why your opponent is not. Admit your failures and hold your head high to show us your are strong and take responsibility for you actions. LEAD our country, LEAD our gov.t. and be beyond reproach. understand that we the people know that we all make mistakes and we are willing to forgive them so long as you don't keep repeating them. show us respect and strength of conscience and of character and we will follow you. Let the Lord guide your campaign and you office if you are elected. We will be praying for you.

and finally....

To the American people -
Dear brothers and sisters, I know that as you watched the election you were surprised, even stunned. you watched with breathless anticipation that your candidate was dominating the election or watched in absolute horror as you candidate was loosing more and more ground they counted on for the win. Today many of you are elated that you will most likely not be required to pay the hefty fines imposed on you for not having health ins. at tax season while others are scarred to their core that they or their children will loose the heath care they have counted on for the last 2 years. Many of you believe that Mr. Trump will single handed stop the "slaughter of millions of unborn humans" while others feel he will take away the rights of woman to make the choice (no matter when she decides to start making choices). I cannot list all the issues we are facing but 1 thing is clear, good or bad, Mr. Trump is NOT a career politician. this may be a good thing or it may be horrible but we were never voting for who would be the best president in this election we voted for the person we believed would screw up the country the least. I do not care if you are black, white, yellow, tan....purple whatever you are a fellow human being and my door will be open to you. I will show you the love my King requests/requires of his children to show others. I will feed you, I will clothes you and I will tell you the truth. I will not turn my back on you. I do not care if you are a man or a woman, I will not talk in any way to humiliate, emasculate or dehumanize you, your gender does not and should not by definition make you are target.
We live in a time where many (if not most) act as though they believe that if someone does not agree with them then they must be the enemy. THIS IS NOT TRUE. I have many friends that are homosexual and they know how I believe but this does not mean I love them any less or would treat them as less. There is no place in our society for racism, there is no place in our society for chauvinism/sexism, there is no place in our society for classism <if that is a word>. We are ALL fighting a battle whether it is financial, mental or simply trying to find our place. We cannot look down on anyone else. I dare say if you are looking down on someone else then reach down and help them up. In the current state of our country it is easy to allow hate to infect our state of mind. As a good friend of mine stated this morning on FB:

"America, you will wake up tomorrow and you will do good things. YOU can make a difference in your communities. You have more power than you realize. Don't relinquish it because of one vote. Go raise some awesome kids. Do something that makes you happy. Go make the world better. It needs us. Find your African-American friends, your immigrant friends, your female friends, your LGBTQ friends who are also hurting. If you don't have friends in those demographics, get some and show them that Jesus loves them and died for them too. Let's bridge this divide. Love each other. We can do that. You know why? Because America is great."

Thank you everyone for reading and until next time

Cast a big net and keep tight lines

For my WIFE.... I'm sorry!!

I don't normally do this... if I have something to say to my wife I sit down with her and talk with her. I am posting this publicly so that maybe if there are young men reading this they may learn something and those that are old and your marriage is long in the tooth that you read this and breathe some life somewhere. And NO there is nothing wrong in our marriage and I am not apologizing for something that is about to break our family.

I just want/need my wife to know how deeply in love with her I am.

To my wife:
first I want to say that I am truly sorry.
I am sorry that I have not become a millionaire so that I can give you all the things I think you want.
I am sorry that I have not always been the husband you needed me to be.
I am sorry that I have not always been the father to our children that you needed me to be.
I am sorry that I have not always followed Jesus the way he commands me to that you can follow.
I am sorry I have not always made it clear that I do love you more than you think I do.
you are my best friend and my partner.

I know that we could not be more opposite if we tried. I can think of only 1 or 2 things that we have in common and they are .

My desire is always to:
- Remember that my words can shower down pain and destruction but they can also bring joy and life.

- Continue to court you, to chase after you and express my desire to be with you, physically and mentally/emotionally.

- I will never say "I would die for you". How hard is life after you have died?.... "I will LIVE my life for you." I will give away any of my desires for you because you are my deepest desire. (The Lord not withstanding).

- Put your needs and desires before mine; to not be selfish but to offer to you first, then I will take the left overs (as you have always done for me).

- To learn your love language and remember to speak to you in that language, to make sure I am loving you the way you need to be loved and not the way I THINK you need to be loved or that I need to be loved.

- To remember when we have an argument, that we ARE NOT enemies and I do not need to win "whatever means necessary". I will try to calm myself and discuss until we come to an agreement for the needs of our family.

- Whenever I have been hurt or feel I have been wronged or degraded I should remember that you love me and it is not your desire to emasculate me but to lift me up and love me, I will reach out and explain why I feel hurt and listen to your side of what I misunderstood.

- I want you to know that I do see you are an equal and not one to be lorded over or to be worshipped, that you are my partner and we are both trying to do our best for our family and for our King.

- I will not ask you to go fishing with me (and you will not ask me to read a book) because I know you want to be with me out there but aren't able to be and I know this hurts you.

- I will not ask you questions that I know are to set you up so that I can prove how I am more right than you are and make you feel small.

- I always want to lift you up in the hopes that one day you will look in the mirror and see what all the rest of us see, how amazing you really are.

- You are NOT the reason for every bad thing that happens in our family or friends lives. Most of the time you are the encouragement we all lean on when things go south.

- You still make my heart skip when you smile at me or compliment me, you make me feel like a super hero.

- Your love and compassion are the very blood in my veins that give me the strength to keep fighting when the big boss music starts (video game reference). I fear NOTHING when you are by my side.

Keep this truth in your heart always; I love you beyond my understanding!!

Thank you everyone for reading.

Until next time:
Cast a big net and keep tight lines.

Let's all just be good to one another, I didn't say get trampled on!

Good morning, afternoon or evening faithful readers.
I must say the hardest part of any good weekly blog is deciding what to talk about. I love fishing. I love video games and I enjoy an intelligent politically charged discussion. But more than all those things I love a good, vivid story. If I read your story, book, post etc. I want your words to actually put me there next to you as you are reliving the event/s. This is the main reason why I have not posted in a while there is plenty to talk about but no one wants to listen to rambling. so let's begin.

First let's get the "Colin Kapernick" discussion out of the way. First I have never understood why people get so frustrated with things like this when we (the general public) have all the control. I am a soldier, a sailor (an airman in fact). I served during Desert Storm and would serve today if needed. I did 6 years active and 2 years inactive (I was a reservist) and I am proud of my service. I fought and had friends/brothers who died in that service. But .... and you may not like this but it is a fact.... we did so for the freedom to sit, as protest, during the national anthem. Colin Kapernick (and others who follow) has/have a right to sit during the national anthem. He is not a soldier, he's a football player. I think it was despicable and it disgusts me to think of anyone doing this however he has that right. But see here is the thing. I earn my own paycheck and guess what, I have a right too...... The right to NOT watch any games that include any player that would do this. The right to not buy any merch. that those organizations produce.....see if enough people choose this path then the teams will have no choice but to cut these guys. It's all about the money and if these guys cost the owners money they will get removed from the team. I will not comment on the fact that this was incredibly hypocritical, here sits a man that makes literally millions of dollars a year to play a game and he wants to pro....... I said I wasn't going to comment. Point is the best way to make your voice heard if you disagree with someone is with your money. ok ok enough of that :)

So over the past 2 to 3 weeks I have purchased several items off of FB groups (many of which my readers are a part of) at incredibly good prices. Further, I have been helped or given things when I really needed them and this blog is in honor of those folks. First a gentleman GAVE me a fish finder and GPS unit back a few months ago, I believe it was. Although I have not used it as it does not fit well with my boat (no room to install it yet) this was an awesome thing and I want to say thank to him, however, I cannot find our messages and I don't remember his name. I then purchased a FF and GPS unit all in one from a gentleman locally and it was awesome unfortunately the GPS head unit did seem to work for me, now here's the big deal with this, when I reached out to him and explained my problem he very graciously agreed to give me my money back. THAT IS HUGE TO ME and I just want everyone to know what a great guy this man is. Say howdy to Mr. Joe Witherow he is a good man and I am honored to say I know him. I also received a set of boat seats this last weekend and they will work great on our catfish boat from Mr. Rick Peters who stayed up late on Saturday evening so that I could come get them.
I regularly receive minnows or bait while on the water from folks that are done fishing and don't want to waste the bait. I (and my father and a friend) have been towed back into the marina several times when our outboard was malfunctioning. When dropping my boat solo I almost always have someone offer to assist me. All these things I have listed are to show that there are great people out there that are willing to help out others with no concern for personal gain. I have heard a saying that "the true character of a man can be told by what he is willing to do for others when he knows he will gain nothing for himself". I believe we have a responsibility to those in need (no matter the circumstances) but I believe that we also have a responsibility as those who are in need, to be gracious and understanding of the position we put these folks in while they are assisting us. For this I say thank you to all of you who are reading this for any help you have ever provide not only to me but to anyone, knowing they could not pay you for your time and/or trouble. I promise to reach out to anyone who needs my assistance knowing that I too will not gain anything beyond the knowledge that I helped someone when they needed it.

If you would be interested to read a series of interviews featuring local guides on Truman Lake and Smithville lake please vote on the survey above.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, until next time:
Cast a big net and keep tight lines.

Our BEST and Worst day ever... and i've had a motor go out on me

I have always found it interesting that it is virtually impossible to wake up on time for work or church without somewhat rushing to catch up (although this has gotten significantly easier since I have aged, now I can't sleep in even when I want too.) but let it be the morning of a fishing trip and you have to leave the house by 4:30am you will wake up bright eyed and bushy tailed as though some mystical force has awoken you for the epic battle for the human race itself.

So there I was at 4:30am sitting on the side of my bed shaking out the sleep from my brain and getting dressed in the dark, all while trying not to wake my wife and the baby. Suddenly my phone notifies me that my dad is on his way. I rush up the stairs to wake my son (who ABSOLUTELY HATES getting up early, fishing or not). I wake him with the promise of coffee and we wait on the deck for our passage, to the mighty Truman lake, to arrive.

Approximately an hour and a half later we pull up to the Bucksaw Marina and load the boat to go hunting crappie and catfish for the day. The temperature was perfect. Not to hot, not to cold, just right. So we pull out of the no wake zone and my son has us pull around to the other side of a small jetty right there at the drop point (if you know this marina you know what I am talking about) the water had to be low because the jetty is usually covered by water except for the point itself, this time you could walk the entire length of it if you so desired. So we get around to the south east side of the jetty and he begins to cast the throw net. The first 2 tries where wildly unsuccessful with nary a shad to show for it. On the 3rd cast, however, he pulls in 7 nice size shad and to be honest we could have been done with the shad at this point. So we decide to pitch or dip the stumps on the west bank, just across the channel. The first couple of casts went fruitless but on the next cast I hooked into a fish I thought could have been a small catfish or a small bass (I should note here that I use a 4.4 ft. micro lite pole and reel for crappie fishing, it gives a greater sense of fight with smaller fish). I pull it into the boat and it's a fat 13 1/2 inch crappie. I was more than excited. My day could have ended here this was my record to date and I was thrilled. Nothing could go wrong now (hahahaha whatever). while I am dipping these stumps my son decided it would be a good time to catch a few more shad, you know just for good measure. On his first cast out he caught ... I cannot tell you the number as it was so many that it would be impossible to count by sight. They were small though in fact many were caught between the netting itself but I personally like the small ones, you can hook 3 or 4 on your hook and you know something will try to run your line. He does this one more time and the live well was chuck full of bait. I am still stunned as to how many shad he caught in those 5 minutes.

With a live well full of shad and a record crappie we decided to head down the channel and try our luck at a few spots we were given from a friend. I let everyone know we are heading out and to get settled and everyone agrees. I throw the throttle all the way forward and off we go. We had not gotten to the first turn when my dad screams "hey I lost my hat" so I pull back on the throttle and we spin around and see it floating on top of the water, so we head back to grab it. With hat in hand, we turn back around and head out full force. Once again, before we get to the first turn my dad hollers "crap my pole" I shut down and he explains the his pole just went into the water. We searched for about 5-10 minutes with no luck. The suck about this is that he just bought the reel at BPS less then 3 mo. ago. Dad decides that we need to get on fishing and we head out again at full force. This time we make it all the way to our crappie spot. All in all the crappie fishing was poor (our skill not the bite, still working on this but there was a storm coming in so that may have had something to do with it and that is what I will blame it on). So here we are trying to crappie fish when my dad hollers "son of a gun" and I feel him leaning on my back hard. My son (who runs the trolling motor from the bow) turns and looks and starts laughing. He jumps up and sits next to me and reaches under my father's seat, which has completely broken and is now resting on my sons arm and my back. So we get dad standing up and pull the seat out and get it stowed. My dad decides it might be ok to place the blue painters bucket, we carry, over the seat post and sit on this. Now for many of us this would probably have been a feasible solution for the remainder of the trip but dad (as you know, If you read my blogs) has seen many moons and his stability isn't what it use to be. We all get settled a bit and my boy starts the trolling motor up and boom dad and bucket to the ground or should I say deck of the boat, now this probably would have been a bit more humorous except that he cut his arm or tore his skin pretty good. But even he was laughing at this point. So my son jumps back and helps him up. while my son returns to his position in the boat he trips over the oar (a hand made oar my dad made at the beginning of this fishing season) and snaps it in half. At this point the entire boat erupts in laughter. We were crying, it was so funny.

We are all settled and decided "well heck we've gone through all this, we might as well head to our known good catfish spot and chill for a little while." so off we go without incident. As we are sitting in our spot which happens to be right out off the channel itself in the middle of the lake my son notices HUGE storm clouds coming in from the northeast and more importantly we can see the wall of rain coming right at us. Now I don't have to tell you that at this point we barely cared we had fought to be here right now and DANGIT WE AREN'T MOVING!! My son has the brilliant idea (no sarcasm) to take off his shirt so the when the rain does pass we have dry shirts to put on soooo... off come the shirts. Now it's plenty warm outside but can I tell you that rain coming from 3 thousand ft. up is COLD. it was much unpleasant but I was in the military and I have dealt with much colder and much hotter conditions but we weren't moving. I caught a small cat and after the rain died we realized we had been at this spot far to long so we decided to go grab some lunch and head back out. and that is what we did. score Jeff: 1 record crappie and 1 eater blue cat; dad and cubs: nothing.

Dad decided he would buy a new chair at Walmart and we had some Mexican for lunch. we hit the water around 1:30 and headed to a spot that has yet to fail us. I tried a bit of crappie fishing but this spot really isn't a spot to catch sizable crappie so back to good ole catfishing. This was amazing my dad pulled in the biggest of the day and probably the last couple of years. but the real story at this point was my son. Cubs caught one or 2 decent catfish but he was tired and threw his line out and expected to lay down in the boat and chill (this would not be the case). We were chatting about something when WHAMMM the tip of the rod bent over as though it was pointing at the fish that clearly had been hooked. My son jumped up and grabbed his rod, set the hook and started reeling.... the fight was on. when he pulled this beautiful monster into the boat we were all giddy at how beautiful this thing was, the light blue and pink shading and the sheer size was awesome. He gets the hook out of the fishes lip and he is hold her up in mighty glory when.... the lid to the live well was closed and the fish decided she was going to have one last ditch wiggle to break free, my son looses his grip and the fish ...no kidding... bounces off the live well and yes, into the water. Have you ever seen confusion, anger and acceptance all come over the face of a young person at the same moment? He was FURIOUS and went dead silent. In an effort to console my boy I looked at him and smiled and said "alright look get that pole rigged up we know there are more just like that in here and we can't catch them if we spend our time being upset about that, besides you still won, you caught the big fish." but it hurt me almost as much as it did him.

We spent about another hour fishing then headed to the state park marina to clean our fish. We took home about 5 lb.'s or more of fillets so it was a great day but man we earned them fish.... for shore.

Thank you for reading and have a great weekend!!!

Until next time cast a big net and keep tight lines

Scam... where's the scam?

What a crazy 2 weeks it has been I literally have so much to talk about that I will be posting 2 blogs this week (if I find the time). In the last 2 weeks I have had myself and my bank account succumb to a scam and had to deal with the bank and all my finances (2 days before my direct deposit hit my acct.), my son, father and I had both THE BEST and WORST day fishing (in the same day) we have had ...ever, my Daughter got married (I was the officiant), my mother-in-law decided to try to break her spine... yes break her spine, my son, daughter (another one) and I volunteered at the KC Comic Con and I received my official ordination. This may seem like a lot in 2 weeks and it really was but it doesn't feel like it and I am still alive and look forward to more. With 7 kids and a grandbaby there is always fun to be had right around the corner.
In this blog post I want to talk about the scam and my bank acct. I am quite embarrassed as to my naivety and how easily I was duped but I believe this is good to share as it may help one of you or a loved one, in the future, to understand what I went through and how this scam actually works.

I highlight this as I know this a huge thing right now and to be honest I would never have believed I could've fallen for such a stupid scam. We never seem to believe it could happen to us ... until it does.
So on a bright and sunny Tuesday I received a call from a company claiming they had found my application for an online loan. I have used this avenue (online loans) many times in the past couple years to help get over rough spots in our finances, so this seemed perfectly natural, mind you this is where the "perfectly natural" ends everything after this set off sirens and bells in my head that something just didn't seem right. They had ALL of my information and I mean ALL of my information including the last 4 of my social. Now I know you can buy lists of info from companies all over the internet, with peoples information but rarely can you get such a comprehensive list (or so I thought). The person on the other end of the line stated that they had received my loan application from a group called OLA. This is a real organization and ironically they were set up to fight or more prevent this type of thing from happening.
The guy on the line said they could secure me a loan of $5000 to be paid back at $154 a month for the next 36 months. With my daughter about to be married and a slew of other things I could use this kind of money for, I continued to talk with the guy. He said they simply needed to deposit $2k into my account today and that I was to immediately send the money back via wire transfer the next morning. Now as I said I am familiar with online loans and online bill pays and all of them go through what is called ACH. I do not know what that exactly stands for but it is a secured way for companies to send you money and for you to setup the auto bill pay for each month. the guy on the other end of the line stated that they did not use ACH and that this was just a different way to send and receive money.
Ok let me stop right here and explain a few things;
1. I am not in the banking industry and I don't know how everything works (but this did set off an alarm in my head...which I ignored) so this seemed reasonable.
2. I could not understand, if they were going to put money into my acct. and all I was doing was sending it back, how anyone would get hurt or "burned"
3. As a father of 6, $5000 is a lot of money that I could use and I wanted to surprise my wife with the ability to get herself a vehicle and some new clothes (or whatever she needed).

So needless to say I ignored that little voice in my head that said "dude, I can't put my finger on it, but something just isn't right here". So I agreed to let them put the money into my account. Oddly enough they had all of my acct. information (including my routing number and all). They were adamant about making sure I was at Walmart to transfer the money back the next morning first thing. This seemed odd but later I figured out why. For those of you in the financial industry you already understand what is going on here but I did not. The next morning I wake up and I see 2 checks had been deposited into my acct. both in excess of $900. One had been "cleared" the other was on hold for what was approximate a week. So I got up and left the house to transfer the money back to them. When I got to the money gram place I called the guy from the "loan" place as instructed and he walked me through filling out the transfer form. I have filled these out before to help friends but this seemed odd as I only had a name and the city and state to fill out. The guy told me to send the $1800 back and explained that only the 900 and change had cleared, so he asked me exactly how much was in the acct., when I tried to log into my acct. it had been locked. These 2 things (the weird sending instructions and the locked out acct.) set of alarms in my head that I could no longer ignore. I told the guy on the phone I would transfer the money and call him back. As I walked out the Walmart doors I immediately called the fraud line for my bank. As I was on hold to speak to someone, I received a phone call from my bank, it was the fraud dept. and they needed to talk with me right away and they left a number to reach them at. I hung up my call and called the number they left. It was immediate explained that I had been a victim of fraud and not to attempt to do anything with my acct. until we got it all sorted out. At this point I am still trying to figure out how anyone could get hurt as I still did not understand how, if they put money in my acct. and I was just giving back, that anyone was going to be deceived/hurt/burned etc. The woman from the bank explained that this group was under investigation and they had several counterfeit checks from them and that the check they had put into my acct. were in fact "bad" checks. After speaking with her in the parking lot for what seemed like an hour, she instructed me to go to my branch office and had me open a second acct. and that this acct. would be closed once the Direct deposit had gone through and they could transfer that money to the new acct. but they wanted to hold my "old" acct. for the investigation. long story short they were able to clear everything up and get me taken care of but if I had transferred the money with money gram I would have been liable for all the money I had transferred.
On the way from the Walmart to the bank it dawned on me (like a brick to the head) here is how this works. Now pay attention, when you deposit a check into your acct. your bank clears a certain amount for you to use so that you are not stuck without any money while that check is being processed. This is a fabulous service the bank provides and is needed (I remember when this wasn't true and you HAD to wait for the check to clear) any money you spend, of that cleared amount is taken against the check once it completes processing. Now if the check does not clear you have to pay back the money you spent (and some additional fees) in this case if I had transferred the money via MoneyGram I would have been liable for the entire $900.
In my case everything turned out fairly ok and I was reasonable unscathed but the bank told me that people get hit with this everyday that don't figure out what happened until it is too late.

Let me share a few things I learned from this:
1. Always speak with your partner about your financial decisions. If I had talked to my wife she would probably have seen the scam before it happened. I knew I should speak with her but I ignored this thought because I wanted to surprise her (and I did :))
2. NEVER NEVER NEVER ignore the sirens that go off in your head that tell you something is wrong. There is a reason those are there. I am told (no research mind you) that the fraud prevention folks for the United States Treasury Dept. study the real bills that are printed, so carefully that even the slightest misprint in a forgery can easily be detected... the point? they do not study all the counterfeits that would be impossible but when they see something isn't right they know that something isn't right, they may not know exactly what right away but they just know that it's not right. We do the same thing everyday and don't realize it. If you walked into a store and thought you had walked into a Target but you saw that everything had a blue border or décor and the telltale yellow smiley face you would quickly realize you were in a Walmart.
DO NOT IGNORE YOUR BRAIN TELLING YOU SOMETHING IS NOT RIGHT HERE.
3. If in doubt about how banking works (or anything else) pick up the phone. I know most of the folks reading this blog do so on cell phones or tablets. It is easy to dial your banks number and just talk to them, they will guide you. Believe me, they don't want to get screwed over any more than you do.
It is my deepest desire that this helps at least 1 or 2 of you. Things are tough out there for most us financially and it is easy to see how the idea of a reasonable loan or quick money is a very big temptation to put logic aside and take a chance. I always encourage my children to take risks but there is a right way to take risks and a wrong way. Ignoring all the signs of a bad risk is the most sure way of come out the bad side of that risk.

Until next time cast a big net and keep tight lines

What I hate the most about Pokemon GO.

One of the biggest challenges that I face in life (other than the fact that I have six children), is that I am an extreme extrovert.
I love to listen to other people's stories.
I love to share my stories with other people.
This is one of my biggest rules:
Rule #1. Always be safe or take the safest option.
Rule #2. As long as you're being safe about it, always choose the option that will ultimately have the best story.
I don't know if this was a choice that I made early in life, to be an extrovert, but I do know that most of my life this has pretty much been thrust on me. What I mean by that is; I'm always the guy in the DMV office or any large public groupings (concerts, the mall, a line for ANYTHING) that everybody ends up talking to. I always seem to be the guy that people just flock to and they tell me about what a horrible day they are having or share a great experience they just had and I enjoyed this very much. I see it as an incredible honor that people are willing to share these things with me.

Now with that said, here's the problem; most of the things that I enjoy doing in my spare time and as a profession are designed or centered around the introverted lifestyle. for instance I love creating programs writing code or writing apps or creating databases etc.. But you have to do this sitting alone in a dark room most of the time concentrating on the couch trying to not sit in a social environment and be able to be productive as a programmer.

I also love fishing. Fishing seems to relax me, there's something about the pull of the line letting you know you have a fish on and the fight is has begun. But even if you are out with your buddies this experience is very much a personal one YOU are reeling in the fish, YOU fight the fish and YOU caught the fish. they may watch but this is not a social event <as it were>.

I am also a lover of video games. I have been playing video games since they FIRST came out. but again most video games are designed for one person to achieve such and such or beat a certain boss. now I do play World Of Warcraft (an MMORPG or Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game) and although you do get to interact with other players in the game you are still behind a keyboard and inside and stuck to your computer.

All of the things I have chosen as hobbies or my profession try to guide or even push me to an exclusive and often lonely environment.

Then 2 days ago my son (a burly, 6.5, 250lb monster of a man) came into my front room and said "Hey dad, have you checked out that new Pokémon GO? I totally thought it would suck, but I am addicted. you gotta check this out" he then proceeded to install it on my phone. I didn't really do anything with it until yesterday while I was waiting around for something or other and I opened it up to see what all the fuss was.

Basically the idea is there are all these cute little "Pokemonsters" around you that you can not see without the app and you have to catch them. You can then level them up and once they (or you) are a high enough level, you can meet up with other people and battle your little monsters against others.
Ok I have to admit this thing is a lot of fun. For me the greatest draw is that it is deigned to interact with others IN PERSON. this is a huge game changer (excuse the pun) for those of us use to being stuck in our homes or on a mobile game (game on a tablet or on cell phone). We now HAVE to talk to each other to play.

You run around town and try to catch thee little guys, but you MUST be safe and aware of what's going on around you. it would not be difficult for instance to chase one of these things into oncoming traffic if you are not paying attention.

But isn't safety and awareness always important? I mean there are more then a hundred ways to hurt or kill yourself just going out fishing, if you aren't paying attention or acting irresponsibly and as a parent I have to monitor my kids online video game play for a myriad of dangers there. So to those who might safe the game is unsafe I say it's not the game teach yourself and/or you children to BE AWARE OF THEIR ENVIRONMENT.

But the thing I hate and I mean I HATE the MOST about this silly little game is..... I didn't think of it first. You can bet there will be following games that will require you to interact with others and run around outside and do ... something (and I will design one of them). Just be careful, watch out for dangerous situations and never... I mean NEVER EVER meet up with ANYONE without friends or parents with you.

Thank you for reading, cast a big net and keep tight lines.
Until next week.

To my babies (children)

Hey everyone, sorry I have not posted anything in a while I was really sick for 2 weeks. Never been sick like that, for that long but I guess age has caught up with me. For all you young people ... do not grow old. The older I get the more crap my body will no longer put up with. Then once I was feeling better I really had no time to write and before I knew it there were camping trips and holidays and well... again sorry it took so long.
I love camping!! I can not say it enough. If I could I would camp every weekend over the summer rain or shine. There is nothing like looking at a pristine campsite once you have the tents and kitchen setup. There is nothing like watching that flame grow up into what will be a sustainable fire and starting the first campfire of the weekend. There are few sounds on earth quite as relaxing as listening to the wood pop as it burns. The smell of the burning wood. and I don't know of anyone that would not agree with that feeling of pulling up to a campsite after a long day of fishing or playing in the water. I believe there is something primitive about the experience. The idea that out of very little you have created (albeit just for 2 days) a place to live, a place to cook your food and place to connect with your friends and family. This is your spot and you built this (just stop thinking about the fact that you too will have to take it all down).
 So 2 weekends before the 4th of July weekend I took my kids camping. My middle daughter has been almost more excited for this trip than I was. I am a preparation freak. So badly so that I am sure it drives my son crazy. I have a list for the kitchen/cooking/food stuff (each thing with a check box of course), I have a list of bedding, I have a list for the tent and awning (yes these have parts), I have a list of fishing gear and I have a list of all the lists I have. On Thursday we go down the list and place each thing in it's proper place or bin, then check it off. I drive my kids nuts but we have a great time because we have everything we need and nothing gets forgotten.
I have a friend down at the Talley Bend Campgrounds and I had never been there. He invited me and the kids down for the weekend. I really like the campgrounds and the spot he picked for us was beautiful. I am really picky about my camp spots but he really knocked the ball out of the park with the area. I highly recommend checking out the Tally Bend Campgrounds if you've never been there. (I will try to link a map spot for the campgrounds if I can figure it out but here are the GPS coord.'s:  38.136355,-93.614428) My only real complaint was that I like to fish the dam and some spots on the upper part of the lake and they are just too far to drive on a budget weekend. Had I planned for the drive this would not have been even an issue to bring up.
We decided to take the younger kids tubing and try out a new pair of water skis (which wouldn't fit my feet even though I got them for me). It turns out that a 40 HP Force outboard motor does have enough power to pull a few people (kids) around in a tube but not enough to pull a 200lb man out of the water on skis (hope the 80 will).
The weekend before the 4th of July weekend I took just my youngest son out fishing at a smaller lake here closer to me (Smithville Lake | Little Truman). We grabbed 2 doz. minnows and hit the water around 7am. I had not expected the wind we got and if the wind had not been so bad I think we would have caught a lot more fish but I do not do well in the wind. It was kinda funny because with my oldest son and my dad we don't usually go through 1 doz. minnows in a day but my youngest son and I went through 2 doz. in about 2 to 3 hours. Not really sure how that happened but maybe the boy was just really hungry for fish...
The point I want to get to here is that both of these trips almost got cancelled. As a matter of fact, the trip with just my son, I had to fight myself to go several time the day before. Neither were almost cancelled because of work or house stuff getting in the way but just me saying to myself "I don't want to hassle with this, I can sit in the AC all weekend and do what I do every weekend.... nothing." but then I would say to myself "Then you'll get the same thing out of this weekend that you always do... nothing." I would not have the memories of my daughters putting up their own tent for the first time. I would not have the memories of my youngest daughter teasing me because I forgot to close the air vent of their air mattress and losing air that night as they tried to sleep. I would not have the memory of my middle daughter get one part of her leg sunburned. I also would not have the memory of taking out my little man, just the 2 of us, out and fighting the wind. In the end I would have ended the weekends with nothing.

Sometimes as Dads/Moms, Uncles/Aunts, Brothers/Sisters or Grandparents we need to consider what we will gain from doing things that may not seem to be fun or comfortable on the surface, if they are done for the sake of the other people they will always turn out to be more fun or at least memories that both of you can share and build you relationships. I know I am glad I fought the "lazy me" because I had a blast and more importantly I KNOW my kids did.

Thank you for reading, cast a big net and keep tight lines.
Until next week

Catfish Fried Rice??

I hope you all are having a great week. I am a Friday person myself and enjoy the relaxed atmosphere that Friday bring with it. The hopes for an amazing weekend whether on the water or just relaxing with friends and/or family. It's the anticipation.
As many of you may know I have 6 children (and a grandpie) and it has become apparent that the older 3 are going to have no problem cooking for themselves and some darn fine meals at that. I actually look forward to visiting them when they are old enough to live on their own and grandma and grandpa come to visit. I suspect the meals will be AMAZING.
We have an extremely large amount of catfish in our freezer and unfortunately (or fortunately as the case may be) my wife and 2 of my daughters do not like fish. So my sons and 2 of my daughters and of course myself can eat all we like. I personally love fried fish but let's be honest there is only so much fried food a person eat before they start saying to themselves "you know I bet we could do more with this". With that in mind my son came to me this week and said "hey dad you know how we got all that fish in there? I want to try something". So I was totally on board and was actually looking forward to what he might do with it.
As a little background info about me. I love, LOVE, Chinese food. Even bad Chinese food is a good option if you are not sure what to feed me. You know those times when you say to your significant other "hey where should we go out to eat" and then they say "I don't care (which is a lie)" so you start listing things and with each suggestion out of your mouth they are like "nah, I don't feel like that tonight". Well whenever this happens to me and my wife I have a list of Chinese restaurants on queue and we usually end up at one of them.
So I am sitting in my office and my son walks in with a bowl of something that looks like we got it from a Chinese take-out joint. The bright orange colors of the carrots mixed with the bright yellow of scrambled egg and the light brown soy sauce tinted rice created a fragrance I can only describe as amazing. He said "I thought I would try something a little different." I can only remember the first bite as being well.... amazing because after that bite I do not remember anything else... maybe it was the soy sauce induced zombie state I was thrust into but I like to believe it was because I enjoyed the dish so much I tore into it as though it was the first plate of food I had been given after being stranded on an island for years. (have you ever fantasized about what it would be like to be stranded on an island for years and just wondered if you could survive .... eh maybe it's just me. let's move on...)
I could not get over how delicious the meal was. I asked how he prepared the fish and he explained that he had cut it up and sautéed it in soy sauce. From there he just made the fried rice as normal. (I will provide a few easy recipes below if you are interested.)
The whole experience got me to thinking about how many times we get stuck in the rut of doing the same thing over and over for no real reason other than the fact that it is easy and we already know how to do those things.
I personally believe "If you are not learning new thing then you are just waiting to die." and I am not ready to die. Yes I know Jesus as my lord and savior and yes I have done the best I could/can to be the best friend, father and husband I can be but I am just not ready to go yet. ya'll know what I mean I am sure.
Even as I am writing this it occurs to me that the principle of continuing to grow and learn and "step outside the box" applies heavily in fishing as well. One of the first things you learn when you are serious about fishing is to continue changing your game, your presentation even your bait until you find what works and what works today may not work tomorrow. This may be one of the reasons I love fishing so much, today is not the same as yesterday and tomorrow will not be today.

Thank you for reading, cast a big net and keep tight lines.
Until next week.

Catfish fried rice
- Jacub Bass

1. 1 Medium onion (we don't use onion but I know some do)
2. 4 to 6 ounces catfish cut into bite-size pieces
3. 1 can of mixed vegetables
4. 2 large eggs, beaten
5. 4 tablespoons soy sauce
6. some soy sauce and teriyaki (for sautéing the catfish).
7. 4 cups minute rice.

1. Saute Catfish in soy sauce and teriyaki until done (flaky). place to the side.
2. Cook minute rice as normal.
3. if you choose to use onion you can do this 2 different ways either mix the onion raw in step 4 or sauté the onion in butter first (however you like your onion is perfect for this).
4. Combine rice, catfish and mixed veggies (and onion if you choose) in a sauce pan. Mix in the soy sauce.
5. Create a small hole in the middle of the mixture and scramble the 2 eggs. Once they are scrambled to your liking mix the entire mixture together and remove from heat.
6. Enjoy

* For as many fisher there are out there, there are as many way to fry fish as well. this is the way I do it;

Fried Fish:

1. large eggs beaten (you can add buttermilk to the eggs for an added touch of flavor)
2. 1-2 cups of cornmeal (I like the buttermilk cornmeal myself). or Flour if you don't like cornmeal.
3. 4 to 5 good size fillets (the size of the fillets should be determined by the size of your fryer).
4. Enough to oil to cover your fillets while cooking. everyone has their choice of the best oil to use, I use a heart smart veggie oil but any kind will work.

1. Coat your fillet in the egg mixture.
Note!! if you use buttermilk in your egg mixture the final product will be a light shade of off white when complete.
2. Place the coated fillet in the cornmeal or flour mixture and gentle shake until the fillet is well coated. **Let this sit for a few minutes to allow the flour or cornmeal to stick.
3. Heat oil to 375 degrees before placing your fillet in. if it too cold the fillet will be soggy and um... yuck. if it too hot it will cook the outside and the middle will still be raw ... yuck as well.
once the fillet tarts to float it is almost done. watch carefully at this point for the fillet to begin to turn golden brown and she is done.
4. Place fillet on paper towel and lightly salt if you so choose.
5. Enjoy.

Hush puppies:

1. 1 1/2 cups of cornmeal
2. 1/2 flour
3. 1/2 tsp baking soda
4. 1 small onion diced (I substitute celery as I do not like onion)
5. 1 cup buttermilk
6. 1 egg beaten
7. Enough to oil to cover your hush puppies while cooking.

1. Combine all ingredients in a bowl and mix well.

2. Spoon out the amount of mixture you would like and gently place on hot oil and fry to a golden brown. make sure you turn the Hush puppies to allow even cooking.

3. Place on paper towel.  

4. Enjoy

Please share any recipes you may have, as well, in the comment section below.

To Dad

I would like to dedicate this post to all the fathers that take their children fishing or attend all those baseball games or .... whatever you do to spend time with your sons and daughters to teach and bond with them, this IS not about fishing, this is about being DAD.

For as long as I can remember whenever my dad went fishing I was going with him. Unless he was going with a friend and there was only minimal space I was right next to my father on the bank or in the boat. at times we would joke and carry on other times he would yell or get frustrated because I was not listening or paying attention. I annoyed him, I frustrated him but we built memories and lessons together.

At age 10 I told my mother I didn't like fishing with dad, this was for 2 reasons; 1. he got quite upset when I would make mistakes. He had a short temper. but most of all 2. I got bored really fast with throwing my line out and doing nothing (I had/have ADHD, but this was before they had heard of such a thing). I was definitely a handful and then some.

Now for those of you who are bleeding hearts, you can relax my father never beat me black and blue or locked me in ... anything. He was not abusive he just had a short fuse and apparently I was the human torch :).

Please let me take a minute for those who were abused, I am truly sorry that happened to you and I hope you realize that it was not your fault. That person has/had issues of their own that they chose to take out on you. This post is not meant to make light of that behavior. It is wrong, It is discusting and you have the opportunity to teach your children a different path.

Ok so the next time I am out with my dad he sits me down and says "listen I understand you don't like going fishing with me anymore, is that true?" so I explained that I just didn't like sitting doing nothing and trying to be quiet (because making noise scares the fish off). So he kinda smiled and said "ok, I'm gonna teach you something new today". I cannot give exact details of how that day went (it was, after all, over 30 years ago) but he taught me how to bass fish and it changed my view of fishing. Of course we always have/had lines out for catfish but I enjoy the constant moving of bass fishing (and Crappie fishing isn't that much off).

Over the years I have caught as many tree limbs as fish, broken my line and had to have dad fix it, run a fishes fin threw one finger and into the next. Although he may not have been the most patient about it, he was there and now we laugh about it as I am bringing up my own little crew of children.

I have 6 children and a grandbaby and I love each and everyone with every bit of my heart. I get impatient with them, I have been know to yell (ok a lot) but we all have fun and laugh and have great times with each other and together. I have laughed with them and cried with them and they are all my favorite (it just depends on who's asking the question).

My very favorite thing about my father now is that he and my oldest son are best friends (and my youngest son is right behind him). They hang out (even when I am not there), work on cars, fish and talk to each other.

My dads strength is not what it use to be and it makes it difficult for him to get in and out of the boat (and a few other things) and I tend to get very frustrated about the time it takes him to do things. This weekend while we were out on the lake I got frustrate and made a comment about getting out of the boat and he said something to me about feeling useless. Now I would not share this with you all (as that seems a very raw and sensitive thing to say, especially to your son) but the comment really hit me hard. I have never really seen my dad as useless, I have never felt that way toward him so it never occurred to me that he might feel this way. I will not go into the details of what he and I spoke about on the way home. Dad (mine and yours and you) you are not and never will be worthless, you spent your earlier years teaching me and now I can pass that on to my children. because of you I can exercise discipline over myself, because of you I can put food on my table when times are tough and even when they aren't, because of you I know who I am I know who Jesus is and I know why that makes a difference, because of you ... I CAN....

- Grandpas please relax and let your offspring do for you, you did plenty for us when we couldn't now it's our time to give back.
- Fathers respect and honor your dads one dad you will be in his shoes. be patient as he once had to be with you. If you don't have that to look back on then give it to your sons' and daughters be patient with them teach them in love and gentleness do not be their friends be their fathers (you will have time to friends later).
- Grandsons pay attention to what both of these men are trying to show you. One day you will not have the opportunity to ask anymore questions but you will need to pass these on to your children. and for pete's sake watch what's going on around you!!

Thank you for reading, cast a big net and keep tight lines.
Until next week.

***On a completely different note:

I am considering doing a series called "Guides of Truman Lake" wherein I will go out with guides from the Truman lake area and basically interview them. The idea is to increase exposure to those men and woman that make their living off the waters many of us take for granted. If you believe you would be interested in such a series please comment below. This may turn into "Guides of Missouri" if I do a series on the guides for Smithville Lake and such.

This weekend Cody Vannatten of Cody bait and tackle (and a guide on the Lake of the Ozarks and Truman Lake) had a fund raiser for a friend (I do not believe I am liberty to give details so I will let him explain if he so chooses). They offered baked good and some AMAZING BBQ for donations. Below are a few pictures and I believe they are still taking donations if you can help.

Trying our luck (really trying actually)

Trying our luck (really trying actually)

I hope all my faithful readers have had a profitable 2 weeks. I apologies for not having posted a blog last week but I was in a state of self reflection <as it were>, you will understand if you continue reading.... :)

So on Sunday the 24th we (my dad, my son and I decided that we didn't want to take the trek to Truman Lake (our home away from home in the summer), so we decided to head to lake a little closer to home. I have been fishing Smithville lake for as long as I have Truman lake (read my previous blog) and tend to refer to Smithville as "Little Truman", I have caught many many fish from Smithville lake, everything from catfish to drum to crappie. So knowing the spawn was on I really wanted to hit this lake to test out my new found knowledge and understanding.

I have to stop here and thank my FB groups for all of the great knowledge I have gathered just from reading the posts everyday, I have learned more about crappie and catfishing in the last year than I have in my entire life combined, you guys are awesome and always willing to share your knowledge (as long as we don't ask where exactly you caught that fish :)) I would like to especially thank 4 guys that have really changed my game on the water Dan Huff, Jeff Faulkenberry, Cody Vannattan and Nate Daniels. All the guys on our groups are incredibly helpful and a fount of useful info but these 4 guys go out of their way to assist and provide tips whenever others get stuck. Thank you guys keep doin' what you're doing it is truly appreciated. 

Now back to the story... 
My father has never been a big fan of Smithville lake, he doesn't dislike it but in his words; "I've just never caught much out there is all". Challenge accepted. I tend to look at a lake and pick out bridges right off as I have found they produce really well. I am sure there are a lot of very good reasons for this but I won't go into that part. I also happen to know that there are a ton of MDOC (Missouri Dept. of Conservation) placed fish attractors and beds throughout Smithville. So we pulled out of the dock around 7am and headed directly to the bridge. This turned out to be a very good idea. I was fishing with minnow tipped jigs and I noticed many fish running about 10ft. down so I cast my jig out, count to 8 or 9 and begin reeling .... bam the bite was on. After the 5th fish we pulled in, in about 15 minutes, my dad said "ok guys I'm a believer" and we continued this way for a good portion of the morning. Many of the fish we caught were to small to keep but we ended up cleaning 17 fish even though we probably reeled in about 3 times that many.
But my catch isn't really what this weeks blog is about.

Today I want to talk about the laws and appropriate behavior on the lake.
As we were fishing a boat began to bear down on us and for a few minutes we all 3 believed they were going to ram right into us, just at the right time the boat turned sharply and as it approached us we could see that the 2 men were wearing MDOC uniforms. They asked us how the fishing was going and who was catching the most fish etc. and to be honest they were very friendly. They asked to see our Fishing licenses and I showed them my lic. using the MDOC app (This app has your legal fishing lic. and it is very convenient. It is strange that they called it "MO Hunting" but it makes it very easy to buy your license and have a copy at all times). Unfortunately they could not find my son's lic. on the app or in their system. My son had bought his lic. on the way and had a text from his bank to show that he had paid for it so the officer told him to make sure he contacted the MDOC office on Monday and clear it up. They then took a look in the live well and measured a few fish (we don't keep anything under 10in. anyway so we were good). Then they told us something that blew our minds. The officer then asked if we had all caught them and just tossed them in the live well to which we responded to the affirmative. He then told us that we Must either keep our catch separate from the other fisherman on the boats catches or have a way to specifically identify our catches against one of the other guys on the boat.
At first I thought he was teasing us, then I thought that is the most ridiculous thing I had ever heard until he explained the reason. See apparently once you have caught your limit you're not supposed to help the rest of the guys on the boat catch theirs. I had never ever heard that but I suppose that makes sense. He gave us some great tips on how to follow this law by clipping left or right fins with each person having a designated fin to be clipped. The 3rd guy then does not have to clip anything and knows those are his.
The officers went on their way and the three of us marveled at the many ways such a rule could be skirted without anyone being the wiser .... but I digress. We are not interested in poaching or lying about our catches so we took the rule to heart and I clipped left for my son, right for my dad and no clipping for mine.
The point I want to make is:
1. Not all of the MDOC Officers are or feel a need to be arsholes about their job and actually most that I have met are extremely cool and understanding. They are more interested in protecting our resources than catching bad guys but when the 2 duties cross you bet you will be cited for it.
2. Know the rules, if they had been so incline they could have written us a ticket and it would have been our own fault. It is our job as fisherman to understand what the rules are.

We had completed our fishing for the day and had a proud mess of 17 Crappie over the 10in mark so we decided to take the boat over to the main marina and clean our fish. This was an amazingly BAD idea for 2 reasons. #1 we used far more gas driving over there than we need to. and the 2nd reason leads me to my final story and one of the most important lessons I have ever learned on the water.
We pulled into the dock and I asked the young lady at the marina where the nearest bathroom was. She pointed up a hill and I knew there was no way I was going to make that. I stepped out to where the boats were slipped, found a secluded spot, looked around to make sure no one was watching and relieved myself off of the pier. My son was already at the fish cleaning station and we began cleaning the fish to complete our day.

My father was in his seat and ready to depart, I was in the drivers seat with the motor running and my son was reaching down to pull the final rope so we could leave when..... yes... you already know don't you?..... up walks a SGT from Missouri Water Patrol. He has his ticket book out and was ready to write a ticket... it was a done deal.... so he says to us "I understand that one of you guy had relieved yourselves off of one of the piers down here and I am just wondering which one of you guys had done that?" I instantly knew there was no trying to avoid the inevitable so I simple stated that it was me and that I could not make it up the hill so it was either off the pier of in my pants. He kinda smiled but he said "Listen I came down here to write you a ticket and I probably should but since you were honest about it I will let you go with a warning" and he took my information. He then explained that if anyone had seen us (other than the person who had reported it) we could be looking at indecent exposure or if it had been a child that we could be charged with sexual misconduct or the like and asked that we be careful to find a bathroom the next time we are out in the open like this. You can bet I will.

On the way back to our dock I found myself getting more and more upset but with each wave of fury I felt, it continued to occur to me that this was actually my fault. He was doing his job, the job "we pay him to do" and if my daughter had been with me, and we had seen that, I would not be happy about it. So to all of you that have ever been on the water and seen a guy peeing off of his boat or the bank or whatever, I just want to say, for me, I apologize.

We will be returning to Smithville very soon and look forward to all it has to offer but if you choose to head out there please, please make sure you have all your stuff together and have a way to relieve yourself discreetly. It's our job, it our responsibility to know the laws and respect one another while on the water.

Thank you for reading, cast a big net and keep tight lines.
Until next week.

The Day after

The Day after

(or "what the heck just happened")

When I was in college, we were taught that when writing a paper you should always start with a thesis statement and build the paper around that statement. For this blog, I guess my "Thesis statement" would be:

Knowledge and equipment go hand in hand.

With all the knowledge in the world if you don't have the proper equipment your knowledge is not going to get you very far.

With the right equipment and no knowledge you also aren't going to get very far.

Now if you read my first blog you are probably already laughing because you know what's about to come but hang with me and you might get a chuckle.
Armed with our new found knowledge <see my first blog> my son, my dad and I set out, the following weekend, to see how much we understood, without our buddy Jeff to guide us.
First off our motor is a beautiful 40 HP Force with a 6 gallon tank (remember that part; 6 gallons). Jeff's motor was a 200 HP (I believe) so it took us a little longer to get to our spots to say the least. But we found them and felt very pleased with ourselves.
The first stop we made was to acquire the shad we need for catfishing. Jeff made this look so easy and although we knew we needed some practice throwing the bait net, we didn't realize that the rope for the net was not quite long enough and truthfully the net wasn't quite as big as Jeff's either. My son threw like a champ sometimes the net flew open like a parachute catching the wind and other times it fell to the water as though it believe itself to be our anchor, in a sad flat kinda mess that frustrated my son for all he was worth. After many very disappointing tries (disappointing to him, not me, I was actually impressed he didn't end up in the water hahaha) he was able to pull up a few tiny shad that would eventually, at the very least, be a great cause of joy and relief to he and my father. Now before you laugh too hard I ask you, have you ever tried to throw a cast net to catch shad from a 16ft aluminum bass boat in wind blown, choppy water, while trying to run a trolling motor and all while your dad and grandfather watched you? ok then :)
With a few tiny shad (and one big enough to chop about 4 pieces off of) we headed to our new found crappie spot.
Now I was pretty sure the Crappie were closer to the bank than we had been fishing the weekend before but we had come out to use our new found knowledge so we stayed out in about 18ft. of water.
Now, we do not have the spider rigging setup to actually say we were spider rigging but we did put out a few lines hanging from the side of the boat at the depth our Fish Finder was showing fish. We decided to tie off on a stump and try our luck in one spot. I found out later why many of you are already laughing about that idea but apparently when you are spider rigging you want to be moving, VERY slowly trolling but moving nonetheless. I also did not have the hooks rigged in the same manner that Jeff had showed us (a point my son continuously made clear... at one point he got so frustrated with my setup the he actually said "we paid Jeff X amount to teach us how to fish and you guys didn't hear anything but the bait" and shook his head. he was right though and I learned a few more things after this trip as well.
Next time I will rig up as follows:
A 1 1/2 oz. weight at the end of my line.

A Crappie hook about 1ft. up the line from the weight with a minnow.
A second hook another foot up the line with a minnow.
With this setup you want to move only fast enough to say you are moving but not fast enough for your line to drag at all. The line needs to stay directly vertical at all times.
After about an hour of nothing much but a single small crappie just large enough to keep (but we didn't) we decided to move on to catfishing.
While heading to our catfish spot, which happened to be just between our crappie spot and the marina, we noticed the engine missing quite a bit. Due to my past issues with motors my adrenaline of course began to rise and I started to worry. With thoughts of "man we can't afford to have this motor in the shop" and "I really don't want to get stuck 5 miles out from the marina, no one's gonna want to tow us in", I asked my son to check the gas tank when we made it to the catfish hole. I did relax quite a bit upon his announcement that we were simply getting ready to run out of gas. That may sound strange but no gas can be fixed with about $12, a far cry from needing the carb. rebuilt.
We fished for about another hour at our catfish hole and I am proud to say that my son and dad did catch 2 fairly nice blue cats. We threw them back as we did not feel like cleaning only 2 fish, especially when we already had 20lbs of fish in our freezer.
We decided to head back in as it was getting late, the motor sputtered from lack of fuel. I had my wife praying from home and all 3 of us, you bet, were praying. At one point it stop altogether. My mind began to wonder to whether or not any of my Facebook friends might be out fishing if I needed someone to bring us a gallon or 2 of gas :). My son crawled back and tilted the gas tank to the side to feed what little gas was left to the hose and we made it back to the marina.
When we were out of the water I opened the tank to find there was absolutely nothing left in there, if you were dying of thirst you couldn't have even rinsed out your mouth (not a good idea anyway).
We/I learned that if you are going to pay to be taught something then it is probably a wise idea to:
A. Have the right equipment.
B. Do the thing you were taught, the way you were taught.
C. Drop your boat closer to your hole or have extra gas somewhere close.

Thank you for reading I hope you enjoyed our folly's, cast a big net and keep tight lines.
Until next week.

Bass Family Fishing Report

Bass Family Fishing Report

This blog is to document mine and my family's fishing adventures, rants and raves.

I have thought of doing this for a while but after the EPIC weekend my dad, son and I just experienced I decided it was time. This is an outlet to share our experiences while on the water or docks, fishing and just basically having fun. It may turn into more adventures not centered around fishing, or even water, but we will see what happens.

I hope this is entertaining and useful, at the very least I hope it keeps your attention. Please feel free to share your thoughts and comments.

Ok so this winter we scheduled a guided fishing trip with one of Truman Lake's premier Crappie and Catfish guides Jeff Faulkenberry of "Faulkenberry's endless season guide service".

Back story:

I have been fishing for as long as I can remember. With my father in the Navy we had the opportunity to fish all over the United States.

I basically quit fishing around the time I turned 16 and did not even pick up a rod until about my early 30's (when Kmart when out of business....the first time :) ).

I had decided that I would go all out and pick up a bunch of fishing gear and give that summer one chance to prove to me that is was worth my time again.

In May of 2003 my brother and I decided we were going to use some of this gear I purchased but not just anywhere we wanted to go somewhere that we KNEW we could catch fish. So we stopped at a local bait shop to get worms (Forty woods bait shop) and asks the guys working in there where we could go that would virtually guarantee we would catch fish. After much discussion is was decided that Truman Lake was the place we needed to go. Now Truman Lake is about an hour and a half from Kansas City but we had all weekend, so off we went. We had his oldest daughter and my oldest son with us and we had been driving for about a hour when we he turned to me and said "hey man it's getting late, let's head home and try to find this place tomorrow". I responded with something like "let's give it another 15 minutes, we knew this was a long drive, but if nothing in 15 minutes then we turn around sound cool?" he agree and almost 15 minutes later exactly (9:45pm) we pulled up to the boat ramp at the Truman State Park. We parked right on the boat ramp so the kids could sleep and we could fish unhindered by the babies (don't judge me :)). With nothing but 2 $20 fishing poles, some hooks and worms we caught 6 fish in 45 minutes. It was amazing. Needless to say we were HOOKED. <see what I did there... hooked?.... oh I kill me>.

We started fishing every time we had the chance. Checking every spot in KC down to Truman Lake. I would call my father, who, at the time lived in Dallas TX. and tell him about the great fishing and expressing how much I wish we had a boat.

On Christmas Eve 2004 my dad pulled up in front of my house with this mess of a boat (no offense but it needed a lot of work) but it was my new 16ft. aluminum bass boat and I was in love with it. The boat had belonged to one of my uncles who had given it to another of my uncles, who then gave it to my dad and now he was passing it to me. He said "Merry Christmas son, it only comes with one rule... you can never sell this boat, it's been in the family since it rolled off the assembly line and it must stay in the family" obviously I agreed and thus began my love affair with boat fishing. The following summer I tinkered with that darn thing every time I had a chance. A new wire here, a new live well there and so on. Last year (2015) we had to replace the motor and I cannot tell you how nice it is to have a motor that starts with the flick on the ignition (vs. having to crank it for 10 minutes and praying the whole time it will start :) ).

Our trip:

So with a new boat motor and the taste of fried fish on our minds, we headed to the 2016 progressive boat show in KC where we knew we would meet up with Jeff Faulkenberry.

I am a member of several local (and not so local) fishing groups on F.B. and I knew about Jeff's reputation. When we finally met him it was like meet a celebrity, for me. I had watched all of his videos and read every post he had posted trying to gleam ever bit of info I could to become a crappie tournament worthy competitor. But when we started to talk he was just an average guy like all the rest of us, he just happened to be doing for a living what we all were doing for fun. My son put it best when he said "man Jeff is just a really chill guy" and I couldn't agree more. What he meant is that Jeff does not get frustrated and tell you put his stuff down and let him handle his own gear, we were just out fishing with one of our friend (who just happened to have WAY more knowledge and experience than we did). So we scheduled the trip for April 10th and went our way.

We showed up at the State park to camp on Friday the 8th, the weather reports had all been, at least fairly good up to now and we were excited. Then... ohhhhh then..... no sooner did we get our tent up than we received a freeze advisor for that very night. Luckily my dad had the presence of mind to bring a couple of space heaters so we thought we would be fine. At 10pm we weren't all that certain anymore.

My air mattress was MUCH larger than I had thought it was and took up more than half the tent which left just enough room for my dad's cot and no room for sleeping arrangement for my son. Now I have purposely left my son's name out of this because I fear he may be embarrassed if his friends read this, but at around 11 to 1 am my son came into the tent and took me up on my offer to sleep on my air mattress next to me. I woke up ever 2 hours FREEZING and in pain from the way I had to sleep because there was very little room for the 2 of us. Finally I just snuggled up to my sons back and tried to sleep and stay warm the best I could. This would be a trip I will never forget as my son is almost 18 and is a little old to cuddle with this daddy anymore ... but I will miss that....

The rest of the weekend was fairly nice, how could it not be when we had slept in sub freezing temperatures the first night. The wind on Saturday was pretty bad and we played around fishing for a few hours with dad catching one decent catfish and me catching a .... something that was to small to keep. So Sunday morning came and we headed to Bucksaw marina to meet up with Jeff.

The first few hours were difficult and the crappie just would not bite. We were on top of schools of fish and they just wouldn't bite. We could tell that Jeff was getting a bit frustrated but as a true pro he never lost it and explained that the cold front from Friday night and the winds had really affected the crappie. So at approximately 11 to 11:30 we began Catfishing. Holy CRAP the fishing was amazing no less than 15 minutes went by without a new fish in the live well. In just under 4 hours we landed 17 catfish. now to some of you that might seem like much but to us this was an amazing situation. I have NEVER caught so many fish in such a short time. None of them were the behemoths we have seen randomly post on FB but everyone of them were "eaters". I learned a few things I want to share as I close out this story:

1. There are fish down there. There are time when it seems like there is nothing below the boat because you aren't catching anything but they are there, just be patient and if nothing else switch to catfish (hahahaha)
2. BOAT stand for Break Out Another Thousand (hahahaha)
3. An extreme cold front will really affect the fish bite.
4. Shad are the best possible bait for Blue cats period.
5. Learn to READ your fish finder. The lake is FULL of fish and your F.F. will tell you if you are in the right spot.
6. Never leave fish that are biting to find fish; Never stay in a spot too long if you aren't getting the bites.
7. Enjoy your time with your family while you can.

I am hoping to take a few friends out with Jeff later this summer but until then keep tight lines and warms hands.