Fishing With Norwegian-American Men of a Certain Age

[Insert Photo of Small Child with Large Fish Here. Camera remains at cabin – sorry.]

Everyone needs an uncle named “Bub” – or some other unlikely moniker. Bub is my wife’s uncle. Bub might seem an unconventional name to some, but not to me. I had my uncle Ole. Yes, Ole was his real name, though my hip, urban friends couldn’t believe it. They must have thought he adopted “Ole” as some sort of ironic statement, a commentary on life in rural Minnesota as recalled by our ancestors but surely not lived out into the 21st century. (Ole died at age 90, while working in his garden. Probably last guy I’ll ever know who actually “died with his boots on.”)

Bub knows fish like my uncle Ole knew fish. It’s instinctual, and despite spending an ungodly amount (he told me how much, but the male fisherman’s code of silence forbids me from sharing) on a color depth finder, and possessing an underwater camera, he still finds his favorite fishing spots by lining up landmarks from shore. Once he has the visuals in place, then he checks the depth finder just to make sure he was right – though he probably suspected he was right all along.

The Dude and I went fishing with Bub on Sunday. We were out on the lake almost 4 hours – not bad for a 7 year old (not to mention my 45 year old butt which still hurts from bouncing along in the waves in that rather Spartan fishing boat.) We didn’t catch a lot of fish, considering the time spent on the water – only 12 total. But the twelve we caught were of a good size. Eight Large-Mouth Bass, 2 Walleye, and 2 rather large Blue-Gill Sunfish.

The Dude caught only one fish, but it was the largest – a bass. “You gotta put this in your blog he said.” (If someone told me when I got married that 13 years later I’d be sitting in a boat fishing with my 7 year old son, I would have believed him. That sounds credible. But if you were to predict that he would say, “Put that in your blog,” I would have had absolutely no idea what you meant, thinking perhaps it was insult aimed at me.)

The Dude insists on calling them, “Big-Mouth Bass” despite my constantly correcting him, “Large Mouth Bass”. “It’s another Big-Mouth,” he’d say as we drag another Large-Mouth into the boat. It’s like he’s calling them names, “Hey Big-Mouth! Shut-up already!”

Catching the two Walleye was exciting. These were not the little “baby” ones we’ve caught when fishing on the dock but real keeper sized Walleyes, the kind that drive Minnesotans crazy (Walleye song - sung to the tune of Rawhide.)


WARNING: Note to squeamish – do not read next paragraph.

Interesting find – when cleaning the monster bass that the Dude caught, we uncovered a rather good-sized crayfish in its belly. It looked recently consumed. The bass must have been real hungry that morning. The Dude was amazed.

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