BLEH To Outdoor Activities!

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Aug 162011

Aye-yup, bleh to it all. I made a rather vain attempt to do some guerrilla camping at a west end park on the Ottawa river today. This trip has been a few weeks in planning. Waiting for the river to get lower, what to bring along, safety shit, weather, blahblahblah. I even bought a new bike to ease the pedaling long distance and to allow better attachment of my cart. Well, the best laid plans of mice and men…

The river was nice and low, meaning my planned campsite was readily accessible and it would have been easy to waterwalk out to the weed beds. I had bought a nice CHEAP one person tent. The weather was to be hot today & tomorrow (27degC, with a low of 15). All my gear was set, including camp stuff, food, fishing, even ready for a swim. I took my bike downstairs first, then came back to lug all the rest down. Sun was shining and it was HOT! So far, so good…

Ah, but then the shit hits the fan. First off, some dipshit ignoramus tried to rip my cart apart and wrecked a clamp for one of the side supports. OK, a bit of fiddling and diddling and I got the damned thing together solid. Then, I needed to pump up the tires. That was expected, as I hadn’t used the thing since I don’t know when. Done. I got down on my knees to attach the cart to the bike. My right knee doth protest loudly at that indignity. Clamp, cinch, and tighten. Done.

I loaded the cart with all my grabage. Up with the kick stand and…… Ping! the fucking cart slips off the bar. Well, now shit! A bunch of time spent trying this that and the other thing to get the frakker to stay. No go. I ended up locking both bike and cart up and, hoping that none of my gear gets jacked, go up to my apartment to grab a coupla tools and a coupla screw pipe clamps. Back down and put a small pipe clamp on the bar to keep the cart clamp from sliding back and off. Test. OK, Done.

All told, from start of getting things together in the apartment to now, it’s been about 3.5 hours. I start pushing my bike and load to get it on the roadway. Fuck, but it’s a heavy load! I’d been practicing my biking since the purchase of my cycle every second day or so. I figured I’d be ready for a bike trip of 6+ klicks, one way. Climb on, and away I go!

Before I even left the parking lot, I noticed a clickety-click at the rear wheel. Since I had to adjust the kick stand to keep it from being forced into the spokes of the tire by the cart clamp, I thought maybe the stand had moved. Off the bike, quick check, nope, all OK. Back on the bike, and away I go! again…

Clickety-clickety-clack-clunk. WTF??!! I was maybe three blocks from my home when Ka-Ping!!! two spokes were broken. Seems the cart clamp would swing back and forth and knock against the spokes of my rear wheel. I did a bit of a sharp turn and that swung the clamp deep into the spokes. Two broken spokes and I wasn’t 5 minutes into my trek. Well, fuck it. Ain’t worth the effort no more.

I pushed my bike (and pulled that gear on the cart) back home. All the while trying desperately to NOT break any more spokes or get the the whole frakking thing jammed up. Now, the sun and heat is no longer a nice thing. I got the shebang back to my place, unloaded the cart, locked it and the bike up, and lugged all my crap back to the apartment.

Went off to a local bike shop and got 2 new spokes for the wheel and got them on. Keep in mind, this was a back wheel with all the attendant gears and chains and whatnot to deal with. Got it all back together and gave the bike a test run to ensure I got it right. But, damn!! I did!!! Good. Locked the whole fucking thing back up and went upstairs. I didn’t give sweet sassafras if that same dipshit ignoramus who tried to mangle the cart tried to nick my bike. Fuck it.

So. Here I be. Frustrated, hot, sweaty, and filthy. This is one of those rare moments where a nice “cold” one looks damned entertaining. Knowing full well that if one is kinda cool, what about two? etc etc etc…..

So. Here I be, on the computer, typing my blahs to y’all. My knee aches. I now officially resign from fishing, and biking, and camping, and anything closely related to those things. If’n y’all want to buy my gear (fish, camp, bike, etc), just email me. We’ll talk…

Keep The Faith*

Posted by robbz at 15:53 Tagged with: , , ,

04:12 hrs

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Jun 282009

Yes, it is quarter after four on a Sunday morning. Both feet are cramping and the lower legs are in pain. Sleep does not come because as I get comfy in my bed, the explosions begin. It starts with a small tingle, then a quick jolt from a cramp, and kapowie! the toes curl up from a cramp in one leg while the other attempts to make me scream from pain. Such fun…

I’ve been up and down since 01:00 or thereabouts, trying to walk it out. Walking helps, but there is only so much one can do in an apartment. I went out onto the balcony once. All that did was offer a respite from the heat and made me want to have a smoke. Oh yes, a smoke. Just what I need at this point in time. Well, it was only a small want, not a, shall we say, burning desire. The solar path lights I mounted out there sure do look nice, tho’. A consolation prize, I s’pose, small that it was.

I may as well stay up now. There isn’t much use in even trying to pretend that I will get to sleep before 08:00 anyhows. By then I’ll be exhausted and probably crash out ’til 17 or 18 hundred, if the legs allow. That is a terrible waste of a beautiful summer’s day.

In the summertime, when the weather is high,
You can stretch right up and touch the sky

Ah, but now ain’t that the livin’ truth, hm? The heat, the sun, yes, and the humidity… all a glorious part of summer. I went out today to see if I could catch some golden shiners for my fish tank. All that went in were sunfish, pumpkinseeds. I kept five of them. They’re a terribly aggressive fish and as pretty as they are, not suited to mixed tanks. I’m thinking about going out water-walking later today and see if I can capture some other kind of fish. Supposed to hit 26 degC today with cloudy periods, so it may be a bit of a bugger sight netting.
 

Hell, I could just roll on out, go water-walk and fish. The river levels are way down so that would mean I could get 100, maybe 150, yards off shore before I hit waist deep water. The weeds’ll be up and maybe a nice bass will be out cruising. I could hunt gar in the shallows, too. Or simply plunk my sorry ass down on an empty patch of sand away from the crowds and pass out. I mean, heck, in the summertime when the weather is fine, I can get on out and be quite sublime. Ok, ok, so my rhyming sucks! It’s almost 5 a.m. for cryin’ out loud!

Thus ends another boring account for yours truly. Boring the entire planet since February of 2005, and doing a right bang-up job at it, too!!

Keep The Faith*
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Post script:
I didn’t make it to 0800. I crashed at 0700, lost almost the entire day, and arose at 1730. {{sigh}} so much for water-walking…
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Posted by robbz at 02:42 Tagged with: , , , ,

Ya Gotta LOVE Winter!!

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Jan 142009

Somebody’s gotta, ’cause I sure as heck don’t! Our temps dropped to -29degC (about -20degF) this morning, with a wind chill hitting somewhere around -35. And it’s gonna stay in the minus 20′s ’til Sunday. It will get into minus single digit temps by Monday, with luck. Brrrr……

I was listening (again) to a talk radio show this aft and the host put out the word for folks who “love” winter to call in. And they actually did call in!! From x-country skiers, to outdoor laborers, to fishing fanatics. The host gave away a copy of his latest book to the best “lover of winter”. The guy who won talked about going out in this kinda weather to do upkeep on the backyard rink and going out to ice-fish for rainbow trout in the Calabogie Highlands (hm, I wonder if this’d be one of the lakes my brother has told me about and I was once invited to go to one New Year’s eve long ago?).

Ice fishing? Ice fishing! Well, I consider myself to be a fishing fanatic, but to sit out in the cold, shivering whilst staring down at an 8″ hole in the ice, hoping that some dumb pluck of a fish would be stupid enough to pick up my bait…… Naw, like I always say when asked about ice fishing – “Me, I’d rather fish for fish, not ice.” Then again, last week, I took my sore knee and myself down to the river to see if anyone had popped a hole in the ice. I was actually thinking that if I could find one, maybe I would head out during the week and try my hand at that hole. Forgetting that I had sold my 2 ice fishing rods in ’07 at a yard sale (yes indeed, I had not one, but TWO ice rods! And I hate ice fishing!!). Forgetting that I had no bait and no money to buy bait. Forgetting that I’d need to haul all kinds of shit with me to fish with and stay warm, and that’d do wonders for the ol’ knee. Forgetting…, ahhhh, forget it!

Today just simply reminded me how I heartily hate winter. Bus Drivers! Mechanics! Dispatchers! Stay on fucking strike! Walk your damned picket lines! I hope y’all freeze yer gonads off!!! (um, with apologies to the female strikers. Y’all can freeze sumthin else off, k?)

Keep The Faith*

Posted by robbz at 16:09 Tagged with: , ,

One-Eyed Fishing

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Jul 172007

.. Ay-yuh, I went fishin’ today. My true-blue water walking. I went hunting for longnose gar in the shallow flats between Andrew Haydon Park and Britannia Beach. It’s only about 3/4 of a mile travel along the shoreline from point to point, but slogging thru knee deep water makes it great exercise.

.. My first stop was to get my dollar store inflatable boogie board blown up and ready for my little tackle kit. Surely not as good as my full scale floaty I have, but it served the purpose. Next was to collect and shuck a bunch of freshwater mussels (or clams, as I call ‘em) for bait. Then it was off a-hunting gar!

.. Well, at least that was my intention. Remember me mentioning tripping over rocks and stumbling into dips in the riverbed yesterday? The only thing I didn’t do was go for a dunk in the water. I don’t know haw many times I stubbed my toes or slipped on a rock, or nearly fell over sinking down into the many pits that permeate the area. Most of the bottom is nice and sandy, but one needs to keep an eye out for the traps.

.. I should say “keep TWO eyes out”, because one eye does not do the trick when trying to avoid “pit”falls. Not only that, my need to espy my prey from a slight distance also requires binocular vision, of which I am woefully lacking today. The times that I did spot a fish was usually when I was right on top of it and it was scooting off.

.. All in all, it wasn’t the best of water walking sojourns. But, mind you, it wasn’t all that unproductive. I actually had two pick-up and run by gar (see my Gar Page for a better description of that). One of them even came up out of the water as I tried for a hookset. That was really cool!! The other ran off at least 50 yards of line and when I finally went to get the line tight, I ended up discovering that the darn fish had somehow absconded with my bait!

.. So, it wasn’t the best. I missed attempts on a lot of fish ’cause I never saw them in time. There was wind that tended to make the water very wavy. The sun kept hiding behind clouds, too. Both of those things makes visual hunting of gar in the shallows a real bugger, even with two good eyes and polarized glasses. The water level was about a foot higher than normal for this time of year and that kept me from making a trip out to the weed flats around 100 yards from shore.

.. Oh well. Frustrating as it was most of the time, I did get some exercise and had fun anyways. I really was hoping to get fish today, but that may have been overly wishful thinking in my condition. Oh well, again. The day was hot. The water was warm. I got to “see” some gar. I got to fish some gar. What more could I ask for??!!

MY EYESIGHT BACK, FER CRYIN OUT LOUD ! ! ! !
… hehe …

Keep The Faith*

Posted by robbz at 21:52 Tagged with: , ,

Where To Now?

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Jul 232005

.. Each and every day, I get up and ask myself, “Where to now?”.
.. It’s that unknown of having no job, no direction, and no end to it all. I suppose the basis of the question is simple depression. A strong lack of focus or desire.
.. There is an employment counselor that I see on a regular basis. She gives me “homework” to do. I attend seminars to test aptitudes and abilities. I search the internet for ideas and possible job opportunities. I explore the possibility of going back to school to do . . . what? I pound the pavement, leaving CV’s here, there, and everywhere. Newspaper want ads, business journals, employment rags, Help Wanted posters, networking thru past acquaintances, hearsay, and words in passing.
.. Bang-bang-bang, then wait.
.. For what? I wait for the phone to ring and find that someone wants to give me an interview. That has happened only once in the past nine months! It IS depressing. I’d be happy if a company sent me a letter or an email stating “Thanks, but no thanks.” to my application.

.. So, each day, I come on to this here computer, check my various emails, update my 2 websites, and wonder. I wonder what I am doing wrong. I wonder if it’s my clothes or my hair style or the fact that I am missing a front tooth that has kept me from getting a job.
.. I haven’t tried those multitudes of jobs out there working for McD’s, or Wendy’s, or Tim Hortons (mmmm, coffeeeeeeee!). P’raps I should, because what I need now is to work. I don’t give a shit no more about money. Social services (welfare) doesn’t give me enough to even barely pay all the bills.
.. I JUST WANT TO WORK!! It’s just that easy.

.. Oh, and I’d also love to go fishing. In my canoe. Alone, but with the deer and the beavers and the birds and the bugs. I want to sit out on the water and watch the sun set. I want to watch the carp leap out of the water and come splashing down like a miniature grey whale. I want to watch the ripple and swirl of gar feeding in the shallows. I wanna break from all this shit!!!

…………. sigh …………..

.. Life goes on. Tomorrow, I head out with a friend to do a wee bit of water-walking. Hunt baby gar for my fish tank. Maybe even get to see an adult swimming around. Yup, I guess that I can take that as a break from all this shit. Heck, I’ll take anything I can get my hands on these days!
.. And so, life goes on. Hey, I’m still alive and breathing! I’m still clean! THAT is something, hm?

Keep The Faith*

Posted by robbz at 15:32 Tagged with: , ,
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