The Alternative Angler – Rod Rage Part 2

Never mind smelling the flowers, don’t forget to take time out to see the satirical side of fishing life and grab a laugh along the way as well. So here’s a regular column from Kevin Perkins to remind us that life is for laughing at, or taking the p*** out of, whenever we can.

Rod Rage Part 1

Rod Rage – Part 2

There are some amongst us who are very organised will have loaded up their cars with all the fishing gear the night before, ready for a speedy exit. Leaving a car full of tackle outside your house does, however, bring about the remote possibility that some nefarious passer-by will espy your gear and taking an instant liking to what they see, then relieve you of some, or all of it, by lobbing a brick through a window. Waiting for the local constabulary to come out and issue you with a URN for the insurance claim will give you enough time to grow a beard, never mind having enough time left to go fishing.

Those of you unlucky enough to have ever come out in the morning to be faced with a puncture will know from bitter experience that the spare wheel, jack and wheel brace are always located directly beneath all the gear you neatly stowed away the night before. And that after dragging all the tackle out, it will never all go back in the same way.

Don’t forget…

Loading up in the morning has the benefit of security, but brings the increased risk of leaving something behind. Once again there is a formula that equates to the more you are rushing, the greater your chances of overlooking something, and indeed, if you are really running late the more chance there is of that particular ‘something’ being rather important to your day’s fishing.

There has been more than one occasion where I have left behind food, bait (not remembering the deadbaits from freezer has become almost a commonplace event) rod(s), reel(s), net(s), umbrella, boat drogue, mud weights, anchor, chair, various articles of clothing, quite often taking just the one boot, spare batteries for torch and/or alarms, complete fly selection, fired-up hand warmers, etc, etc. With the exception of the deadbaits, which in my defence were ‘hiding’ in the freezer, all the rest of the ‘must haves’ were placed in prominent positions to ensure I couldn’t possibly fail to see them (I did) or trip over them on the way out (I didn’t).

I will confess that I started ‘missing’ things quite early in my fishing career. My formative junior pike angling years meant a ninety-minute bus ride to the Thames, and towards the end to the journey the bus turned off the main rod and trundled off to circumnavigate Slough town centre. Whilst the bus went off on its detour, I used to jump off, run to the fishmongers round the corner for a couple of herrings and half a pound of sprats, and jump back on the bus as it went on its merry way to Windsor.

Being brave, I left my tackle on the bus whilst it went round the town and I did my shopping. Being stupid, not once, but twice, I managed to leave the precious bag of fish on the bus when I got off. No doubt the bus conductor enjoyed his bonus fish supper on those nights. The look on my little face when I got to my swim and opened the tackle box to find nothing there would have brought tears to those with the hardest of hearts. I’m starting to fill up even as I write about it.

But I remember….

And remembering black days, there was the time I cycled over to the canal with my rod strapped to the crossbar, as you did in those days. Less than fifty yards from the towpath I rode over a kerbstone and the front bootlace holding the rod bag came undone and it tipped forward at 45 degrees. The rod bag didn’t offer much protection against its contents being ground along the pavement, and the tip ring and metal ferrule of my almost new two-piece rod were no more. Biting my lip and holding back the disappointment, I ended up the day fishing with just the butt section after an attempt at affixing a float ring to the rod tip and whipping the two sections together with three-pound nylon was less than successful.

Back to the plot

Assuming you are still running late, it doesn’t matter how fast you drive to try and make up time, it never happens, even if selected warp drive as one of the options when you bought the car. Never mind those speed cameras keeping your velocity to safe limits on perfectly straight stretches of road at 4.30 am, if you’re running late, the biggest obstacle you face is picking up a ‘mate’ on the way.

If men and women can’t ever manage to ‘arrive’ at the same point in time, (if you catch my drift…!) what chance is there for two blokes going fishing? The odds against you leaving home exactly on time and him just stepping through his garden gate as you pull up are truly astronomical. The much more likely scenarios are:

You leave late, and arrive outside your mate’s house at such a speed that when you do pull up, the deceleration causes your wheels to ripple the tarmac. As you come to a halt, you just have time to grin meekly at your less than happy mate who is sat outside with all his gear, when your rod bag, which only a moment ago was travelling at a ferocious rate, slams into the back of your head.

On the other hand, you might have arrived spot on time outside your mate’s house, only to find the place in total darkness. Do you then:

a)Say sod it and drive off.
b)Wait patiently outside for ten minutes to see if he comes to life
c)Get out and search for small stones to throw up at the window in an attempt to rouse him, if it’s still dark, it can be quite difficult to locate the requisite handful of gravel. Stumbling around in a stranger’s garden at that hour in the morning looking for suitable projectiles has its own set of dangers, discarded rakes, ponds, cats, cold frames, guard dogs and suspicious neighbours reporting a prowler to name but a few
d)Sit outside and phone him up, if he answers, all well and good. If you rouse his wife/partner from their beauty sleep, you will be held responsible for waking the entire household (even though her shouting down the phone at you might have contributed slightly to the disturbance) and you will probably be asked to go away, only probably not quite so politely
e)Stay in the car and hold down horn button on steering wheel for 30 seconds. Keep engine revving ready for quick getaway, and the only person not chasing you down the street in various states of undress and armed with a surprisingly varied amount of weaponry will be the one you were supposed to be picking up.

If you are rushing around like a lunatic because you are late and are trying to get to ‘the’ hot swim – don’t bother. Some other bloke will have already beaten you to it, and by that I don’t mean minutes. It’s not like you arrived in the car park almost simultaneously and glared at each other as you furiously unloaded the cars and rushed off down the path, first one in the lead, then the other in the manner of the ‘Wacky Races’.

No, that other bloke will have been settled in that hot spot hours, maybe even days before, all you can do now is to go and find somewhere else to fish. And if your day has already started this badly, it almost certainly wont get any better from now on.

And finally…Milestone or Millstone….?

Form an orderly queue in order to buy me a very large drink to celebrate that this is the 200th article I have managed to slip under the radar and get published on FM (if it gets put up, of course). To your credit you have all largely suffered my ramblings in silence since the AA column, Donald and Damien et al were foisted onto you over five long years ago.

In all that time I have skilfully managed to not pass on one jot of information on how to fish any better (probably plenty on how to fish worse!) but I hope that I may have least brought a modicum of entertainment to the site.

I honestly don’t know where the articles come from half the time (and doesn’t it show) and I certainly have absolutely no idea of where they are going to come from in the future. My thanks go to Graham for putting up with my inane drivel for so long, but more importantly, if I can write something that passes for an article, then many more of you out there can do the same, and probably considerably better.

With the notable exception of myself, FM is lucky to have a number of regular contributors, whose articles are both informative and intelligently written. But as well as that, we would all like to read about stories, ideas, even suggestions from ‘regular’ anglers. It doesn’t have to be War and Peace, 500+ words will be fine, and if you have pictures as well, so much the better. Nor do you need the writing ability of JK Rowling (I’ve proved that!) to make it readable.

So, come and join us, it doesn’t hurt, we won’t laugh at your effort (unless we are supposed to) and you get to see your name in print – can’t be bad, can it?