Monday, April 20, 2015

The Tale of the Happy Husband

Good morning.

This might be repetitive for some of you, but it's a story worth telling in its entirety.

Last year, Jered found his grandpa's tackle box and fishing pole in his parents' basement, and on a whim, decided to bring them home with him.


He started dropping by the lake at Raccoon River Park to cast out a few times every once in a while, and I thought, I could see us spending some summer afternoons like this.

Before long he learned that his buddy from work also enjoyed fishing, and before I knew it, the new hobby turned into an obsession.  We're talking multiple nights a week, long into the night because "catfish bite more around 2 in the morning!"

 

I joined a few times.  They'd set up a campfire on the beach or edge of the river, and it was enjoyable.  Especially when they would catch a few.  (I didn't see much difference in the number of fish they caught in the middle of the night versus what they caught during the day.)

With a few fish under their belts, the obsession grew.  He bought a boat.  Then bigger, better poles.  Then a bigger motor.  Then an underwater camera.  Then blah, blah, blah.


My favorite times were the ones when we would go to the lake during the day, either on the boat, or just to the beach.  Jered fished while I read a book and basked in the sun.  Those days were delightful, with the exception of the time that we both got painfully fried.  

Admittedly, the long nights that I spent at home while he was out fishing were not as enjoyable.  They had their sights set on catching a river monster, and that seemed to mean spending as much time as possible at the river and the rest of their time day dreaming and making plans for fishing trips.  If I asked for a night with just the two of us, he wanted to spend it at the lake, fishing.  I got real tired of that word.

A few redeeming moments existed though.

 

With [maybe?] the exception of our wedding, I had never seen Jered so happy as on his big fishing day in Mississippi.  He caught his largest fish to date, weighing in around thirteen pounds.  

I think it's safe to say that the end of fishing season was part of the reason I was looking forward to cooler weather more than normal this year.  However, the boys have supposedly agreed they need to cut back, or at least be better at how they plan their fishing time this year.  And so far, they've done a great job.  Part of this is due to their use of ditty/diddy (I've seen it spelled both ways) this time around.  They set several up at night, leave them, and check them the next day after work.  

This has proved to be much more wife-friendly, and they still seem to be catching plenty.

I rest my case:

Numero uno:

   

Dos:


Number three was even bigger, and the fillets are already prepped and stored in the freezer:


Yesterday afternoon they went back out to check the poles.  Then I got a call from Tyler:

"Aimee, we're gonna need you to meet us down in the shop in about four minutes.  Be photo shoot ready.  Just wait."

So, without further ado, number four:

 

 




That's right.  They caught their first river monster.  And they were ecstatic.  I almost cried for them.  And because this is my turf, I can share with you that they both checked their hair in the Vespa mirrors and whipped off their shirts saying, "We haven't been working out for nothing!"

Jered was on cloud nine the rest of the night and couldn't stop looking at all the pictures.  This guy weighed in at over twenty-seven pounds!  (The record in Iowa is over eighty, so I'm not naive enough to believe that finally catching a river monster is going to slow down their obsession at all.)

It really did make my day to see them so happy.  (Plus my husband is super hot.)

Well, just thought I'd share their fishing tale with you.

Aim 

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