Steelhead Benchmark

I'm one of those fishermen for whom fishing is always great even when catching isn't so hot.

When I go out on the Lower Deschutes with my son, whether on foot or in his drift boat, my day is made just by being with him, enjoying the sound of the river, feeling the motion of the boat, or the thrill of navigating, with him on the oars, whitewater that will flatten on the rocks any boat with an inexperienced captain.

On a trout trip, a single fat redside rainbow trout will more than make my day. On a steelhead trip, a grab, as we say, or a bite will suffice. I don't knock myself out to hook fish. They're a bonus.

But sometimes you get a day for the books.

Late last month Chris took me out on a day trip to our homewaters, the Lower Deschutes River. (He was the guide, but I insisted that he fish too.) Our quarry was summer steelhead, a close relative of the rainbow trout, except that the steelhead is anadramous, that is, born in a freshwater stream and then grown to maturity after migrating to the Pacific Ocean. They return, like salmon, to spawn, but unlike salmon, may make two or three trips back and forth before cashing in their chips.

At Chris's house, we ate a pre-dawn breakfast of hot Quaker Instant Oatmeal and drank strong coffee. Then we headed for the river. A friend accompanied us.

This past year I've developed a knee situation that has curtailed skiing and I thought that it might end fishing - at least wading, which I love to do. I can't flex and put weight on the right knee without support from the left. Makes climbing stairs awkward. But my son would brook no excuses during the arrangement of the trip. "I'll be right next to you as you move through the run, Dad."

True to his word, Chris put me in more easily waded runs (less big rocks to trip on) and stayed right with me. I also learned that I could take a stab of pain to avoid folding and taking an unscheduled swim, but his strong arm was what really kept me out of the drink.

Remember I said a "grab" meant a good day of steelheading? This was a day for my record book. Chris set me up for two hookups and two steelhead landed. (We released them both - one hatchery, one wild.) I had this feeling that I was experiencing someone else's life. We were swinging Intruder-style flies using spey rods and shooting line that can reach out on the river a loooong ways, but both of my fish were hooked on a second cast, darned near at my feet.

Our friend was also two for two, and Chris, who spent relatively little time angling, fished the runs after us, and gave us first choice wherever we fished, finished up three for four (one got loose). He also hooked two big rainbows, but they didn't count on a steelhead day. All fish were released.

Three guys, seven for eight. Not bad.

In and Out of Here

For the next couple of weeks I'll be in and out of here, traveling back and forth over some significant distances both for business and professional development consulting in "grading for learning."

I was over in the River Canyon for the past two days, and needless to say, I'm in another world over there. In a good sense!

We're going to get further into brain-friendly learning techniques (just getting warmed up!), brain-friendly teaching techniques (I can't wait to tell you about the Vice Principal who screamed at me in the doorway of my in-session eighth grade history class because they objected to one of my brain-friendly policies that became school protocol the following year), and grading for learning. The VP story is a something else, worth a post all by itself.

Just have to fit all that in when my brain can breakaway from travelling, planning, and lesson plan and Power Point (interactive!) revision! (That's what I get for being a single-track, stereotypical male, eh?)

Weekend Diversion

For your viewing pleasure, here's a video (just learned how to post these today!) that non-verbally sets the stage for the mission of a not-for-profit organization I helped found to combat the growing exclusion of recreationists from their rights to be on our state waters. Note the fences across the waters near the end.

While you're watching the video and learning the variety of waters in my state, I'll be organizing my study, straightening the house, doing the dishes, and every thing else I need to do to properly welcome my wife home from the east coast tomorrow!

The live action shots and white water stills are from the River Canyon. I love it there. Beauty and adventure, with peace of mind to boot.

The young man rowing the drift boat and wearing an orange PFD (a little past midway in the video) is the author of my featured fly fishing reports and the man behind the camera for many of the photos on the blog. Most of you have probably also figured out that he's my son. ;-)

Here goes...

File Under "This Could Never Happen Here!"

I just got a last minute invitation to dinner (fresh sockeye salmon, no less) from my sister. Second day in a row. Yesterday was New York steak!

I'm doing the bachelor thing for about another week. My wife, who spoils me as a matter of course, is visiting her family on the east coast. My sis is entertaining old friends from the east coast here in town. Apparently these circumstances have a canceling effect on my lack of opportunities to eat well!

But my opportunities to get on with the grading posts and comments have to wait another day, because I'm heading out the door.

Let me leave you with this question: How would you feel if your child's school was adjacent to an old bombing site where unexploded bombs were recently found?

From the Orlando Sentinel...

Getting to Know You

Assistant Superintendent Kimberly Moritz, who writes G-Town Talks (upstate NY), a very cool and personal edublog, tagged me for the "8 Random Facts About Me" meme. From what I have picked up in blogging context during my short tenure in the edusphere, these exercises are meant to help the blogger connect and network, and maybe even have a little fun.

So, between wiki planning, outlining a back-to-school post on hitting the ground running with standards-based grading, and wondering what polar bears are up to while we stew about global warming, I thought it would be fun to play along.

If you get tagged and you've just been through this, please forgive me. I'm looking to tag folks who have yet to play some version of this both to get to know them better and avoid bugging recent players.

First, the Rules:

1. Post these rules before you give your facts
2. List 8 random facts about yourself
3. At the end of your post, choose (tag) 8 people and list their names, linking to them
4. Leave a comment on their blog, letting them know they’ve been tagged.

Here we go...

1. I don't watch TV. I realize programming has improved since the 50s, but commercial interruptions are annoying to the max, and I can't stand to be on someone else's schedule unless they're paying me.
   
2. I haven't gotten a speeding ticket since 1982 mainly because my wife was sitting next to me when I got that one.
3. I'm book poor. Aren't you? There ought to be a Twelve Step program for bibliophiles.
4. I love to (have to) read every day. A little fiction, a little non-fiction. Actually a lot of both.
5. My favorite thing to do is spend time on the river with my family.
6. I drive an old Ford pickup. After it's fourth warrantied transmission and second warrantied engine, it ran well.
7. I long for a new Tundra four-door (long bed comes out next year).
8. My driving passion is improving instruction and classroom assessment for student achievement, and one of the last frontiers in classroom assessment -- grading for learning, aka grading linked to standards, aka standards-based grading.
9. For Vivek: The origin of Repairman...
   

I'm taking a break to research who hasn't played recently...

Tagged so far: Vivek, ms_teacher, California Teacher Guy.

Research over! If you played recently, maybe put up a link to your meme post? The Science Goddess, Exhausted Intern, Miss Profe, Midwest Teacher, Miss A., Eric.

Humor and Irony

I'm feeling more like a fisherman than a teacher today, which is odd, because I wont' be going fishing for at least a week. Still, I'm timing out and reminiscing. I'm smiling too, because I thought of a "fishing situation" that unfolded over on the north Oregon coast in the days before I became a fly fisher and the river canyon became a refuge. ("Freddie" is my fishing nickname. It has a history.)


The Line Between Legal and Not

Back in the day when Freddie fished only with monofilament, he and a couple of other gear-flinging river monsters were getting ready to toss spinners into a hot fall chinook hole by the banks of the Trask River in western Oregon.

Our boys had seen lots of other roaming fishermen that day, but the catch was limited.

Among the other fishless wonders were two preppy college boys who looked like they could be related. They wore identical cheap gray fishing vests and identical cheap green hip waders. Prior to arriving at the hot spot, these guys had been sighted two or three times in various runs on the river. These boys were hard to miss, especially since their gear was by Zebco straight off the cellophane-wrapped cardboard. Apparently they didn't know how to fish, because no one on the river actually saw them with a line in the water. Nobody gave them a second thought. It takes all kinds, right?

Shortly after scoping out the target hole, Freddie and his two buddies began tossing their spinners. Nobody else was around. Freddie got a solid grab, and the fight was on. A few minutes later, the fish was landed, bonked, bled, and put in a wet burlap bag near the bank. In the blink of an eye, as if by magic, Repairman and his friends were fishing with an audience. Guys had appeared out of nowhere. And right behind Freddie, as he worked his magic spinner, were the Preppy Twins.

Then Moby Chinook hit Freddie's spinner. Moby hammered ol' Freddie, but Freddie was up for it. Just a short way into the battle, it became obvious to Freddie and the entire crowd that Moby was hooked in the back. Most unfortunate.

Freddie looked forward to no choice but to release the fish after it was landed, preferably without taking it out of the water. The law is the law, after all, but Moby Chinook didn't know he could get out of the struggle so easily, so he just kept kicking Freddie's butt. Finally, Freddie got a little impatient to get on with legal fishing and reefed really hard on the 25-pound test Stren. The hook pulled loose with frightening results.

Treble hook, spinner, and line headed back towards Freddie's head at Mach 4. Freddie quickly ducked the mass of lethal metal. As the heavy spinner reached the end of its monofilament tether, the last foot or so of line landed on the right shoulder of Preppy #1. Said shoulder provided a pivot for that short length of line and the treble hook, which had not lost much of its momentum, buried itself in Preppy #1's back.

"AAAaaahhh!" Preppy #1 screamed, as he threw his arms out to his sides. His disposable Zebco outfit flew into the bushes. Freddie rushed to the prep's aid, feeling very bad about the long-distance stabbing.

Preppy #2 brushed Freddie aside and said, in a manly voice, "I'll take care of it."

Meanwhile, Preppy #1 was screaming profanities and jumping around trying to reach the embedded spinner.

Two of the treble's hooks had penetrated the unfortunate prep's vest, shirt, undershirt, and skin, fortunately for him without disappearing past the barbs. His manly companion was able to remove them without much effort.

But sympathy on Freddie's part turned to confusion when the formerly hooked Preppy #1 screamed at Freddie: "I need to see your fishing license!"

"Huh?" said Freddie.

"I need to see your fishing license!" the Prep repeated, modulating his voice somewhat, but still angry and shaken.

"Why?" Freddie asked, thinking, what does my license have to do with getting drilled by a spinner?

"Because I'm a game warden, dammit! (He's obviously embarrassed, but he's going to salvage something out of this debacle.) Is that your fish in the burlap bag?"

Not wanting to appear intimidated before the crowd and his two buddies, Freddie said, "You've got some ID to back that up, right?"

Freddie is thinking, this doughball cannot be a state cop.

He smiled at Freddie like a kid who'd just set fire to an ant hill and pulled a silver, five-pointed Oregon State Police badge from the breast pocket of his cheap gray fishing vest.

"O-kay," said Freddie, beyond amazed.

Freddie pulled out his wallet to show the officer his license. The officer's companion, also a game warden, checked Freddie's bagged fish very carefully and found that it had been hooked in the mouth. Everything's 10-4, and the wardens are very disappointed.

Then, as the wardens, their cover blown for the day, slowly moved upstream and out of hearing range, the crowd of fishermen began to chuckle.

Freddie's buddy Jay summed it up, shaking his head and laughing: "He wanted to nail you for snagging a fish, but you snagged him. You snagged a game warden. Wonder what the fine is for that?"

Freddie couldn't help but think that life sometimes dished out surprises, like you'd get fined for snagging a salmon, but wardens were fair game for foul hooking.

Checkin' In

After a great riverside dinner with the wind gently blowing the heat on down the river canyon, I'm at a loaned computer, beer in hand, to say, "Wish you were here!"

Maybe I'll come out of my reverie tomorrow long enough to string some thoughts together that don't have to do with relocating my wife and life to this river canyon!

Father's Day

I'm spoiled.

My 22 year-old son called to wish me well, and my wife let me sleep in (I got myself up at 9:50 AM after having pushed the limit till 2 AM this morning), made me coffee and a great cheese and veggie omlette, and she did ALL the dishes (normally, that's my job).

Then she went for a bike ride to leave me stress-free for the day. I have two Eddie Bauer t-shirts and a golf shirt coming by mail, and we got each other really nice patio furniture for our 28th (!) anniversary Friday.

This afternoon I worked on my business web site, got some beer and peanuts, and now I'm going to read of few pages of my latest thriller. :)

This evening we'll celebrate our anniversary, Father's Day, and my Mom's birthday (she'll be 83 Tuesday and still goes to the real estate office and sells homes!).

I love my family. Life is good. Today's for smelling the roses.

PS: Back home now... at my Mom's house, my sis (who is another teacher) served champagne before dinner, then steak, broccoli, carrots, baked potato, French and garlic bread, a great red wine that had no sulfite, and a salad that included my favorite healthy greens, avocados, and fresh local tomatoes, with choice of dressings. My wife hand-cranked vanilla bean soft ice cream and we had it with her home-baked bundt cake and local strawberries for desert, with Kona coffee. Cards and presents all around. I'm not lying.

Like I said, I'm spoiled.