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You guys already know that this podcast runs on Black Reifel Coffee, but we want to score you up on a few things you might not know about Black Reifel Green Beret.

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Evan Hafer founded BRC in 2014, along with his buddy, an Army Ranger, Matt Best. The venture allowed them to combine two of their passions, developing premium roasts to order coffee and supporting the veteran and military community.

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B-R is committed to supporting veteran law enforcement and first responder causes through the company's Biobank Give a bag campaign. They supply troops and first responders around the globe with exceptional coffee sourced from all over the world and roasted right here in the U.S..

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I recommend joining their coffee club. You get great coffee delivered to your door, discount pricing and a bunch of other good stuff. Most importantly, though, you'll never run out of coffee again and you can permanently take it off your shopping list.

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And for all you next level coffee freaks out there, they have an exclusive coffee subscription that'll get you exotic microlight coffee deliveries every month. Now, I'm not totally sure what a microlight coffee is, but I assume it's like a microbrew except for coffee. Instead of beer, just head over to Black Reifel coffee dotcom backslash meat eater to get all the goodness and use the promo code meat eater checkout to get a 20 percent discount.

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You've seen this cook up some pretty wild stuff here at Meat Eater, whether we're fixing diet, making our own sausage, rendering down fat or even making tallow, we're passionate about what we cook and how we cook it.

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And we know not everyone has access to these odd cuts in materials. So we decided to hook up with Porter Road and give you a chance to join in the fun. We're pumped to let you know about our new minister, Porter Road boxes. They work a lot like other subscription boxes, but we got wild with it.

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Yeah, there's there's a lard and tallow box so you can try your hand at rendering and stepping up your frying and baking game. There's a sausage box, which is my personal favorite for obvious reasons, and that includes enough pork fat back pork trim and casing to pair with one diers worth the trim and make a bunch sausage. And finally there's a scavenger box that has everything from kidney to pork shanks. That one also includes a signed copy of our buddy Steve Vanilla's The Scavenger's Guide to Hot Cuisine.

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With any luck, you've already got some gamey and maybe some fish in your freezer or soon will. And now it's time to start thinking about how to put it to good use. Head on over to Porter Road, Dotcom Backslash Meat Eater to check out our latest collaboration and get cooking.

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That's p o r t e r r o a d dotcom slash meat eater. Find all these ingredients on your own. It's not easy. And we got limited inventory, so be sure to get yours while you can.

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Do gingers have souls at this one? Am a fishing vessel that every time he hits the water, the cool kids beat the piss out of him. If you hate and picks Legos, don't ever go there like that will be your personal hell. I can't find my scissors anywhere in the world. Merry Christmas, degenerate anglers from me, Joe Somali and me, Miles Nulty, and welcome to the Christmas Spectacular that we sincerely hope none of you are listening to today on actual Christmas.

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We truly hope you are spending actual Christmas Day with family and friends pounding eggnog and stacking up those Amazon gift receipts. You can buy the new ride that you really wanted for Christmas.

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Genuine question. How does your family fix eggnog? Like, what's your eggnog? Go to tradition.

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This is important. It's plain, Jane, but I. You asked. Now I have to give a shout out to Hailo Farms, a Trenton, New Jersey staple, because there is no better pre made eggnog on the planet than Hailo Farms. If I could ship you some without it spoiling, I would. But that said, not like chilled, chilled Halonen sprinkling nutmeg and I traditionally go Maker's Mark. I like bourbon over rum. However, if you want to make it extra sweet and girly, go a little crown or vanilla.

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But you know you don't do the you don't do the warm eggnog thing. I thought that was like what would people did outis. That's not what you do.

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No I don't. My family never has. And I know that's the thing. We just never did that. I personally like it chilled and I'd be afraid I'd overwhelm it and just end up with pancakes. I mean, so since you brought it up, I'm really not a fan of any hot or warm alcoholic beverages like hot toddies.

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And you don't do the hot toddy now. I've had them, I don't know, like alcohol. It's not supposed to be hot to me. I don't like it.

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See, I can't go with you on the hot toddy, but I'm with you on the eggnog. Like eggnog. I'm like I'm totally with you on. And I think I always thought it was because I grew up in a warm climate. Right. Like one of those places that you dog on because it doesn't have seasonally appropriate weather for Christmas.

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Therefore, it really doesn't have Christmas. But that's a whole other thing. Go ahead.

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I'm not I'm not touching that. But when it's eighty degrees outside, warm eggnog is gross.

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Yeah, I would imagine it is. You already think it's not something you want to consume, but imagine what it's like when you're sweaty and someone's like here, have a hot cup eggnog.

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It's all.

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But my family had the super special eggnog drink that they always used to make. And so I don't know where it came from, but it was very, very specific. You would in a blender, you would combine eggnog, eggnog, ice cream, crushed ice, spiced rum and brandy, and you'd blend it all up into like this North Pole Carnival cruise boat drink and then a little little little bit nutmeg for garnish and tote it so good.

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And that for all of you out there who live in hot climates and still do have real Christmas and you want to feel jolly, I highly recommend doing that if you can find the eggnog ice cream, because that's that's key and it's kind of hard to find. So there's my holiday tip.

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Damned if I got a lot of places around here, including Halo Forms in Trenton, New Jersey, stable and make a delicious eggnog ice cream as well. If we could be sponsored by them, I'd be OK with it. I would drink the shit out of what you just described and so good. I'm not kidding. I already know at some point my wife's going to listen to this and go, oh, that drink Miles was talking about.

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Sounds delicious. Yeah, we should make those.

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And we're big. We're big picnic. A lot of fans here so I can get down on this. I like that.

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Yeah. Do that seriously. Like honestly do that. And I want to hear how it comes out. And if you guys try it, which I hope you do, let me know how it goes for you anyway.

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We hope that all of you out there are off doing whatever Christmassy things bring you, joy, unless, you know, you don't celebrate Christmas for religious or other reasons, in which case we hope you're out taking advantage of the fact that all the fishing spots are virtually empty either way.

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Yeah. Either way, though, good chance that by the time you listen to the show, Christmas will be over and this will just be an annoying out of season episode that you have to sit through.

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And you're welcome for all that.

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Oh, man. But we have to press on because it's Friday. Yep. And it's Friday, man.

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That's the show. And before we get to all the auditory gifts that we've wrapped for you, quick reminder that this podcast is fueled by black coffee. And thank God for that, because when my children come tearing into my room at five a.m. Christmas morning, I'm going to need that before I can even look at them basically.

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So go to Black Reifel Coffee, Dotcom, backslash Medidata, get your hands on some and use the promo code meat eater at checkout.

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Take twenty percent off your order in there whether you meant to or not. You brought up this interesting point. Right.

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So we're in the strange like pre post Christmas time warp because we're we're recording this right now before Christmas. Yes, correct.

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And and this episode will release on Christmas Day.

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Yes, it will. Mm hmm. But we don't expect anyone to actually listen to it until after Christmas. We do not. Yes.

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So so whatever everyone's hearing are the voices. Of past Miles and Joe talking about events that future Miles and Joe are going to experience intended for an audience were that future has already passed.

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The only true wisdom consists in knowing that you know nothing. That's Usted. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

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And that's all right. Just don't overthink it. I mean, it's a fishing podcast, Chris Michel, I do not say.

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But if you want to go that Heddy route right now, President Joe is probably losing his shit because his kid has decided to put the stickers on her Barbie camper van herself instead of waiting for President Joe to do that for her.

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There are tears present. Joe is yelling, what's present, Miles?

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Likely up to me at this point, President Miles Myles's is probably wishing he could Irish up his coffee because his son is like gone into full on toddler dictator mode, demanding presents and refusing breakfast is what I'm guessing.

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And then I'm getting annoyed and starting to lose it. And then my brilliant wife steps in and says, why don't we all just go take a walk and we get outside and she's much smarter than me.

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Everything works out fine. That's my guess. That's that's pretty close, except that we won't take a walk. Everybody will just go to their separate rooms and we like you go take your off, go to your room. Daddy's going in the garage for a little while.

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Anyway, in the spirit of the season and this show, we have pulled together a whole series of holiday greetings from some of our favorite regular contributors here on Bent and will be sprinkling those throughout just like shitty candied fruit nuggets and Atlanta's concrete fruitcake, after all.

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I mean, we want to be surrounded by our friends for Christmas in this digital world. We've created two.

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So, yeah, we do. And kicking it off for us, one of our more, I might even say, our most esteemed guests. Yeah, totally. You probably know him as a famous actor, but we just know him as the proprietor of the finest bait shop in upstate New York. Here's Ray Liotta himself.

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Hey, how you doing? This is Ray O'Reilley Liotta as Bait and Tackle and Polaski, New York Wikinews. Merry Christmas. Shops open today from ten to seven and today only everything in stock is half price. We've also got free Connollys made by care and a big pot of pasta was all made by my mother in law.

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So come on by and I'm just with you. You know, today it's Christmas.

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Pretty stupid. First, I just want to thank Ray, because he actually called us, he called us asking if he could give a holiday greeting on our show exclusively, which is huge for us.

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You know, and I also got to say, you can just feel the compassion oozing from from every word that man speaks.

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And, you know, I'm realizing that they were going to keep that streak going because in our next segment, we're interviewing captain in Lake Erie, fishing wizard Ross Robertson, a guy who's about as empathetic as a gator snatching puppies from the retirement community.

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Oh, that's. Come on, dude. It was a reference. Didn't you see the viral video, the dude pulling his puppy out of that gator's jaws? It's current events.

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I thought it was very heartwarming. Yeah.

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And besides, you know, Ross knows that I only bust his balls out of love. He and I have a long history and a fish together many times. But there is still much I don't know about Ross. All those questions and more will be answered in a rapid fire interview segment covering water.

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I'm going in cover before I can hold it for no more. Today in front of the firing squad on Covering Water, our news segment, please welcome my dear old friend, Captain Ross Roberts. And what's going on, buddy? I started jumped ship here, and I'm not I'm a friend, not acquaintance. Great. Moving up the world. I normally I'm just guessed guest guest. Guest guy we picked up in the parking lot of the ramp. Ross Robinson.

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I got to say, nobody can see you, but I love it. You have the full orange beard going right now. That's very festive for this time of year. It looks warm, your face looks warm, ginger, cause that's that's the whole game anyway. Anyway, so to reiterate how covering water works, this is where we rapid-fire a bunch of essentially useless information about a notable fishing personality at you guys. And the way the game is played here is we're going to put two minutes on the clock and Miles and I are going to go back and forth and rapid fire questions at you.

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And we want to answer as many of them as we can within that two minutes. So you can't think too long about them and you can't pontificate on them. You just got to kind of just go just kind of whatever pops into your head as the answer. Free association. Free association. Yes. A poodle, a noodle, a doodle, whatever, from as basically two minutes and a twenty plus year career. All right, let's go carets we're hoping for.

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And then what we'll do is, is you take the biggest career ending answer and we'll give you one minute on the clock at the end to expand and elaborate on that answer to beg for forgiveness. I nod and beg for forgiveness. Exactly. So if you're clear on the rules, we can we can get going here, Miles. I'll hit the first question and we'll roll from there. Ross, are you ready to play? No, but let's go.

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Any help? OK, two minutes starts now. Four Loko or vodka? Red Bull. Vodka. Red Bull for sure. Crawler, harness fishing. Brilliant or boring. You're about to get hooked right now. It's brilliant. You got to be the brains to do that. And moving on, where's Christmas gift you ever got? Probably a big bowl. Nothing from Joe Stromatolite, OK, which is more delicious. Walleye or perch, potentially. OK, best walleye fishery in the country outside the Great Lakes.

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Some Canadian later I can't even think of because we're out of time. Name one thing most ICE anglers do wrong, don't move enough.

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Most critical electronic on your boat, my son, our GPS, my greatest angler of all time, probably Ellender.

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I thought he was going to go Russ Roberts and Species'. You've never caught but hope to someday.

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Oh, God. That should be the simplest one taken too long.

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Billfish ahead, go miles gobies invasive problem species are great baitfish.

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Oh great baitfish yummy. Mmm.

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OK, you can spend eight hours in a pop up with any celebrity. Who is it. Anybody but Joe's family or. It's got to be some hot chick. I mean like Pam Pam Anderson in the nineties. Let's go.

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I love that you got the time. We'll talk about it later. Good. Good on you for the 90s though. Go ahead, Miles. Do gingers have souls?

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Not this one. Spring or fall walleyes.

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If you could only pick one spring, what's the most annoying thing the clients do? Brave man and, you know, like the timer actually stopped on the last question there and like if there was a career ender, you got it in just at the buzzer, dude.

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Like, right.

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Just right there. So I'm going to I'm going to put a minute.

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I'm going to put a minute back. I'm going to put a minute back on the clock here. That starts now. And you can expand or elaborate on any one of your answers.

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I mean, obviously, the client breathing thing, because I'm good enough to take some more of those, you know, now, I mean, you know, guiding is probably and I know Miles knows it's a very rewarding but very challenging thing. And a lot of times people won't allow you to help them. And a lot of people don't really, you know, what needs to happen because you're playing chess and they're playing checkers and sometimes people just being there like I mean, they just they don't listen to anything you're saying from from from step one.

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And it puts you behind. By the time they realize that the day is over or the opportunity has been missed, maybe it's you spoke to fish or you haven't switched or the bite has changed. The bite is over with. And the good guys clients are the ones that have open minds and actually listen to what you're saying. And most people are not that way. They try to think and a lot of the guys that I have are successful people.

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They own their own business and they're trying to outthink me when they should just be paying attention to what's going on and helping allow me to help them, because that's ultimately what makes a successful day. I've been there, done that. I'm doing it for them, not for me.

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That was like a minute ten and I'll give it to you. That was pretty it was pretty tight on the mat. Let you go a couple of extra seconds, but that was fun. And we have confirmed that you do not have a soul, which I have known for almost over a decade at this point. Anyway, thank you for taking part in covering water, my friend. Have a but don't talk to you before then. Have a Merry Christmas.

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Happy New Year.

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Thank you. I feel like I only lost ten percent of my fan base. Wow, outliner, you are batting a thousand in the segment so far as the two and arrest angler of all time, that's that's that's high praise right there.

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Kudos to you, sir. Now, a number of you wrote in after the first covering water we did to tell us that you dug the segment.

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So we're going keep it going. If you have someone in mind you'd like to hear peppered with questions both inane and illuminating, tell us if we think it's a good idea. We'll try to get on the show and we'll also give you credit for sending us the idea.

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I do know one person who will not be on covering water, and that's our resident West Coast Steelhead expert, Skagit Johnson.

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It's not that we don't think Skagit would make for a good interview. It's more a format problem. Like he's not really like a quick on his feet kind of thinker sort of works his way through deep questions, the same way he swings run slowly and methodically.

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We also feel I couldn't really grill him on West Coast Steelhead right now because I get the impression he hasn't caught one in a while.

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You never know if he has or not. It's no, it's been kind of slow. He did, however, manage to record a little Christmas greeting for all of you. This is your old Steel and buddy Skagit Johnson out here in Oregon wishing you a green Christmas.

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Happy holidays.

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I was going to tie up a dozen winners, swing on the lower Kleck and see the fish. You're feeling festive, but I can't find my scissors anywhere in. Well, what?

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So the fish are all dead next year.

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I can almost taste the Pinay, Tang and WoodSmoke of a Pacific Northwest steelhead camp when I hear Skechers voice man, it's evocative.

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There's a lot going on there, but it's not as evocative as the book that I'm going to cover in this week's Frickin and Philistines, which also just happens to be set on a Pacific Northwest Steelhead River. Yeah, this is one of those books that I know I should read.

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In fact, I've been meaning to read it for like over a decade now, but I think the guilt over not having read it already just makes it harder for me to make myself pick up copy.

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You know, I do. I totally get that, that the guilt just kind of creates a block. But I'm not judging.

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I'm just saying you really should read the book like I think you will appreciate it when you do. And it's that good. I love that book.

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I know. I know. I know. Maybe I'll make it a New Year's resolution. Anyway, this week on Freidkin Philistines, the segment where we tell all of you ingrates to put down your screens and read a goddamn book. Once in a while, Miles is going to tell you about the classic David James Duncan novel, The River. Why? What's Folkston?

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It's a guy who doesn't care about books or interesting films and things that I'm Fallston.

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Movie adaptations of books are almost always inferior, with certain exceptions, The Godfather Fight Club, High Fidelity in The Princess Bride come to mind. But by and large, we all know Hollywood screws up our favorite authors visions.

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As far as fishing books go the river, I might offer the most egregious offense I say might because I've never actually seen the movie. I haven't seen it because I refuse to watch.

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A complex, thoughtful and hilarious book turned into a cheesy rom com starring the backup quarterback from Friday Night Lights. Setting aside my casting skepticism, the original author, David James Duncan, disavowed said movie and tried to get his name removed from the project after seeing it. That's never a good sign. And in this case, it's a genuine tragedy because the river, which is probably my favorite fishing book ever, we meet the protagonist, Gus. Then just after he's barely managed to graduate from high school, squeaking by with a two point three GPA and taking an extra year to get there.

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Gus may not be a traditional scholar, but he is a fishing prodigy and he's about to finally achieve his dream. He's moving out of his parent's house to a cabin next to a river where he will live out his ideal schedule, which once adjusted for thorny necessities like sleep, food and minimal work, allows him to fish 14 and a half hours a day, seven days a week. And that works out to about 4000 angling hours per year. Gus quickly learns a somewhat familiar lesson in this genre fiction.

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Getting exactly what you want can lead to disappointment. From there, Gus embarks on a pretty standard coming of age novel journey. Since fishing all the time doesn't actually make him happy, he has to figure out what will. And we watch young Gus stumble his way into wisdom, friendships and, of course, romance. I can see why Hollywood would want to turn this book into Sleepless in Seattle with fishing. The basic plot, when stripped of Dunkin's wit, insight and brilliantly strange characters isn't all that compelling.

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But the book itself is rich, thoughtful, funny and and unexpected. On every page, it captures the experience of an awkward and overly analytical teenager with a fishing obsession. It's layered with Dunkin's deep knowledge of religious and philosophical traditions from around the world. But he employs that knowledge to progress the story so it never feels like he's just showing off. Finally, the book and its characters capture all the many ways that fishing is a great metaphor for the diversity of the American experience.

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From high minded fly-Fishing literary snobs like Gus's father, who he calls H2O to Downhome Salt of the Earth beat soaking rednecks like Gus's mother, who he calls Ma, for example. Here are a few passages from a chapter called Being Educated and Getting Brung Up. When people are kids, their parents teach them all sorts of stuff, some of it true and useful, some of it absurd, hogwash example of the former don't crap your pants example of the latter, Columbus discovered America.

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This is why puberty happens.

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The purpose of puberty is to shoot an innocent and gullible child full of nasty glandular secretions that manifest in the mind as confusion in the innards, as horniness upon the skin, as pimples and on the tongue is a cocksure, venomous disbelief in every piece of information, true or false, gleaned from one's parents. Since infancy, H2O was of the opinion that a parent's most sacred duty was the education of his children. Ma adhered to a more primitive philosophy holding the child will educate himself and that a parent's job is to simply get them brung up.

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But education, as provided by H2O, proved to consist of no end of fine words and no beginning of practical instruction except in fly-Fishing, while getting brung up as overseen by MA proved to consist of no fine words at all. Yet nearly everything my brother and I can do with our bodies and hands is a result of something Ma taught us when it came to getting us brung up full of know how good food, spunk and savvy there was never a better than Ma.

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As for matters such as what is the meaning of life or how to seek it or where, or why she fought it out, such cornpone cantankerous opinions that we were forced to plug our noses, bail out of the nest and start looking for answers ourselves.

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If you haven't already go read the river, why and even if you have, it's probably time to read it again.

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I personally give copies of this book to every teenager I know who's even a little bit interested in fishing.

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Just don't tell them there's also a movie version. And hey, if that felt just a little too elevated in culture, don't worry, here's Atlantic City's own stripper, surf legend Bob, the garbage man wishing all of you a merry Christmas.

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This is a story for Chunkin expert Bob the Garbage Man Berten, and on a new newsgroup, wishing you a merry Christmas and a happy Chanukkah or whatever, hope you all get golf clubs or roller skates, a new mobile homes in Ohio, anything to keep you sort of reach.

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God bless you and your family and your other family from your first marriage. Ah, yes, balance has been restored to the show where we went from a book that covers much of the world's religious and philosophical traditions and explores the meaning of life through the act of fishing. To Bob imploring all of you to buy golf clubs, which really do contain multitudes.

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And in that vein, it is now time for us to cover the multitudes of fishing stories that broke around the globe this week.

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Let's jingle our way over to Fish News, Bishnu. That escalated quickly. OK, so since it's Christmas, we're going to keep news light, cheery, festive and at least 83 percent accurate this week.

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OK, however, this is still a competition despite the holidays, Miles. And I do not know which stories the other guy is wrapping up and putting under the tree.

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And at the end of it are merry.

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Audio engineer Phil will be rewarding one of us with a victory Nerf bow and arrow, and the loser will get a value pack of tube socks.

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Now, I'm totally going to win this one. I should have come up with better stories.

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OK, I can't remember you. Ledingham, who's who's got who's up first. I'm leading. I'm the lead off this week and lissome it no matter what. You can never have enough new socks. I can't. So I mean, it's not a total loss, you know what I'm saying? You don't get the Nerf bow and arrow.

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Yeah, those were always just like the I have a bad association with socks for Christmas. Those were always the gift. You're like, oh, but I was hoping for a toy.

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Well I had it was actually the boyfriend, long time boyfriend of my great aunt would be like the creeper that would give you like packs of underwear like Spider-Man underwear.

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But when you're a little kid, you know, you open things in front of the whole family. It's like what you get in.

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You're like, oh, you creepy asshole.

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He was kind of creepy and always pissed me off anyway. OK, so enough about that. OK, so I do get to lead off and here we go. Christmas news starting now from Fox News.com headline 300 Santas go fishing on North Carolina Lake benefiting Toys for Tots and setting a world record. It's a good one. Isn't that jolly good? Isn't that jolly? And this was a one day event sponsored by The Ugly Stick and held on Lake Norman.

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And there were nearly fifteen thousand dollars worth of new toys donated during the tournament. So good on you ugly stick. That is. That is super sweet. Yep. So now so this this story, it says that a record has now been set for the largest fishing tournament contested by anglers dressed as Santa Claus.

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But it does not say if we're talking like Guinness Book or whether this is confirmed or it's just based on an assumption that three hundred Santas have never fished in one place before. You know, I'm not entirely sure, though.

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I believe that it is a record and I find three hundred Santa is more cheerful than the standing record of 300 Satan's jet ski fishing on Lake Mead in Las Vegas. So did you actually find that now?

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I am sorry I was so excited because I was going to go find that one movie on Satan Santa Cenci letters.

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Yeah, that's what I did there. Anyway, despite all those Santas conjuring up smiles and glee, a good portion of them could not use their Santa magic to conjure up a pattern. Apparently, Angler's Scott Hamrick and Roger Hooved took home the title of Top Santa and five thousand dollars with a fifteen point seven pound bag.

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Now, I checked with a source friend of ours, Clint Bartlett, tourney guy friend of yours. You know Clint, he's a friend of the show and he lives down around that way.

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And he says that's a good bag, not a great bag.

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In fact, Clint says, and I quote, Seven bags over twelve pounds is not good even for the wintertime.

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So despite all those Santas cranking and warming, 59 of the 150 votes in the tourney in zero bars. But, hey, you know what?

[00:30:10]

This one wasn't about winning. No, everybody wants the big money. Yeah, everybody wins. It was for an amazing cause. It looked like a ton of fun. And if there was a Santa tournament here, I might enter.

[00:30:22]

It looks like a good time. I would. So, yeah. Big win for Toys for Tots. I like this story. I love that story.

[00:30:27]

I'm curious, Joe, have you ever had any jobs that required you to dress up like Santa Claus? No, I've never had a job that required me to dress up as anything in particular, because I have I actually have had Santa.

[00:30:42]

Oh, I mean, I wasn't like the mall Santa would. Come on, kids, let's sit on my lap. But I used to work at Big Sky Resort here in Montana as a snow pack.

[00:30:52]

I've stated I've stayed in the penthouse there, believe it or not, much nicer than anywhere I got to stay, I can tell you as a lowly employee there. But yeah, for Christmas, I had to dress up in a Santa suit and take pictures with kids on the slopes.

[00:31:08]

It's true story and did you're so tall and lanky, I had a fake gut that I put in and the whole I mean, was the whole deal, but my favorite part about that whole thing is like after I got off of that shift, you know, I had to be on like the green magic carpet run for the kids to take pictures where all the kids were.

[00:31:26]

But then when I got released from my shift, I got to ride all the way back down. And I, of course, I'd like dropped off the side of the mountain into the trees. And as I was going over the top, I could hear this kid yelling at his dad from up on the chairlift like, Daddy, Daddy, look at CNN.

[00:31:40]

He's going to die.

[00:31:43]

That was my favorite part about that.

[00:31:45]

All right. Shattering the dreams of the youngsters. My first story has nothing at all to do with Christmas, but I don't really care. I like it. Oh, that is fun. It's a light and fun story for me anyway.

[00:32:00]

OK, this this one is such a good example of how journalists spin scientific papers to get like clicky headlines that people just consume. So check it out. A few weeks ago, the journal Nature Communications published this paper titled Domestication Fire the Commensal Pathway in a Fish Invertebrate Mutualism. All right.

[00:32:23]

So no idea what that means, that people have no idea what that means. That paper got spun into the following news headlines. Farmer Fish becomes first animal found domesticating another species and algae farming fish, domesticated shrimp to improve their farms. And this fish is the first of its kind to domesticate other animals.

[00:32:46]

The last one is the only one I understood. I didn't even I didn't even really fully grasp this spun fake headlines. But you might have clicked.

[00:32:55]

So go. All right. So here's what's going on.

[00:32:56]

Maybe damselfish, which are a type of fish, have long been known to tend their own little algae farms on the reefs where they live.

[00:33:05]

They basically just cultivate and defend a little patch of algae. And that's what makes up a big part of their diet. So not really farming, but they call them farms. Right, right. Right.

[00:33:14]

So these researchers from Australia, they recently discovered that longfin damselfish take the whole thing a step further.

[00:33:22]

The researchers noticed that longfin damselfish farms have lots of these these really specific tiny shrimp called myside hanging around. And they observed that the myside shrimp didn't seem to mind being close to the damselfish, even though they avoided all other kinds of fishes, and that the damselfish that had a lot of shrimp chilling out on their algae plots tended to get better crops, so to speak. And it turns out that myside shrimp feces makes dynomite, algae, fertilizer. After extensive observation, the researchers concluded the damselfish and myside shrimp have evolved into a relationship that seems a lot like domestication, myson shrimp are actually attracted to the smell of longfin damselfish and will seek them out.

[00:34:09]

Damselfish are highly protective of their farms and they chase away any critters that come near except mice and shrimp.

[00:34:16]

So the shrimp get protection from other predators by the damselfish and the damselfish get fertilizer from the crops, from the shrimp pupping. It's one of those like cool science stories that mainstream media just loves to grab because it makes animals seem more human. But I am personally just wary of anthropomorphism in general, this seems to be an example of people wanting to ascribe human traits to fish. So I don't believe that the fish are intentionally cultivating and domesticated these shrimp. I don't buy it.

[00:34:49]

I think now I think the shrimp are getting protection. The fish are getting more food, and they're both just learn to tolerate each other and be like, cool, you can hang out. But here's my question.

[00:34:58]

I'm throwing this out to all the real biologists out there, because I know we have some that listen, how is this different from all the symbiotic relationships that we already know exist between aquatic species? Like how is this such a big deal? We know clownfish hang out with CNN because they both get mutual protection from predators.

[00:35:17]

We know that certain type of rafts operate what we call cleaning stations in the reef where larger reef fish will show up and let the rest eat all the parasites and dead tissue off. Yeah.

[00:35:27]

How is this different? I don't get it. Like I read the paper and the paper seems to be claiming that this is a totally different system, but I don't get how it's different. So I'm actually asking, please, someone who gets this better than I do. Send an email and explain this. If I get a solid answer, I will do a follow up and admit that I'm wrong. But I don't personally see how this is any different.

[00:35:48]

It's a cool headline, though. It's a fine headline. But I look at something like this and it's like, man, somebody, you know, observe this and put it, put some effort into documenting it and writing a paper and all this stuff for a piece of information that that at the end of the day, I'm just like, neat.

[00:36:06]

That's neat. Like, you know what I mean?

[00:36:08]

Like, this doesn't forward progress or like it's just like I figured that out.

[00:36:13]

So, I mean, maybe, maybe, maybe this will somehow lead to more respect for damselfish.

[00:36:20]

Because if there's one thing I know about damselfish having grown up with saltwater aquariums in the house, you know how like you can't do saltwater and just throw shit in there. You got to wait for the bacteria to set up in salt to get right.

[00:36:32]

And the sacrificial lambs are the damselfish.

[00:36:36]

The damselfish are the cheapest saltwater fish in the aquarium store that you throw in to make sure your Shites right before you throw that 50 bucks away on the blue tank.

[00:36:47]

And that's what I know of damselfish. So maybe there maybe somebody to be like, wow, they are way too smart to be.

[00:36:53]

The toilet flushes for saltwater aquariums worldwide.

[00:36:56]

If this really is an example of like domestication in another in a fish species, I get why it's a big deal. I just again, I just don't understand how it fits, how it's different than just basic symbiosis. I'm missing something here.

[00:37:08]

I don't really see it either. And frankly, like comparing this to you're talking about the cleaner asses. I think that's a much more interesting symbiotic relationship, frankly, you know, like what they do for for fish than Thanis. But, you know, who am I?

[00:37:24]

This one has an extra step, right? Because they're not it's not directly the shrimp and the fish. There's the algae involved. So there's a third party. I get it. It's a little more complicated, but still, I'm not sold. We'll take it here from throw away damselfish in your tank to two fish that everybody wants for the long haul, maybe even for the wall. And this one comes from for the win dotcom headline. In a rare feat, Angler lands to near record muskies on the same day.

[00:38:03]

And this is a pretty short story. I'm just going to I'm just going to run through it here real quick. When Benjamin Knutson's fishing rod bent double recently on Minnesota's Malek's Lake, I knew right away he said this was the one I was hunting for.

[00:38:16]

It was her and that Muskie measured fifty six point five inches and weighed an estimated fifty one pounds, which is an exceptional catch, as the story points out, for this large but shallow lake.

[00:38:29]

But while that could have justified calling you today, Neutze and two hours later landed another Muskie that measured fifty three point two five inches and weighed an estimated 54 pounds based on the length girth measurement formula.

[00:38:44]

And both muskies were released and fell just short of the record in the state's catch and release land category, which is fifty seven point four inches. Also, the second Muskie, if Knutson's weight estimate was accurate, would have tied a Minnesota weight record that has stood since 1957.

[00:39:02]

That fish has actually come up on this show has several times before, and that fish measured 56.

[00:39:08]

So for all the the Muskie fans out there wondering what the skinny is, both of those fish fell to the famed Bulldog.

[00:39:16]

And if you're familiar with that soft plastic, it weighs a ton. And I find them utterly painful to throw.

[00:39:22]

But they catch Piegans, man. It is a legendary lure. It's basically nothing but a gigantic Mr. Twist. And they catch some big muskies.

[00:39:31]

And, you know, all I can think of here is how this makes other musky anglers feel like to tie it to the season when all you want.

[00:39:40]

Yeah, yeah. It's like, well, well, yeah. It's the holidays, man.

[00:39:43]

You pissed off about something, but it's like when all you want in your life is the Micromachines aircraft carrier and every chance you get four months you drop hints about wanting the Micromachines aircraft carrier.

[00:39:56]

Then on Christmas morning you get no aircraft carrier, but the kid next door gets the aircraft carrier and the Micromachines C seven air cargo playset and you just have to settle for the dollars for Army trucks, which is my analogy for Northern Pike.

[00:40:09]

So. Anyway, I can't I cannot even imagine, Ben, what Santa can bring you, that will be better than that. Not so huge. Congrats on that.

[00:40:20]

Got to say, you were taking such a high road on this Somali like. Yes, you as the guy who just has such a chip on his shoulder. Must be like I'm slightly boiling in in jealousy over this.

[00:40:32]

And you're like, oh, no, I'm real, real happy for him. Really.

[00:40:35]

No, I am. Because I because I've let it go Miles. Like I don't expect in my life to ever catch a 50 pound monkey. Like I'm OK with that.

[00:40:44]

I don't expect to catch that fish. I don't deserve it. I've said this about myself. I don't I don't deserve it. I'm not devoted enough to the to the musky pursuit to deserve that fish feels like a justification for failure.

[00:40:58]

But I'll let you have it. I'll let you have that and feel better about yourself. And I think that that sets me up nicely because a lot of us seem to have been justifying a particular act that we've done for much of our lives. And I'm going to talk about that when this is this is my Christmas news story. All right. I did find. All right. All right. For much of my life and I don't know about you, but for much of my life, I've been told that Christmas trees make great fish habitat, right?

[00:41:26]

Oh, yeah, man. I love it. I love where we're going. Yeah, you just you just love it.

[00:41:30]

Just sink your old unwanted Christmas trees to the bottom of the lake and the croppy, the bluegill, the bass. Everything you watch is going to flock there.

[00:41:39]

You'll have your own personal slurp up that tinsel. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:41:42]

I mean it's going to be like your personal secret hotspot is going to be stacked with fish. Right. This is sometimes framed as almost like a civic duty for fisherman.

[00:41:53]

Like you're a bad angler if you moltz that tree or God forbid you burn it. But I'm going to throw a side note here. Old Christmas trees make the best bonfires, forget about palettes, try a giant pile of dried out pine trees complete with needles.

[00:42:09]

I promise you, you will never see another bonfire like it again. It's amazing.

[00:42:13]

It's illegal to burn anything here, like leaves and stuff. So we like we just drag ours to the curb and they pick them up like the trash.

[00:42:19]

Yep, yep. Yeah. But I'm telling you right now, check out that that pine tree fire fire.

[00:42:29]

But I'm not supposed to say that. I'm not supposed to talk about what a great bonfire you can make with the old trees, because according to conventional wisdom and the Internet, you have to drop your trees in a local like this is like lake fishing gospel. And and for much of my life, I just accepted it. Even if I didn't do it personally, I believed, like, I carried guilt because I wasn't as good of an angler.

[00:42:50]

So my goal for this Christmas news story is to figure out exactly how beneficial Christmas trees actually are when it comes to lake habitat. I'm biting my tongue. I want to jump in and I'm biting my tongue.

[00:43:03]

Let me get through it. You're this is your deal. A few years ago, a friend of mine was telling me how they don't allow people to sink Christmas trees into their neighborhood lake anymore because he claimed the acidity from all the pine trees was throwing off the balance. And I didn't question him at the time because we were just shooting the shit. But then I was researching this story and I figured, well, I should check that avenue out. I dug around online and I couldn't find anything about pine trees affecting the age of lake water.

[00:43:31]

So I then called a few people who know way more about this stuff than I do, and they hadn't heard about this issue either. So it seems like it would take what I from what I can gather from other people's more expert assessments of mine seems like would take an unreasonable amount of trees to throw off the balance of a lake. Like as long as you're not filling the lake with trees, which would pose so many other problems beyond the acidity, I think this is a non-issue.

[00:44:02]

In fact, dozens of states collect old Christmas trees and turn them into massive underwater reefs. In certain cases, we're talking about tens of thousands of trees all tied together and sunk to the bottom. The trees create a structure for aquatic organisms and fish, and then they break down and further feed the system. My home state, from what I can tell, doesn't do this, but I found many that do. So if you're looking for something to do with your old tree and you'll feel like burning it, check with your local fisheries management agency to see if they accept free donations.

[00:44:32]

But then this led me to yet another question.

[00:44:34]

Do Christmas trees actually make quality fish habitat? Like, are they good? And the answer, from what I can tell, is yes and no. The reason that so many people in states drop Christmas trees, the bottom of lakes has a lot more to do with their availability than their quality. Mm.

[00:44:52]

Pine trees have a couple of things working against them as fish holding structure. First, they deteriorate really pretty fast and will only provide good cover for a couple of years at best before they disintegrate. Second, their branches are too close together for big fish to want to use them as ambush. However, I found one study from the Berkeley Research Center in Nebraska referenced numerous times that claimed fish gravitate to limb gaps just big enough for them to fit in between.

[00:45:22]

And Christmas trees have supertight limbs, so they work well as a place for bait fish to hide from larger predators, but not so well as a place for, you know, big fish to hang out hardwood with their more widely spaced branches make far superior cover for most of the fish species that we target. And they last a lot longer. So bottom line, I don't think there's anything wrong with tossing your old Christmas tree in a lake. But don't expect like you're creating some kind of a magical big fish paradise, right?

[00:45:51]

That's not going to happen. More likely, your holiday cast off will just become rearing habitat for baby fish, which is valuable, but not quite what we've been told. And finally, my last point, please remember, trees float, so you can't just go chucking your tree into the water and, like, walk away and think you've done well. If you want this to work, you actually need to weigh it down pretty significantly and preferably do so with biodegradable sandbags.

[00:46:18]

So I'm going to say we recommend a car battery.

[00:46:20]

Yeah, just lead pure lead. Oh, man.

[00:46:26]

No, this is I'm glad you brought this one up. And I've learned a little bit here, but I will tell you see, I've heard the same thing about the acidity. Now, maybe you've maybe you've debunked that. Frankly, they used to do this all the time growing up where I live. Right.

[00:46:42]

Mercer County, Lake Rosedale out there. Besides, bring your Christmas trees on this date.

[00:46:46]

But as far as I know, they they shut that down years ago. They don't dump any trees in any lakes around here anymore. Now, I can't tell you why that is.

[00:46:57]

I don't know if there was a specific study, but this has come up in circles, you know, shooting the breeze with guys over the years. I have never heard anybody say that they've had good fishing on dumped Christmas trees. No. And I've heard the I've heard the acid thing a bunch of times that they're too acidic, that they disintegrate to disintegrate so fast. It's it's it's almost not even worth it. So I don't know that we come up with a definitive answer here.

[00:47:25]

I'm just sort of rehashing the things that I've heard sort of, you know, speculated.

[00:47:30]

But I feel like that was a big thing when I was a kid and a teenager. And it's gone away. And sort of the consensus is now like just not not worth the effort doesn't doesn't really do enough.

[00:47:40]

I think that's true. And the thing was, when I was really thinking I was going to get a bunch of new information on and debunk this whole thing, and I couldn't find anything.

[00:47:48]

I couldn't find it that and that's what's most fascinating about this one to me, is because I've heard that so much people people say it like it's law, like, oh, there have been studies at the university, but then you looked and. Well, OK, now now I don't know.

[00:48:01]

Is that is that a myth? But I have heard that before, so I have to who knows.

[00:48:06]

But I haven't seen a sign or a call online to bring your trees in a very long time.

[00:48:12]

It's still happening that I can say it may not be happening by you. It's not happening by me. But there are a lot of places that are still doing that and collecting them for these really big, large scale projects that that and Christmas trees are just what's available. So I think that's why they use them, because I can get them for free and they're there. So some places are definitely still doing it. But the take away really is it's not a great panacea for fish.

[00:48:37]

But I also don't think it's like I think it's a problem necessarily. But no, I don't think you're doing a great thing by dropping your Christmas tree down there.

[00:48:44]

Wow. I know Phil is going to have a problem deciding who who the Christmas victor is, because I feel like we both did a good job keeping it lighthearted.

[00:48:53]

Phil, you know who's been naughty, who's been nice. And as soon as we're done hearing from Phil, we're going to kick it over to the Ben to talk about another material that hypothetically could make some some pretty good bottom structure if you had enough of it, which you might if you purchase this item. Wow, it's the end of the year already. Man, I think after a year like 2020, the last thing we need is something else to argue about.

[00:49:21]

And we already have so much of that around the holidays. Die Hard, a Christmas movie.

[00:49:25]

I don't know what's the deal with parents in these Christmas movies where Santa's obviously exists in this universe? Did they not have Santa visiting their house every year? If Santa was visiting their house every year, where did they think all these presents came from?

[00:49:42]

Who the cares? It's the holiday season and I am crowning both of you winners of the episode.

[00:49:50]

Thanks for a great year, guys. See you next year. But if you really need a winner, it's Miles. Why did you put the head of hair? You know what I'm getting that what? You didn't have to be so hurtful with me. So angry.

[00:50:04]

This week's sale bin item comes to us from the Craigslist page of Satellite Beach, Florida. And it's not what you think. There's actually got tipped off by my buddy Dave Graham. Shout out to him for sending this along. And look, I know we dig on Florida from time to time on this show, but this is not going to be one of those legitimately.

[00:50:21]

So this is not going to be one of those Florida man type, cheap shot setups where we, you know, we find a guy selling a wheelbarrow with an outboard attached to the boat and we make fun of it. This one is definitely unique. OK, probably the most unique one I think, that we've seen yet so far. Yeah.

[00:50:39]

The title of the listing reads Wanting to trade exclamation point twenty one hundred pounds of Lego pieces for a decent fishing boat and then lists a dollar figure.

[00:50:54]

And apparently this is all about like all worth about 12000 bucks.

[00:51:00]

Yeah, like there's really not much room here for description now, because the Post is it's exactly what it sounds like. That's what it is. And I don't know about for you, Joe. For me, the photos are not making this seem like an attractive opportunity.

[00:51:16]

It's just piles and piles of tight shots of. Yeah, it's just mayhem piles.

[00:51:24]

And if you're even even just a hint, OKd, this is your nightmare. Straight up nightmarish. I like Legos as a kid. I was definitely into them, but I, I really hated when the sets got mixed up and because it would always just turn into these, these cauldrons of chaos, you know, you were that kid GIGO guns had to go with the correct GI Joes.

[00:51:46]

I liked it.

[00:51:47]

I liked having my sets as set separately. I got really anxious when they'd all just get mixed together because like, there you are, you're trying to build your car or whatever. And, you know, you need that one set of wheels and they're in there somewhere. But you can't find them in this kaleidoscopic mass of, like, angle pieces and braces and medieval turrets. And then there's always the random but yellow, weird, disembodied heads floating around of the Lego guys.

[00:52:14]

Well, the the photos that we're looking at here are like that, but just times a thousand. It's just it's like on steroids.

[00:52:22]

I don't think that guy is nuts about it as you. But I was a huge Lego kid. I loved the Lego boats that floated. Remember the holes that were solid, but I liked a set, like I wanted to build that set and then keep it made. I didn't take them apart and make them. Agnone So I'm I'm the same. Yeah. Kind of on the same page that. So I'm with that now. The Post does go on.

[00:52:41]

It says we have twenty one hundred pounds of clean mixed Lego pieces of all types that are surplus to our needs.

[00:52:52]

Which and this just begs the question, how many Legos do you have if these twenty one hundred pounds are surplus to your needs, what exactly are your Lego needs?

[00:53:02]

And the only thing I can think is that like are you an owner of one of the Lego land establishments, which I have been to with my children?

[00:53:11]

And dude, if you hate and fixed Legos, don't ever go there like that will be your personal hell side note. For that very reason, Lego land was kind of a bad idea before covid.

[00:53:22]

Now they might be done like there's just not enough hand sanitizing spray sanitizer on the planet anyway.

[00:53:29]

They just dip the whole thing in bleach at the end of the day. Just burn it, burn the whole Legoland down now.

[00:53:35]

Anyway, the post goes on to say this type of product sells every day on eBay. What type of product?

[00:53:40]

Twenty one hundred pounds of Legos on eBay for anywhere from eight to fifteen dollars a pound. Like I did not know Legos were dealt with like beef, you know what I mean? Like, yeah. So yeah, it says if you sell them at an average of ten dollars a pound. There you go. It's twenty one hundred dollars worth of Legos. Twenty one thousand.

[00:54:01]

Excuse me. I can't do one one thousand dollars in the later dollars so clearly.

[00:54:06]

Have you researched. I did not. Is that accurate. Did you research this. I was not familiar with like contraband, black market Lego prices before this. So I did have to do some. Oh, of course you did.

[00:54:16]

That's why we love you. What do we got?

[00:54:18]

I cross-referenced, I checked Amazon, I checked eBay, checked Etsy. And actually from what I could tell, this is legitimate information like Legos are comparable in price to what you would pay for, like wholesale salmon filets. They're right in that eight to fifteen dollars a pound. Yes, really.

[00:54:35]

So if you just take a pound of mixed up Legos, that's worth eight to 15 bucks, just random mix Legos, not a set, anything just mixed. Yeah.

[00:54:46]

And so, like, I'm trying to figure out the backstory on this because we do. Right. It seems like this person at some point realize that extreme Lego is not the optimal hobby if you live in coastal Florida.

[00:54:56]

And so, you know, in the Sunshine State's perennial recreation cage match, I'm going to say this person chose wisely because they picked fishing over golf. Correct.

[00:55:06]

But, yeah, they don't want to take the time or effort to separate package and sell their little metric ton of assorted Legos, which are potentially worth over 20 grand. So they're just offered up a straight boat trip.

[00:55:20]

Like I got to say, man, look, creative as this is. I don't think this person, though, is going to make a successful angler, anyone who keeps tossing Legos in a box with no rhyme or reason or organization until they cross the two thousand pound threshold is going to struggle with tackle storage.

[00:55:35]

But oh, and every boat owner knows you got to be a little OCD to captain and maintain a vessel. You know, when this person does get a boat, if this works out, I'm picturing a very seized up engine in the near future. But this one was a lot of fun.

[00:55:53]

We love getting links from you guys for the S-Bahn. Keep those coming to bent at the. Ed Dotcom, and if one of you out there is like, send me that twenty one hundred pounds of Legos, I'm in.

[00:56:05]

Hit us up, we'll get it squared away or you got to do is take us fishing.

[00:56:11]

Before we move along, Miles, mentioning of black market contraband in that Selborne segment reminded me that we've got a message of good holiday cheer from our favorite under the table, south Louisiana captain down a road whose last name we bleeped again. We have to believe it on time because he's still got warrants out in St. Bernard Parish.

[00:56:28]

Here's our buddy Darren. What up yards down road down in south Louisiana? Me and my partner Joey Kampo want to wish you a merry Christmas. We are not blind right now and we fresen our Hoeness off. Hopefully Santa Claus brings some warm weather when he gets his ass down here this year. And Santa, if you listen, if you can do anything to get the Saints back to the Super Bowl this year, I promise I'll stop doing my side hustle selling bootleg Kosta sunglasses to the drunk frat boys on Bourbon Street.

[00:56:58]

I later.

[00:57:06]

There might want to be careful there.

[00:57:08]

The Saints are those saints looking pretty good and and from what I hear from you anyway, that side hustle he's got is pretty lucrative.

[00:57:17]

Oh, I.

[00:57:18]

I wouldn't worry about that. I give that promise a zero percent chance of lasting beyond the season.

[00:57:24]

It's not like he swore to God on his lady Chantelle. That would be an actual blood oath.

[00:57:29]

Dude, I have so much to learn about South Louisiana culture. And since since we are on the subject of people that I just don't understand, I think it's about time to Grynch up this episode.

[00:57:39]

Yeah, it is. Because you guys didn't think we were going to get through this show without hearing from our very own Internet fishing expert, Lance V..

[00:57:46]

Did you? Of course you didn't. So without further ado, let's throw some some audio coal in Miles Ear.

[00:57:53]

Stocking's with his least favorite bit trolling with Lance. The segment All You Boys and girls love to hate and hate to love.

[00:58:03]

The land to the boats, to the lake, to the sea, filling up the net with your boy. Feliz Navidad, stocking stuffers, it's me, jolly old Lance, be here to slather you with Christmas cheer at Internet fishing. Awesome sauce. I know you're busy Googling instructions to that go PROMACTA Santa brought you. But just so you know, YouTube can't teach you how to make a viral tic tac fishing dance. Only I can do that hashtag Masaya.

[00:58:35]

Remember, Christmas is about family or goofy socks or fat guys stuck in Chimney's Christmas like life is a competition. So listen up, because this question from listener Kylies really captures the spirit of the season. Kyle writes, Dear Lance, if you were on fire in front of me and I had to piss so bad that my bladder might burst, I don't think I would piss on you to put you out. But I could use some of your advice. I need to buy a belated Christmas present for my little nephew, Krispin.

[00:59:02]

His parents collect tote bags and celebrate Meatless Mondays. So I know they only bought him lame educational stuff, you know, like books and toys made of wood. What can I buy him that will make him love me more than his real parents? Great question, Kyle. This one really touches me. Hashtag children are our future hashtag little angels.

[00:59:21]

Kyle, if you truly want to be the cool uncle, you'll buy little Chrispin a five and a copy of Ultimate Fishing Simulator to then you'll download the secret patch that lets him play has his favorite fishing superstar may problem is, unless you're showering at Doubler chatter or have deep connections to the Russian Dark Web, like I do know where you're getting those, my guess is you're lucky to scrape up enough Velveeta for a bowl of mac and cheese. So here's a list of baller gift ideas for all the brokers, uncles and aunts out there who didn't quite manage to get that box in the mail before Christmas, but still want to be cooler than your siblings in the eyes of their spawn.

[00:59:58]

No, no.

[01:00:01]

A subscription to YouTube premium. Plop those kids in front of the screens and let the little tykes binge all their Internet fishing heroes without having to sit through annoying ads. I mean, bro, did you ask for it? I saw it was like sixty percent infomercials for Manly Boutique Soap, which is an oxymoron. And yes, I did have to look that word up to use it in a sentence, hashtag vocabulary and hashtag educator, numero to potty fish or toilet fish and game.

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Google it and thank me later. I guarantee you'll pick one up for yourself as well.

[01:00:35]

Number three, Arenado, a monster energy monthly sampler subscription. Does this mean that little Chrispin will stop asking his parents to pick up a case of monster energy assault every time they go to the store? Of course not. He'll still need his daily sweet and salty power boost. But the monthly sampler allows him to try out all of Monster Energy's new lab tested formulas without sacrificing his routine hashtag discipline.

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And last, but certainly best of fishing fast. Now, I know you're waiting for a sarcastic comment, something like if you were a fishing vessel, you probably still have an active Facebook account, but I'm dead serious. If little Christmas parents are as lame and beat as you say, he probably needs to toughen up, buy him a fishing vessel that every time he hits the water, the cool kids beat the piss out of him. It's basically like getting him a fight club membership hashtag first rule of fishing.

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So there you go.

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Kyle, I hope you hit my advice and savage little Crispins New Year, since this Christmas is probably already been ruined by artisanal coloring books and Patagonia sweaters.

[01:01:40]

That was exactly what I expected, but I do hope I do hope that little Krispin gets that toilet fishing, said I am to be honest, I actually bought one for my kid under the guise that, like, oh, it's a potty training tool and not a present to myself.

[01:01:57]

I hope both of you enjoy that. And I do not want to know how it all comes out.

[01:02:01]

I'd buy one for my kids, but I got to tell you, they have so many cheap play fishing sets, which I'm very proud of, but none of them could be piece back together in their original form if your life depended on it.

[01:02:13]

Like they're all just are they all intermingled? They're in all different time zones.

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Like there's some outside, there's some in this bathroom, you know, they're just everywhere. So I don't I'm going to skip that. I don't really need one of those.

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But anyway, speaking of piecing things back together, we're still thinking about our friend and large owner, Mitch McFly, up in Canada, hoping things come around so he can kind of peace his business back together, you know, once these pesky covid travel bans are lifted.

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But, you know, despite that hardship, the guys just got such a positive attitude, you know what I mean, considering what he's facing and he was kind enough to send along this warm holiday message for all of you. Is there folks, Mitch McFly up here, a beautiful Pickrell point large on Alberta's pristine Spooner's Lake, wishing all our valued guests from the states a safe and happy holiday? I'm sure many of you have got new ice augers and 4000 horsepower snow machines and stainless steel jacuzzis from Santa Claus.

[01:03:11]

Too bad you still can bring them up here. Real shame. I'd hate to ruin your holiday by telling you about all the monster walleyes that we've been schooling right off the point or the 47 inch pipe that's been following them around. So instead, I'll just see.

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Take care and God bless. Thanks, Mitch.

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While I'm waiting to get back up there, I'll just be, you know, doing donuts with my new 4000 horsepower snow machine in front of the retirement home that's right across the creek from my house.

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They're going to love me anyway.

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We're just about out of time in this way. Too long Christmas extravaganza. Yes, but before we go, Joe's got a holiday yarn that he's going to spin for all of you. So grab a blanket and settle in while Uncle Joe does his version of Twas the Night Before Christmas, only with treble hooks, stock, trout and family fishing lure. It's time for end of the line.

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If it's not loud enough, MC. Scooch on up to the fire, boys and girls, pour yourself a fresh eggnog, because today your old pal Joe has a Christmas tale that will take us over the truck trout stock rivers of New Jersey through the mostly clear cut woods where shopping centers now exist and to grandmother's bait and tackle shop will go to discuss what I believe is the greatest line spinner of all time.

[01:04:40]

I'm basing that somewhat on fact, but more so on a deep rooted family loyalty and a heaping helping of because I said so. It all started in France in the 1950s, where savvy businessmen Cecil Hoge, senior and his wife Fritzie discovered the lure that would become the Panther Martin Spiner. To be honest, details of the exact order of events are conflicting and a bit cloudy like that eggnog recipe.

[01:05:05]

But to the best of my research, Hoge, who was a mastermind at mail order sales, struck a deal to get these laws imported to his facility on Long Island in New York.

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It was there that they were packaged and sold as Panther Martins, originally as a mail order catalog item, which, as we all know, eventually blossomed into wholesale with every major retailer from Kmart to Wal-Mart and beyond. Hoge eventually moved manufacturing to Italy. And as I understand it, that's where Panther Martins are still made today.

[01:05:37]

And for most of my life, perhaps like for much of yours, you know, they said made in Italy right on the package. So I just assumed it was the Italian stallions that invented the Panther. But now they come from France, just like the MEPs. So, yeah, the French really know cheese, baguettes, funny hats and inline trout spinners. These days.

[01:05:56]

The whole family still owns and operates Panther Martin, and it's still in Port Jefferson, New York, and their catalog features a wide variety of offerings.

[01:06:04]

Side note, many of you boys and girls may be unaware that Panther Martin actually introduced the first soft plastic swim bait to the market in the form of their V.V. floor, which featured a modern style bootable decades before. That was the thing. But we'll save that for another fireside chat. Today, we're just focusing on their classic teardrop body trout spinners and their classic brass body Spinners Deluxe Fly edition with the red or yellow feathers lashed to that treble hook. What makes a panther a panther, regardless of specific model, is that its blade rotates freely around the post without needing a clasp to spin it.

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The result is a tighter spin, which many, myself included, believes creates a sharper vibration underwater.

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One can also argue that since the blade isn't swinging around all Lucy Goosey on a clasp, Panthers fall less often and start spinning instantly after they touchdown. Both the teardrop and brass body models are heavier than others in the category, even though they remain small and compact. And in my opinion, they cast further and more accurately because of this. Never am I without teardrop panties with a silver blade and the yellow body with the red polka dots, the gold blade with the black body in the yellow polka dots, and some of those delux fly brass body models with those nice feather hotspots on the tail.

[01:07:20]

They're four stained water. But here's really why. These are my ringers on the trout stream. Every year since I was probably seven or eight, I got a few Panther Martins from my uncle for Christmas. Only Panthers, never MEPs never rooster tail because he was a Panther Martin guy.

[01:07:37]

Though my grandmother sold the store when I was only three, there legitimately was a bait and tackle shop in the family for a very long time and my uncle worked there. So my mom and my uncle earn somewhat of a reputation as a man to emulate on the area stock or streams.

[01:07:51]

He was sort of a Sharpie that all the locals knew. And according to my grandmother, people frequently came in the store and said, Give me whatever the hell your sons catch and all those trout on out there. And it was always a panther, Martin, that was slit across that glass countertop.

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To tell you the truth, those Panthers just kind of accumulated for years because little kids don't always trust lawyers, write worms and power bait, make more sense to a seven and eight year old.

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So I was probably twelve or so when I finally tied one of those Panthers on, believe it or not. And I got whacked within minutes and that was that. And now I had a healthy stash of Panthers from all those past Christmases and I was now a Panther Martin.

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MAN two And I could argue that Panthers catch more fish, but I know that's not entirely true. Rooster tails, maps and swings mess them up equally. Still, when the last mom and pop tackle shop in my area, which was very similar to my grandparents old store, sadly shut its doors for good. Last year, I bought all the remaining Panthers off the pegboard, just about 200 of them. They were equally as many rooster tails and MEPs hang in there, but I left them for the dude that can probably tell a similar story to this one about those laws.

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Straight up, that was the best closer this show has ever had.

[01:09:12]

Do you vitiate that buddy, crush it on that one? That was really, really well done. I like that one so much. I'm not even going to mess it up with a stupid joke. I mean, all the stuff that everyone just heard, I do hope that that you all had a safe and happy holiday, however you chose to spend it. And I just want to say thanks. Thanks for spending some time with us. We really appreciate all of you that we do very much.

[01:09:32]

And as always, drop us a line, send your awkward photos, bar nominations, sailboard items. And how about we'll throw in worse Christmas gifts to bent at the median income. And if you want to get the one and only Ray Liotta on your podcast, go ahead and scope paranoia on Instagram. Also, remember, we've got some cool degenerate angler's stickers and meat eater fishing stickers now with your name on them. If we incorporate anything you sent us into the show, you'll get some.

[01:09:58]

We're also following that degenerate angler hashtag on the gram. And if we like what we see, you might get a little sticker treat from us.

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Know for sure. I want to see. We'll see what comes up there. Let us know how you spent the holidays and if you managed to get out on the water. Tell us how you did. Merry Christmas, everyone. We'll see you next year on New Year's Day, to be exact.

[01:10:17]

And you probably won't be listening then either.