The Bente podcast is presented by Black Reifel Coffee Co., which is cool because not only does Black Reifel support the veteran and military community through sales of their totally delicious rose to order coffee, but did you know that founder Evan Hafer also used to be a fishing guide? Therefore, he understands that legit anglers thrive on coffee and subsequently so do people that make podcasts. So if we ever sound jittery now, you know why.

Yeah, I need a cup of coffee before I head out fishing or make a podcast, and I'd rather not get stuck with a cup of whatever's lukewarm at the gas station.

Black rifles, wide variety of roast options gives me lots of good stuff to choose from. Check them out at Black Reifel Coffee Dotcom Backslash Meat Eater and do us and yourself a favor and use the promo code meat eater a checkup. You'll get a 20 percent discount and we'll get to keep making this podcast.

Hey, we know your fishy people here at Bend, but we're betting quite a few of you are also pumped that hunting season is here and so are new episodes of The Meat Eater on Netflix, Meat Eater, season nine. Part one is officially live for your viewing pleasure.

The new season has some bad ass adventures, Steven. The crew had to Colorado, Texas and Wyoming, three states where the possibilities are nearly endless. So check it out and please do let us know what you think of the new season. We always love hearing from you.

Even the fishermen head over to Netflix to check out season nine, Part one. And don't worry, more episodes are coming. So they tell us Season nine, Part two will arrive in early twenty twenty one. And we will fill you in on those launch details as we get closer.

I, too, can picture myself standing there and blowing 40 shots, a permit, a storm, they say this town is about to be better.

You go to Wal-Mart parking lot, you kind of put your blinders on. You walk through it, you pretend like you don't see anything. Get whatever you need done. I sleep with my little iPod son in case some epic, fishy shit happens in my dreams.

Good morning, degenerate anglers, and welcome to Bend the fishing pod cast that the cast of Clerks would have been listening to at the Quickstop had podcasts existed in 1994.

I'm Joe Cervelli.

Miles Nulty. And just hearing a reference to Clerks makes me well, I guess it makes me want to cover myself in flannel and go to a tower.

Records of Tower Records on South Street in Philly all repeats.

I spent so much time and money I didn't have there anyway. Besides podcasts, do you know what else they didn't have at the Quickstop in 1994?

What's that delicious black reifel coffee friendly reminder here that Bent is presented by our earbuds of black coffee and we are genuinely thankful for that because it means we get to fuel our recording sessions with high quality caffeine instead of, you know, the Quickstop sludge crap.

Exactly.

And you can fuel your fishing and daily grind with the good stuff as well by heading to Black Reifel coffee dotcom backslash meat eater. And when you do enter the promo code Meat Eater and score yourself 20 percent off your entire order, you honkers the items.

So, Joe, are you aware this is our first official podcast of the fall season? I am.

And you are correct. September 22nd was the first day of fall. Yeah.

I mean, dude, I'm already feeling it out here on the East Coast, the nights are noticeably cooler.

The real thing, though, I recently helped my neighbor cover his pool, which is kind of the final reminder that, yeah, while grateful fishing looms, I guess so does that long covid winter.

Yet pools are really not a thing out here. I don't know a single person with them because they really are like five days a year. You can use it.

Yeah, our fall started last month, you know, that's when when things got cool, which I don't mind. I look forward to it. I like the fall, but I know what's coming right and and right about this time. With that knowledge sitting in my head, I'd like to be planning a trip someplace warm. Yeah. Like someplace warm and salty with boat drinks and and big fish then like that's that's what I want to be thinking.

It's not like it's not like I take those trips every year. It's like a jet off to the southern hemisphere every year. But I do like to imagine myself there and we don't get to do that because no one's going anywhere right now.

But thanks to all of you out there who keeps sending us these copious emails, nominating your favorite fishy watering holes from across the globe, I can still kind of take a little mental vacation.

I get to live vicariously through you, which I appreciate, and we'll tell you, but we can get.

So I appreciate it, too. Yeah. Yeah. Both Joe and I read all of these and and sometimes we actually get to, you know, sail away with you like we do with this week's That's my bar best God damn bartender from Timbuctoo to Portland, Maine to Portland, Oregon, for that matter.

This week's That's My Bar nomination comes to us from listener Spencer Foster, Spencer wrote, I'm an archaeologist who works in Belize during the summer. Every time I finish a dig season, I take a few days to vacation and fish on a small island called Korkor. In 1961, a hurricane split this island in two, creating a channel known to the locals as the split. This channel is a popular hangout for locals and tourists alike for swimming, diving and fishing toward the center of the channel.

Fishermen can hook into multiple species, including barracuda, snapper, parrotfish, jack and even the odd cobia. Directly next to the split is the Lazy Lizard Bar and Grill, a beautiful little beachside oasis that serves cold Billiken, a local Belizean beer and hot fried skunk. As I'm throwing out cut sardines and squid, I can listen to the reggae tunes drifting out of the bar. If I get drained by the Caribbean sun, I can wander over and fuel up on calamari and a coke while watching young locals free dive for lionfish using homemade spears.

My visits coincide with the off season, so I get to enjoy this without swarms of tourists. The global pandemic prevented me from visiting the lazy lizard this summer, but I'm already looking forward to next year. Now, this nomination just has so much going for.

It is a little bit of history, like a personal anecdote, but most importantly, that vivid description.

Yeah, that just that sold it for me.

It takes me back to my honeymoon in the Congo shack in Turks and Caicos, which we yeah, we ate out on day one and then every other day thereafter because it was just that mellow.

There were like Bonefish cruising around and like conc a million different ways, which is a food that I love so, so good.

Yeah. It's it's I think we're all feeling that little bit of bummed out about not getting the hit some of these joints this year because of covid. But it'll be waiting for you, man. And I appreciate the the comment about hitting it in the off season because you've probably been to a lot like I've gotten to visit so many cool bars in my travels. And because we're there fishing in the cold season or, you know, different time of year, it's not like peak tourism time.

I know what he's saying. Like, it's a different vibe when you're not there, when it is jam packed with people or if it's jam packed, it's only with the locals.

It's a totally different experience. And I don't know about you, Joe, but personally, I've never been to Belize and I haven't either. That is one of those places I've read and heard so much about, like the culture and the people in the ecosystem. And, you know, obviously how good the fishing is. And I've always wanted to go and, you know, dude, I didn't have any plans to travel there in twenty twenty. But the fact that I can't.

Yeah. That I'm actually barred from doing so just makes me want to go so much more. And then we get this email and I'm reading it and I'm like momentarily transported out of my locked down life. And I'm just for a minute, I'm not sitting in my home office, which is really just a plastic folding table in my bedroom staring at this little screen. I'll stand in hip deep in the blue Caribbean with a rod, my hand and like some crusty salt on my shirt and like a sunburn just starting to blossom on my arms.

And I could almost taste that. BILLIKEN And conc even though I've never had a Billiken But I could imagine it. And I was I was there for a minute. So, Spencer, thank you for that. Like momentary vacation that I just got. Yes.

Just in my mind, it was incredible description. And I, too, can picture myself standing there and blowing forty shots at permit the entire time.

Got it. Just got through a live crab at him. It's amazing. All right, Spencer, we hope you get back to Cape Cod soon. Just remember when you do and it's overrun with Degenerate Bend fans, the next time you go you'll have only yourself to blame. And for the rest of you who want to blow up one of your favorite bars and have all of us crawling all over it, please send us an email to Bente at the Meat Eater dot com so we can continue building up this amazing segment of great bar recommendation's.

So while we all feel the pain of not being able to jet off to Belize right now to visit the lazy lizard, I can tell you you're free and clear to visit Diane's pop. A stop in Pemberton, Wisconsin.

At least you could see a great bar and at least you could as of my last visit there in late June.

So, you know, back it up. Hold on. You got to drink in like a real live bar somewhere. You went to a bar to drink. And we're not talking about your back deck with, like a home painted sign, lit up with string lights and neon beer lights right in your bar.

I have that, too, in my backyard. But no, this was this was a real bar and it was the only real bar I drank in all of last summer. And I won't lie, man.

I felt weird about it. However, the only people in the bar were the bartender and the guys I was with. Right.

I mean, you know, Diane's pop stop wasn't exactly raging like Studio 54, but yeah, there was a sign behind the bar, you know, those black signs that are like lit. And then you use, like the neon pastel markers over them to write the specials.

They exist in bars. That's the only place that's they're like the whoever came up with that only sells to bars. Yeah, I know exactly what I mean.

So there was one of those in this bar and it said due to covid-19 we will be staying open because I'd rather be drunk when the world ends.

So I had no idea what the specials were. Yes, but I got that message loud and clear and I was like, you know what?

OK, give me a paper. Give me a PBR.

Yeah, but I made a new friend while I was up there, and you're about to learn all about them in our segment dedicated to letting professional guys and captains vent about stupid things their clients do. This, my friends, is smooth moves.

So that's why. Why did you do? Joining us today on Smooth Moves, my good buddy Tim Landwehr, owner of Tight Lines Fly Fishing Co. in northern Wisconsin. What's going on, brother?

Not much. How are you doing, man? I'm good, man. I miss you. And having spent a few days sharing stories with Tim, I know this is going to be a good, smooth move. Remind us how long you've been a professional guide.

Since I was probably 18 years old. So I've been guiding part time from 18 till now and I'm forty seven. So it's been a couple of years now.

It's been tough. So you don't a day over thirty two. So. Yeah, yeah. Right.

A lot of sun man. A lot of sun.

So you do a lot of smallmouth fishing, a lot of musky fishing and you've seen some goofiness. So, so hit us man. Give us the WTF moment that comes to mind that just stopped you in your tracks. I know it's probably a hard decision.

There's a lot of those moments, Joe, but I'd have to say as a guide, you know, you have certain pieces of water that you go down that may have some dangers and things on it. And we have one specific little back channel that we fish all the time. And over the course of about four years, a paper hornet's nest is built on it and it is massive. It's like the three foot long draping from the tree horniness on it.

But every time I sneak through this, you have to tell your customers like, ladies and gentlemen, grab a seat. I'm going to sneak through this. You point out the hornet's nest.

You point this out like a lot like a paper, for instance. And, you know, when people are excited about fishing, they see greasy water. They start to see through the guy's eyes. They start to see a spot that they have to fish. In this particular day, the guy just I mean, he just kept cast and kept casting. We see this greasy slick of water and the dude stands up and I can see him stand up and line up.

And before the words get out of my mouth, he sends a rope through that hornet's nest. I mean, like the double hull, like the oh, dude. And immediately I watched it wrap around the entire nest like it wasn't going to disturb the nest.

And at this moment, it's like a holy shit moment of like, huh. I wonder what we're going to do now because we are just a hair maybe ten feet downstream from this hornet's nest. So I had to tell the guy I'm like, OK, very calmly sit down.

I pull my EpiPen out from the side hatch of my boat.

So so we get downstream and I have the guy rip off all of his fly line without I can see the hornet's nest wobbling up there with the current pull in the line. He pulls all of the fly line out and we just get down stream. And now we've got about another 50 yards of backing on top of the flight line. And like, OK, you're going to have to pull it tight now. And he pulls it tight and he cuts the hornet's nest directly in half.

Fellows, there had to be, I don't know, between a million bees.

And and it was just crazy because you could see them all freaking out. The bees freaking out because. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I had no words for him on the I'm sorry we get downstream and I could see, like, bees coming closer to figure out where the disturbance was like. I'm giving everybody like the like, OK, we all get out of the boat. We're going to have to get out of the boat.

So I just got to jump in because, like, we're somebody's going to go into anaphylactic shock if we don't. But fortunately, the bees were disoriented and they dispersed. But that was one of the most holy shit moments I've had because I had dogs that nest for years.

I was going to say, did you are did you also ruin a landmark? Because that's one of those things with guides. Like when you talk like, yeah, we're just just downstream a hornet's nest.

It was it was it was one of those things, because if somebody fish that back channel like you were going past hornet's nest and and then it came back and told the fellows the story about it and they're like, oh man, that was a cool hornet's nest.

I just got to jump in here to give you credit on the like, OK, strip off the line very, very quick.

Like that could have gone really without without quick thinking. That could have done much, much, much worse than it did and and getting a getting enough scope out there that you could, you know, give it a yank without them find you was a stroke of brilliance in a very tense moment. So like, kudos to you, man.

That's a good guy, because most people I know what I just yanked it down in one shot and it would have been it just just say, yeah, yeah.

I mean, and the fact that you got to him before he started his front cast, I mean, it was a little quick applause that she knew it. And the thing is, I will say, Miles, the like, looking back on it, like I had played out that scenario in my head every time I went past that hornet's nest, like somebody is going to catch it, you know? But actually, you know, many people think good guiding is is like all about just finding the fish, knowing where the fish are and what they're eating.

But it's not I think a good guide is the guy who has a positive mental attitude all day because rest assured, like, I'll be pissed off about something. And he's the guy that's like assuring me that my skills will come together and his fish right around the bend. But that's just what I look for.

Yeah, that's the cheerleader aspect, right? Yes. There's the cheerleader aspect. There's the psychologist as well. The counselor aspect like a good God, I can't really say good God is like a bartender and a counselor who can't prescribe meds. I don't know. Some some I butchered that quote. But it's something like that. Just finding the fish, though, for guides, that's truly bare minimum. That's like C minus level guiding. If all you know is where the fish are.

I degree really good guides do so much more.

And I think Tim's instincts in that situation are the perfect example.

Right, because like, he's got that guy feeding out the line instead of letting the client just yank his way into anaphylactic shock, you know, and all the while, he's still rowing the boat and piloting it and thinking about four different things ahead.

Like that's a good guide. That's that's managing to to do several different things at once.

Like, I give him a lot of props there. And and he's got solid instincts for sure. Just like I mean, I think I think it's safe to say all good anglers trust their instincts. You agree with that? Yeah.

Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Even if they're mostly wrong. But they will just insist that their instincts are spot on all the time.

Oh, I'm not I'm not saying our instincts are right, but like, if you don't have confidence in what you believe in yourself as an angler, you're screwed. You're not catching shit.

But when do you know like how do you know when to trust your instincts or when to admit that your instincts are totally full of shit? Like how do you know how to figure that out?

I just generally assume that 60 percent of my instincts are full of shit every time.

But this question I see where you're going and this question of self trust versus self doubt, I think it's an important one to us Fisher folks.

So Miles here is going to delve deeper into it in this week's Weekly World.

Webster's Dictionary defines fish as. The word for this week is perseverating, I first learned this word from an old girlfriend in the middle of the conversation where she was becoming an ex-girlfriend and was listing the personality traits she most hated about me. The common definition is to repeat something insistently or redundantly, but the word comes from psychology. And yeah, that was a psych major. The words clinical definition is the repetition of a particular response, regardless of the absence or cessation of a stimulus.

In other words, it's when we keep doing something long after that thing has stopped working. All right.

So some of you are probably wondering what the hell ex-girlfriends and clinical psychology terms have to do with fishing. And that's a valid question. But I think this word and a similar one with a slightly different meaning get at one of the central questions we all face is angler's the Latin roots of perseverate are per meaning through and Severus meaning strict or earnest. These are also the roots of another word that might be more familiar persevere, which means to persist steadfastly in pursuit of an undertaking TASC journey or goal, even if hindered by difficulty, distraction, obstacles or discouragement.

Perseverating is bad, persevering is good. But how do we identify the line that separates the two?

Anybody who spent any significant time fishing knows this dilemma.

You have an idea of what should work like, say, a cold front just pushed through and you know, you just know the fish are going to be sluggish. So you work finesse tactics slow and deep, but it ain't happening. What do you do? Do you switch it up, go with something you have less confidence in or just keep pushing what you think should work and have confidence that if a fish is going to bite anything at all, it's what you're doing.

All good anglers persevere. We keep casting, keep working patterns and systems that we think should catch fish. But at what point does persevering turn into perseverating? When are we being patient and when are we just repeating the same action and hoping for a different result? You know, that whole definition of insanity thing really does. Etymological distinction is the timeless and central question of fishing. Should change spots, change beats, change retrieves or keep grinding it out?

Trust my first instinct and wait for the bite to turn on. I can't answer that question for you, but I do think that knowing the difference between perseverating and persevering separates the good anglers from the great ones.

And on that note, you have officially persevered through the first half of our show. Which brings us to the part where we pump you full of info on recent fish related happenings. So you sound more hip to the scene at the Bait Shack. Let's roll out some fish news, Bishnu.

That escalated quickly, our top story this week, though, not actually part of Fish News proper meat eater, season nine, part one is now streaming on Netflix.

Yes. Yes, it is.

If you can't get out and fish this weekend, which I'm sorry for it, but you got an option, you can binge your way through some fresh media episodes. And for all of you out there who completely lack self-control, we are exercising it for you this season. Part two of Season nine will come out early next year. So just consider this like our civic duty. It's like portion control for media.

You can't have the Big Gulp. You just get like the mini cam.

Well, I'm not I'm not entirely sure I'll be fishing this weekend. I'm going to be too busy sulking and rehashing in my head how I lost news last week. I mean, you're still up.

And I don't know I don't know why you'd be sulking over still being ahead all time.

I have appealed this to the high court of mediator, just so you know. Good luck with that. Yeah, I know. It's it's going to get ugly. It's going to cost me a lot of money, but apparently not enough RadioShack gift cards to fill. But that's OK because I'm feeling pretty good this week as a reminder, Miles, and I have no idea which news stories related to fish and fishing. The other guy has found this is a competition and it is judged at the end by our podcast engineer, Phil Taylor.

OK, so Phil, all hail Phil.. Phil is the man.

And this is a risky move for me because I get to lead off and I'm Jojo's going first.

What do you got, man? Bring the game.

I got to come in a little somber, though, so we're going to kick this off with a tragic tale that makes my blood positively boil.

This comes to us from USA Today.

Headline fans rally behind Probus Angler after ROBERI, a pro bass angler from Kentucky, was robbed of more than 15000 dollars worth of gear after arriving in Texas for a weekend tournament.

But Matt Robertson still competed after receiving an overwhelming show of support. Now, other sources on this story say that the value of the goods was closer to twenty thousand dollars.

OK, Robertson arrived in Jasper, Texas, last week in advance of the Bassmaster Central Open on Sam Rayburn Reservoir. His truck was picked clean, however, during his wife's visit to a nearby Wal-Mart.

No, according to Robertson, there was 11 years worth of accumulated gear in that truck. And he told Bassmaster, I had everything in big TOTE's, including all my tools, Jack, tire iron, anything I might need in case of an emergency.

They unloaded everything and they left my spare tire because that's my nightmare, honestly, like, I do have nightmares about that, because if if someone got a hold of, you know, your stash of fishing gear, some you can you can replace the stuff that you can buy. But some of that's irreplaceable, man. Like, you can't get it back.

So I'm going to get to my fix for that in a little bit. But I agreed totally. That is also my biggest nightmare. And the story goes on to say that Robertson was flooded with offers of money, but he says, you know, hey, I know people work hard for their money.

So the dude refused to take it, which I kind of respect that. Absolutely. But it goes on to say that, however, Robertson reluctantly accepted a tackle store gift card from a fellow pro who was not scheduled to fish the open, and he used that to buy just enough gear to fish the three day tournament now. So, so many things, right. First, the person who did this scum of the earth, you go straight to hell.

Yeah, that's number one. But two, I don't feel like this could have been random, right.

There was a photo in the article showing some of the tackle he lost.

And it was a lot, man. I mean, this was like this is a hit, like an orchestrated hit.

I think there's no way that whoever did this didn't know exactly what was in that truck, because this isn't like a break the window and steal the iPod deal, you know what I'm saying? And I assumed that maybe this was a late night run to Wal-Mart.

But, hey, this was broad daylight and there were plenty of other people in the parking lot.

And like, nobody thought something was weird there that unload had to take time, right? Yeah.

I mean, weird stuff happens the Wal-Mart parking lot all the time. Yes. You know, you go to Wal-Mart parking lot, you kind of put your blinders on. You walk through it, you pretend like you don't see anything. You get whatever you need.

There's whole websites devoted to the weird things that happen to Wal-Mart stores at a Wal-Mart I saw did jump out of his truck and crack a jingling on his way in like you're opening a beer taco.

Refreshing. You need to be well hydrated for that Wal-Mart run. I get it.

But all the sources of this story feature security cam photos of a white Chevy Tahoe believe. To be the perps caught on tape and the public is being asked to keep a lookout for it, but I don't even fully understand that because in a couple of those shots, like, I can damn near read the entire license plate.

So I hope that, you know, the local SWAT team is suiting up right now because that's what I want.

While all theft is obviously low, I just find the stealing of fishing gear extremely low.

Like, I cringe when I see those posts pop up on forums and on social media, like somebody's jacked my tackle bag out of my truck.

That just that just burns me.

Yeah, I think every few years it seems like someone decides is going to be a good idea to break into all the guide rigs around here because they know where they're going to be, right? Yeah. And they know that there's usually some cash for the shuttle driver in there and there's usually some gear, but it is vigilante justice. And that's what keeps it from being anything that happens often, honestly, because the whole community of anglers around here finds out who it is, because towns aren't that big and bad things happen to them that generally have nothing to do with the police.

Right. So, I mean, they're trying to sell it. So what happens? It usually pops up for sale somewhere. And that's Yalom, right? Yeah. Yeah.

Well, to get back to your fear of having your gear stolen, just a final note, because you'll appreciate this.

The day we had our security system installed here at the house, my wife was unavailable to weigh in on sensor placement.

And it's a scam anyway, right? Because the service is advertised like cheap monthly pay, 50 bucks a month. Secure your house. Yeah, but then you find out the package only comes with four free sensors. So it's like pick the four most likely places someone will break in or you up the bill a couple grand and arm every possible entry point. Right. So I bought a handful of extra sensors that day and I put every single one in the garage.

So we've since upgraded the home in its entirety. Right.

But at the outset they were like many weak points in the part where my family sleeps.

But the garage was Fort Knox too.

And my wife was pissed when she came home. She was pissed, but I had a valid argument.

Right. And this is I'm not even kidding. Thanks to something I saw on CSI, which taught me nobody ever expects a locked door behind a locked door.

So in other words, people will break into a garage, assuming the door inside the garage from the house to the garage is unlocked. And that's stuck with me. Yeah, and now mine is mine is is always lock that door.

But I was like, hey, yeah, I was breaking into this place.

I'd come in through the garage and she kind of conceded, but not really. She knew exactly what I was doing. So there you go.

I mean, I like that you had that rationale ready to go like, oh, no, no, no. It's not about my gear, honey. It's it's science.

I learned it from CSI. Hold on.

I appreciate that very much. And, you know, I actually this is this is true.

Until I get married to my wife, I don't think I ever lived in a house where we locked the doors. It's just the northeast way, man.

I love that Mayberry idea. And I visited a lot of places where it's like that. I am. I am. It's just ingrained, like I'm just a nut job or like I don't keep anything of value in my truck.

Like, no, I'm not getting I think it makes sense. Like, it's just so to contextualize this, this isn't like an idealistic thing for me. It was I grew up in a house where you couldn't lock the doors because everything was screened. It's all you had to do is just punch to the screen and you're in. So it didn't really matter. Our house got broken and do many times when I was a kid, but we just couldn't lock it.

Design problem.

Welcome to the tropics. Lived a house.

Oh, this is in Hawaii. Yeah. This is where I grew up in Hawaii. Like literally we had giant screened in porch. There's no way to secure that. You just couldn't do it.

Wow. That is a major design flaw. And then in college, I lived in this house where I think we just lost the keys within the first week and then no one even bother was just like whatever that was going to do there to everything.

We also we also had several of the guys on the couch. So there was usually an alarm system there because somebody was on the couch pretty much 24 hours a day. But still we got broken into there.

And then after that, I don't know, man. I just kind of got out of the habit of it. I never did it. But but I married a woman who had just come from New York and now it is like locked up all the time.

I wish nothing to do with fishing. I ventured far and wide. I'm sorry about that.

But I also don't have a great Segway to get from where I was like trying to buy some time for a Segway and I don't exactly know get there.

Apparently still counts the Segway because my first one sucked last week and then I lost. So your turn.

I'm just going to say that that locking the door on a house that even though I'm getting used to it now is is outside of my comfort zone.

And for this this first story, I also went far, far outside of my personal comfort zone into a strange alien land that seems primarily populated by teenagers and.

Twins. That's right, I wandered into the land of ticktock. Oh, man, isn't that against the law now? You shouldn't say that publicly.

Well, I mean, I did. It's true. I went there.

I will also admit it was not my first foray into into tick tock land. My goddaughter a couple of years ago showed it to me.

But at that time I think she was like 10. And at that time, from what I could tell, she just used it to learn and practiced dances. So I just didn't pay any attention, like, oh, cool. Yeah, take your dancing whenever this happens.

I fancy myself pretty up on, like, modern media, but that's one where I draw the line of the old man, like I know what the hell that is.

I'm doing some dances. Let's take that God damn Tic-Tac AP kids. I don't know. I don't know what I don't get it again.

All I know is it used to be for dancing, but apparently it's evolved because I hear now it's a national security threat. But also this week I learned that one can find some strange and obscure fish news in the swirling cosmos of tick tock.

I'm very curious. This is interesting. You're also giving away your sources.

So, you know, I don't think it's going to be a regular well that I draw from Laci Scott, a sculptor by trade with a large tick tock following, shared a story about rehabilitating a goldfish named Monster this summer. And, you know, in case somehow you missed this, here's a little recap.

In April, someone turned an unwanted 10 year old goldfish into a pet store that Laci frequents. The fish was in rough shape, barely able to swim in developing lesions on his belly from just laying there on the gravel, motionless. Pretty much everyone in the story except Lacy was just waiting for this old, decrepit pet fish to die. But not Laci.

No, she took him home and set up a, quote, hospital tank where she worked on rehabilitating him several months later, not only was he eating, swimming and lesion free, but he grew substantially and his color changed from Jet-Black to this gorgeous, vibrant orange. And so Lacy posted a story to her account. And I got to say, it feels like a collaboration between the Humane Society and Children's International. We get to see monsters metamorphosis from a dejected, dark, solitary abuse case to a stunning, colorful fish twirling in a big clean tank among the company of other fish, all set to inspirational piano music.

And if anybody is looking for a textbook definition of pathos, just check out this video because you got it.

Seven and a half million people watched Lacey's monster story. You know what that means, right? She's going to be the next pit bulls and parolees. She'll have a she'll have an Animal Planet show the gold rehabilitator done.

And I mean, look, I get it. We all need a little good media right now, right? Like I mean, hell, that's that's part of the DNA of this show. But a goldfish, I mean.

Really, what's the situation there? OK, all right, all right. And let me let me be clear here, though.

I'm not throwing shade at anybody in the story, especially not Lacy or the pet store or even the original owner.

In fact, they all get props for me because they didn't do what millions of other goldfish owners do when they're tired of the fish that their kid won at the fair, you know, the one they assumed would be dead in a week. But somehow it ended up surviving for over a decade and now the kids grown up and gone. And what the hell are they going to do with the stupid goldfish? They don't want to kill their kids, pet, but they don't want to take care of it either.

So, you know, they just set it free in a local pond.

Let's go back to nature or whatever. Those are the people that I would like to publicly shame right now. Yeah, you people you're the problem because goldfish are barely natural. In fact, here's something we should all know. Invasive goldfish are a major problem worldwide, spreading bacteria and disease and competing with native wild fish. So listen up.

If you can't be bothered to care for your pet fish, take responsibility for your actions and kill it quickly. Setting the fish free in your local pond or even flushing it down the toilet will result in one of two outcomes. Either that fish will die a slow, painful death or it will find a home in a local ecosystem and mess things up. Goldfish are carp, and as you probably heard, carp are wreaking havoc across North American fisheries. Goldfish are no different from their hated cousins just because they've been selectively bred for the past two thousand years to be pretty.

Getting rid of goldfish once they've gained a foothold in a waterway is nearly impossible. They are impervious to electro shocking. So the only way to get them out is to poison every fish in the system and start over. Washington, Texas, Minnesota, California, Alaska, Nevada and Colorado, among other states, are dealing with major goldfish outbreaks. And this isn't just an American problem. Canada, the U.K., Australia, they're all fighting the goldfish hordes.

So monstrous might make for a touching tick tock story. But don't be fooled. He is an ecological time bomb just waiting to be unleashed.

So I love the goldfish game at the old the old carnivals, their state fairs back in now. I won to one year. My mom kind of adopted them and named them Jack and Diane.

And they lived on they lived they little. Yep.

Little Diddy big Mellencamp fan my mom and they lived in a fishbowl in our kitchen.

Jack only survived for about two years.

Diane lived 13 in a fishbowl with no filter.

Yep. I mean, they live forever much they are much, much tougher fish than than people realize, and I don't have anywhere around here that has a population of them. I know this happens. I know it's a problem. I know it's a thing.

Every once in a great while, though, I'll bump into a, you know, few dudes, like, couldn't find live shiner.

So they go buy a bag of goldfish and no justification here.

But I mean that orange pickrell chain pickrell dude, a big orange goldfish hanging under Bob works.

But that's not. No, it's not cool. It's not cool. We could not endorse this. Yeah.

No, no, no. I'm not endorsing it at all.

I've, I've seen it but I don't have anywhere overrun with goldfish though. I've had aquariums my whole life and I'll never forget this.

As soon as you started telling the story took me right back here.

I stopped at the Big Pet Mart here one time years ago.

I forget what I was buying, but this this mother and this son who was, I don't know, ten or eleven, they literally come running in like the house is on fire with a Tupperware container, with a goldfish that is flipped over and they're like screaming for someone to help them.

They're like, please, someone, please.

And like, you know, it's a poor 14 year old kid work in the aquarium section. He's like, Ma'am, I like it was dead.

It was dead. Shit rattles. But it was like it was like their dog just got hit by a car.

It was like like please do something. Like I was like a dollar ninety nine by another one, you know what I mean.

Oh well I had a goldfish delivered a similar amount of time, but I didn't realize what I was holding on to and we didn't flush it till it was dead. So I don't have to, you know, look back in shame. Yeah.

OK, well this next story, we're going to talk about a fish that not even the mighty Lacy could revive me.

A good one. This is a funky one, OK? And this one caught my eye. This is from the UK's Guardian headline Kings Trophy found preserved in centuries old Danish shipwreck.

Oh, man, I almost did this one.

I'm so glad I didn't good on me. So this is this is kind of cool. I appreciate this is a short one, but I appreciate it.

A two metre long sturgeon. And for us Americans, that's nearly seven feet. A species today near extinction has been found preserved in the pantry of a 500 year old Danish royal shipwreck in the Baltic Sea.

There's a quote here.

It says, During archaeological excavations in twenty nineteen, a wooden barrel submerged inside the shipwreck reveal the almost complete and well-preserved remains of a sturgeon fish archaeologist from Long University in Sweden wrote in a recent article in the Journal of Archaeological Science. And the discovery was possible thanks to special characteristics of the Baltic, a semi close sea with low oxygen levels. So apparently, as I understand it, aside from that low salinity, there's a number of factors that make the Baltic excellent at preservation, including a clay bottom.

Apparently clay bottom does a much better job of preserving. So this boat belonged to King Hans. And the story says Hahn sailed to Sweden in fourteen ninety five on his best vessel, the Gribbs Hundun, the most imposing warship in the region with the aim of restoring a union of the three Scandinavian countries under his crown.

And this is we interpret the fish not so much as a gift, but as a prestige display, said Brendan Foley of Lund University.

But the ship sank on its way. King Hohns lived. But how much you want to bet? He was like, Holy shit, tell me someone got the sturgeon off the boat.

You know what I'm saying? This is the part of the story that I was living like on. Like the ship sank King Horns. But how did he survive? What happened? I don't know that part of the story and it's not there. I looked for it now.

He got off on the lifeboat, but the sturgeon went down and like someone went to the canteen or whatever over that.

And I just find this really funny because what struck me is they believe that the fish was a show of prestige, which even though it was salted in the pantry, it's really no different than taxidermy now.

Right. Like how much you want to bet the whole voyage the servants were like, sire, should we cook the large sturgeon tonight?

And King was like, no, no, not until King Henry and Lord can get a look at that. Some bitch ain't never going to believe that shit.

It's like me is a little kid. I always had a frozen something in the freezer or I'd have some poor bass or catfish roasting in a cooler because my dad had to see it and then my uncle had to see it and we had to drive it over for my grandpa to see. So King Hohns, I understand you.

I get it. And I thought that was I thought that was pretty cool. It was a great story.

And part of what I liked about it was, was that it showed how they learn more about the range of the Atlantic sturgeon. Yeah. From finding that and because that that. Is pretty much gone at this point. We've done a really good job of destroying it, but it was some of the only evidence they have that in those waters over in that part of the Atlantic, they used to apparently be swimming around and yep, no one's seen him there for a very long time.

So I thought that was a great, great choice, Joe. It was it was a good story.

My my only the only thing they have a picture, I guess, from a dive cam underwater.

But like, I can't really it's a very hazy picture. Like, you see the edge of the barrel.

But I'm not clearly seeing the fish unless you found a different source than I know. I would like to really get a good look at it, you know, but again, Sturgeon, kind of like we talked about, I think last week, cartilaginous fish, not not so much bony. Right. They don't preserve that well.

Makes sense. No, I'm sure it's been delicious, I all I know that it's brand for that long. You know, we I just want to point out that I think one thing we do well on this show, at least this segment, is we draw from a diversity of sources. We've got USA Today, we've got The Guardian, we've got tick tock. And now we're going to be we're going to be pulling something from a very different source.

And this is, you know, once again from a scientific journal, we really we really cover the gamut. And, you know, I think there are very few things that just about everyone can agree upon. OK, but one of those things is that fish are slimy. They just are.

And all you out there do a quick Google image search for fish, fill up Friday and thank me later.

Speaking of fish being slimy, it's pretty common knowledge among anglers anyway that fish have a layer of mucus on their skin. That mucus layer is important. So if you're planning to release the fish, try to avoid scraping it off. Don't handle the fish more than necessary. Use rubber nets if you can. Don't drag the fish up on the grass or rocks or sand or the deck of a boat. Keeping that mucosal layer intact helps protect fish from bacteria and viruses.

And I know some of you out there saying, yeah, enough with the fish handling one on one. We know all this like people have been telling us this for years. What's the point? Well. Ever notice that it's not just fish that are slippery, just about everything that lives underwater has that similar slippery feel, be it plant or animal, and that's not an accident. It's an evolutionary trait. That mucus layer does more than ward off infection.

It also reduces friction. You ever try running in water? Yeah, yeah, it's hard, so it's because you don't get Shubra is what you're telling me the one because of the mucosal slime?

Yeah, yeah, that's what I'm saying. And I threw and threw them off with the Chesbrough.

Totally threw me off you. Totally, totally out of my head.

They're all right. Objects moving through water create far more drag and friction than those moving through air. So it makes sense that anything living in water would have evolved some way of reducing that drag, both seaweed and fish have little pockets in their skin and those pockets are reservoirs for mucus. Those reservoirs maintain the outer slime layer, both helping to prevent infection and creating a more slippery surface so that fish can pass through water more easily and plants don't get whipped around as violently by waves or current.

OK, I'm with you.

Yeah, as you're well aware, Joe, I am fascinated by bioengineering that is borrowing design principles honed through eons of natural selection and applying them to modern technology to make it more efficient and, you know, natural.

Yeah, it says exactly what you just said in your Instagram bio all the time, but I'm all about it. And so ships.

Right, especially those those huge long distance cargo ships, they lose a tremendous amount of energy to fluid friction.

So I found an article published last week in the journal Physics of Fluid.

You know, we've got The Guardian, we got tick tock, we got physics of fluid and that it explains how ships hulls might be redesigned to mimic fish and seaweed skin in order to make them up to 20 percent more efficient. And it also broke down the exact physics of how that works. And I'm not even going to try to explain that because I have no idea what I read. I don't understand it, but I do like the idea of redesigning cargo ship hulls to act more like Fishkin.

In theory, the holes would be covered in small cavities that are constantly supplied with a natural, non-toxic lubricant, maintaining a slippery surface and significantly diminishing the ship's fuel consumption. So just remember, kids wet your hands before you touch the boat. You don't want to pull off the slime layer.

So I've never served. But you're from Hawaii, so I assumed you have. Yes. Is this like sex wax for your board?

No, no, that's the opposite. So what, you wax a board in order to make it stickier so that when you use wax the top of your board, so that when you stand up, you get some friction and something that grip on you don't get on your bottom. Oh, that's my boogie.

That's why my boogie boards never went anywhere when I was a kid. You know, you're doing it. You're definitely doing that wrong.

As I said, all the wax works and, you know, we got a little extra nugget of knowledge in there for all of those folks who don't know anything about surf and surfboards will cover those topics in another episode of Vishnu's. In the meantime, we're waiting with bated breath to see who Phil will choose for this week's winner.

And as soon as Phil is done declaring a victor, we are going to kick over to a new segment called Sagely Wisdom with River Horse.

It's going to take you away from the hustle and bustle of life for a little while.

You will forget about the covid and just mellow out, man, we promise. Let's be honest, it sounded a little try hard, but Miles Nolte's is the winner this week. I don't think anybody asked for his goldfish manifesto, but he provided it anyway. So extra credit given where extra credit is due. If anyone is wondering what criteria I use to determine the winner every week, it's the same criteria that the judges used to determine no vacancy. The winner of the Battle of the Bands at the end of School of Rock.

Hey, now, this is River Horse coming to you from the deep, deep south with a little sagely wisdom. Enjoy. Have you ever stopped to wonder about water, the miracle of it all, or the fact that it's even here on this Earth? The average drop of water is aloft in the sky for 10 days or more, making a journey around the globe. How far has it traveled in its lifetime? Perhaps it was a shimmering turquoise reef in the Caribbean, or even alone, the glacial alpine lake before it found its way to you.

Most people run inside when it rains. Not me. I love it. Here's a story about the beauty of rainstorms. And hopefully the next time you're in one, you'll stand there joyously and flat out revel in it. My brothers and sisters, this is called cloudburst. A storm, they say this town is about to be lit up, empty roads, far and wide bellied up and took themselves away in cookie cutter neighborhood mansions. There is hand-wringing in front of flat screens alongside grave concern that the leased Land Rovers will need to go to the carwash again for a fresh wax and polish a run for it as well.

Straight for the water. I'm in the canoe on the lake. I live for rain. The first tendrils of wind left in nimbus, ever dark and undulating like boiling kettle water envelop every scrap of Harris. And I feel the subtle brevity of a warmth in the air, swimming upward exchange for far more bearable cool. And then the first few untethered and more drops bigger than you might think, and surreal in the way they sideslip at an angle from the skies and into running straight down, same as a river, which is simply water in the act of falling to other places.

Same as us. Sometimes for go pulling the hood of my hair. I am much more a fan of immersing myself in it all. Native Americans have always felt Rheins to be signs of change. This is true change of stars and minor Heddy and bleeding for these days, more so holding hopes alive that I can keep this ship ever steady at the helm and savor it. All of us have seen turmoil and train wrecks along the way. So if and when days are sweeter than sweet, appreciate them and hold your breath.

It's on the loose now. The whole sky is red lining. Buckets and buckets pour down and it feels so good to stand and cast out. So many exploding droplets are blooming to and fro that it appears as if every damn fish in the world is rising. What else? And simple nature feels this sensual and alluring, so unquestionably all encompassing and so forth. Who is the pool that invented the roof and why is the rest of the world under them?

Instead of being out here on with the headlamp and the fish on through the night and ride the hips of this storm until she leaves? And after where? From a bedroll and the back of the truck looking up at the stars, I'll be watching the weather wanton with desire for endless lifetimes of rain. All right, so do you know what River Horse is? I'm a little afraid to ask, but tell me tell me he's the owner of fishing.

He's the entire collection of time, life, pure mood CDs for anglers, dude.

My house could be on fire burning. And if I had river horse talking in my ear, I'd be like, this is fine. Yeah, this is all. It's all good. It's all right.

Because we lean on the funny and the humor at Bent so much. But his segment just reminds me of one of those stress apps which are very popular right now because there's commercials on TV all the time that tell you to just stop what you're doing and listen to the sound of a waterfall for 30 seconds.

So, look, this was our first one from River Horse. I appreciated it. I hope you guys did and appreciated that reset.

And I really hope we hear from him more often.

Man, man. So do I freakin love that dude. And it's it's not just his voice, but that guy.

Kraft's words as well as anybody that's writing about fishing, in my opinion. Oh, he's brilliant.

I don't I will never be able to write like a river. No one no one that I know of can. So I hope he's on a bunch more, too, because I cannot think of a better person to have speaking calmly into my ear holes as we navigate the global dumpster fire of twenty twenty anyway and and switching from soothing dulcet tones to what I consider to be nails on a chalkboard.

We're about to check in with our barely tolerable correspondent, Lance V..

Yes, yeah, yes, yeah, yeah.

Lance is back, ladies and gentlemen, to bring us his own version of wisdom sagely, totally say eyebrow telling you how to win an Internet fishing.

And I'm sure this will inspire a whole new deluge of hate mail in the inbox that we have to read.

Bring it. The land to the boats, to the lake, to the sea, filling up the debt with the boy. Yo, your boy, Lance V here again, dropping all the knowledge on how to be a true Internet angler, not just some poser with a stiff rod and a wi fi connection.

This week, I'm going to teach you how to get the best fish photos to post online. OK, so you caught a nice fish. Good for you. It's probably half the size of my smallest fish ever. But hey, we all start somewhere. Now, don't just take a couple of pictures and let it go.

Let it go. Let it go. Tech frozen. This may be the best fish you ever fondle. Don't waste the opportunity by getting all sappy and looking like it's all I think about the future. Think about the gram. Here are the top six tips to help you get the most out of that fish numero uno portable studio.

I shouldn't even have to say this, but you got a gorilla pod to hold your cell phone, right? I sleep with my girl, a pod sun in case some epic, fishy shit happens in my dreams. It's as critical as your fishing rod selfie mode burst 10 second timer. Don't even come at me with a three second timer bullshit. You can not craft the perfect pose in three seconds unless you're a member of the goon squad hashtag skills for days.

So now let's assume you actually call it something numero devs switch it up, show for that fish around the lake like you're an uber driver on a meth binge at each new spot, put on a fresh outfit and grab around a pic's, run through your tackle box, pull out all your most expensive Beijng from your favorite brand partners, and then play a game. I like to call Pinda lower on the hog face. With the right plan and execution, you could turn one hog into twenty and spread your greatness out for years to come.

Oh, and by the way, you need twenty pairs of sunglasses because nobody wears the same pair longer than half a season.

Numero Trece spray ampersand pray spend at least fifteen minutes taking pictures of the fish out of water. Don't listen to all that environmental bullshit about keeping them wet. Fish breathe oxygen just like you me a john b there's plenty of oxygen in the air.

Hashtag science numero cuatro. Act like you've been there only it's a softball dad smile for the camera.

Even if that fish is a PB. I'm aware look on my face like here's what a decent one looks like for your reference.

Sucker's numero five brima shades on, mask off. I'm not losing the cichlids or shades. Obviously, if I'm wearing them and you can clearly see the logos, I'm sponsored by them or when having negotiations regarding sponsorship meetings and calls and shit are happening. But if you can't see my face because there's a dope ass insane clown posse buff cover my grill, how is everyone going to know that I'm the one holding the dog first until my flat brim up just enough to make sure the logo is still showing Avi Shades are for your protection because without them I could see right through.

You also shave because beards are for hippies, hashtag modeling tips, numero six Kamasutra, that beast.

Sure, we all know the basic group and post and it's a classic for a reason why nangle long arms, big fish. But don't be afraid to mix it up. Hold it over your head like Simba cradle in front of your junk. Lay it down on the deck and spoon it. Get creative and you might just turn into a legend like the dude who invented the fish bra. Props to you homey. For real hashtag genius.

Worry about how and when to use Photoshop later most because I have got the power to copy the program. My boy at college, Dougie said he secure it. But first you got to get the raw material and that all starts with a dope photo. Don't waste a big fish or in your case, any fish by not getting the right pics. If you're not going to get good shots, why even bother going fishing?

That's it for me.

Let's be sorry you had to listen to the rest of that dumb ass show just to get my moment of shine. If you can't listen to this shit anymore, you need to go, Pete, the Google squad on you to get with their program now before I join the team and take it over. Just messing Googs mad love. Don't you ever answer any emails?

Man, to be young and have the luxury of taking 400 frames of one fish to nail that perfect shot isn't what the kids are doing these days. What the lances of the world.

Keep them dry, keep them dry, everyone.

I vividly remember taking film to the drugstore and most of the roll on the disposable Kodak point and shoot camera was empty.

But I couldn't wait the three months or whatever it would take to fill the role. And I had to have those first five grip and grins on the roll back immediately and I would always just take them on half empty camera only two two days later, get back blurry and cut off.

Well, I mean, you have to say I had to, because if you kept that one around, like that disposable camera was going to get a drop of water at some point and then the whole roll shot.

Dude, please, you're going to make me have to go back to therapy because the biggest week fish I ever caught, I had on a disposable point and shoot camera.

I mean, massive. I should have mounted it. I should it was it was it was massive. And like two days later, I went trout fishing and it rolled out of my fishing vest into the water. And that was the end of that. Yeah. I mean, done the fish was delicious, but I don't have a photo.

I mean, your memory is probably better because like to be to be honest, I don't have any stories like that.

I don't have any of my own fish pictures that really stick out for me. But I do have entire hard drives of other people's fish photos from all my years of guiding. Right. Because I was just taking pictures of other people's fish and sending them to them. And the weird thing, and this is true, I can look back on those photos and some of them are well over a decade old. And I can remember the exact details of those fish, like the hole where we called them the weather that day, what they ate.

But I cannot tell you a damn thing about any of the people holding those fish. Like, I could pass those people on the street and have no idea who they are. I don't know their names. I don't know where they're from. I don't know anything about them. But I remember those fish.

I remember the stories of their fish.

Well, yeah. And, you know, I see I'm a people person, but I'll give you a pass on that because you were a guy that was work. I mean, it was just like new people every single day, day after day, which I think gives you a pass on, not remembering exactly who caught what. So, I mean, that makes sense to me. Big fish are memorable for you people. Not so much. But in the case I'm about to explain, I actually do remember the fish and the angler.

And four nights ago and almost 40 years ago, September 21st, 1982, Albert McReynolds caught a world record striper in my home state of New Jersey and here in my office.

Check this out. Right.

I have one of the original photos of Al and that massive bass hanging at a local marina. And it's not a print that somebody made later, OK? It's not a copy. It is one of the originals developed from the film that was in the camera that way. Really? Yeah, dude, it's it's awesome.

And it's a it's a long, twisted story about how I got the photo, OK, that I'll save for another time. But right now, since we're almost out of time, here comes our End of the Line segment, a tribute, if you will, to McReynolds, a classic lure and his legendary catch phrase.

It's not loud enough, but. This week, in honor of the recent passing of one of surf fishings, greatest legends and most debated anglers, I am calling out a very specific law. All right. The rebel minnow saltwater version, five and a half inch model, black back over silver. And I'm sure many of you are familiar with the smaller Sweetwater version of this classic. All right.

It's been a staple in the Bass Pike and Trout scenes for many decades, but it's the big cousin with those three shiny stainless trebles that caught Almac Reynolds, a seventy eight point eight pound striped bass on the night of September 21st, 1982. For twenty nine years, that fish stood as the all tackle world record striper.

And so Connecticut angler Greg Myerson took an eighty one point eight pounder to the scale in 2011 and beat it right now. Myerson's fish was caught from a boat. McReynolds landed his from the Vermont Avenue jetty in Atlantic City, New Jersey. And it's a catch that has always been shrouded in mystery.

And many people claim that conditions that night were far too rough for Al to have even been on that jetty casting. Others claim he found the fish washed up dead.

Some say a commercial fisherman gave him the striper and it has been written about over the years ad nauseum, spawning pro and anti McReynolds camps within the strapper scene. But the truth is, despite all the unknowns tied to that fish, the bottom line is that it was qualified by the AGFA. And the fact alone that it was caught off the beach prompts many surf casters to this very day to vow that Myerson's boat fish is, quote, not my world record.

As a young kid, I actually got to lay eyes on one of the few replicas of the McReynolds bass in existence, and I mean, you could fit a basketball in its gaping mouth without it touching the sides.

That's no bullshit.

It was far wider and taller than me, the eight year old gawking at this unfathomable fish hanging in a museum in Brigantine, New Jersey.

And I remember so vividly in that cavernous buckett mouth, someone had stuck a five and a half inch rebel minnow black back over silver. And even back then, at that young age, I remember staring at that law and thinking, there's no way there's there's no way in hell it caught this fish to quote, no effects. It was like feeding a tic tac to a whale, like a hot dog in a hallway. Now, what I've never doubted is that a blast that size would eat that lower.

All right. According to the legend, a school of giant stripers had mullet pinned against the rocks that fateful night. And that lure, that rebel, would have matched the size and profile of those mullet.

But having fought big bass in the high 40 pound range, knowing their power, I could just never get my head around the idea that that little hollow plastic rebel lasted for what McReynolds claimed was an hour and 20 minute battle on 20 pound test mono to boot.

So all of those relatively small trebles stayed glued in that thick, massive jaw for that long during a fight that McReynolds himself said made his back ache and caused his forearms to lock.

It always just seems so damn unlikely. But see, that's the fun without these little questions, without all these little mysteries and there there are a lot more than just the lure tied to this catch, it makes me wonder if we would even be talking about the McReynolds bass today. The debate, the mystique, the allure of the whole thing is what has kept the story in the forefront of the surf fishing and striped bass cultures. And sadly, on Sunday, May 10th, 20 20 Almac, Reynolds passed away.

And though he had fans as well as detractors, better or worse, he will live on as a legend in the striper scene. And that rebel minnow will forever be known as the lure that earned him that status.

Right.

Well, you know, what a cheers to Al because cheers. The truly great fish are the ones that come with truly great stories. And that and that is a great story. That's it for this week. We hope you guys enjoyed the moment of Zen from River Horse got smacked down by the epiphany that a gorilla pod is more critical than your real.

And finally, understand that when your guide says, please don't cast right now, you shouldn't freaking cast.

Listen to your guide as always, if you like what you're hearing, have comments, suggestions, concerns, bar nominations, or just want to shoot the shit. We adore hearing from you.

So hit us up at Bent at the Meat Eater Dotcom, please.

We read every one of them and we appreciate everyone. We do it. Yes. Leave us a glowing review. Wherever you consume your podcasts, those really matter. Whenever you consume coffee, it should be Black Reifel coffee. And man, we hope you let him up this weekend.

Hey, one last note before we go. You know, Miles and I work on a lot more here at Meat Eater than just bent. So we're asking for a little assist for a future project featuring a whole cast of meat eater characters far more famous than us.

That is true. That is true.

And seriously, if you've ever had a near-death experience while fishing, we love for you to send just like a basic gist of the story to bent at the meat eater dotcom.

OK, now, to be clear, we're not talking about your buddy Tommy getting hooked in the calf meat with your musky Buchtel.

OK, we're talking about heavy hitting stories that left you thankful to be alive.

And we do appreciate your input. And speaking of listener emails that we love again, a listener named William who did not provide a last name, wrote in and said, we should close every show with until next time get bent.

And I don't know about every show, but just for you, just this week, William, until next time, get bent.