Fishing, flooded fields and football

Several years ago I was privileged to fly to northern Ontario, Canada, and spend a week in a fish camp.

We stayed in a modern but rustic looking cabin, the only one on a large lake. The walleye and northern fishing was great and topped only by the scenery and wildness of the area. The place was owned by a couple of SoDak characters one of whom is named Doom, an appellation that strangely fits the man.

Guests were welcome at the cabin but the owning partners decreed that one or the other had to be present to oversee any (paying neither authorized nor licensed) customers. Doom was our host and guide so we were forced to endure his embellished stories of past personal exploits.

I just recently became aware that Doom has a new problem. He was convicted of drunk driving and now the Canadians, who consider DUI a felony, won’t let him cross the border. No Doom, no guests to fish because even he can’t go visit his own cabin.

Actually it is his second conviction but last time he was able to hire a lawyer and get the conviction expunged (now that is a 75 cent word!) from his record.

He has again hired a lawyer and will probably get the same thing accomplished all over again but for sure it will cost him a bundle.

Before one feels too little sorry for Doom you only have to remember the beautiful, talented 28-year-old MCC teacher and mom that was recently killed by another repeat drunk driver.

Maybe the Canadians are on to something, making DUI a felony offense.

This week I flew diagonally across our neighbor to the south on the way to and from Tulsa and then another day trip to Hutchinson, Kan.

I can assure you that Kansas at the moment is wet! Looking into the reflections of the sun one sees hundreds of small ponds, every pivot track reflects standing water and I saw no field work being done due to mud. It kind of rankles looking at the moisture below and reflecting on Kansas’ threat to sue to stop the irrigation in Southwest-ern Nebraska.

In my opinion they already have a God’s plenty of that precious resource and should forget about being greedy.

Nebraska’s football machinations are interesting to watch. I never was much in favor of passing over the best of the Nebraska kids and then recruiting high school standouts from all over the nation as Pederson and Callahan seemed to have insisted on doing. They were even known to welcome players that were rejected from other major programs.

I’m reminded of the old coyote hunting neighbors who kept and hunted with packs of greyhounds.

When their memories faded a little they would go to the dog tracks and find cheap dogs that were either too old to win or would rather fight than chase the mechanical bunny. Most times they’d find that those “hot-bloods” weren’t good at chasing coyotes either!

Coyote hounds run by sight and these dumb dogs would run right through barbed wire fences or off high banks if they thought the coyote went that way. Most had “personality” problems and would rather brawl than run the prey. Not only were they worthless as hunters they didn’t even make good pets. Not worth feeding the only solution was to trade the no good dogs to their unsuspecting fellow hunters or simply not bring them back from the hunt.

I wonder if Steve Pederson needs a pack of “hot-bloods” to go chase coyotes or whatever his unearned $2.2 million leads him to do. What a sad mess it is but I do think the chancellor has found the only guy on the planet, Dr. Tom, who can save the program!

That is the way I see it.