Charlie’s Haus

In the last year or so I have started to look at the world with a pessimistic view. Crime is increasing. Stupid people keep popping out dozens of children (think about the movie Idiocracy). Both the repulican and dem parties are corrupt. Ive long said that there need to be at least 3 parties in order for the system to work. None of the people I know are stongly one side or another, they lie in the middle. The Dems are shoving socialism down our throats (goodbye American Dream where you can become rich with one simple idea…you can still do that but the government is going to tax the hell out of you and take half that money away). Socialism doesnt work for the same reason Unions dont work, people that are lazy stay lazy and people who are motivated become lazy because they get no benefit for being motivated.

The dems are hellbent on taking away our freedoms and taxing us to death. I sometimes loath living in Liberal WI. When I wrote to my Representative (Jon Erpenbach) asking him to support the Castle Doctrine in WI (its a law that gives protection to people who protect their property with firearms), I was basically told that he wouldnt support it unless the police force was on board. WTF. You represent me, not the frakking police department! (unless the officer lives in your district too) The founding fathers had great hopes for this country. They would be rolling over in their graves if they saw what was happening now. Its a proven fact that criminals prey on the weak and those who cant defend themselves. It doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure out that a criminal isnt going to attack someone if they dont think they can get away with it. Thats why we should have concealed carry in WI. Crime rates arent that high here for the most part, but they would probably go down if we had it. “Violent crime rates are highest overall in states with laws severely limiting or prohibiting the carrying of concealed firearms for self-defense”. (FBI Uniform Crime Reports, 1992) Yes thats right. Concealed carry protects everyone even if you dont carry. The bad guys dont know if you have a gun or not, thats enough of a deterrent for most people. The biggest joke of all is that the people of WI cannot carry a weapon concealed because the Governor keeps vetoing the bills that pass. However, he himself has an armed guard. Funny how we are all safe and live in a safe place, yet he needs an armed guard? Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.

I have started to prepare for any kind of conflict/emergency that would happen. First I stocked up on ammo. Now Im starting to stock up on supplies. Most people think you are crazy when you mention that. Look at what happened to New Orleans when Katrina hit. Where was the government then? It took them an eternity to mobilize and provide support. People had to protect and provide for themselves. The problem is that the majority of them were not prepared for any kind of disaster and they paid dearly for it. What happens if terrorists take out the power grid? Or what if the stock market tanks to the point our money is wortless? What if China tries to cash in the bonds they own? The majority of people would be screwed. They would have to rely on the pity of others to provide for them. Im sorry, I would like to help but I can only worry about my family. I would be able to go out and hunt and do whatever else I needed to make sure we are cared for. The same cant be said for the tree hugging, gun banning liberals. Most of them only know how to buy what they need.

A great man once wrote: “And what country can preserve its liberties, if it’s rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.” That great man was Thomas Jefferson. He saw the need to be able to make sure that your voice was heard and that the leaders were doing what was best. Im not saying we should go and shoot a bunch of people, but people need to arm themselves with knowledge before they vote for someone. There are too many “Useful Idiots” out there. They all voted for Obama, I can guarantee it. Whats a useful idiot? Someone who believes everything the media tells them and doesnt do any research on their own about a candidate.

Well thats enough broken incoherent thoughts for one day. That reminds me….I need to go buy some more ammo

Not really, but I did make sushi last night! I have much to learn, but really it isnt that hard. I did imitation crab and cream cheese in mine, and added cucumber to Mandi’s. Next time we need some more ingredients, but I wanted to see how to do it first. Baby steps. The biggest thing we learned is that the normal soy sauce you buy is WAY to salty. Its nothing like in the restaurant. Need to buy some authentic sauce me thinks. Next time Im at woodmans or World Market Ill pick some up.

Also tried my hand at canning last night. We have so many cucumbers its not funny. So the only thought was to make pickles. I found a recipe on allrecipes.com (best recipe site ever!) and got the ingredients. I then broke out my 5 gallon kettle that I will eventually use to make beer for the hot water bath. It worked great. All 6 jars sealed even…not bad for the first try. In 2 months we will have to break them out and see how they taste! Hopefully delicious!

I got back from Canada real early on Sunday morning. It was a great trip again this year, but with a pleasant surprise. I caught the most Muskies! I had 8, and Andy had 7. Thats 15 for the two of us in our boat. The other boats had 3 guys and they didnt come close to that many which is hard to believe. We had perfect weather for fishing too.

The 30 mile ride from the launch to camp sucked hard. It was windy/rainy and we had the smallest boat. What normally takes a little over an hour took us 3 hours. At one point we took a wave over the bow that swept me off the front deck onto the bottom of the boat there was so much water….and at another point there was an inch of water on TOP of the floor…we put the bilge through its paces for sure. Luckily the rest of the trip went much better.

First the weather. It was nice cool nights in the 40-50’s, and highs during the day of upper 60’s and a few days of low 70’s. There were only 2 days of real sun, the others were overcast or rainy. We definately had better luck during the rain (thats when Andy got his biggest fish ever, and the biggest of the camp tis year of 49″…a real monster).

The first night (around 4 hours of fishing) I decided to throw nothing but my Double #12 bladed bucktail. The size of the blades is crazy. The lure weighs 2.5oz…an arm buster. The blades are so big that I jokingly refer to them as hubcabs. I thought double #10’s were bad, but this is a whole new level. Anyways, the first night, nothing. Not even a follow. That worried me that we were going to have a slow week, but not so.

The next day I started throwing a jig and trailer and swimming it back. I figured the water was cold 66*, so subtle and smaller would be best. Boy was I wrong. Andy got hung up in a pine tree and had to cut his line to get his bait out. We were in front of a weedy beach so I said lets just sit here and Ill fish this hard while he retied. I finished casting with the jig and saw the #12 monsters sitting there so I said why not. First cast, BAM! That was the 42 1/2″ that I got. I couldnt believe it.

I proceded to cast that for the rest of the day, catching another musky and 2 decent pike. The next day I casted it for the first few hours, but my arms, back and wrists hurt so bad that I could no longer stand it. I went to the “small” double cowgirl (double #10 blades). Last year I tried the double cowgirl for about 10 casts and said screw this, it was too much. But this year after throwing the double #12’s, it felt like a baby lure. I ended up using it almost exclusively for the rest of the trip. The only time I changed away I went to a spinnerbait because I couldnt get through the weeds with it anymore.

To make a long story a slightly less longer story, we only had 1 day that we didnt catch at least 1 musky. Most days we caught more. The first full day we had 4 (we both had 2). The last day we had 5 (I had 4 and Andy had 1). Thats just a crazy number of fish. We also had a crazy number of follows. We converted a few of them to hooked, but not many.

As I mentioned, the last day I boated 4 muskies. They ranged from 36″ up to 42″. Not a bad score really. I couldnt be happier with our performance. Andy also stepped up his netting skills and did a great job. No more repeat performances of last years debacle….which cost me a fish near or over 50″.

As I mentioned earlier Andy caught a nice 49″ Musky. It was a beast, and it was a treat to see him catch it. We watched it come up behind his rumbler (a topwater lure) and inhale it. It reminded us of watching a jaws movie. It was a site to see for sure. The only sad thing is that the net we had isnt really made for fish that big and it ended up cutting half of his tail off (you can see it hanging there in the pics). Hopefully he gets by just fine without it (my guess is as long as it doesnt get infected it will be fine).

So this year was a great success and we learned a few new things. First is that the double cowgirl is nothing to mess with. We caught over half our fish on it. The second is we need to buy a real musky net. The 49″ ended up putting a hole in the brand new net of Andy’s father in-law. That sucked.

With the price of the large bucktails I have decided to buy the stuff to make them myself. I really have a hard time paying $25 for a single lure. Now I should be able to make them for around $10 or less each. I would also like to make a few spinnerbaits. I really like the one I got at the fishing show this spring, and plan to make a few like them.

So here is a pic of my largest fish, and if you click on the picture, you will go to the gallery containing all the fish we caught.