I think I've managed to get together a coherent story that explains why he got two fish and I got none.
We had a hot tip about spots to try. I won't name the tipper for fear of blowing his cover, but the tips were greatly appreciated. They were all small kelp beds that wouldn't take much time to check out, but being as lazy as I am and having a heavy anchor, it seemed like too much work to drop the anchor, spend a few minutes checking the spot, and then pull the anchor again. So the solution was for me to drop Dam on a spot, idle around while he checked it out, pick him up, and then drop him on another spot.
After a few spots, he shot the first fish. It wrapped up pretty well and it seemed to take him a while to cut it out. On his first dive with his knife out, he discovered a 400 pound black sea bass trying to munch on his fish, but he stabbed at it with the knife and uttered some Vietnamese curses, and it fled.
After we boated that fish, we anchored at a bed big enough for both of us. I was working my way down the bed when I spotted Dam ahead of me, working on his second fish. I'm quite sure that fish was meant to be mine. Shit happens!
We moved to another spot before he worked on gutting and scaling the second fish, but the vis had deteriorated a lot. Otherwise I'm quite sure I would have limited out.
And then we moved to one more bed where we both dove, but I was feeling about 71 years old by then, and may not have been at my peak. I usually refrain from doing any workout involving my legs on the day before diving, but I'm basically an addict and don't feel good if I haven't earned my dinner, so I snuck in a 30 minute ride on my spinner bike at moderate resistance yesterday. I think it was a mistake. In fact, I'm sure that if I had not worked out, I would have limited out today. I've told my wife to stop me if she sees me trying that again.
Anyway, that's my story, and I'm sticking with it.
Dam's first fish weighed about 48 pounds as near as we could tell in the bouncing boat. We forgot to weigh the second one. It was a bit shorter but a lot fatter, so I'm guessing around 55 pounds.
We had a hot tip about spots to try. I won't name the tipper for fear of blowing his cover, but the tips were greatly appreciated. They were all small kelp beds that wouldn't take much time to check out, but being as lazy as I am and having a heavy anchor, it seemed like too much work to drop the anchor, spend a few minutes checking the spot, and then pull the anchor again. So the solution was for me to drop Dam on a spot, idle around while he checked it out, pick him up, and then drop him on another spot.
After a few spots, he shot the first fish. It wrapped up pretty well and it seemed to take him a while to cut it out. On his first dive with his knife out, he discovered a 400 pound black sea bass trying to munch on his fish, but he stabbed at it with the knife and uttered some Vietnamese curses, and it fled.
After we boated that fish, we anchored at a bed big enough for both of us. I was working my way down the bed when I spotted Dam ahead of me, working on his second fish. I'm quite sure that fish was meant to be mine. Shit happens!
We moved to another spot before he worked on gutting and scaling the second fish, but the vis had deteriorated a lot. Otherwise I'm quite sure I would have limited out.
And then we moved to one more bed where we both dove, but I was feeling about 71 years old by then, and may not have been at my peak. I usually refrain from doing any workout involving my legs on the day before diving, but I'm basically an addict and don't feel good if I haven't earned my dinner, so I snuck in a 30 minute ride on my spinner bike at moderate resistance yesterday. I think it was a mistake. In fact, I'm sure that if I had not worked out, I would have limited out today. I've told my wife to stop me if she sees me trying that again.
Anyway, that's my story, and I'm sticking with it.
Dam's first fish weighed about 48 pounds as near as we could tell in the bouncing boat. We forgot to weigh the second one. It was a bit shorter but a lot fatter, so I'm guessing around 55 pounds.