Lund Explorer

The biggest danger is having the lower unit/gear housing crack. Did you notice any fluid leak on the floor before you tried to drain it? If you are real lucky, the leak comes from a missing o-ring on one of the two screws you removed. But, most likely it is the seal around the drive shaft. Regardless, it sounds like it is time for a trip to the marina.

Prayers sent Matt - To you, your wife, and the whole family. Hopefully this little guy will recover from his injuries and find a good life with his Godparents.

Sorry Tom, but I think the Big O nailed it with the title of Gentleman. Fortunately, I know you've got what it takes to live up to it.

Congrats Guys - This quick turnaround should give Keri more sleep than she got last year!

"Want to like or comment on this page? To interact with RageTail Steve Parks you need to sign up for Facebook first." Oh well, I guess I'll just take the lump of coal! Merry Christmas Anyways. Old Fashion Non-Facebook Steve

After many years of sitting in an ice shanty looking down a 2'x4' spearing hole, I can tell you that LM Bass are one of the hardest fish to catch during the winter. The vast majority of bass that swam through were completely shut off from feeding and just slowly swam past whatever bait I'd drop down to them. Perhaps one in fifty would turn towards what I had put down, and no more than one in ten of those actually resulted in a bite. As you are limited to using artificial baits, I would suggest jigging Rapalas. Fish the bait with slow movements about 1' off the bottom for a short while, then move up another foot and repeat the process. Do this upward movement 5-6 times and then go back down towards bottom. Another bait choice I would consider would be a small Berkley Gulp minnow.

In cube form, it goes quite well with scotch!

My guess is Milfoil.

Because untold millions of people who aren't tied to the dynasty known as the SEC will still tune in to the championship game. If people (including folks like me) don't want to see a continuation of this flawed system, they simply need to turn the channel selector when this game comes on. Only the Neilsen ratings will wake up the people who make these choices. Let's just look forward to Bama squeaking by LSU for a narrow win and OSU blowing out a huge win in their game. Then OSU can finish in third place in the final polls.

It is inevitable that as you grow older that you will realize that the death of friends and relatives is something that is going to happen. Life is tough and will lead you into many low spots. It also has just as many if not more high points. For every death of a loved one, you can find a new life brought into this world that you can choose to love just as much as you did the departed. At your age, you have reached the point where you need to decide how you will react to this inevitability. Many people find strength in religion, while others simply choose some other way to get through it. What you decide is completely up to you. How you face these tests, whether you choose to dwell on the low spots or celebrate the high points will in large part determine the quality of your own life. Grief is a natural response to the loss of someone you cared about. It may not make sense now, but I've known for years that the person who goes through this process of grief the most, usually does so because they had the ability to attract the most friends and loved ones. These are the type of people who leave the biggest hole when they pass from this world. Even here in this internet family, we have the perfect example of that in our loss of Jack "Fish for Dollars" Yates a little less than a year ago. The reason we have a dedicated thread in his memory is due to the fact that he opened himself up to all of us so much. While I was never lucky enough to have met the man in person, his life touched mine, and felt the twinge of loss when I heard about his passing. Seeing that thread title doesn't give me nearly as much grief as it gives me pause to remember all of the great things this man meant to so many of us. And now we come to this point. A friend named Austin who comes here to ask the question why. To look for help in getting through a low spot that he hasn't had to face very often. I can tell you that almost everyone who reads your post will feel a twinge of grief as well, simply by knowing that a friend is facing trouble dealing with this tough life. Many of us will post some sage piece of advice to try to help, and many others will only say a quiet prayer that you find the strength to get through this rough patch. Some like myself will do both. So my young friend, I will pray that you find the ability to accept this loss, and will find a way to celebrate all of the good times you had with the person you've lost. You learned to care for this person because you shared many of the high points in life, and that caring will continue if you can keep those thoughts alive.

Windows 95 completely changed how we worked as well. In my opinion DOS was an easier and faster operating system in that your hands never had to leave the keyboard, but the option to have several programs open at the same time finally made the need to grab a mouse worth the change. When I first started in my career as an accountant in 1978, about 50% of our clients were still being kept on the old style columnar worksheets with hand typed financial statements. By 1980 all were converted and in 1982 we started processing tax returns by computer along with most spreadsheets being converted to Lotus 123. I'm actually with the same accounting software company I had in 1986, and even though the program is now Windows based, it still has some of the old DOS style "Alt-Key" commands built into it. Business wise, I think the internet and email has been a mix of blessing and curse. Too easy for employees to waste time cruising the web rather than working. It still grinds me to remember the day I caught an employee updating her resume on a company computer I furnished her with, during the time I was paying her to work for me!

You can believe it. They're punching holes all over the western half of North Dakota right now looking for natural gas. Our oldest Grandson went to Colorado right after graduating high school several years ago for the same type of boom and hasn't looked back since. From what he has said, it is hard to get work on a rig itself, but there tons of support jobs. He started out working for a pipe supplier where he and another guy were "drifting pipe" at the well sites. As he described it, drifting a pipe entails running a short length of slightly large pipe down the length of the main pipe to look for warped pipe that could change a well's direction. His starting pay back then was $15 per/hour with all the hours you could handle available. He now has his CDL and is trucking for the same company and has been up there several times. Bad news is that his job (like many oil/gas jobs) bounces the family all over the place. Even worse is the fact that this latest activity is in one of the coldest places in the lower 48! I was stationed in Nort'Dekota for over three years, eh. Some of the nicest people you'd ever want to meet, but the winters were absolutely brutal. Sell most of your bass fishing rods in favor of walleye rigs, and mothball your deer rifle in favor of a good goose/duck gun. Mount a good block heater on each of the cars, and pack a survival kit in the trunks. Once all that is done, the only thing left to do is to purchase enough clothes to make sure that when you go outside there isn't any exposed skin that "40-Below" air can freeze solid. Why not Minot? Freezin's the Reason!

Got a few scheduling conflicts to work out, but I'm going to try. As far as cost goes, does anybody want to match what it would cost me to leave the War Dept home this year? The old girl doesn't have many vacation days left for her year(Sep - Aug) which is going to be issue #1. On top of that, you guys already know she outfished me last year hawg wise, so you can try to match the ration of **** I'll get for leaving her at home!

So do you plan to target the green fish or the brown ones? East Basin or the West Basin? I've used a pretty wide variety of baits over the years. Topwaters, crankbaits, worms, tubes, and grubs, they all work at certain times. Like a lot of other lakes, its more important to find the fish than to find something they'll bite. The East Basin has the most diversity from rocky islands, to deeper weedbeds, to productive dock fishing patterns. Once you have figured out what the fish are staging on, it is fairly easy to find a number of areas with similar cover. The West Basin is much shallower but still holds fish on slightly deeper weedbeds, the rice beds, docks and channels. At times, the sandsucker hole will attract fish as well. I've always found fishing the west side means covering a lot of water until you find a productive area as so much of it looks exactly the same on the map. BTW, whatever baits you want to fish, I'd suggest something in green or brown. Motor Oil was always a good flavor.

Wow! What guy growing up as a Motown fan cannot only sing along to those songs and but can get on the moves groups like the Temptations had. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4P1x7Yy9CXI

Now We're Talkin.....

Fish, it might be easier to explain what music I don't like. I just hope that you understand that this is just my opinion and taste in music varies widely. It starts with some of the older country "twang-twang" music, probably includes most polkas, and definitely includes disco. I didn't include rap in that last sentence as I just don't consider it music. The constant whump-whump effect of the heavy bass could just as easily be accomplished sitting anywhere near a pile driver in my opinion. I also sort of expect the performer to actually be able carry a tune rather than reciting words. Your first choice of music on this thread kind of shows what I mean where it sounds like the original artist's voice is blended into this characters speaking rendition. Most of the things I do like includes many of the older Big Band sounds including swing, jazz, and/or blues. Not that I will listen to it all of the time, but I do enjoy listening to the likes of Glenn Miller, Boots Randolph, Al Hirt, Count Basie and many others. I also enjoy most of the stuff that came out of the sixties and seventies even though I'm not real big into the bubblegum stuff of that era. Almost anything Motown still ranks high on my list. There was also a time when the Moody Blues was tops. But those where different days in my life I won't be returning to. These days, I'll occasionally listen to some of the more modern country when its forced on me, but I find myself looking for classic rock when I actually want to listen to music. Did I mention that one of the strange habits I have is ALWAYS driving with the radio off? Rather like how you enjoy fishing alone, my peace and quiet time is behind the wheel. Now I just have wonder how many of the guys on here don't realize that they've liked Boots Randolph's #1 hit without even knowing it!

Sorry Chris, that was sad. You'd think that if they were going to ruin a song with Rap (or whatever that's called when they don't actually sing), it could at least be something from the Disco Era! Fortunately I listened to the original so it will take away the possibility of nightmares. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVC2cszdTao

I haven't gotten anything yet, but that will change by the end of the day. Definitely will be making a trip to North Star's site for that sale to stock up on a few jigs, shakey heads, and a dozen spinnerbaits or so. I've got to hit Siebert's sale also for a few Big O's and to see what else I can add poundage wise. But before I can fill the tackle boxes, it's time for me to fill the freezer. My local meat market has one of their big sales going on this weekend. Center cut pork chops @ $1.89, Ground Chuck @ $1.99, and NY Strips cut for free @ $2.99. I think some of the guys from last year's road trip can attest to how those steaks were. The last thing I'm going to pick up goes against the grain of all those who demand spiral cut ham for Christmas, and that's bone-in prime rib @ $4.69! This year the tribe will be sitting down to Prime Rib and Crab Legs before getting on to the business of opening presents! Spiral Cut Ham - Prime Rib & Crab Legs -

It's not just glaring, but darn near fatal! You guys should still have soft water so I would suggest taking it out on one of these 2k-3k acres lakes for a test drive. Pickup one of your 250lb buddies, throw in a bunch of gear, and head for the downwind side of the lake. Get down to idle speed, turn into the wind, and throttle down. Then repeat those steps with that Triton. When you get back, tell us how far it took you to get up on the pad for each.

I didn't know that. But from the first, Gordy and I have always explained to others that we are an adopted Son/Dad. We always looked at it like I wasn't replacing his real father, but simply giving him a second one.

Sorry for dodging the question, but I am almost certain that you would be better off finding a local NH accountant that understands all of the ins and outs of how CSA's are treated in your home state. From the little I know of that type of operation, I think you'll find that there are more than just accounting questions to consider.

Yup, one of several that we have taken into our family over the years. We adopted Gordy when he was 19 years old and going to college a long, long way from his home and family. We may not have gone in front a judge to do it officially, but the bottom line was the same. He needed the help and like before, we had the ability and provided it. He lived in our home with free room and board, and was given the chance to concentrate on his studies rather than trying to fight his way through school worrying about working enough hours to afford it. He has two degrees now. The first in CAD, and now one in nursing. The student loans aren't anywhere near what they could have been had he been on his own, and for a while there, he may have even dropped out without that support. That was 14 years ago, and yet when he and his wife came home last weekend the first thing he did was hug his Mom and then he shook my hand and called me Dad. I love and care for them as much as any of our own children and the others we have taken into our home. We talk weekly on the phone or by email just like the rest of our kids. Granted the first kid we decided to help left for his first real world job towing the best graduation present. A Ranger 335 Commanche that I had outgrown. I sure wish that the communuity college he was teaching at was closer to home as I miss him and that darn boat. Gordo, who I get the chance to fish with several time each year had to settle for a newer 14' Lund! Our last adoptee wasn't into fishing much. When she got back from two years in the peace corps, she went back to school for her master's degree. What do you get a kid going into social work? So J, he's adopted. The wife and I raised four kids of our own, and once we had them on their way in life, the best way I could make a difference in this world was by helping to see that a few other young people got a chance at a decent start to their own. So far, we've tried this three times and one more time will double our family. There might even be time in these old bones to double it again.

Anybody want to take a SWAG at how many homes are broken into each year because some clueless people have to get on a social network site and announce to the entire world that they are going to be out of town for a week or two? Just like everything else in life, it isn't social media that is the problem. It's the people who get on it. Stupid people should hide from the world, not post proof of it!

To start with, congrats on passing the exam. With regards to the actual test score you got, I can only wish you good luck. The first time I ran across this scoring system was in 1989 for a real estate exam. You punched in your answers into a little keypad for all of the questions, and then got a printout of pass/fail afterwards. We were told that by not providing an actual score that a potnential employer wouldn't discriminate against those who passed with an 80% score when compared to someone who got a perfect score. Does that make sense to anyone? Recently our adopted son took his state RN's licensing exam, and they have thrown a curve into the testing process. 250 Questions! Punch the answers into a keypad that sounds a lot like the one I used. The new twist is that if the computer realizes that you have answered the first 100 correctly, the machine stops and you've passed. If the machine keeps going after that, you can still pass the exam, but you can also toss out any hopes of a perfect score. I'm not sure why student or potential employer isn't allowed to know those scores. Must be it takes a smarter guy than me to think up the answer!