sdowiat

Not me, but my buddy & roommate.... and I had to go pick him up at the Jail! In Dalton Georgia in 1987 I was 21 and lived with a buddy in an old run down house that we rented really cheap. We actually worked at the same factory too. I was fine in a dilapidated old house because I worked a LOT of weekends plus overtime and wasn't home much anyway. He lived at home with his parents most weekends but it was like 2 hrs away. One Sunday morning in the early spring I was working for some double overtime money when I got called to the supervisors office for a phone call. It was my friend calling from Jail. It was a pretty morning and he had a new fishing rod that he just couldn't wait to try out... so he walked to a little neighborhood recreation area that had a pond.. and he said that before he made his second cast some official person appeared and asked to see his fishing license. He didn't have one and they actually took him to jail! I had to leave work where I was earning double pay on Sunday to go pick him up. Maybe he got mouthy or something but he was normally a really subdued guy.... In retrospect it all seems a bit harsh.

With both Now and the Future ( which comes faster than you would ever think ) in mind, find your money / time / finances balance and try to keep it in mind. I made a lot of money mistakes in my early years. At 23 years old ( 33 years ago ) I bought a bass boat that was on display in the center of a mall. I sure paid for that! Luckily it was only a 15.5 ft one that cost about half what a nice 19 footer would have cost, and I was young with a decent job and could work a LOT. I was able to survive that mistake and overall do well... but a lifetime of those type mistakes would really take a toll and I'm glad to say that I gradually smartened up. Now I struggle with being to far in the OTHER direction and preparing for the future at the expense of today, but still I recognize that it's important to find the right balance in life.

I was Texas rig worm fishing around docks on Chickamauga. My worm had been hit a few times,( on other docks ) was pretty torn up and was barely hanging on but I was gonna use it as long as I could. After a long cast the worm came off my hook about 10 feet from the boat. I try not to litter and made a couple of quick casts to pull the floating work to where I could grab it... I tried but it still wasn't quite close enough. I was on my knees and my rod beside me had several feet (10 ish) of line out because I was intending to put another purple worm on.... So I grabbed the line and swung the hook out to try to pull the floating and mangled worm to me. I got the hook around it ( not through it obviously ) was was pulling to me by hand when wham a 3 pounder darted from beneath the boat, grabbed the worm and got caught on the hook. That 3 pounder was a handful to get in bare handed. I'm surprised the line didn't cut me, but I got him in bare handed and caught him on a hook that was only pulling a worm in its crook. My best fish for that day.