Lake Hartwell is in my nose.
Both noses. Right and left.
Lake Hartwell invaded my sinuses at the exact moment that I was in mid-chew of one of those little powdered sugar donuts.
Half of the donut was in the front of my mouth, half was in the way back spot between tongue and throat where it's past saving.
And from up front of the Bass Boat, right up through the trolling motor, to about halfway on the side of the boat, which I know has a name, but I'm too cold to look it up, but for this blog I'm going to call it the donut-hand-board side, Lake Hartwell in all it's 45.3 degree fury is racing right at my face and I'm watching it coming, in like freezing water slo-mo, and I see this ONE drop, just this one little, bitty droplet swing out over the donut-powdered-sugar-hand-wiping-of-the-moustache side of the boat, swing way out that way, catch a breeze, swing back in, somehow CENTER itself, then magically alter course about the width of two of your own not denture made front teeth, drop down about three freckles on my face, move up one pimple, and slam into my damn right eye.
Then Lake Hartwell rolls down my face, SPLITS IN TWO, with one part of the lake running up underneath my goofy looking fake fur hat like the lady cop in the movie Fargo wore, and the other part of the lake runs down my cheek, somehow remains stuck on my face, then advances down my neck, across my throat at about the part where the donut SHOULD be inside there, across my St. Christopher medal and gold cross my wife gave me that was SUPPOSED to protect against this very thing, down my chest bouncing off the grey chest hair like some sort of freshwater pinball, then up and over the lump that is my stomach from too many of those above mentioned donuts, and then, THEN, heads to parts of me only my bathroom mirror can see anymore.
And all the while icy Lake Hartwell is becoming way to friendly with my privates, this is what I'm hearing, in my right ear because Lake Hartwell is at the same moment invading my left ear:
"YAHOOOOOOO … DAMN … BOY THIS IS LIVING … DIDN'T SEE THAT COMING…"
Almost an exact quote but mind you I'm doing the best I can under the circumstance, and that there quote is coming from Jason Turner of somewhere within boat-haulin distance of Lake Hartwell , and the driver of my media boat who when asking me, "So where do you want to go out there," with THERE being a 45-degree lake with about 36-degrees of outside sitting on top of it, and my EXACT response was this, "Don't care, AS LONG AS IT'S SLOW."
And all of these paragraphs above this is pretty much the exact definition of: Basically Screwed.
Look it up.
It's Practice Day for the 50 Elite anglers. That's what the PR people are calling it in the hand out they gave me when I stumbled upon the media center while out hunting for something to eat, and or SWILL.
Here, though based on exact behind the scene info from a real-honest-to-God-Fish-Journalist is what, had I written the PR handout the day would have been called:
"Greetings Fish-Journalists welcome to the wool knit skivvies, way too tight but used to fit longjohns, 3 pairs of socks, one pair of wool lined cargo pants underneath some camouflage thermal hunting pants, two tee shirt, one thermal long sleeve shirt, two fleece sweaters one being your own one you stole from your wife, one BASS sweatshirt underneath a bubbly thermal camo jacket all held in place by a big boy snowsuit they now call a snowmobile suit with dirty knees and a tiny rip on your ass DAY."
Much more informative of what the day is all about instead of some non-descript, "Practice Day."
So that was my day, and by the way I had to get up at 4:30am for it to happen. I did manage to shoot some pictures of the Pros out there practicing, and once the camera un-freezes and gets all de-fogged, I'm going to send one copy to the editors, one copy to the good folks at Blue Cross/Blue Shield for more proof of my claims that Bassmaster Pro Fishing can damn near kill ya.
db