B.O.A.T.

Fisherman know that the word boat is an acronym for break-out-another-thousand.  As I was putting guide boat 003 to bed for the winter on Saturday I noticed that I had yet another broken site gauge for my gas tank, the 2nd of the year.  This thing is junk but  essential equipment  , the only guy that I know who would run around without knowing how much gas he had was the dufus I bought the boat from as it came without one.  But you got to hand it to America, every Alumaweld, Willie, Fishrite, North River, Koffler and many more boats sold in the last twenty years come equipped with this thing on their built in gas tank that also serves as a step....walla....I see the problem. You'll notice that I even made a protective ring for it but still go through at least one every year like I'd bet the rest of the guys do also.

So if you want to make some lettuce just look up the Moeller company and find who  owns it and if they're a publicly traded company you're in on the deal. I've gone through one every year for 10 years at 20 bucks that = $200.00 . I figure there are at least 500 boats like this in our local area and everybody must have the same situation ( the Marina has a whole shelf of them) so....that comes to $10,000.00 in just local sales. mmmmmm.... Jeff's hot tip for the week. I know ,I know,  Dave, you're wondering what the heck we're doing with this primitive ' Direct Sight Capsule Gauge"  anyway. On that Ranger boat I'm sure you're computerized with not only fuel flow but hours and miles remaining in the tank...but me, I use a net handle for depth testing during silver season.

You're probably  wondering why I keep a handful of the old busted ones. Well, I meet a lot of people and I'm hoping some day when I get a guy into the 'what do you do for work'  conversation while we're out fishing and someone answers " I work for a Marine Co. named Moeller"....Yahtzee... He'll catch his fish of course and when he goes to tip me I'll  just ask him to send a lifetime supply of the Moeller Direct Sight Capsules,,,, you know 40 or fifty of them oughta do it.

So me and MPeasy made one last boat ride before I put the Minnow away. I was tempted to wait a bit longer and maybe fish another day of two but it was the right nice day to do a good job of winterizing.  Here's the captain and a last look at Mile 14 from the River. We actually love this time of year when we finally have our own place all to ourselves....It's a good life.

I took MP downriver to say good bye for the winter to my knew friends. These guys entertained us all season long. They don't seem to be spooky at all, I suppose they view me the same way I view them, just part of the program at Mile 14.

And yesterday when we were showing our house sitters for Mazatlán 2015 around I know Hollis Swan and his girlfriend Allie were a bit surprised when I grabbed the shot-gun to walk down to the boat launch.  A lifelong Alaskan Hollis is used to and knows guns so he didn't say a word, it just seemed natural to him I suppose.....Well, I took these photo's just this morning. So have fun here Hollis, just be careful around all our friends here at Mile 14.... safety is no accident.