The Annual Father & Son Fishing Trip Deadliest Catch Reenactment Trip

The boy child and I were invited back to the Father and Son fishing trip to Ludington, MI, and I was able to preview some aspects of young master G's burgeoning adulthood that show promise.

First of all, though there was an Xbox available for worship in the main den of our rustic cabin, Roonster only played it because the fishing trip apparently occured during Michigan's annual Freezing Wind and Rain Anti-Fishing 48 Hour Extravaganza. The lake was enjoying robust three foot swells that would make an Alaskan fisherman puke his lunch.

But before I go on, let me thank our host, Sue Scholtons, manager of the Sunset Bluff Resort for having such a gorgeous place to not fish for three days. Sue is a lovely, highly intelligent, can-do kind of person. When we paid our bill, handing her a wad of cash, she drug out a lined sheet of notebook paper that had her accounts listed on it. Then she told us to count it for her. You don't get that kind of down home aunt bee's champion pickles charity sale goodness and trust many places these days. Good thing too--we'd shorted her $100 because we were, um, testing some Single Malts (they passed).

Bass Pro Shop doesn't sell Go Karts

So there we are, all out of pork rinds and cheese doodles in the middle of the day. Everyone is reading (except the real fishermen two doors down who took one look at the sky and promptly left for Harrah's) or out on the porch drinking cheap beer and smoking expensive cigars with pensive look so severe and focused I think we burned a hole in the screen. Sunset Bluff Resort is on Lake Hamlin, a beautiful bulge from the right shoulder of Lake Michigan. It's surrounded by low hills and (duh) bluffs, all ringed at the water's edge by incredibly expensive homes and resorts. It's postcard country, a living motivational poster, heaven. Next to Alabama, it may be one of the most beautiful places on earth.

But the waves were high and the wind was cold and the fish were all lying on the bottom of the lake laughing at us. Usually on windy days the sun is hiding behind great walls of slate gray clouds but our windy day was gorgeous. In fact, it was picture perfect: sunny, calm, 68 degrees. Everywhere you went the wind was so still it didn't even wake the 9,000 American flags flying from every vertical surface in and about Hamlin and Ludington. But the lakes were useless. So we took off into town and spent the GDP of Paraguay on beer and Cheezits at Walmart, stopped for ice, and spied AJ's Go karts.

There was no one in line. There were eight of us. We were full of piss and vinegar, on edge from too much coffee and beer, wads of cash in our fists. We stood in line like released prisoners dropped off at Hooters. We were drooling. The woman running the joint looks at us and says: No, no–you guys want the fast track, in the back. We drug our tongues behind us as we neared the insanely long, serpentine track in the back. We bribed the gatekeeper to lose track of time and spent the next twenty five minutes attempting to kill each other. Our glee was tinged with madness and bloodlust. My son actually t-boned me at full speed when I spun out on a turn. Spinning off into the turn, he yells over his shoulder, "Learn how to drive, bitch!"

Thou Shalt Not Tempt the Lord, God, Thy Father Lest Ye Be Smote, like a dog, yea Verily, like a–CRASH!

Now, I'm a good driver. I come from Noble Alabama shine runners. Cornering's in our blood. I took the turns in that little kart so close, I shaved rubber off the wall. So pretty soon I was bearing down on my only son with the sincere intention of flipping his pathetic little car over the wall and setting it on fire. I was inches away, coming into a turn where my highly advanced, Matrix level speed geometry prescience indicated that he would die in a ball of flames when Tony Lipinski's manic son rear-ended me so hard the chassis shot out from under me and disassembled itself into an abstract sculpture. As I was reattaching my head, he yells back "Learn how to drive, Bitch!"

My Son Succeeds in Advancing the Scope of Fishing Pole Accident Probabilities

The next day it's slightly less like a Hurricane outside so we all suit up and waddle down to the pier where we cast into the wind and watch our lures whipped sideways into the woods. Dutifully, we keep casting. Except for Roon, who, against all odds, had a legitimate malfunction on every cast. I stood there in the wind for all of fifteen seconds before I reeled it in and gave up. Sometimes you have to accept fate. But us city guys don't get many chances to stand in the natural glow of God's handiwork, places like the docks at Sunset Bluff resorts, and they're all trying get the most out of it, trying to hit all the "fishing trip" artifacts. One guy was standing on the dock, back to the gale, his hair blown around his face like he's being raped by a wig, simultaneously lighting a cigar, casting his lure, telling a dirty joke, drinking a beer, and peeing off the dock.

Roon, however, was enjoying only one angler's artifact: the tangle. Against odds so precarious they'd make Nader look like a sure thing, on every cast, Roon wrapped himself in a cocoon of monofilament. As soon as I rescued him, I would turn to walk back up to the cabin to chip the ice off my body and try not to die, and he'd yell out "Dad?" and I'd turn, like Vincent Price, full of menace and apprehension, to find my boy ensnared in his line.

Finally I escaped only to hear his voice outside the cabin seconds after my ass had settled into a Barcalounger. I walk out and every linear inch of the 400 yards of 8 pound test I'd put on that rod was wrapped around his fist.

Next year I'm bringing an aquarium.