Am I turning in to Bill Dance?

[Mike S.]

Gets expensive quick, doesn't it?

[Waterfoul]

There's a spot on Wabasis Lake we call the Outlaw hole.  Always produces fish.  Must be the B&R Outlaw/Symetry combo I "placed" on the bottom as structure.

[djkimmel]

Welcome Bill.

[Waterfoul]

But hey... we won the tournament that night.     Almost made enough to pay for my "mistake."

[Dan]

First trip of the year after not having fished much the last couple years. I go to a lake that has the ramp way up at the top of a hill. My brother-in-law dumps me in. I prime the bulb, hit the key expecting it to sputter with the oil that's in it from winterizing. It cranks right up on the first turn of the key, and I'm geeked. Turn around to back the boat out a ways and see the bilge pump has kicked on and water is shooting 2 feet high out of it. Yep, forgot the plug. Luckily my brother-in-law had his phone and I called him to bring the trailer back down.
I have a few pieces of equipment strewn around. Stepped on my long handled net once and it teeter tottered a new rod and reel right off my deck on Duck Lake. We GPSed the spot came back after the tournament with a aquaview just to find weeds about a foot high on the bottom which swallowed up the rod and reel.
The net I stepped on was a replacement for the one that blew out of the boat up on Burt during an old Michigan Federatiion event up there.
Only fell out of my boat once. I had just waxed it and had just put new electronics in it. I was throwing a rattletrap and playing with the graph. The rattletrap hooke the rod tip and when I went to throw it the now out of balance rod shook out of my had and hit the deck. I quickly kneeled down to get it and my knee (wearing blue jeans) hit the freshly waxed gunnel and as fast as that I was in the water. I could see the rod sinking so I knew after summersaulting in which way was up so I decided to head for the surface forgetting the rod.
As I was climbing in the boat a guy comes out of his cabin to ask if everything was alright. He asks if I lost anything and I said yes a rod and reel. He told me to go home and get dry clothes on and he would put his scuba gear on and have the rod for me when I got back. Bruce, the scuba diver, and I have been friends ever since. Found out he lives not to far from me here in town.

[djkimmel]

And you don't have any of THAT on video either, do you?!?

If we had all this stuff on video I would buy greatlakesbloopers . com and we could make a... well, enough money to buy 2 or 3 new fishing rods anyway... but it would be great cabin fever entertainment!

[Firefighter Jeff]

   Well, thank goodness this has all happened over many years and hundreds of fishing trips, other-wise my wife would have made me give up the sport long ago.  lololol  Reading the other posts sparked more memories.  Maybe I have been trying to forget  !!!!  
  Threw an anchor off the bow once and the rope snagged a inline spinner on my baitcasting rod. Just kinda slingshotted it into the water after releasing it  !!!!
   I have on more than one occasion left the transom straps attached and floated the trailer instead of the boat when launching.
   More than once forgot to put the plug in.  I don't always retrailer.  I just let it pump out.  Did that on St. Clair the first trip this year.  Just told my novice co-angler that it was pumping out the rain and transome wash-over.  lololol   I will say that it takes a while between pump outs.

   Feeling better yet MikeS ??   lololol  

[Mike S.]

Oh yeah!  This is great stuff.  I put this post up to give everybody a laugh, and it turns out to be almost therapeutic.

I have to go out to Wolf Lake here pretty soon.  My buddy's cousin just got his little outboard fixed, and took his girlfriend out on the boat. He ran to the middle of the lake, and they sat and did who knows what. When he went to start it, the motor was apparently in gear, and he was giving it gas.  It fired right up, and was turned to the right.  Needless to say, the boat starts spinning, he who is standing up in the boat gets thrown overboard, and then the motor falls off the back of the boat.  He wants me to go try to find it with my side imaging.  Now that was dumb!

[Firefighter Jeff]

  Call him Bill Dance Jr.      Let us know how it goes with the SI   I'm sure if I try hard I could come up with a few more "issues" on the water.   
     It all started way back when.  I remember my Dad taking me out in a little rental rowboat.  I started out using cane poles to fish.  On this trip he let me use a "Real" rod and reel.  Closed face Zebco 202.  First cast I make, I throw the whole thing right in the water.  Needles to say Dad was none too happy. The bobber was floating right next to the boat, so he got it back. He just had to pull all the line off the reel.   

[djkimmel]

I had to so that once for a Big Ten college angler on Lake St. Clair!!! I think he was on the Purdue team?