Trafford Publishing: Tales From Crotch Lake

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Tales From Crotch Lake

by Harry D. George, Jr.

194 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #01-0054; ISBN 1-55212-653-6; US$22.00, C$25.50, EUR18.00, £13.00

A collection of 23 humorous short stories centered around what really happens when a group of men take annual fishing trips to Canada.

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about the book about the author sample excerpt catalogue info

About the Book

Ever wonder what men really do on their fishing trips? I mean really wonder? Well, here it is - laid out for all the world to see in these twenty-three stories - lived and collected over our forty years' of heading north of the border on our annual fishing trips to beautiful Crotch Lake, Ontario.
Crotch Lake? Yep! That's the name and there really is such a place! Romantic isn't it? And it is on the map, but you'll have to read on to learn more about the lake and it's intriguing name.
The stories in the book are all true...well, they're true for the most part...except where I decided to make stuff up or my memories have been dimmed by the dual fogs of alcohol and....(I can't for the life of me remember what the other fog is. Sorry.)
Except in several instances, the names have been scrupulously maintained to identify the culprits and to preserve for all posterity the perversity of their genius, the magnitude of their gullibility, or their otherwise inane or inadvertent contributions to the merriment that has always characterized our annual fishing, philosophy, and survey-of-the-state-of-Canadian-brewing-and-distilling- arts expeditions.

About the Author

Harry D. George, Jr. (1949- )
Mr. George is an occasionally charming, but otherwise incorrigible, middle-aged, iconoclastic old fart and fisherman. He has been making annual pilgrimages to Crotch Lake since he was fourteen (which was a long time ago).
In addition to fishing, he also enjoys:
writing, traveling, scenic, marine, and travel photography, boat captaining, napping, essaying, spoofing, satirizing, puttering, bullshitting, playing the piano, trombone, and/or euphonium (if you have to ask, don't - but it ain't a tuba), computerizing, and fixing things with duct tape, WD-40, and/or Superglue.
He hates: mowing the grass, cats, politicians, going to work (which interferes with just about everything), neckties and socks.
Education: B.S (plenty) and J.D (Just Did)
Miscellaneous: Mr. George is divorced, has two dogs, five boats, two cars, a house, a girlfriend, and has successfully spawned twice:
Jennifer - an up-and-coming photographer of the first order and a fine fisherperson, and
Harry, III - a dashing young man and a fisherman of the first order who just plain catches fish - The Twerp!

Sample Excerpt

Sometimes an event occurs that has effects far beyond what anyone could ever expect or imagine - an epiphany. Obviously, we all experience such events, both large and small - those events that for some peculiar reason, change our lives. It is rare indeed, however, that one relatively minor event has a major impact on many peoples' lives. Such was Jesse Kirk's simple decision to take a walk on the 1963 Crotch Lake trip.
Jesse was in his 40's then. Jess lived hard, played hard, and fished hard. On this particular afternoon and evening, all were playing hard, Jesse included. The normal late-afternoon cocktail hour had started earlier than usual and ran a little longer than usual. The outcome was that the supply of fine Canadian spirits was put at great risk of exhaustion. Since the liquor stores would have been closed by the time someone could negotiate Louie's lane and drive the additional 20 miles or so to get there (and provided someone could be found who could actually accomplish that feat in addition to getting the key into the ignition), quite a number of the group were reduced to retiring to their bedrooms to silently cry over their very sad predicament.
Jess was not one of them. He was not one to be reduced to tears - even by such a tragedy as running out of booze on a fishing trip. Nor was Doc Potter, but for a different reason. Doc, you see, was much more a true connoisseur of fine Canadian spirits than the others. He was a sipper, not a swiller. Also, Doc, just by his general nature, always seemed to function sober with the same uninhibited mind that others only achieve (albeit too briefly) when they have a mild "buzz" on. In fact, I think most people who have known Doc have appreciated and understood him a lot more fully when they have had such a buzz on than when they did not. Anyway, the need, desire, and effects of alcohol had much less of an allure for him and he did not indulge to the degree of the others. He also had a flask filled with Canadian Club in his tackle box in the boat.
While the others sobbed in their bunks, Doc and Jesse went up to Doc's boat.
"You know, Doc," Jess said, "if we just sit here sippin' your whiskey, some of the others just might come lookin' for us and want some of this mighty fine stuff too. I don't really think there's enough for three or more. Do you?"
"Definitely not! Hell, why don't we just go out fishin'. No one else is gonna bother us there."
So fishin' it was; or actually, fishin' and sippin'. Well, actually, it was more sippin' than fishin'. Well, to be completely truthful about it, it was actually almost all just sippin'. But Doc does maintain that they did do some fishing that evening.
As dusk approached, they headed in. It was just inside the log barrier that encloses the area of the shore where the boats are kept at Louie's that Jesse had a thought. It wasn't a particularly good thought, but it did seem so to him at the time. Perhaps it was just the effects of the afternoon and evening, or perhaps it was just to re-invigorate himself. We'll never really know (and Jesse has never said anything truly coherent about it). In any case, he stood up in the front of the boat, picked up his tackle box and rods and announced, "Doc, I think I'll walk back from here." And with that, he stepped over the side of the boat and onto the water.
He wasn't actually on the water very long - a millisecond or nanosecond might be stretching it a little bit, but I don't think too much. What he was very shortly was on the bottom, in about twelve feet of water, and he was more than a little confused about it all too.
The water at that time of year might reach 55° at the surface, but at twelve feet, it's more like 46° or 47° . Water of that somewhat cool temperature has the effect of clearing all the cobwebs and confusion from your mind very quickly. And after a quick but futile attempt at walking briskly toward the shore and determining that the bottom was rather difficult to walk on (what with the impaired visibility and decided lack of oxygen down there), Jess dropped his tackle box and rods and pushed toward the surface.
Were it not for his robust stature and disposition, it would, indeed, have been doubtful whether he would have made it - his clothes having absorbed a considerable amount of water, and therefore, weight, but Jess was nothing if not strong.
"Well, I guess we know who you're not!" Doc postulated somewhat amusedly from the boat as Jesse broke the surface gasping for air. It wasn't that Doc had ever really had any real doubts about Jesse's identity - particularly not along those lines since, in his younger days, Jesse thought 'turning the other cheek' meant to follow a left hook with a right cross - it's just that the comment seemed somehow appropriate under the circumstances.
Doc re-started the motor and went over to get Jess, who at that point in time was somewhat less concerned about his inability to walk on water than he was about meeting the one who could.

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