Unseasonable temperatures and the holidays

I hope you and your family had a Happy Thanksgiving! Hopefully, you didn’t eat too much turkey and your favorite team won its football or basketball game!

We stayed home to a quiet afternoon meal of turkey with fixings and watched football too. My team (go Broncos) wasn’t playing so I didn’t have a dog in the fight and just watched because I like football.

Speaking of couch potato activities, this warmer than normal weather along with the shortage of snow is having an effect on winter activities in the area. The obvious one is lack of snowmachine operations 24/7. Here in Big Lake, once the snow is deep enough, and often when it isn’t, one can hear snowmachines running up and down the sides of the roads literally all day and all night. There are a few ATVs running around, but no snowmachines yet. I like riding ORV’s too, but not just for the sake of making noise!

With no snow, the cross-country skiers and recreational snowshoers are also out of luck. However, most of the hiking trails are open and have firmed up with the freezing temperatures. I know it isn’t skiing, but at least you can get outside for some activity.

The warmer temperatures have not been kind to the hardcore icefishers either. I know some folks have already been out on the Valley’s lakes, but I won’t recommend venturing forth until the ice is thicker — like about a foot or so. I’m a big guy and I’m a bit paranoid about breaking through things, because over the course of my life, I have broken through a lot of things! Now that I’m no longer a kid, the old joints and appendages (like my head!) don’t like hard hits on solid objects. Besides, if the ice is thick enough, I can drive out with all my gear to where I want to fish and not worry about my truck being at the bottom of a lake somewhere (or my snowmachine and icefishing gear trailer)!

In this lull before hitting the ice, I like to go through my icefishing gear to get organized. In the last couple of years, some new style icefishing reels have appeared on the scene. I have a couple and still need to pick up the latest version I have ordered. Getting the rods set up, line on the reels, and the terminal tackle in order with hooks sharpened are all activities I can do while couch bound and waiting for thicker ice. I can also make sure my ice auger engine fires up and runs correctly and the auger blades are sharp for drilling holes through that foot-or-more thick ice!

Also on the indoors front, this is a good time to get caught up on any reloading work you shooters might have sitting on the bench. For a long time, I’ve needed to cast some lead bullets for my blackpowder rifle shooting and now would be a great time to get going on that project. I’ve also been trying to get my ammunition and reloading supplies organized so I can stay on top of when I need to buy more powder, primers or bullets. My wife likes to give me store gift cards for birthdays and Christmas and knowing exactly what I need to keep shooting is a great use for such a gift.

Several years ago, I used one of those gift cards to get a nice fly tying setup, including the vice and hardware needed to produce quality fishing flies. I accumulated the various materials like feathers, beads, and a limited assortment of hooks over time as well. Since I’ve always wanted to do more flyfishing, now would be a good time to tie some flies since I’m sure I’ll lose several in the course of fishing next summer!

I realize Friday is “Black Friday” and many of you are planning to go or are already out shopping. At my house, we intentionally avoid this day because of the crowds and craziness that seems to go with this official tipoff of the frenzied Christmas shopping season. However, if you enjoy that sort of thing, you can venture forth and shop either for yourself or those folks on your Christmas gift list. This can also be a good opportunity to spot items you might like. Subtle hints as to what, where, and how much the item(s) cost can then be directed to your family or friends.