The Man I Married . . . and Carp

It's common knowledge that you should never marry a person expecting him or her to change.  Case in point:  Nine years ago today, I married a man who spent the night before our wedding carp fishing on our beach.  And guess what he did yesterday?

Some things never change.  Except for that boy in the background.  That's a pretty big change from nine years ago.

Yes, yesterday was a grand carp derby on our beach.  Cubby was very much involved.  Especially in the baiting.  He really enjoyed the baiting needle for threading the corn on the line.

And miracle of miracles, A. managed to not lose Mr. Jason's two-inch baiting needle on the beach, despite repeated attempts by Cubby to do just that.

Cubby's buddy Mr. Jason arrived around 6 a.m. with a truckload of professional carp fishing equipment lent to him by a friend.  Did you know there are professional carp fishermen?  Oh yes.  It's apparently a big sport in Europe particularly.  And here we are with our own carp swim (that's pro-talk for a place to catch carp).  So we had a gathering of boys large and small, all intent on catching big-ass, ugly fish.

That's a lot of boys.

They had perfect weather for it.  They caught four huge fish, the biggest of which actually pulled the entire pole set-up into the water, requiring A. to make a dramatic running dive off the dock to save the borrowed equipment.  The resulting fish weighed 25 pounds.  That's a really big fish.

A. also slaughtered a lamb this weekend and grilled half of it for lunch on the beach.  Cubby, as always, enjoyed gnawing on the bones.

He has a history, you know.

Charlie put in an appearance, but wasn't much use when it came to reeling in the big ones.

Considering they outweigh him by fifteen pounds or so, it's probably for the best.

They all had a marvelous, absolutely testosterone-fueled good time.  Because they are all small boys at heart, no matter how old they are.

Happy anniversary to A.  I landed a pretty good one myself.  (Sorry for the fishing pun.  I couldn't resist.)

P.S.  They ate some of the carp fillets for dinner, because, as I have mentioned, the white meat on carp is really good.  Not that anyone believed me.  Bunch of Doubting Thomases, the lot of you.