"Poets talk about "spots of time", but it is really the fishermen who experience eternity compressed into a moment. No one can tell what a spot of time is until suddenly the whole world is a fish and the fish is gone." Norman Mclean



So its 4 am and I'm fishing a lipless crankbait in a big river eddy. Thump, I set the hook and a bass rockets out of the water. This smallie looked like it jumped two feet straight up then tail walks across the surface next. And it was a very big smallmouth in the 18/19 inch range. I was expecting maybe a big cat so I had the spool of braid on. When the bass was close it came up headshaking and I pulled it right up the shallows and onto the bank. It flopped and came off but was on dry land. I pounced on it and had it in both hands when it flopped again. This time it landed in shallow water maybe a couple inches. I pounced again pinning it to the bottom as I landed on all fours. It's squirming and flopping and I'm trying to get ahold . The bank sloped very gradually and even when it came loose it was aground half in and half out of the water. I'm crawling thru the water the fish is flopping and long story short it end up getting away and I end up on my hands and knees in ten inches of water, soaked to the skin...

It was a long day at work, I couldn't get the big smallie off my mind. That night I was up for work several hours early and back again. I had a fish on for a second or two. Not long enough to tell the size. Then it was real slow for a long time. On a deep slow retrieve I felt weight and set the hook. No smallmouth this time as the rod bent into a deep c shape and line began to peel off in earnest. But the fish was hooked solidly and there was no drama this time. Just powerful exciting runs until I finally grab the lower jaw of a dandy shovelhead.