Getting Launched

Does having your day end with an ice cream cone make it a good day despite everything?

But I can't start at the end of the story, right?

In this extended family "Launch" refers to only one thing, driving up to Lake Mille Lacs, paying per head to go out on a fishing launch to spend four hours trying for a walleyes. The favorite location up to now has been Twin Pines, just a couple miles south of Garrison. Yesterday doesn't change our appreciation of the place, just makes it physically unlikely we'll go again. Steve is heartbroken.

 

He'd been planning this trip since last summer, at least in general. Once he actually scheduled it, we were the first to sign up. They don't take out the launch tour for less than 4 people, so I was recruited to fill out the group. No, I haven't been fishing for a couple dozen years or more. Yesterday didn't change that. I went with my camera rather than paying for an out-of-state license, literally did not touch a pole, line, or bait other than one leech dropped on the floor which I "rescued" to go on somebody's hook so as not to die in vain.

 

I drove Steve up, his buddy Paul drove Steve's son up from the cities. We both had a very light lunch ahead of leaving shore, the others had a hearty meal in the restaurant on site. Snacks and beverages were packed, along with all those other necessities. They did not include fishing gear since the launch company provides all that. It also didn't include the OFF! I was sure I'd packed. A few hundred biting flies following the boat around were delighted by that omission. One photo I've omitted to take is all the red spots on my ankles. I watched another young fisherman getting sprayed by his uncle for the flies, but within about three seconds he was still getting attacked as fiercely as I was. Those with, say, long heavy denim pants were ignored, but most of us dressed for the for the forecast 88 degrees for the sunny afternoon. The day proved its fondness for reaching 95 degrees.

 

That became important later. Earlier it was just a fun excuse for dunking a hat in the water, then wearing it to cool off.

 

Even without fishing, and despite biting flies, the trip was fun. I got lots of shots of the boat, the lake, fish being caught (we set the day's record of their boats for best catch), and people showing off their fish, however small, including three small perch. Small clouds  puffed up, made all sorts of cartoon faces which, by the time the camera was set to shoot them, morphed into something else, but by then the next cloud made its picture to entertain any imagination.

 

Despite our boat's group (which wound up being 15) having a good day, there was a lot of awful fishing going on. I watched the captain do his best to set depth for people,  adults try to teach kids how to cast, hold their poles, and everybody to reel in without breaking their poles. (You have to wait for them to put the net under your fish before you lift out of the water!!) Both kids and adults were sending their lines anywhere and everywhere, bouncing their poles up and down despite hearing over and over that the fish in that part of the lake at that time of day were on the bottom ONLY. I'm guessing 5 actual fishermen were in the bunch... and I do mean men as it happened. One kept informing everybody who would listen - and some of us who'd stopped listening - about catching the second largest marlin in some contest from his son's 40-some foot boat in the Bahamas. Apparently a marlin under 1,000 pounds is only worth giving away as charity (pat-him-on-the-back). For our trip, four fish were in the keeper slot for size with the walleye rules, and two of them went home to Steve's son's family, filleted by the captain, no extra charge. 

 

Steve's buddy caught 4 walleye - two keepers - including first, most, and biggest on this tour. More fun than that was this trip ended his 8 year jinx of not catching single fish. (Steve takes full credit - for ending the jinx, that is. Steve himself caught zero. His son caught a single small one.)

There were lengthy discussions about the economics of running a fishing launch these days. The price of leeches jumped (for reason covered by a wind gust), gas had just jumped a buck a gallon this week, diesel even more because somehow the Saudis... yada yada. (I'd heard earlier that the extreme heat along our gulf coast kept our refineries from working efficiently, as well as keeping the employees from being pushed as hard as in cooler weather.) Another lengthy discussion was about the lack of Coast Guard getting around to instituting laws and enforcing them on Mille Lacs regarding speeds as boat raced past fishing launches, how close they were allowed to come currently (no regulations), and how the lack of regulations in the industry meant that any Tom Dick and Harry could just invite any fisherman into their private boat, charge them less, and not have to be covered by permits or insurance, thus undercutting the large companies. It all added up to a full boat like this one going out and still loosing money on each trip. What used to cost Steve $25 for a 4 hour trip fishing now costs $48.

Steve not only didn't wind up catching a fish, for part of the trip he just laid down across a flat  surface to stretch out his back. He refused to come in out of the sun, where I spent most of my time to avoid getting burned. He's one of those who burns a little bit and a couple days later has a nice tan. So not considering the rest of the sun's effects, he overheated.

He'd needed an assist from the guys to get all the way down the dock into our launch in the lake, at least 80 feet. We waited until everybody else left the boat before we got off afterwards so as not to delay them, because three abreast across a small dock is slow and tricky. I went ahead with one of the bags of stuff and opened up the car doors. Turning around I saw Steve coming slowly up the dock, paused and drooping between the guys. As I watched, he came a few feet more and stopped again. I decided to shut the car doors and hop in, pull out of the parking lot which was across two lanes of Hwy 169 plus 2 lanes' width of shoulder.  Why on earth make him work that hard? I could cross during a traffic lull and pull onto the shoulder to load him up.

However, once I got the car turned to see approaching traffic, there was a gathering of people and Steve was laid out flat on the road shoulder. Once it was safe I pulled onto the shoulder just a few feet ahead of where he lay, thinking to get him easily into the car for whatever came up next, starting with running the AC.

Things were already out of my hands. Several in the crowd were medical and first responder folks, getting ready to go out on a launch themselves, now delayed a bit of course. (I never did see if their launch waited for them or left without them.) I knew the bag I'd carried had tea left he hadn't drunk, and suggested giving him that, but was overruled. (We don't know his blood sugar.) OK, I had bottled water. (But it isn't cold. Somebody was bringing ice from across the road.) He hadn't eaten much since a very light lunch - now it's suppertime -  and I had snacks right here. (But we don't know his blood sugar. Don't you keep a meter in the car?) No, both of us per our  doctors test once a day and get the A1C tests when we do lab work. So far so good. (Well, we called 911 and the ambulance is on its way. No ETA for how long out though.) So you still can't give him water, out here in this heat and sun and now sitting up in the hot pavement Seriously?? (No we need to get his vitals first.)

The ambo finally arrived, they got him up on a gurney "just to get him off the pavement",  and were getting his medical information from him. So would we let them put him in the ambo? They could get his vitals, give him an IV and get fluids into him, then make a decision as to what next. I still thought it was silly they couldn't have done a couple common sense things while waiting. It's not like he passed out, just while walking got exhausted and his legs refused to go another step. I've hit that wall in the pool before, needing to just stop a minute or 5 before getting out and grabbing a granola bar and some water. We knew he was dehydrated, and it turned out the heat he'd been sitting in for now 5 hours had hit 95... in the shade. He was wearing black clothing in the full sun of course.

While they were dithering in the ambo, asking him what he wanted, him telling them to ask me, them filling me in,  then heading back to talk to him, his friend came and sat in my car with my AC going while his son paced outside, the most worried of all of us. While I was still questioning why commonsense treatment wouldn't be enough, his son was emphatically wanting his dad to go to the hospital, almost as if I wasn't going to take proper care of him while I was waiting for information. As soon as they mentioned that his EKG strip had some irregularities on it, the decision was made. I left ahead of the ambo after verifying directions, thinking they'd be right along (it took another 15 minutes for them to leave). While waiting at the hospital I made several phone calls, interrupting the last when the ambo pulled in. 

They have a very nice, modern hospital in Onamia, except for being icy cold. I got to spend a while in the ER waiting room while they got Steve evaluated and hooked into all their instruments, enough time to identify an other patient-in-waiting with a UTI as wearing my identical shoes, and enjoy the bouncing of a 10-month old on his mom's lap while waiting to have a rash examined. So much for medical privacy, eh? The waiting room walls were covered with 6 huge versions of the same painting, blotches in random clumps of vibrant blue, purple, and green. If somebody switched them around I doubt even the employees could tell the difference.

Eventually I was allowed back to see Steve, who was getting his second bag of saline while hooked up to annoyingly beeping machines. A third bag was finally required, all his levels of whatever they checked returned to normal including cardiac patterns, and he was finally released. The diagnosis was heat exhaustion and dehydration. 

So-o-o-o-o... they couldn't let me give him water and get him into a cool car?

He proved he could walk up and down the hall behind a wheelchair (for balance) and we were finally allowed to leave. By then we were both glad to have the heat on in the car for a bit.

I fed him some chips in the car while we looked for some fast food place that was still open that late in rural Minnesota. The closer you get to the metro, of course, the later they stay open. It became a race to get someplace early enough to still be open because they stayed open late enough to be there for us by the time we finally got there. The magic mix was Cambridge where the McDonald's was still open. 

It had been an interesting drive that far. There was a storm over the metro, with lightning visible occasionally from as far north as we were. We knew where the weather was because our fishing companions called us from there to share the news and check on Steve. We didn't get a drop, just a very few bugs, not enough to impair visibility, and in fact not noticed until this afternoon.

The main topic of conversation on the way home was other drivers' high beams. Something like one in four still didn't seem to know how to dim them, or possibly were just plain assholes. Just ask Steve. He was free with his comments. Most of them didn't bother me, but a few exceptionally obnoxious sets took several seconds to recover from. One car flashed their brights at me from a distance, the usual signal that my brights were on. Once they'd passed me, I demonstrated for Steve what my real brights looked like to prove to him I hadn't left them on. In the process, I saw a brown blur on the road ahead and started hitting the brakes. It was exactly what I suspected, a family of deer crossing the road. The driver hadn't been being a jerk, they had been warning me of what was ahead. I came to a full stop, noticed the car behind me had stopped well back of me with their flashers on for whoever was following them, and we waited until Mom and the first fawn crossed, while the second one stubbornly refused to cross and returned to the other ditch.

In Cambridge Steve got a sandwich and I got an ice cream cone. We let the dog out once home since Paul, who didn't know he'd be dog sitting quite that late, and never answers his phone to hear what was happening, had put her back inside her kennel when he went to bed. Steve hit his chair and didn't wake up till mid morning. Back on his normal schedule, he's absolutely fine. I guess we can call it a good day despite everything, though the ice cream cone at the end had only a little to do with it.