World without music...

I was born into a world of no sounds, and when I had my hearing replaced, I only used it for communication and never bothered listening to music. As the time went by, I heard of songs, but never really got into them. Only because the people were singing; I liked techno songs back then. Until the day I had a new kind of hearing equipment, I could hear everything better, and I listened to a couple of songs I’ve heard of before, but they sounded so much better. I then scrolled to another genre of songs, and pretty soon I listened to millions of songs that I never got to hear since a whole decade and a half since I was born. I was literally obsessed and constantly waiting for new songs to be up on I-tunes. The world without music would be chaotic, because some music lovers like me would go insane if we went through the whole day without listening to music. I am just like my mom, where I would listen to tons of songs and know which ones they are right away. I can’t even think of why I could easily remember tons of songs but not know tons of concepts that I have to learn from school. I listen to literally any kinds of songs except for country. Country is just a little under my league, I must listen to music that holds a lot of rhythmic verses and has catchy beats that change from time to time. Country is just a “dragging wet mop of noises” My most favorite kind of songs are the ones with their own unique beat and yet catchy, they have to usually be fast paced, like hip hop, pop, rap, and songs that would sound a lot like they are “on the ball” I can’t stand listening to very slow music where they sound as if they put too much passion into their voice, and almost sound as if they were about to run out of words. Besides country songs are usually like the blues, there is usually a depress country singer singing about depressing events, as for I; I’m always wanting to move on and listen to cheery songs. Songs like that surprisingly have a lot of influence on my mood. I would listen to alternative songs while working out, listen to hip hop when I want to spice up the boring mood of knowing that I have to wait or kill time before I could do something fun that I planned on. When I go to places like camping, I would still listen to music. If I was working, at Hy-Vee, I would be tired, not because of the work there, but because there is no music to listen to . So music has lots of influence on my daily living, hearing the same songs still doesn’t matter, I would always “hear it differently”. What would you do on a day without music, perhaps forever? Make your own?

Got fish?

When I was young, I would see others fishing near me and they would catch tons of fish while I catch hardly any. I was about to go insane and realized this guy knew where these fish were. He didn’t have a ranger, a depth finder, and fancy lures. He just had a sheet of all of the depth mapped out in the lake I was fishing in. He just pointed them out and fished the fish out of it. He found weed beds by seeing through the clear water, while I was fishing on sandy grounds where nothing but perch would bite if you were lucky. So I studied how to fish through trial and error. Eventually I got to a point where if I took a rookie out to fish, I would get five before they even get one. It is all about indication where the depth is, oxidation levels, drop offs, structure, and the lures you are using. Other people would just depend on worms. There are variety of fish I go after, but the ones I mainly go after is the Muskie and northerns. They hang out on top of the weed beds when the barometer is in the 29 range and when it’s cloudy and less UV rays out, it’s all about common sense, fish sense. You would likely use blazing neon lures in clear water over those weed beds, and when it is murky, chances are good to catch one if you use darker colored lures, mepps, spinners, and non- crank bait lures work best. Jerk baits work the best when it is an unusually calm morning or evening only with any color. When it’s really cold they are in the bottom zone feeding on perch, so you could use crank baits and troll around the weed beds where they disappear. The image below is an example of the weed bed area, where the pan fish are inside of to protect themselves from big game fish that I am after. To catch muskies you should troll in the empty space on the maximum depth side, because they will hammer on the pan fish that pop out of the weed bed with no shelter. To catch smaller fish like bass, sometimes northerns, crappies, you should take the minimum depth side to cast and reel in lures the classic way.

Some of these monster muskies can be up to 50 pounds, and yes they do live in Iowa, and Palo; the neighboring county of my hometown Cedar Rapids, as well. So it is pretty much like a shark that lives in the lakes of the cornfields. This fish below is the kind of fish I’m after, and is a great thing to win.

Unexplained Opinion of Oddities

I cannot explain accordingly to my opinion why people play videogames so much. I’ve asked a couple of obsessed gamers why they do it. Their answers, “You get experience”. I would say experience of what? They would just keep on saying that it was fun and always trying to topple high scores and impress people. To me, it makes no sense. However, I would occasionally compare how some gamers later in life win nothing but enhanced memory cards of the games they beat. As for I, would win tons of trophy deer, fish, and business experience to increase wages. Wages that’ll help me achieve what I want, a lakeside view lodge where I could see the sunset on the lake in amazement. A place where I could put all of my trophies up, in sports, hunting, fishing, and all the above on my wall except for memory cards. This is obviously my dream home, something that would not clash with all of the trophies I have received on my journey being an outdoorsman. This picture below is what a video gamer would only win. Yep, this masterpiece is formed after tons and tons of hours of useless effort are put into.

It still startles me how these video gamers still want to play and waste their hours away. I took some of these guys to go camping where things can be achieved. They had lots of fun catching their first fish, their first daredevil acts, such as swimming in the river, or doing other red neck like activities that are fun to do but unethical to the city dwellers. But at night they are homesick, they want to go back and play video games, I tell them you could watch the stars and do other things, but they have gotten themselves so blinded up into a net of the two dimensional world of mine craft, neo-pets, and so on. So it is literally possible to get yourself addicted to these games, I never needed a rehab, I just used common sense to realize this activity is stupid and there are better things to do. Think outside of the box, outdoors alike, not in the box, like an x-box.

Camping weekly （If only...)

Every weekend, I either work all day or camp all day and night. This weekend, however, I couldn’t camp, because I have to work a total of 11 hours this weekend. I need to shift my schedule to a point where I could work many hours, still be in cross country practices/meets, and camp all weekend. A dream that would be, I have to wait until October to readjust the schedule to camp. When I mention camping, that could range from Vinton, Iowa to Walnut Acres. Everywhere I go to camp, I meet lots of new people and they have a lot in common, because they love to camp like you too, and they’re by lakes and rivers all the time, assuming that they fish often. Why camping? It’s like going to resorts, but much cheaper and there are usually more people to meet, or invite to one of your bonfire nights and it always ends up being a great night to gather. After all of the adults enjoy their rounds of beer, they’ll go in the camper to pass out and sleep in as for us kids, we would star gaze or try to catch ginormous midnight catfish. There is that wide ten hour frame where adults are not around, and you can do all sorts of crazy stuff. By crazy stuff, I mean jumping off trees into rivers, (yeah at night), and we could sometimes go noodling for big flatheads if there is no snapping turtles in the zone, (I know it’s not legal in Iowa). Then we would do more of a normal type activity, such as playing ultimate, (glow in the dark Frisbees). I would with my friend eat tons of food that is still left out on the tables during the adult’s potluck. They would be glad to know that we cleaned up their tables, but they would have no idea where the food went until the following noon. I just love the sound of fires crackling and feeling the warmth of the air, and watch the stars ranging from Perseids to leniods regions, and see several shooting stars. We would make wishes, and on the nights we see meteor showers, we would end up with a ton of wishes, ridiculous ones. They never come true, unless if you make it happen. Not saying I’m a skeptical person, but I have optimism the size of a planet. The worst part is coming back home, knowing that you have school and a daily route. But I am going to constantly look forward to the next weekend, or week after, if the work schedule is in my way.

Freeze up already!

I am frustrated to see people out there fishing with their boats, they have a huge advantage in fishing, as for my friend and I as broke teens fish off the banks. My friend and I fished for an average of three days a week for the whole summer. We started to figure out fishing patterns and where their next favorable drop offs are. I just can't wait until winter; because I’ll be able to fish in places where other people will be able to with their boats. I'll be walking on ice, pick pocketing all of the giant fish we've been desired to catch. Lake Palo, Iowa, has been known to have some of the largest muskies of Iowa, with several potentional state records, and my friend and I are planning to obsessively go ice-fishing there. We're down with vexlars, aqua-vu, frabil tents, spring bobbers, propane cans, and so forth. We will be able to get geared up to catch these monsters. The lake itself would seem like a spot where only panfish would live, because of the murky waters and several largemouths, like a farm pond. However, it has bunch of striped bass in there, and they behave as "big minnows" for these monster muskies to feed on. So they grow to a certain size and are almost unheard of, because they have so many places to roam in this giant man-made lake. There are hidden structures out there, and I can hint to you Iowans that there is a bridge underwater in that lake, there is a giant drop-off, so the bridge is settled lateral to the ground. Cornering up fish there would be great, like a quarry structure, the fish will be lined up by the wall, until they see a minnow submerging along the bridge, any fish of any size bigger than the minnow is defiantly likely to inhale it. Back to the musky, there is a giant one out there, I don't know specifically where, but I can tell you that the D.N.R stunned them to put these Palo fish on charts and study the statistics of these fish growths, population, and set rules on possession limits, size limit, e.g. The D.N.R apparently stunned a muskie that was well over 56 inches. (Bigger than some flat screen TVs!) I have, however, heard of a story, more like folklore to me, but it took place in Itasca County, Minnesota. It started out with a stormy weather, as the storm passed over, a boat plane soared over the lake, and something that appeared to be a crocodile caught his eye as it sways by the channel, and they flew closer to it and realized that it was a muskie! Apparently this muskie was literally the size of a pondtune floater, which meant this fish was way off charts, measuring up to ten feet, if not more. So that fish there would be considered an off the charts species, almost impossible to imagine. Of course, they never caught the stunned fish, but hundreds of people gathered up to try to find it on the shore assuming that the fish was dead, but was never seen as it submerged back into the waters. Afterwards, resorts sprung up on the lakeside view of this lake, and people pass on the story that has been carried on until this very day, which is 40 years since it happened.

Open Season yet?

The colors on the trees of Iowa is turning into red, orange, brown, in very few spots of the woods. The temperature is starting to drop, the daylight is starting to get shorter and shorter. The open season is about to begin later. I have been tracking for these whitetails through deer cameras, searching for scrapes, and enjoy viewing these monster bucks polishing the velvet off their antlers. It is about time to find a perfect tree stand to get these trophy deer. I want to find what I would call "natural funnels" where the trail is enclosed into a single line, because there are obstacles such as fallen trees, creeks, thick bushes, steep hills, that the whitetails would walk around instead. When they walk around these obstacles, my tree stand will be preserved at a blind corner where they will walk around towards me.

There's more to hunting than just getting deer, I see lots of things happening while i'm on the tree stand. I've seen coyotes attacking birds and snatching them away, i've seen squirrels riding on some does, it just amazes me how many things could possibly happen in just a plain vast forest. I also enjoy seeing birds with red dots on their heads that looks very similar to a cherry, and the fruit flies would try to get to the cherry, and before you know it, the bird snaps at them and poof! The flies are gone. I enjoy seeing them flocking away at sunset as well. I love watching the sunset while i'm on the treestands, the forest gets darker before the city does. As I walk out of the dark forest at night, the moonlight is like a streetlight with an exception that the light is blue/grayish color; you could see literally everything in the grassy fields, the crickets, grasshoppers, minks, mice, rabbits and some coyotes howling. The creek is flowing so quietly, the littlest noise you'd hear is the current changing, with a single tiny minnow darting across the crystal clear creek.

In the daytime it is actually suprisingly quiter than the nights in the neck of the woods. I would sometimes sleep and then wake up at an instant because I would hear leaves scruffling, but it's not the whitetails walking through, usually it's the squirrels flipping leaves over to find nuts. (They're so insane somedays I wonder if they lost a wedding ring in the leaf pile) Overall, the relaxation, excitement, patience, curiosity, and readiness always pays off when it comes to hunting.

Why do I love freezing?

I love being in the outdoors world, especially when it is winter themed and there are lots of boreal trees and boundary waters up north. When lots of people think about winter, they would think about staying in their house and have their "winter blues" until the snow melts away. For me, it's more like I have the "summer blues", becasue I can't wait until winter, to be able to do so many activities! There is ice-fishing, hunting, camping, skiing, snowmobling, hiking, and so many more on the list. I love ice-fishing, it's actually pretty warm in the tent, and some people I know live in a ice-fishing tent that owns a refridgerator, microwave, flooring, couch, and tv, just like a real house! With an exception that there is a hole in there that fish get caught through. I try to catch northerns through the ice, because at that time of the year, they pack on pounds and you could use aqua-vu to see the northerns the size of fence posts swimming through the waters, and the best part, to see it inhale the minnow you have on. I go hunting for monster whitetails out there, especially around the Burglinton, Iowa region, where they have huge antlers! (Big enough you can't grab your hands around their brow tines) I just love the feeling of being able to ambush whitetail deer as they walk through the snowy grounds, easier to track their blood trails, and the best part is going back to the hotel to soak in the spa. To talk about what happened during the hunting session, there's always a story. Not only do I ski, but cross country skiing seems to be one of my "must" do. I want to go out skiing at night to see snow reflecting upon the moonlight in a rich silvery glittery pattern. I enjoy these things, even when I go sledding with my neighbors, we will still see the same pattern on these snow grounds during moonlight time. Hiking has the same perception too, just different because you're out to see wolves, moose, deer, and anything that may catch your eye, (even the sasquatch!). Last thing I would do after enjoying that outdoor activity is go back inside to sit by the fire and drink hot coca, or I could be watching the wintery constellations in the sky to watch for geminids meteor showers or northern lights if I'm lucky enough while being in a spa on a roof (If only I could afford that), and listen to music. There's just lots of things I love to do during the wintery seasons, I could care less about the temperature, tis the season to be jolly! No more dealing with hot weather, sweating unconditionally, and getting heat strokes like I would easily get. No more dealing with mosquito bites, bugs buzzing by your ears, and sitting in hot cars, sitting on metal benches, and more pain that involves heat. When winter comes by, be prepared to agree with me how much fun winter is as I demonstrate how great this weather is and what to do in such freezing weather, don't fight the cold, enjoy it.