A Letter from the Cali Boyz

“Don’t get us kicked out of the club during an El Nino year!”

If that ain’t a motto to have tattooed on your forearm, I don’t know what is.  If you think I’m being dramatic, well, let me tell you boys, Zero Dark Muley (Kevin’s new handle, aka Cold Train Kev) and I upgraded out of the rice.  As a wise duck hunter once said, “the rice is dead.” Yep, we found ourselves in a high-high-high dollar club last year.  We left the rice and moved down Highway 5 to the northern grasslands where Teal and King Sprig rule and they are entertained all day with legions of Joker Spoonies.  Side note, nothing worse than a duck decoying in hot hot hot and helicoptering it to discover it was an orange feet and orange fat spoon digger. Any way, where was I?  Oh yeah, we started out with the best of intentions last year.  The plan was for Zero Dark Muley to move the trainer down the week before the opener and I’d fly in from a back east work trip the night before the opener, rendezvous, and hit the club.  Great plan, except when I landed and turned on my phone, I got the following voicemail: “Hey dude, I haven’t moved the trailer yet, come by my house after you land and we’ll pull it down tonight.”

I’m the definition of pissed upon hearing that because I know this shit is going to go south.  I land at 7p…by the time we hitch up and get to the club, we could find ourselves in a narrow parking with a 30’ travel trailer and no way to turn around.

Eff it…I guess that’s why they call it mutual destruction.  Well, fast forward…we arrive at the club at midnight and the entire place is a graveyard, everyone is asleep and we got Cold Train’s diesel engine growling and the gravel crunching beneath the tires.   We’re “those guys” right now and we survey the parking lot to see all of the trailer parking spots are taken.  We saw one “space” in between a pole barn and a power pole next to a canal that we thought could fit the trailer – maybe.  I don’t want to give Zero Dark Muley too much credit, but let me tell you, in one try ol’ Cold Train parted the red sea and backed that sumbitch in to a spot tighter than a gnats you know what with a first pitch walk off home run.

We stayed up another 3 hours celebrating how great our new spot was and finally turned in by 4a to get ready for the morning blind pick.  Or so we thought.  Turns out we parked in an off limit spot, but the next morning there were too many trucks that drove in to move it.  We like to call moments like this, the highest of highs and the lowest of lows.  So being the responsible types, we did the right thing and left a note on our trailer, “We will move our trailer next week – sorry.”

The problem was, we didn’t know how low we were about to sink.  Have I ever told you that Zero Dark Muley’s original Indian name was “Add an Hour?”  How’d he get that name?  Whatever time he told you he would be some where, just add an hour and that would be his actual arrival time.

Well, as it turned out, ol Add an hour became Add Six Weeks as his wife had their second baby and he went Seal team 6 dark on duck season.  The longer he stayed away from the club, the more pissed the club owner got upon seeing a 30’ travel trailer parked next to the canal in an area he was adamant he didn’t want anyone parked.  He left notes, left voicemails, he called me up in person and dropped more M*****Fers and C***Suckers in one sentence than I thought was possible.  Apparently our four letter descriptions were adjectives, verbs and nouns.

Anyway, I don’t mean to dwell in the past and keep talking about last year, but you can imagine how pissed the club owner was that Ol Add a Month parked in an off limits spot and then didn’t return to move it.

 So fast forward to this year, somehow we got invited back, which not everyone else in the club could say the same thing.  El Nino year is here so whatever we do, “don’t get kicked out of the club!”

Once we got through a slow November, the hunting has generally been decent with some lights out days.  I was out today (Jan 9^th) and got 6 teal and a Sprig.  I’ve had a few limits this year, as has Zero Dark Muley.  Had some slower days as well…at one point I hit rock bottom, thought about hanging up my cleats and retiring from this duck game, but that’s a story for another day.  For now, enjoy the video of some ducks flying around this morning taken from one of the other club members and a few pics of the club.

Hope all you Hoy 7 boys are well.

In Search of the X,

Gaucho Wino