A few more days of 50 + degree, sunny weather, and still the ice on the river is solid enough for a few ice shanties to still be in place. It looks pretty rotten, and I haven’t checked it’s thickness lately. From the mouth of the Au Gres looking out over the Bay, it looks like ice all the way across, not good ice, but ice. North of Whitestone Point is open water.
Just got home from a short trip south. I was anxious to see the state of the river. In short: The ice is still solid. Even with the high of 57 degrees, and lot’s of sun, I would still venture a guess that one could chance walking across the river. (but I wouldn’t try it).
Ice on the river today. 20 inches at the deepest point drilled. Didn’t have much luck though, no fish. 
New WII game: Call of Duty, World at War. Haven’t had a chance to jump in yet, so no game report. I can report a bit on the Call of Duty, Reflex online play though. I’ve test myself online a few times now, and although the game itself looks good and responds well, I’m not really happy with the online play. Reason: It seems that every game I get involved with is dominated by CHEATERS. Ok, I can except that there are people out there with far better skills than mine and for the first few times I dutifully served as cannon fodder. When that got old, and I couldn’t figure anyway to stay alive more that a minute or two, I decide to play a little differently. Arming up with the heavy machine gun, I backed into a long blind alley and trained the weapon on the opening. Ok, I should be able to get a least one kill, right? NOT! The first opponent that peared into the alley, got a long burst of automatic fire, right in the face. You think that would do it, but no, he runs toward me, bullets spraying all over his body. Maybe 2 or 300 hits later, he kills me with his knife.
Ok, so I figure he’s cheating. Set up again, same alley. Guy walks by alley, looks in, grenade go’s of at his feeting, and full auto fire pummels his body as he charges toward me and again uses a knife to kill me.
Cheating confirmed, connection broken. I really don’t understand what kick these people get out of playing a game in this fashion. I tend to think they just might have a few screws loose. I wish someone was policing the online Wii games like they used to back when I played PC games online. Cheat=get booted on the game server.
PS: The Dlink seems to be working ok right now, but then it hasn’t been on very long. I had it shut down while I was installing a new 23 in. LCD monitor. A ViewSonic VA2323wm. I like this monitor!
A few hours on the river brought 1 Walleye fingerling, a 16 inch Walleye, and one real nice Perch. The ice is averaging close to 12 inches deep. Ask the ladies, it was a good Valentines day.
We’ve been seeing very cold nights, and a bit of wind, with near 30 in the daytime. Today we’re under a Winter Storm threat, but so far at 4pm, only about a 1/2 inch of snow. We’ve seem some ice fishermen up and down the river, but there doesn’t appear to be a lot of action. I guess the biggest news/worry we have up this way right now, is Hillary Clinton’s commitment to sign us onto the UN’s crazy world gun ban treaty.
Fast becoming a member of the ”older” generation, I have to watch my blood pressure. The last week or so I’ve been struggling with it a bit. It’s been up about 20 to 25 numbers. No changes in medication, so I have to look at other factors. I feel that I’ve been slipping a bit on my salt intake, so that’s an easy (but unpalatable) fix.
The other night I opened a bottle of Merlow, after one glass, my pressure had dropped 10 points, after half a bottle, it had risen 5 points past the original pressure. Conclusion: Don’t drink to much alcohol.
The other suspected issue was the Wii. I’ve been using the Wii Fit system a little over a month, and my pressure as been up, just slightly less time than that, so, I’ve been doing a few tests with it also. I’ve learned that a good hard workout using the exercise bike and the Wii Fit, does an excellent job of lowering my blood pressure. (after I cool down) Unfortunatley, an hour or so of playing “Call of Duty”, runs it up 10 to 25 points. Interesting, and just about as unpalatable as throwing away the salt!
The price for this “grey beard” get’s a little higher everyday.