I started fishing a little lake just south of Somerset, Ohio, called Clouse Lake about 35 years ago. Matter of fact, when I first started fishing it, I fished with a fly rod. One day, I was fishing and noticed this older gentleman trying to get a little plastic boat on his car after a hard day’s fishing. He was using a fly rod too. We began chatting and discovered we lived about 10 miles from one another. He lived in Pleasantville. As the conversation closed, he said he would call me sometime and we would go fishing together.
I thought “Yeah, I bet he calls me”. Imagine my surprise when he called two days later and wanted to know if I wanted to go fishing with him the next day.
Earl and I became good friends, we fished Clouse many times and about every other place that we could find, that held water. He was an excellent fly fisherman. There was only one thing wrong with Earl, he liked to catch bluegill. Actually, he loved catching Bluegill. He showed me how to clean bluegills in a matter of seconds. Here is how he did it. First, he got out his board and filet knife. He would scale the fish. Second, He would cut around the head but not clear...