Thursday the 14^th of June started out pretty much like all the Trout bum summer mornings: Up at the crack of dawn, exercising, shower and having a healthy breakfast. NOT. I mean I like the idea of these things, but morning is not to be wasted on that kind of crazy routine. I like to start the day with a cup of good black Sumatran coffee and a clean T-shirt.

Anyway things were on schedule when I got a call on my fishing line, it was a guy named Kirt Gunn he and a friend were in Seattle for a film festival, they were filmmakers from New York City.

  He booked a trip for the next day Friday the 15^th so far so good. In our short conversation he told me about some of the famous water he fishes back home, he also told me he was basically a dry- fly fisherman. Dry- fly fishing in the middle of June on the Yakima River is a late evening caddis event; the rest of the day is usually fishing subsurface under a bobber, productive but not visually cinematic. Remember, fly fishing and particularly good dry fly fishing is always about conditions and timing, ALWAYS. You have to be at the right place at the right time with the right gear, a little like over throwing a third world government the timing must be perfect.

Friday morning I got up and made coffee and looked out the window, it was raining!! Unforcasted rain in the desert, beautiful overcast drizzling rain. I stood in the back yard drinking coffee under the sycamore tree and did the dance of joy. Why?? Let me explain: the perfect conditions for fishing dry flies is overcast, drizzle and no wind. The bugs in this case Pale Morning Duns, Cahill’s, and Pale Evening duns.

 This is the way it works, when the bugs come to the surface to hatch and the humidity is high or it’s raining, it takes them a long time to dry there wings and fly off, they drift hundreds of feet struggling to get airborne. Thousands of huge Mayflies like miniature sailboats drifting over the heads of predatory rainbow trout. In these conditions even the most wary old lunkers lose all control. They just go nuts.

I got down to business, made lunch, collected the gear and hooked the boat to the truck. I was ready to meet my clients and I was stoked. At 8 the phone rings. Kirt’s rental car burned up a wheel bearing just outside Seattle; the rental car company said they were on the way with another car. He said he’d call when they were back on the road.

TICK, TICK, TICK. The clock is running and its still raining. At 9:30 the phone rings, the rental company sent a van with a spare tire, It’s a bearing not a bum tire you boneheads. They assure him the new car is on the way, he’ll call me.

 TICK, TICK, TICK. It’s raining and I’m pacing the backyard in circles like a chained wolf. At 10:40 I call Kirt, he’s still stuck on the freeway, I can tell he’s close to cracking, and says he’ll call me back.

 TICK, TICK, TICK. Now I’ve had a pot of coffee and, like a character in an old Mel Brooks movie, I am starting to go completely HIGH ANXIETY. It’s still raining.

 TICK, TICK, TICK. Is this were I buy the farm? Do I really feel like I have two sacks of concrete pushing down on my chest?

 At 11:45 I call Kirt again, No replacement car, just stuck on the road in the rain, I call the game, by the time they get here the hatch would be over.

So now it was finally over. There was really nothing for me to do but go fishing after all the lunch was made and it was still raining.

Kirt I would tell you how the fishing was, but lets just say it was cinematic and leave it at that.