The Monkeyface News

Insiders Only

So... in my never ending quest to figure out the next path (so to speak), I have been meeting with various publishers to see about the possibility of writing a book.  As it turns out, there may be a few openings for a fish-obsessed man of my ilk.  And what with all this exposure (I will never fail to point out that "exposure" is a thing arctic exlorers and mountain men routinely die of), it seems like I stand a fair chance of getting something published THIS TIME.

 

Actually, Robert Falcon Scott didn't die of exposure... though he certainly suffered from it. The man who found his body reportedly exclaimed, "So this is what it is to die of scurvy!"

 

 

A-hem.  So I've been compiling stuff, and working on some new ideas, and coming up with a book for the masses.  And I'm really digging it.  It's been fun.  A good challenge.  But last night as the beer and whiskey flowed, and the cigar smoke wafted in the air, and I began to realize that my date for the evening was pulling a George Jones, I pulled out my little black book and I wrote, long hand (imagine that!) the contents page for the book that I would really, really, really like to write (that's right three reallies). Not the one I should write, or that might get published... feel me?  The one I want to write. Anyway, here it is... the contents page... with photos attached for your viewing pleasure:  

 

 

The Perfect Book:

 

  An Insiders Field Guide to the Fish and Fishermen of San Francisco, vol.1 (1 of 7)

 

 

1.  The Surf Perches

            a.  Why They Suck. 

            b.  Why They Don’t Suck.

            c.  What Ms. Nguyen Says And Why We Must Listen to Her.

            d.  The Akino Redtail Surf Perch Club of 10-mile Beach Point Reyes.

            e.  Some Interesting Factoids.

            f.   Well If You Absolutely Have To… Ways To Prepare Them.

            g.   Distinguishing Qualities of the Different Species.

            h.  Of Pogies and Men.

                --Pissed off Pete and the end of the world.

                --McKentral and the boys.

                --The Poster Boy Of The Pogie Fisherman's Assoc. Of California, aka: "Fuck The Police"

 

 

 

2.  The Rockfishes

            1. Why I Have the Right:

                        a. blood on the paper work, vomit on the deck...

            2.  The Species You Need to Know and Why.

                        a. God takes up fish painting

                        b. Brownies in the drains.

                        c.  Grassies get fuckin big, yo.

                        d.  You’re The Greatest Deckhand of them all, ma’am.

                        e.  Tacos al rock cod

 

Rockfish continued...

 

                        f.  Rod and reel vs. drag and rape

                        g.  Beers With Milton Love (hoping this happens  some day)

                        h.  Why being a nice guy matters more than putting people on the fish

                        i.   The truth about all those canaries

 

 

 

3.  Sturgeon

 

                        1. ... and the Russian mob

                        2. ... and the law of diminishing returns

                        3. The golden sturgeon in the idiot’s mind

                        4. Alviso Creek was not designed for your Grady White, sir.

                        5. How the slot limit can ruin a man’s week

 

4.  Baitfish

 

                        1.  To eat or not to eat?

                        2.  A short user-friendly history of the Pacific sardine.

                        3.  Surf smelt and the glories of summer…

                        4.  Dabblings in night smelt,

                        5.  Dabblings in dabs:  Mr. Morgan and the myth of sustainability

                        6.  Midnight toppies in Lake Merrit

                        7.  Eating tuna and eating mountain lions is the same thing

 

                               Von Sharky shows off his boiling crab water burns.... 

 

5.  Fishermen I Have Known: Biographical Sketches of Exceptional Fellows

                        a.  How Did This Man Survive? Niko Von Sharky and the Jaws of Death

                        b.  Comes With Boat Attached. The Nomadic Ways Of Mike D.,

                        c.  “Big Rockfish at 340 Feet.”  The story of California’s most notorious fisherman.

                        d.  100 Miles Past The Farrallones in a 17 Foot Whaler or:  San Francisco’s Last                               Professional Harpooneer

 

                                                          --End Of Book 1--

 

Hey, just for the hell of it I sat here for an extra hour and wrote one of these as a short story.  I randomly selected: How The Slot Limit Can Ruin A Man's Week and gave it a go.  If I get any kind of response to this, say, five comments, I'll post it.  

(Honestly, I like to throw things like this out there every now and then to see how many people are actually reading this blog to the end, and how many are here to download pictures of Lana Turner, Raquel Welch etc... no worries either way)

--Kirk-out

 

Monday Morning Movie (on Tuesday Morning)

 

{see the top right margin to book a coastal foraging tour}

All right, all right!  Sorry. Jeez. Give me a break.  I uploaded the damned thing last night and then forgot to post it.  

The movie came out rather choppy and incomplete because I kept seeing landmarks in the background and frankly, I want to keep the smelt to myself.  Feel me?  Anyway.  I promise, I absolutely promise that my next fishing video will include something larger than a smelt.  Thing is, the Monday Movie thing is whatever I happen to be doing that week and, as it happens, I tend to be doing a lot of smelting of late (surprise surprise).

 

Why post a picture of Godard when I can post a picture of his wife and leading actress Anna Karina?

 

Anyhoo... here it is... again... I make no claims to being the Felini of fishing videos... wait a minute... f---k that noise.  That's exactly what I am!  Though maybe I should say... Godard.  I am the Jean Luc Godard of fishing videos... okay... maybe the SF Weekly article has given rise to a bit of grandiosity in these parts. How could it not?  Seeing pictures of myself in kiosks and cafes all week. Hot chicks stopping me on the street to talk about fishing (this actually happened, not once but twice... okay one of them was my wife but who's counting).

In the end I must say, it is a curious sensation to see someone scoop up a handful of dog shit with your face.  And yesterday I chanced upon a homeless person's mattress that was composed of about ten SF Weeklies (there may have been a guardian in there too) laid end to end, and evidently, peed on.  Hey, but that's the price of fame. N'est pas? 

Anyhoo... have at:

 

 

Abalone Fever

{My new post is directly beneath this note to SF Weekly readers}:  

 

Note to SF Weekly Readers:

 

Hello folks! click the link to book my upcoming Forage SF Tour on Sat., April 23rd.

I am also offering my own private tours.  Look at the right margin under "My SF Tours."

Sea Forager Tours is my own coastal foraging tour co.  I am right now offering three tours, click the links at right, to check 'em out.

 

 

 

        Site of recent rock picking expedition

 

Decided to make the mad dash up to our blustery northern Ca. coast last night (actually two nights ago). Got the wake up call at 12:30am.  Slammed the boiling black stuff and hit the road at 01:00, bleary and somewhat regretting the 2 pints I had consumed at 10:00.  

A somewhat goofy adventure to be sure.  With a troupe of three very silly men plus one teenager.  I've always said: although I will probably never attain greatness as a fisherman, I am, at the very least, intelligent enough to hang out with a few great ones.

 

                                                 The great Dengue Fever

 

I have sung the praises of Mike D. before, but really, there is no fish/mollusk/arthropod on the west coast that Mike can't put you on. Most of the time he'll have you throw them back... but on occasion he can be convinced to don the steely eyes and bloody pants of what he laughingly calls: "the harvester of sorrows."  And yesterday was such a day.  One thing about Mike, no matter what you want to fish for, he is happy to oblige.    If your passion happens to be pogies, smelt, greenlings, or herring--no problem.  A jack of all trades this guy. Suffice it to say, without Mike I would not have caught a damned thing.  Plain and simple.  

Anyway... I made a rather silly movie on the subject, (see below), and during the making of it was kind of toying with different sound tracks... then, last night, the fishwife and I went out to the Fillmore to see Dengue Fever, and the thing suddenly made sense.  No denying that abalone is the most sought after local mollusk, especially amongst the South East Asian contingent.  So although Dengue Fever is doing the Cambodian 60s pop thing, it's close enough geographically to Vietnam to kind of make sense in this context... and either way the song rips. But before we get into the cinematic side of things, here's a few pictures of the happy and unhappy results of abalone picking. 

 

Happy:

 

Unhappy: 

 

     Why gloves were invented. The unhappy result of rock-picking abalone.

 

At the end of the day we stopped off at Goat Rock to fish for perch and see if any day fish were running. Nada on both counts.  Did however catch a glimpse of the barebutt Pacific howler monkey, Homo Dvorakzensus. You'll have to keep your eyes peeled for it at the end.

Anyway... here's the latest filmic masterpiece:

 

 

 

Welcome SF Weekly Readers

{If you haven't read the article yet, go here: Sf Weekly}

 

Hello folks! click the link to book my upcoming Forage SF Tour on Sat., April 23rd.

I am also offering my own private tours.  Look at the right margin under "My SF Tours."

Sea Forager Tours is my own coastal foraging tour co.  I am right now offering three tours, click the links at right, to check 'em out.

 

Kirk shows how a guy with chronic lumbago lifts an A-frame net so as not to throw out his back!

Also, feel free to wade though the hundreds of posts on this blog.  I have all my favorite Monkeyface movies available in the right column. Use the search button to look up stuff on herring, sturgeon, night smelt or anything else your fishy little hearts desire.

 

Lots of "blind tossing" lately. The day after this photo was taken the surf smelt ran thick! Why does it always seem to happen the day after or the day before?

 

Off to abalone land. (I'm writing this Monday afternoon). Hope that absolves me for abdicating my Movie Monday responsibilities.

Back on Tuesday night. Expect my first abalone movie on Wed.

Anyway... until then...

--Kirk out 

Bette's In The Bay

 

 

{To decode this post go here: Our Girls}

 

 

                                Bette's in the bay

 

Looks like Bette Davis has suddenly shown up in the bay, even with the current latte-colored water.  And what's this?  Could it be?  Did I actually see it with my own eyes?  Six surf caught Lanas in one stretch of 5-mile long state beach?  In that fiercely independent city state, just south of SF.  

 

        Now wouldn't you rather look at Lana than another crusty old photo of M. saxatalis?

 

Well... Yes.  I did in fact see these things.  So the question is... what does it mean?  A brief bump or a promise of happier days ahead?  

Ah Spring is in the air.  Even if a thick cold bank of fog seems to have followed it in.

 

 

Surf smelt running like gang busters yesterday in a rather unexpected locale where no one but the world's most insane smelt jumper would ever have thought to look.  And at such a weird tide... incoming (both local ocean osmerids tend to run on outgoing tides). Evolution will eventually come to favor fish that spawn at random, unpredictable times, so I guess these guys were far more evolved than the rest... lot of good it did them.

What else.  This morning at 4am someone caught a 60-80 pound white sturgeon at Brisbane Pier.  And if you're fool enuff to go and try for a repeat you get what you deserve.  A whole lot of squack.  The great pier/shore fisherman, Champion de la Banana was quick to remind me today that sturgeon are in the bay all year, and that an April sturgeon is no huge surprise.

Okay.  this is just a short one.  More on Monday.  And hopefully another filmic masterpiece.

 

 

Oh yeah... I caught about a dozen grass shrimp at ocean beach yesterday at low tide.  All in one scoop! Very encouraged by this new use for my A-frame... hmmm wonder if its legal?  Better go check on that.

Kirk-out

 

 

 

Movie Monday 2: Night Smelt Madness

 

                                  Loren Wilson's first dip of the night.

 

 

Ha!  To all of those who thought I'd bailed!  Here it is... Monday receding before us... like a good smelt tide... and I just finished this latest masterpiece... say what you will about quality.  Ha! You can't deny it's a good (and appropriate) song!

Who Loves The Sun?  Not your average night smelter... he loves the moon... or a quarter of it anyway.

(Does anyone get this but me?)

Heading out to the smelting grounds again!  

Here's another for the ages:

 

 

Les Miserables

 

I wish.  Still all too human.  (Photoshop alterations by Chris Cummings)

 

It's official.  I've lost my mind.  Drove down to the smelting grounds at 3AM to fish the last three hours of the midnight tide.  Why?  Because I'm a Goddamned lunatic that's why.  See what happens when crass commercialization enters the equation?  No longer is it a matter of having a slightly eccentric hobby. Now it's pure economics.  And as such I am a complete failure (all this for 8 pounds of night smelt!!!!!) Parking behind a stranger's house in a quiet residential neighborhood at 3AM, (big sign on the fence: this property protected by Smith and Wesson) dragging myself and my gear down to the shores in pitch blackness, fording a small river to get to the spot. Now there's something I've never done before.  Never forded a river at 3:30 of a Monday morning.  Actually I was thinking of all my friends as I did this.  I was thinking of Chris and Megan, Max and Kat, Eric and Nikki, my very own beautiful fishwife, all lying in their cozy beds, snoring away... as I struggled against the elements: braving wind, rain, and river.  A veritable modern day, Monday morning, Merriwether Lewis.

 

Thing is, the popular wisdom on night smelt is that they run on the quarter moons: first and last. Astrologically, this also happens to be the time when sunset coincides with the right tidal conditions. But here's the thing... I have long suspected that this quarter moon theory has nothing to do with smelt spawning behavior and everything to do with human fishing preference.  Night smelt are nocturnal.  This much we know.  Humans, tend to want to get off the beach at a "reasonable" hour.  Fish the quarter moons and in most cases you're done by 8:30pm.  But it has long been my contention that smelt spawn on any out going tide.  But that very few people are lunatic enough to show up at 2:30am to prove it.  

Enter Lombard of the Intertidal. 

 

Smelt Haiku #21

Shivering and wet

Cold in the lonely darkness

All for eight small pounds

 

 

Ugh. I feel dirty inside. Or maybe not dirty... just poor.

Thing is... the fish were there.  And then, as the tide turned... (or was it the approach of dawn) poof... they stopped.  So, in fact, my theory was correct. There was a thick school of fish just sitting in the trough... chilling out.  I could see them with my flashlight (Q: what kind of commercial fisherman studies the fish with a flashlight for 45 minutes before deciding to start fishing? A: a bad one).

Anyway, by the time I started fishing it was too late.  I figured I had a good two hours of darkness but the fish abruptly disappeared at 5:17.

 

 

 

Kinda tired.  Imagine that.  Tired after driving an hour from my apt., wandering the beach at 4:00am, fording rivers, getting back home at 7:00 and then attempting to write this.  Without coffee.  Wait. That's the problem... back in 5.

Okay.  Where wuz I? Wow.  Maybe I should invest in one of those 1/4 inch mesh throw nets that cost something like 90 dollars.  (Any mesh size bigger than 1/4 will gill small fish like nighties and anchovies-- and believe me, nothing is less enjoyable than picking 25 pounds of gilled night smelt out of a throw net with wet frozen fingers in the dark).  

 

20,000 Leagues Under The Sea

 

 

                                       Best thing about the book: the pictures.

 

 

I know it's like a hundred years too late but I'd really like to take a few minutes to critique this miserable fucking novel.  For years now, given my oceanic inclinations, the fact that I have never read Jules Verne's supposed classic has been a source of great consternation. So I was quite thrilled when the novel was suggested as the next installment in my current book club (known to insiders as The Adult Literacy Project, or ALP).  So I started reading.  The build up at the beginning was reasonable, predictable, and lame, yes, but reasonable nonetheless.  But then, suddenly, 200 pages into the sucker it's like, what happened to the plot?  In short unless you're Milton Love or Jaques Cousteau, I really don't want to read your endless fucking descriptions of fish.  Especially if all you're doing is listing them.  Okay, Nemo is a compelling character.  At least Verne had the sense to keep his origins vague.  In fact the mystery of Nemo is the only compelling thing in the entire book.  And then-- in the big escape scene--dude gets bonked on the head, wakes up and voila! They're free! Book over.  About as profound as an episode of Mannix (another fictional character who could not get from point A to point B without a convenient knock on the head).

And one more thing.  Where are the chicks?  Not a single female character in the entire novel!  Where's the fun in that? 

In short, I call bullshit on this supposed classic. You know what 20,000 Leagues is?  It's Moby Dick if you cut out all the stuff about Ishmael, Queequeg, and Ahab and just go with the "Cetology" chapter.  

Yes, yes... I understand, that it was (sort of) the first-ever science fiction novel. I understand that the oceans were once as mysterious as deep space.  I get it.  But regardless of all this... the book still blows. 

 

Les Miserables

 

                                  Now let's talk about a writer.

 

By contrast, and just in case anyone wants to accuse me of Franco-phobia, the Adult Literacy Project has moved on to bigger and better things. Decided to read that 1250 page behemoth of romantic fiction Les Miserables.  One of those books that has been so fully embraced by popular culture that no one really feels compelled to read it (and seeing the musical Les Mis does not count).  Let me say this for the record, anyone who has not read this book is not quite fully human.  Les Miserables is... oh man.  When Cosette falls on her knees and begs God to have mercy on her... I was a sobbing, snorting wreck (it's true I make a lousy atheist).  Gavroche in the belly of the elephant, nonchalantly snoozing while killer rats tear at his bed sheets?  Jean Valjean (Jean Valjean!!!!) enduring the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune?  Hell, I even liked the whole Waterloo section that everyone moans and groans about.  Far better than "Cetology."  Anyway... to compare these two French authors (Hugo and Verne) is like comparing Babe Ruth to Steve Balboni.

 

 
                                                   Like comparing Hugo and Verne

 

In short. Despite the lack of fish, Victor Hugo rawks and Jules Vernes blows (though not like a whale blows).  And that is the official monkeyface opinion on the matter... not that anyone asked for it.  I'm sure the halls of Parisian academia are quaking.  Somewhere a member of the Jules Verne fan club is loading his glass bullets into an air gun with my name on it. 

 

 

When Victor Hugo died, it is estimated that 2 million people lined the streets of Paris to pay their respects.  That's right, 2 million.  

 

 

Anyway.  I'm off my literary low-horse.  

Tempests raging offshore. 

Gotta scram.  

--Kirk-out 

 

 

 

Movie Monday

 

Lombard of the Intertidal, last seen floating past Pigeon Point.  Beyond all the other reasons one should not "blind toss" perhaps the most obvious is that blind tossers, in their attempts to reach the trough, are tempted to wade into unsafe waters... see above.  I think this was the topic of my first blog post ever. 

 

Anyway, I've decided I'm going to start posting a movie here every Monday.  Regardless of cinematic quality, (or whether or not I actually catch any fish) I promise to always provide a good song. So with out further adieu... 

From the man who brought you that classic work of cinematic brilliance, 2010's Palm d'Osmerid winner: Two Smelt.

Lombard of the Intertidal brings you the much anticipated sequel:

One Smelt (scroll down)

 

                                        Once again gunning for the trough.

 

 

Seriously tho.  I really do hate blind tossing.  But what the hell are you gonna do?  You drive 20 freakin miles to the beach (beee-atch) and the water's a joyless soy latte-brown.  Can't see a smelt to save your skin.  I dunno.  I received a whole lot of stink eye from the dude standing next to me... tho I found a friendlier guy further south, who did not have such high principles.

In this case I'm sorry but the ends justifies the means.  At least I got 8 pounds.  Mr. Grumpy never threw his net.  For all I know he's still out there, waiting for the water to clear up.  Anyway.  I've decided to start making 1 minute movies--the quality on this is a bit sketchy... but you guys get the pernt.  More tomorrow.

 

 

 

MSC Approves Limited Narwhal Fishery

 

 

                      "... a groundbreaking and controversial decision"
 

 

In a groundbreaking and controversial development, the Marine Stewardship Council has unanimously approved a recent application for the certification of an artisinal narwhal harpooning operation in the northern reaches of the Chuckchi sea.

 

                             

 

Despite almost universal condemnation from the international community, and science that C. Bender of Green Peace calls "extremely problematic," the Innuit application appears to have passed the certification process in record time.

"Although whaling in and of itself is anathema to sustainability," said MSC vice president, Luke Appling, "the best available science tells us that narwhal stocks have surpassed carrying capacity, and a limited harvest of the surplus population may, in fact, benefit the species as a whole."

Appling goes on to say that limited narwhal hunting will relieve beleaguered stocks of African elephants and Alaskan walruses which have been hunted to near extinction in what he calls "the human animal's tragic lust for ivory."

 

 

Save-the-whale advocates, environmentalists and animal rights activists notwithstanding, the most virulent opposition to narwhal certification has come from an unexpected quarter:  Narwhal farmers.

"It's absolutely ridiculous," says Steve Garvey of Van Nuys Ca, "in one fell swoop they {the MSC} have completely undermined everything we stand for."  Garvey, the former LA Dodger first baseman, goes on to state that the primary function of a small scale, closed-system narwhal farm is to relieve pressure on the wild population and provide a sustainable source of ivory for the world. "It's taken me 37 years to raise this f------ whale to a point where I can harvest his f------ tusk and you're telling me, right at the point where I'm ready to do this, you're going to open the wild stocks to "limited harvest," why not just go ahead and shoot me? You have any idea what the refrigeration costs for a southern California narwhal farm are?"  And anchovies, the God----d thing eats 500 pounds of anchovies a day!"

 

Steve Garvey, former ballplayer, enjoying the company of his sustainably raised narwhal, Maury, (right) at his closed-system narwhal farm in Van Nuys Ca.

 

 

MSC senior biologist, Heinie Manush, says he feels for the small narwhal farmer like Garvey, but says that his job is not "to do what's popular" but to do "what is right for the fishery and the species as a whole." Manush is currently spearheading a controversial program to relist all the smaller toothed whales, as "large endothermic fish."  This startling development is sure to raise the hackles of environmentalists, fishermen, ecologists, biologists and virtually anyone with at least a third grade education.  But this does not appear to phase Manush.  

"The MSC is answering to a higher authority," says Manush, glancing furtively at the portrait of Unilever founder William Hesketh Lever hanging over his desk, "and really, if such an esteemed American as Herman Melville can say that a 'whale is a fish' who am I to say it's not?"

 

Lever founded the British soap conglomerate that eventually became Unilever.

 

 

April Fools. Har Har.  

 

The only thing that ain't a joke in all this: the MSC was, in fact, founded by Unilever.  Remind anyone of a particular cliche?   No?  How about this one? 

 

The MSC lords over the fisheries of the earth like...

 

 

Anyway...  Very excited about tomorrow's salmon opener.  Even though I'm not going out.  (I'll wait till Sept).  Can't wait to hear the results!  Please send pix!

 

--Kirk-out