Summer in SOLdotna

Ahhh...the second of August and king fishing and dip netting are done for the season By the end of the day, the exodus of tourists and pukers (visitors from Anchorage) starts and we begin to slowly reclaim our town. But it's not like the old days before traffic lights and FM when SOLdotna really slowed down. I kinda miss those days.
I've been a blogging slacker these last few weeks. Too much fun to be had, fish to be caught and processed and too many chores to do on the home front. There certainly has been a few things to note on this site however.

Dip Netting
Fish allocation issues continue to divide the community. Commercial fishermen might have a legitimate point when they are closed down for escapement while the dip netters are allowed to continue to harvest fish.
21 reds swam into my dip net this season and I can easily defend this personal use fishery. But when I look around and see the waste and destruction more than a few dip-netters are a part of, I know that the process needs to be made a bit more responsible. Look for a post soon that will examine this issue in more detail.

Progress Days Parade
I am not a parade kinda person, but I make it a point to watch this one for the entertainment that the MC, Merrill Sikorski provides. Merrill thinks it is the duty of an MC to make funny and Merrill thinks he is a comedian and while he makes me laugh out loud, I am not laughing at his jokes. In the vernacular of the internet, I am LMAO at what he considers to be appropriate humor at this family function.

Classic Merrills from the past include informing Alan A of KDLL that he was dragging his pickle. As a young horsewoman from the rodeo went by, Merrill cautioned the crowd not to confuse pole racers to pole dancers. Who can forget the vulgar slang he used when he referred to classic mustang cars that drove by?

This year did not disappoint. As the wiener dogs marched by, Merril offered some double entendres. "We SOLdotnans are proud to show off our wieners" and "It just goes to show that size really doesn't matter". My favorite this year was when the race cars went by. A mini drag racer was on a trailer and there were two teen aged girls sitting on the trailer. Merrill announced that a mini drag racer and a mini drag queen were going by the reviewing stand.