Blistering hot for here -- 75-85 degrees. Oh, people are just melting. I'm fine. Last year's road trip with Roberta Gregory, tooling around Palm Springs and environs in August, at 114 degrees in the shade, has made me appreciate this weather for the balmy coolness it is. Lovely breezes off the ocean.

Fishing notes: was out yesterday trying to catch some greenling. Hooked one, lost it.

Then saw a long golden fish fooling around in the kelp. Saw it roll twice. Decided to try for it.

Now Jim down the street has done wonders with helping me get an idea what to do to fish. So I flipped the bait right over THERE where I'd seen the fish.

Pretty soon, I got a NICE hit, and started to reel it in -- and suddenly it was hit even harder, and the hook snapped right off the line.

A lingcod had decided it wanted my greenling, durn its gold-speckled hide! That was a lingcod I saw, and I should have known, it was that big ('bout 27 inches -- I'd say just the good side of the limit).

Well, I didn't mind losing it. Considering the lingcod season quit on the 15th. So I can say I at least shook hands with a lingcod.

In return for a business article I sent to the Peninsula Daily News, Ric at Jack Mackeral seafoods gave us a nice fillet of marbled salmon -- something you can't get anywhere else in the world, unless you're Japanese, and willing to pay ungodly prices. Grilled it slowly over driftwood coals. Not grilled one moment too long or too little.

To die for. Tender, moist, juicy -- and just slightly smokey. Best job of cooking I'd ever done of the best fish I'd ever had. And such a delicate crispy skin. The fish was so fat the drippings made the coals flare up.

And after loading wood and giving blood yesterday, the salmon and the fruit juice we drank all evening put us right back on our feet.

Which reminds me. I'm thawing some old freezer salmon that nobody up here will touch, and I'm going to need more drift wood.

Hey, someday we may be spoiled -- "Is it bought, or is it caught?" but not yet. We're feeding a fish hunger that goes back years.

See ya.

>^..^<