December 2005

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Picture #1

Picture #2

And the wind kept howling.

Picture #1 and picture #2 show the December small craft alert sequence reaching well into January.

Maatsuyker Island, approximately 10 km south of Tasmania gusted at 163 km/hr wind in November the average wind speed of the month was 67 km/hr. In December winds gusted at 130 km/hr with average wind speeds for the month of 82 km/hr. January’s first week saw 133 km/hr gusts and the first weeks average wind speed of 89 km/hr with force 9 gusting 10. On land 134 km/hr gusts were recorded and the trees and power grid were straining.

As some of you know, the Boxing Day Sydney to Hobart Yacht race created a new record, and you don’t need to be an Einstein to realize that new sailing records are not broken in a breeze, but with lots of wind coming from behind (pun not intended).

January 3 Tassie’s wind made the National TV and radio News. The New Year brought us a road weather alert, for cars driving on exposed roads. Indicating that you get blown off the bitumen, especially if you were driving anything remotely resembling a motor home. And as the TV evening news reported some cars with trailers overturned, trees uprooted, bringing power lines down, with inevitable power outages as a consequence. The day my bum went psycho.   

I happily would have traded my Christmas present for a day’s fishing, but whatever put the wind up Father Christmas, he passed it down again, with vengeance and you could hear more than ‘the angel singing’.

 Life without fishing became boring. Talk about boring, it was so boring; one could bore an as*hole in a wooden horse. And the days were as useful as an unplugged toaster.  

That just leaves me to convey to you all best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral, winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most joyous traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, but with respect for the religious persuasion of others who choose to practice their own religion as well as those who choose not to practice a religion at all;

Additionally

A fiscally successful, personally fulfilling, and medically uncomplicated recognition of the generally accepted calendar year 2006, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions have helped make our society great, without regard to the race, creed, colour, religious, or sexual preferences of the wishers.

(Disclaimer: This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her/himself or others and no responsibility for any unintended emotional stress these greetings may bring to those not caught up in the holiday spirit.)

And finally, thank you all for the many e-mails you have sent to me since the birth of this website. I greatly appreciated your interest.

 The Trout Whisperer

If you would like to contact me for comments or contributions click here: thetroutwhisperer@bigpond.com