is god trying to drown steamboat?

the heavens opened at about 4:45 this afternoon, and 40 mph wind gusts ushered in one of the most amazing torrential downpours i have ever seen anywhere. more violent than the midwestern thunderheads i grew up with. more ferocious than the lightning storms above tucson. just a ridiculous amount of rain - for the first time i truly understood the term "sheets of rain" - in what was really only a 25 minute time span.

it was stunning and impressive and a little scary.

speaking of stunning and impressive: i caught the biggest trout of my life on saturday. a 21- maybe 22-inch brown out of the yampa in town. from a super sweet secret hole that i can't wait to show geno next time he comes out. anyway, my buddy bruce was there with me and he fishes a lot. he said that he's seen longer fish pulled out of the yampa, but he didn't think he'd ever seen a heavier fish. this sucker had the hooked jaw, the big shoulders - just a fat breeding male. bruce guessed 5 pounds, he said he was pretty sure it was a wild fish (not stocked), and probably 5 or 6 years old. the brown ran out a whole bunch of line about halfway through the fight, and it was the first time a trout had physically moved my arms and not just my flyrod. it took about 5 or 6 minutes to get him in, and after i let him go i was shaking.

in other news, i need to post a correction: the person complaining about me not writing about jenn often enough was not debby, but our good friend karin in denver. my apologies.