OUTDOORS COLUMN: A good time, a good place

Somehow it all seems fitting; sitting on the bank, feet in the mud, leisurely angling for channel catfish. The overturned five-gallon bucket imprints a red-rimmed circle on my butt through the denim of my well-worn jeans. The gore of freshly dissected cut bait and sun-ripened chicken livers is drying to a thick, sticky crust on my palms and turning into reddish-brown putty beneath my fingernails. The resulting fragrance is such that I would not be surprised to see a circle of soaring vultures in the sky directly overhead. Reminds me some of a disgusting stinkbait once concocted by the demented mind of Cletus Monroe.

Yet, here I am, disgustingly happy and mouth-wateringly hungry. Strange, isn