Bad Day Turned Good

Sorry for not posting in a while, been fighting some sort of bug. Seems it's rearing it's head a little harder now. Enjoy the story!

Started out this morning sick as a dog! Sore and achy body....sinuses draining....nose running.....headache.....sounds a lot like mr. flu! But as Stew-rat told me earlier, "if you are sick, you are gonna feel sick, might as well be fishing." So I met up with Stew at Bobby's at 8:30 for a little fishing. We had to dodge some showers first thing under the bridge. We fished around but had no luck. As soon as the showers faded off, we headed up to the creek mouth and fished for a while with no luck. Stew cast a little more shallow just past the creek and reeled in a nice Spot to start the day off right.

We fished up further, and I had no luck at all. Stew caught back up with me, and informed me had caught a crappie on a small jig...Looked like he was gonna wear me out again. I continued to bang just off the banks with my shaky head jig when I finally got a bite. I had been having issues with my Pfleuger reel and the drag system acting up, and it was back at it again. I was turning the drag knob something fierce, but the drag wasn't lightening. A couple of times I had to throw darn near my whole rod in the water to give some room. Luckily, I had just spooled some 15 lb braid on this reel, so that helped a lot. I told Stew that it was a good fish, but when she came busting up for an aerial, I realized how good it was. After a couple of minutes of a good fight, this is what hit my kayak.

Half on my bump board lays at the bottom of the river, pretty close to the spot where I caught this fish ironically, so I dont have a true measurement. Estimated at about 20-22" and 4.25 lbs easy, maybe pushing 4.5. Definitely made me forget about the flu for a bit.
Stew and I stopped for a little shore lunch and hung out for a bit. After another drizzle session came and went, we hit the banks again. Stew caught another 2 bass on a baby brush hog, and I caught one more LargeMouth

I was using a watermelon magic trick worm shaky head rigged all day. Only caught 2 fish, but one was excellent and the second was a good quality 1.25-1.5 lb'er. It was a great day all things considered, and I have to send a big thanks out to Tim "Stew-Rat" Stewart for hangin in there with me today. Couldnt have been easy to listen to the groans and sniffles and sneezes. Hardcore all the way!