One Long Retirement Party

DATELINE: MARCH 20, 2023 – PUERTO PENASCO, MEXICO

We’ve hopefully all had jobs we loved. My best was Macromedia, a startup I joined in 1992. The company had around 100 employees at the time; there were long hours but great teamwork, and the sense of belonging and building a success story from the ground up allowed us to go public in 1993 and keep expanding.

A random Macromedia party, Hawaii circa 1998. From L-R, that’s Sherry Flanders-Page, me, Linda Grant, Brian Dudley, and Debbie Kersey. Linda was the operations dynamo that made the place go, and Debbie kept Sherry’s life in order so that business trips to Sydney, Australia didn’t end up in Sydney, Nebraska. Sherry and Brian were both my boss for long stretches, and both of them suffered accordingly, but of the perhaps five people who taught me what I needed to be successful despite my unfortunate personality, they are two of them. (The other three being Len Vernon, also from Macromedia, Al Jacoby, who hired me at BancOhio, and Jim Tolonen, who is a good enough fisherman to be mentioned in this blog now and then.)

I was able to grow my career from a credit manager to a compliance VP, until we were unfortunately gobbled up by Adobe in 2006. I never liked Adobe.

My job for the past 16 years had been at a gigantic German company, and while I loved my staff dearly, I found myself increasingly at odds with senior management. I know many of you can imagine me being at odds with almost anyone, but the politics had gotten tiresome. I was as late in my 50s as I was going to get, and had certainly started running the retirement numbers.

Sometimes, opportunities land right in your lap. I had just gotten home from Africa – and I’m talking just walking in the door, smelling like a yak. Marta was in that honeymoon phase where she could at least pretend to be glad I was home while desperately searching for a way to avoid fish pictures.

I signed into my work email, and it was a dumpster fire of management talking about “re-organization” and “cost optimization,” which are code words for “someone’s going to get let go.” So basically, the very first thing I had to face back at the office was laying off employees. Good people who had done great work who have families and mortgages and responsibilities. It’s one of the worst things about being an executive. There was a decent buyout, but the economy was rough and most of the people would have a hard time finding an equivalent job.

Then I got thinking. I was eligible for the same buyout. I didn’t have long to think about it, but I’m good at math and good at following my heart, and my heart wasn’t there any more. I couldn’t believe I heard myself saying the words, but long story short, just like that, I went from grudgingly employed to AARP. Holy #@%$.

I will never forget the look on Marta’s face when I went downstairs and told her I was intentionally unemployed. She just said “You really didn’t like the place, it’s a great package, and don’t even think you’re hanging around the house all day.” I do not deserve a partner as good as her.

That was Valentine’s Day, a Tuesday. I suddenly didn’t have to worry about weekly reports, employee reviews, crazed salespeople, or some guy with a sinister accent calling me in the middle of the night for some meaningless report by 5am. I would miss my direct staff – they were all superstars – but I wouldn’t miss the job.

I spent most of the day calling friends and relatives with the news. When I got to Chris Moore, he shocked me out of my stupor and talked some sense into me. He mentioned that they were going to San Diego that Friday and fishing Mexican waters for rockfish. I started to tell him that Friday was staff meeting day, and then it hit me – no it wasn’t. Friday was now a weekend. Every day was a weekend. I booked a ticket and started the next phase of my life.

Just a few hours later, Marta and I enjoyed an intimate Valentine’s dinner, possibly at Taco Bell.

I am indeed a hopeless romantic.

Somewhere between the enchirito and the burrito supreme, Marta suggested that I might actually not be done working, and that perhaps I should consider taking a break and seeing what was out there while I was still employable. I did not take well to this concept. There was fishing to plan, and even though it was winter, I was going to find stuff to catch.

The San Diego thing is an interesting excursion. California rockfish is closed in the winter, but Mexico is not, so San Diego boats set up trips to the Coronados to fish deeper water for rockfish. They catch a lot of Mexican Rockfish – there’s a species called that, Sebastes macdonaldi, just so we’re not confused because actually any rockfish I caught down there would technically be from Mexico. The Moores had caught the heck out of them on previous trips, and I was looking forward to my first new species as an unemployed person. We would also be joined by 1000Fish friend Luke Ovgard.

The water was nicely calm, and we passed the long ride eating breakfast burritos and looking up the world record on Mexican rockfish.

The Coronados come in to view.

Fishing started well – I knocked off a few solid reds, and added a couple of chilipeppers.

Let’s unpack this photo a little – Mr. Ovgard tried to sneak behind me and give the photobomb bunny ears, but instead ended up being caught by surprise with that look on his face. Bad timing? Demerol? We’ll let you decide.

But there were no Mexican rockfish. We tried a bunch of spots, and while we caught plenty of fish, there was not a single Mexican rockfish caught on the boat that day. I was stunned.

On the way home, we were looking at each other’s photos when The Mucus, of all people, noticed my picture of what I thought was a small chilipepper. Checking the book, it didn’t look quite right, and as I dug further and examined all the photos carefully, it turned out to be quite a rarity – a shortbelly.

So I had a species. And oddly enough, I owe the ID to The Mucus because he accidentally put my camera on burst mode and got 73 pictures of the fish, several of which showed the position of the anus, which is the main identifying factor for this species. So yay.

We also got some other interesting fish, like this greenstripe, but nothing beats that look on Chris’ face. It’s not as hateful as the Penasco pompano photo, but it’s close. 

That afternoon, we searched the harbor for the elusive reef finspot, but it remained elusive.

We thought we saw one, which resulted in this spectacular photo of my pants about to fail.

We spent the evening eating pizza and chasing California morays for the Moores. I am pleased to report they were both successful, but not successful enough to break my record.

The Mucus with his moray. Chris also got his, so it was a productive if chilly evening.

We decided to go on the boat again the next day, because there was no way that we could miss Mexican rockfish IN MEXICO two days in a row. The weather stayed great, but the fishing, not so much. I got a few nice chilipeppers, and some guy in the back of the boat got one Mexican rockfish, but it was fairly thin pickings.

A decent chilipepper.

I did manage to scrape up a new species in the morning – the greenblotched. This a very emotional one for me – I lost a potential world record in October of 2022 because large greenblotched and greenspotted rockfish are very difficult to tell apart.

This more modest example was at least easy to ID.

September 2022 – we’ll never know what this one was for sure without a full DNA sequence. Heartbreaking.

But this digression actually has a happy conclusion. Later in 2023, Ben Cantrell and his fiancee Ally came out to visit. They’ve moved from Florida to Illinois, and I don’t get to see them as much as I’d like – this is a guy who has helped me with tons of fish and been a great friend over the years. On September 3, I took them rock cod fishing on the Queen of Hearts with Captain Wally Klughers, and lo and behold, Ally nailed a big greenspot. We could prove that this one was indeed a greenspot, and Ally had herself an IGFA world record.

2.25 pounds of steaming world record, complete with Ben photobomb.

Of course they got the beautiful day that Chris Moore never gets.

So, back to San Diego in February. Well into the afternoon, during an especially slow stretch, I got a big bite and hooked up something large. Whatever it was had to be at least five pounds, and from 500 feet down, that’s a lot of lifting. I was hopeful I had a record Mexican rockfish. I got it to the surface, and to my combined delight and dismay, it was a cowcod, a rare and protected species I had seen only a few times in my life.

The crew did a great job netting and getting it descended so it would survive the ordeal. 

The gang on the way home. It’s tough to get four people to take a bad photo at the same time, but we managed.

So I was up three species, taking me to 2167 lifetime. I headed home and continued planning trips for the rest of the year, but managed to burn through February with local fishing, bad weather, and the endless paperwork that comes with leaving a job. It’s like getting divorced, except that I got paid.

I did get to spend more time watching Marta’s band, The Hyperdrive Kittens.

Yes, she plays in a band. She’s so much cooler than I am.

Except when she does facials at home without warning me. At least I presume this was a facial. Maybe she was cleaning the oven. Maybe she tried to change her own oil. I’m going to stick with facial.

My next major effort would also be to Mexico, again with the Moores – a return to Puerto Penasco. The trip was not based on blind hope – The Mucus had carefully researched where we could get at least two clingfish species. The kid is actually darn smart – he just hides it well. That and the hope of a Cortez stingray made the idea more than worthwhile.

We have the Penasco trip down to a science. Leave early to avoid border lines, drive the ridiculous 12mph speed limit in Sonoyta, come home early to avoid border lines. Stock up on Frito-Lay products and Red Bull, and put The Mucus in the back seat with a juice box and a bucket. We got down there late morning and checked into our hotel.

The Playa Bonita Resort. Nice place, except that we are only there about six hours a night and have never been to the pool.

We slapped gear together and headed for Bad Band Beach. We call it that because there is a bar there that always has a band, and, at the risk of sounding unkind, they are awful. The tidepools on this beach are some of the most fertile I have ever seen, but we always wander half a mile or so to get away from the botched Journey covers. 

While these tidepools have been very kind to me over the years, I have only ever seen one clingfish there. Still, we dutifully flipped rocks, because The Mucus swore that this was the time of year to see them. The tide was coming up and we were discussing an early dinner when another beachgoer asked us what we were looking for. (That happens a lot when you’re carrying a rig with a #32 hook and fishing in pools the size of a bucket.)

The beachgoer, Ernest from Indiana, who spotted my clingfish.

I explained what a clingfish was. He asked me if they look like tadpoles. I responded that they do – indeed, the one we were looking for is called a tadpole clingfish. He told me that he just saw one about 15 feet away. We went over to his spot, and bingo, there was a clingfish head sticking out from under a rock. It took some doing, but it eventually bit and I was up a species. The trip was worth it, and dinner at Capone’s was just that much better.

The tadpole clingfish gets its closeup. This was not an especially pretty one, but stay tuned.

Me, the beast, and the fish.

This is what they look like from underneath. Darn cool.

We spent the next morning fishing with El Jefe, one of the better local guides. The water was wonderfully flat, but we have fished these inshore areas heavily. A new species would just be blind luck, but I was strong with blind luck that morning and pulled up a creature known as a Shining Grunt. I knew it was a grunt, and I knew I hadn’t caught one before, but The Mucus actually recognized it and named the genus and species right away.

Usually, when I say a teenager spends way too much time on the internet, I mean something completely different.

Needless to say, Chris did not get a barred pargo.

To put this in perspective, my buddy David’s six year-old daughter Giovina caught one on her first try.

In case we needed to make the point any more clearly, Marta got her barred Pargo on the first try.

And, well, you know.

The evening would be spent hunting under rocks at Pelican Point. This area is supposed to be loaded with clingfish, but I had never seen one there in two tries. But this was a negative tide, exposing a lot more tidepools, so we approached the situation with optimism.

Chris and The Mucus hunt the tidepools.

It was a very slow optimism, because the rocks were insanely slippery and I didn’t want to die. I kept three or more points of contact at all times, so it took quite a while to get where I wanted, especially because this was all done after dark with only a headlamp to guide me. I got dozens of gobies, and I got a couple more tadpole clingfish, much prettier than the one from yesterday.

Tadpole clingfish photo upgrade #1.

Photo upgrade #2.

Chris and The Mucus fished a few hundred yards away from me. From texts back and forth, I knew the guys had caught some kind of new clingfish that wasn’t a tadpole, but it was getting late and I was getting hungry, so I suggested heading for dinner at Capone’s. I checked one more tidepool – the last reasonable looking one before the rocks got dry, and began searching the crevices and ledges. I was about to give up when my eyes, dulled by the paradigm of looking deep into holes for these fish, suddenly focused on one laying out in the open. Whatever it was, it was gorgeous – stripes of several colors running along its tiny body. I assumed one of the required “tidepool twister” positions, and after a moment, it bit.

It was a Sonora clingfish, something of a rarity, and I was thrilled.

Alternate view.

When we compared notes, whatever Chris and The Mucus caught wasn’t this, but it wasn’t something I had ever caught. Knowing we had another night to fish, we were content to go get burgers.

In the morning, we headed for the lagoon. Chris’ friend Eric, an area regular, took us down there in his dune buggy and we spent the morning trying to dredge up whatever would bite.

This is why you use a dune buggy. It’s a year later as I write this, and the guy may still be digging out.

I caught several stingrays, but alas, none of them were the Cortez variety – all Haller’s. I did get one big croaker – a solid fight on light tackle. There are several closely related species in the area, but after some dedicated ID work, this one was pinned down to Winterseen’s croaker (a.k.a. Cortez croaker,) and so became a world record.

World record number 227 – my first as a retired person. I had caught the species on a previous Baja trip with Martini and Spellman.

Interestingly to almost no one else on the planet, my research on the Sea of Cortez croakers led me to a stunning discovery. (Again, stunning to me and almost no one else on the planet.) A croaker I had caught in November of 2014, which I had long thought was a Bussing’s croaker, turned out to be a Gulf croaker, so that’s one more for the good guys.

Thank you to John Snow for his tireless research on the fish of Mexico.

We fished a rock levy that afternoon – I caught plenty of rays, but alas, not the right one.

This one even had yellow on it, but it’s still a Haller’s. Crap.

As it got late in the day, we headed back over to Pelican for a last shot at the clingfish.

Sunset over Pelican Point.

I was hopeful to get the one Chris and the Mucus had caught last night, they were hopeful to get the Sonora. The mystery clingfish, which The Mucus correctly ID’d as the rather rare Northern Fraildisk Clingfish, was easy for me. I went to the pools they where they had caught them the day before, and got three right away.

The northern fraildisk clingfish. Though they are uncommon overall, that particular area was jammed with them.

Alternate view.

Chris and The Mucus were not so fortunate – it seems that I may have gotten the only Sonora clingfish in the area. Seeing the look on Brayden’s face, I can’t say I wasn’t faintly pleased by this.

So four new species on this trip, plus the old one that I had finally identified, plus the two from San Diego, took me to seven post-retirement fish and 2171 lifetime. With trips to Arkansas, Georgia, and Florida coming up, even if Marta couldn’t get used to this, I knew I could.

Steve

The actual retirement party, purposely held on April 20, birthday of a famous German. These are some of our local inner sanctum, from left to right, Michael, Ziad, Danielle, Scott, Me, Marta, and Megan. All the guests in this picture have kids I have taken fishing.