"The Sea Was Angry That Day, My Friends"..

Remember that episode of Seinfeld?

We laughed about that quote from George "The Marine Biologist" Costanza as we headed out on Friday morning for a day of fishing on the Gulf of Mexico.

My brother, Al, spent the past ten days in Venice. One of his goals for his vacation was to go deep sea fishing.

Because we had a few challenges making the arrangements,  I like to believe serendipity led the three of us down to

Fort Myers Beach to Captain Lewis, skipper of the

Not that we are superstitious or anything, but the Mac-Attack also happens to be the name of Al's fantasy football team and dart team.  We also took it as a good omen the boat had a fellow Scotsman, Lewis MacDonald, at the helm. Our premonitions were correct, because it could not have been a better day!

The seas were not angry, fortunately. We enjoyed the beautiful view as we left the marina and had time to find our "sea legs" as we were two hours and twenty two miles away from land before we dropped anchor.

I have been known to exaggerate a little, but this time I am telling the exact truth. Paul was the first person to drop a line into the water. Within 15 seconds-honestly, that quickly- he caught this huge gag grouper and brought it up into the boat. Al and I had yet to put fishing rods in our hands. This is one happy person!

That variety of grouper has to be released, so back into the ocean it went.

For the next three and a half hours, the three of us pulled in one fish after another. We were so involved in the moment,  Al and I both lost count of the number of fish we caught. Paul knows he brought in at least thirty two. Unbelievable. Paul and Al caught these red groupers simultaneously.

I caught this hogfish.

We learned they are considered to be an excellent tasting fish, so it was a good thing.

Before we knew it, the time was up and we headed back to land.

We had a cooler full of red grouper, red snapper, grunt fish and the hogfish.

We caused a bit of commotion on the dock with our catch. Captain Lewis cleaned the fish right there for us while we waited.

We took our catch back to Venice, cooked up a wonderful dinner and placed several more meals in the freezer! Here is a picture of one happy chef!

Thanks for making this day happen, Al.  It was too good to be true.

It was great spending time together! We'll miss you!!!