(Editorís note: Steve (Nelson) Alden is a Caledonia native, the son of the late Margaret and Alden Nelson, who currently lives in Los Angeles. He has offered to write a column for Argus readers. E-mail us at editor.argus@ecm-inc.com and let us know what you think!)

June 25, 2007

Iíve decided to greet yíall by personalizing, in true California fashion, my opening, so here goes:

Dude,

Just so you know, I still pronounce the word "dude" the right way, like a Minnesotan. Dude rhymes with food, am I right? I havenít been sucked in by the Southern California surfer types who, for some reason, (I think itís the salt water), feel the need to stretch out words like dude, adding syllables and vowels that donít belong until it comes out sounding like dee-yoo-ud. If you ever saw Sean Penn as Jeff Spiccoli in Fast Times at Ridgemont High, you know what I mean.

So, if we havenít spoken face to face for a while, I just wanted to let you know that even though people sometimes make fun of me or ask if Iím from Canada, I still talk normal. Oh, yeah, boat still rhymes with float. You donít go fishing on a bee-oh-et. I could go on and on, but you get the drift.

Hey! Speaking of fishing, I get to go lake fishing in South Dakota every summer with my brothers John and Bill. Iím not sure when the tradition started, but itís been a long time since our first Bullhead Jamboree. Itís not named that because we intentionally fish for bullhead, in fact weíd rather go all day without a nibble than catch bullhead. The Jamboree got its name from the very first time the three of us fished together. We were in Billís Bass Tracker on Lake Alvin. The good news is we were catching fish like crazy. The bad news is that they were all bullheads: dozens of them. If youíve never seen a bullhead, theyíre really ugly, and really slimy. Being a novice, I didnít know the technique of landing a fish and getting off your line and back into the water.

I sort of allowed the bullheads to smack against the side of the boat before letting them jump all around the floor. We learned the hard way that bullhead slime, if not rinsed away, will eat the paint right off an aluminum boat. I kid you not. One year I wasnít able to make the trip, so Bill and John taped an 8X10 headshot of me onto the backrest of the empty middle seat. They also brought along a video camera and asked my paper head questions while making jokes at my expense. Just their luck, they got stopped by the game warden. He must have wondered why my picture was taped to the seat. Maybe he thought it was a shrine in honor of a fellow fisherman who was no longer with us. But it was a pretty fancy picture, so maybe he figured it was an actor that my brothers admired, one of those actors that a game warden wouldnít recognize.

When I tell Californians that I go fishing every summer in South Dakota, theyíre usually puzzled and unimpressed. I like to keep it that way. I donít let on that itís one of my all time favorite things in the world, because then theyíd want in on the action. The last thing we need is a bunch of rookies horning in on our fun, floating clumsily around the lake mispronouncing words. Unless I could convince them that bullhead sushi is really delicious, now thatíd be a hoot. More later.

Peace,

Steve.

P.S. Peace still rhymes with niece. Iím no gagsta rapper. But hey, this is Hollywood. Anything could happen.

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