Noodlin'

I first heard of "noodlin'" one night at the close of a bluefish dinner at my grandparents' house in Walpole, MA. Being a truck driver for over twenty years, my grandfather, Grumpy has a mind full of maps and roadways and truck stops, as well as chock full of trucker yarns (much like a sailor, I suppose). He told me he learned to "noodle" in the '60s when he was down in Kentucky, carousing with some of the local folk at a local bar, swapping fish tales and personal bests. Grump agreed to meet them at their favorite fishing hole to learn "real fishin," and the next day he went only to find two men waiting for him without poles at a small, muddy pool.

"Where's the poles?"

"We're usin' our hands," the two Kentucky natives chuckled as they lowered themselves into the muddy water.

"Noodlin'," Grump went onto explain, consists of routing about the murky depths of a creek with your hands, finding an opening, and sticking your hand into said opening with the hopes a great big cat will chomp down on you so you can drag him up to the light of day. Sometimes noodlin' demands you completely submerge yourself to better lower your hand into a cat's hole. Sometimes it's a great big snapper's den that you playfully wave your hand in and the snapper playfully answers back.

Grump spent all day noodlin' (sans gloves, unlike the men in the video) with the boys, drinking beer, mucking about the creek, and for his efforts, caught a few big cats.

Up until tonight, I thought Grumpy had shared with me an embellished truth of a time he had in Kentucky. If it wasn't for Josh's grackle video on youtube that somehow led me to catfish and then to noodling, I may have always been a doubting Thomas. I still think I'll stick to fishing the Cape's jetties and quahogging. That is, unless I take a shot or two of bourbon. Then I may be in the right mood to have a large catfish bite my hand.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=biL-QcviQGk