Fantasy Ice Fishing

     We are having an unusual December in Central Massachusetts. We've had a dusting of snow a couple of times, alot of rain and winds, and even some mild days.  Decembers from my memory have always included snow, ice, cold, missing school, shoveling.  I realized it will finally happen, that the world will become white and it will really feel like winter, but until then, I just look out the window and see the grass on the ground and the cloudy sky.  The lake has just a skim of ice on it.
     My husband's passion for this time of year is ice fishing.  He already started about a month ago.  First, he had the electric auger serviced and is all ready to get through any depth of ice.  Next, he bought some new "tilts", even though there are many in the cellar.  Then, he went to the local pizza place to get a pickle bucket to carry whatever he carries, probably the tilts.  This past weekend he was busy preparing the tilts with whatever one prepares tilts with.  I asked him why he needs so many tilts when he had so many, and I was told the others were no good and he also wants to bring more people along with him, even people who have never ice fished before.  I asked him who that would be and he said, "I don't know".
     So, this is how my day played out last weekend.  He talked about the tilts as he got each one ready.  Then he would say, "Look at this", so I would stop what I was doing, and he would say, while holding the tilt in his hand, "Here I am out ice fishing, just sitting around bored, then all of a sudden the flag goes up!!" then he would release the flag, it would pop up and he would be all excited.  A few minutes later, again, he says to me, "Look at this", and he played out the whole scenario again. He even demonstrated how he "jigs" the line through the hole in the ice, to which I said, "so you do the Irish jig out there".  After awhile I asked him how many tilts he was preparing and if he is going to do this every time he gets one ready, that's when I found out about the newcomers to ice fishing that he is taking with him, whom we don't know exactly who they are at this point, and, yes, he was going to do a demo with each tilt.  I had to remind him he was not bored doing what he loved and also, he takes a grill and food to cook on the ice, which was keeping him busy.
     The next day, he realized he forgot to put his "buttons" on the tilts, so he had to take his tilts apart and put these buttons on, but, this was another opportunity for more fantasy ice fishing.