---

There was a time in my life (probably more years than I care to admit) when I wanted stuff…oh man, did I want stuff––and lots of it. When asked what I wanted for Christmas, the question alone nearly sent my head reeling with the limitless possibilities. Jeez, what didn’t I want? Of course, “want” and “need” are entirely different concepts, but for a life-long outdoor junkie with a serious Jones for anything on the market that promised I’d catch more fish or shoot more birds and deer, the two words were irrevocably the same.

Thankfully, there comes a time in your life when a healthy dose of skepticism and cynicism sets in – middle-age, I think – and you’re finally able to see through all of the marketing B.S. for what it is. In one of the outdoor publications I receive every couple of weeks, I recently read an advertisement for special doe-in-estrus urine that goes for $35 a bottle. I thought, “Well, for that price, it better be one big ol’ jug of pee. Probably delivered Fed-Ex and wheeled to my doorstep on a hand-truck.” I had to hold the page an arm’s length away to make out the fine print that stated that this magical “Eau de Estrus” is bottled one ounce at a time. Unless my decimals in the wrong place, that works out to $4,480 per gallon. Whew, prices like that for bodily waste make you forget all about high gas prices, doesn’t it? For that kind of money, a guy would be tempted to keep a couple of deer in the backyard parked in front of a big water trough. I can just hear it now: “Deer pee? You paid 35 bucks for an ounce…of deer pee?!” Part of me (the stupid part) was secretly tempted to order a bottle. You know, just to see if every love-struck buck in the county would come blindly running to its pungent, sexy fragrance. Good thing for me – and my marriage – that I decided against that purchase. I’d just wind up spilling it in the back end of the truck, or allow it to freeze solid and blow the plastic screw cap, just like every other bottle of deer urine I’ve mistreated. Believe me, you don’t want to smell the inside of my truck at the moment.

I see that similar marketing shenanigans have also infiltrated the world of ice fishing. Last year, the big deal was ice fishing rods that vibrate and buzz at the flip of a switch. Oh yeah, that’s precisely what I need, another gizmo in my life with an insatiable appetite for expensive alkaline batteries. I thought I read somewhere that prolonged exposure to vibrations can cause musculoskeletal disorders (MSGs). Isn’t that the stuff they put in Chinese food? I’m confused. Anyway, I get out ice fishing enough that I’d probably develop one of these disorders if I hung onto a vibrating fishing rod all day. If that weren’t enough, this season’s trickery includes a particular tip-up that gobbles up D-cell batteries at the rate of two every twelve hours to electronically jig your bait. You get the impression that somewhere there’s a roomful of fishing tackle and battery big shots sealing deals, sipping champagne and having a good laugh at our expense.

See what I’m getting at? It’s exhausting. I can’t keep up with this stuff any more. It took me a couple of years to get on-board with phosphorescent glow jigs and the tiny $15 single bulb flashlight you need to make the jigs glow. The little flashlights are so small that I manage to lose anywhere between three and five of them per season. And, the LED bulb throws off such an intense light that you’d better be sure you’re not pointing it in the wrong direction when that sucker goes off. One misdirected shot in the eyeballs will render you dazed and useless for the remainder of the evening’s fishing trip.

Even if buzzing rods and jigging tip-ups do work and are all the rage, the skeptic in me is resisting the purchase of these new-fangled items. I don’t need more electronic gizmos this year for Christmas, and I don’t like the idea that my success on the ice is dependent on whether or not I have a limitless supply of fully juiced batteries. At the rate things are going, I’d have to lug a case of batteries around with me everywhere I go.

This Christmas I made things easy on everybody. I’m actually wearing this year’s present as I write this column. It’s a heavy wool shirt-jacket made by half-frozen elves in Bemidji, Minnesota. Green and black plaid. Very nice. If denying myself state-of-the-art equipment means more fishless days, well, by God, I’m gonna look good when I get skunked.

Dan Brown’s weekly outdoor column is brought to you by Frankie’s Bait and Marine, in Chisago City, and St. Croix Outdoors, in St. Croix Falls, Wis.

---