Wednesday, May 09, 2007

Yawn

Hello Fishies!

Each episode has become more tedious than the last in this made for TV drama, and that is really too bad. There are so many good things they could have shown you!

As I have said before, the rescue of Josh off the Trailblazer by the Time Bandit crew was 100% true. However, he did not remain on board while the Hillstrands caught their crab as the rescue happened after they were done and heading for home. If Josh had been there you can bet your life he would have been out on the deck working alongside the Time Bandit crew. The Time Bandit’s pots had been left to soak for quite some time while they followed the other boats around getting those exterior camera shots. They ran their gear after everyone else was done.

It’s too bad that you were not shown where the extra $100 in the Captain’s wager came from. It was actually from Larry Hendricks who was to write down who he thought would win it and split it somehow or another. It’s also too bad that we don’t really know how they all came out in the standings. If the Maverick had been in the lead till the end, does that mean they finished second, ahead of the “big dogs”? Or what about the Wizard? Captain Keith was writing a check to the Fishermen's Memorial too.

While the prison stripes on his rain gear were a funny touch, I do want to applaud Matt Bradley of the Northwestern. In season two he talked a bit about his personal issues and the steps he was taking to deal with them. This season is no different with the exception of the added pressure of making a court date. We knew from his DC chat that he made that and all was well. The behavior of the trolls towards Matt was reprehensible. The depths that they sank to seem to know no limits, even going so far as to post links and information about his arrest record. Perhaps, with three or four episodes pounding on about his issues, it will help him to keep on the straight and narrow road.

Anyone happen to get a count on how many clothes changes there were in any one conversation? Or Sig looking like he never changed at all yet showing no beard growth? How about Andy and his hats? Cowboy-baseball-cowboy-baseball all in the same scene! I got dizzy just trying to keep up. Then there were the oddly placed snippets of conversation, inserted in ways that made no sense at all, usually done over and over and over again.

The $50 bet between the Moncrief’s was cute, but what about the discrepancy in their weights? For some reason it was a big deal for the Maverick but not for any other boat. I myself am curious as to who was assigned to watch the weigh scales on that one and where that crab actually went. This exemplifies why the captain of the Wizard was so angry with the processor crew on the last episode.

You can be under in your delivery and stay safe as some one else in your co-op will catch it or you will be allowed to make it up the following year. If you go over, you face the wrath of the government in a mighty way, including huge fines and the loss of the income of the overage. I would like to know just how many pounds exactly all of the boats were assigned and if they were over or under.

Now that the king crab portion is over, so is our chance of seeing Captain Corky and the F/V Aleutian Ballad, and that just plain stinks. The AB was not in Alaska for the Opilio season as it was, (and still is) being outfitted for tourist day trips. Remember I told you about that some months ago.

It’s really too bad that they chose to ignore this fine vessel and her crew; it would have been a great addition. We could have seen Corky’s daughter Nicole, a female deckhand, and her brother. I have heard that Corky was so upset with the show that he called both DC and Original Productions repeatedly but they never gave him the courtesy of a reply. How rude!

Please don’t forget that for most of the boats on the show, the crab quota was in fact leased and not owned. While the poundage and gross revenues may seem impressive, it is not indicative of who actually received the money. A good example of this would be the Time Bandit. I was told they sold most of their quota and what they fished was leased. For this they only received $1 per pound. Most crew shares are about 7%.....you do the math.


Stay tuned!

<’)))>{

2 comments:

wishiniwasfishin said...

I would just like to say that the biggest disappointment was the fact that after they exploited the men the families and their careers I never saw not one promotional add for the Alaskan king crab fisheries or any Alaskan seafood add for that matter. What a shame! Also I would like to say I have seen a lot of Russian king crab in ALL of our supermarkets in quite an abundance and while the jumbo legs are quite big and selling for 19.99 a pound the ones they are selling as regular size were very small and selling for 12.99 a pound. I was amazed to see just how small these were. I wondered just how undersize these were and if not perhaps also some female crab. I would say that the silver lining for the Alaskan crabbers is at that rate it won't be too long before the Russian crab fishery collapses. Please fell free to use any of my comments for your suject line in your blog.

The Fish Wife said...

You are so right! In the future I will write about what happened with the US and Russian halibut fisheries which is comparable to what is happening in the crab fisheries now. Also, when stings are done they are finding a tremendous amount of seafood labled as wild caught, Alaskan etc which is turning out to be either farmed or forgein. Nice 'eh?