Hometown News For Orange County, Texas
Hometown News For Orange County, Texas
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DESPITE WEATHER BASSMASTERS A SUCCESS Despite five to seven inches of rain falling on Orange over the weekend, over 30,000 braved the weather. Had it not been for the bad weather officials predict those attending the Bassmasters festivities would have gone well over 40,000. Some great events had to be canceled. Art in the Park and its 130 booths remained closed and the Tracy Byrd concert was also canceled. The media and community had really backed this year’s Bassmasters Elite Series. I don’t believe this publication had eve...
SANTA CLAUS IS COMING TONIGHT Well, hopefully you were good all year because crunch time is about to happen when Santa Claus makes his annual visit tonight after everyone is asleep. His sleigh is chock full of presents and gifts for everyone, including these special people: CLASS 4A DIVISION II STATE CHAMPIONSHIP GAME—A Championship Trophy for the West Orange-Stark Mustangs winning the first half of Friday’s game at AT&T Stadium 25-7 and another for Gilmer winning the second half 28-0. Too bad for the ‘Stangs that it doesn’t...
WHEN THE COLD WINDS BLOW The temperatures are expected to dip and last for a few days. Hopefully Jack Frost will stay away but it’s time to pull out the jackets. Over the weekend Ms. Ginny was putting patches on “Neighbor” Cox’s longjohns. Cox first got the longjohns in 1944, WWII issue. For 70 years Ginny has mended patches on those longjohns. Today they look like Dolly Parton’s coat of many colors. She put the American flag on the back flap. I’m not exactly sure what she put on the front flap.*****Speaking of old folks,...
DICKIE COLBURN FOR THE RECORD While saltwater enthusiasts are just now moving into the most fishermen-friendly months of the year, most bass fishermen are putting the final wraps on a very good 2014 and prepping for the upcoming hunting season.I think it is safe to say, however, that this has been a year of competitive bass fishing that the team of Corey Rambo and Rusty Clark hate to see draw to a close! Rambo, of Orange, and Clark, of Sam Rayburn, have been one of those teams that you knew you had to beat to win it all at...
MISSING MY FRIEND It’s been a week now since I’ve seen my friend Jonathan Seagull. Every morning for going on a year now I’ve thrown him some vittles. He walks around proudly; head up, shoulders back and when he is eating the other birds stay away. The two pigeons that sit on the top of the building across the street just watch until Jonathan finishes. The grackles sit on the utility lines and wait also for the big boy to finish. I’m concerned about him however. I last saw him Monday of last week. Jonathanis a loner, doesn’t...
We got more than the shark did for a change! RECORD PHOTO: Dickie Colburn You will just have to excuse local bass fishermen for hoping for yet another down pour not unlike the system that parked on top of us last Friday.The flooding conditions, depending on where you reside in Orange County, will make it even tougher on the trout fishermen for a few days, but the bass apparently found it very much to their liking! Even before receiving several emails and phone calls from...
EASTER’S GONE, IT’S BACK TO THE COAL MINE What a great Easter Sunday. We had perfect weather for outdoor gatherings. Everyone I ran into Sunday was in a good frame of mind and thankful for the lovely day the Lord sent. Personally, I was again blessed with a nice Easter basket and my friend Marlene came through with another large, chocolate rabbit that will last the year. She also gave me something I’d never seen before, white Peeps with red eyes and green bowties. I’m told Peeps are not just yellow anymore. *****The Boston...
I don’t know that it is possible to have any better sponsors than I have in the fishing business, but I do not fish or promote any lures or tackle that I can’t rely on every day simply because it is free.I am going to fish the lure that works the best for me and my clients regardless of the brand name. Ninety-nine percent of the time it is a specific color that sends me scrambling for something different as I pretty much have all of the bases covered as far as style and len...
Dickie Colburn 8:47 AM (2 hours ago) to Record NEVER TAKE WARM FOR GRANTED It wasn’t until I leaned back on my 6”5” Laguna in a clumsy response to a jolting strike that all but dislodged the rod from my hands that I realized that I could no longer feel my fingers.I held on tightly as the line peeled off the reel, but I couldn’t feel the knobs on the handle and it was “Red fish 1-Dickie 0” for the first few minutes of the tug-of-war. I couldn’t tell if my clients were amazed or amused as they stood motionless in the back of t...
While walking through the Mall last week waiting for wife Susan to buy something that I wasn’t supposed to see, I sat down at the nice rest area to wait a bit more comfortably. I spotted Santa visiting with the excited children who were blurting out the names of different toys and games a mile-a-minute. He was listening to every word they said. My thoughts were a mile away when Santa sauntered up to the bench where I was sitting a plopped down, like he needed a break. ...
Jalen Simar and his 14 year old son, Carlton, shared a Thanksgiving they won’t soon forget. They had been on their deer stand early Friday morning less than an hour when they heard a shot echo through the woods.“We never even saw a squirrel and gave it up just before noon,” said Jalen. “We were sitting on the tailgate eating a leftover turkey sandwich when Carly’s two cousins drove up with a big buck that they all said Carly had seen twice this year, but could never get an op...
The calendar indicates that this is November, but not unlike the past ten months of 2013, the anticipated fall weather is yet to arrive. One day we keep our Frogg Toggs on all day long to ward off a bone chilling wind and the very next day we leave the dock in shorts under overcast skies. Too much wind most every day has been the only thing you can take to the bank! Even more perplexing has been the high water levels that tend to scatter the fish in the open lake and hold...
At some point on virtually every fishing trip a client will invariably ask, “How many days a week do you fish?” If that question is asked on the second day of a two day booking, it is usually because everything but the catching part is less fun than it was the day before. Not a whole lot of folks spend eight hours on the water two days in a row and their body parts tend to balk the second day. I would be very comfortable with four days a week, but unfortunately it never wor...
We have had to deal with a little more rain lately, but it’s the cooler weather that has us digging for our Frog Toggs every morning. More often than not, I find myself wearing the bibbed bottoms even when I don’t wear the jacket. The thinner Classic suits work well enough, but the slightly thicker Toad Skinz material is warm even when you are wearing only shorts underneath. The wind has made things a little uncomfortable lately, especially a northeast wind, but it has...
Ironically enough, relief came in the form of a driving rain that hammered away at our Frogg Toggs and kept the automatic bilge pump running like someone had hit the manual switch. As miserable as that scenario may sound to anyone less passionate about fishing, it was far better than fighting the swarms of mosquitoes that greeted us at daylight. Left to kill only those that had managed to find any opening in our rain jackets, we were wetter, but confident that we would...
Since purchasing the Houston Astros two summers ago, new owner Jim Crane realizes that right now he is among the least popular sports figures around the city of Houston. “People like to win—and certainly I like to win—and we’re not comfortable where we’re at,” Crane said last week in a radio interview by ESPN. “Hopefully, people will turn around and come in our direction, but that’s gonna come when we start winning more ballgames than we’re losing,” Crane continued. “We know that, and that’s what we’re working for. “We...
8 YEARS AND COUNTING Welcome to our 53rd anniversary edition. That’s a longtime for a locally owned publication to make available a free newspaper to everyone who wants one. Our newspaper is delivered to homes on every street, on every block in our trade area, in addition to over 4,000 papers in stores and drop locations in our area. The paper is also made available in the Deweyville, Vinton and Mauriceville, etc. areas. In putting this issue together what surprised us the most is how many local independent businesses and p...
Drinking that first cup of coffee in front of the television at 7:00 in the morning is not the way most folks start their Sundays around here, but I feel certain that it was the norm for lots of Orange County residents this past weekend. ESPN 2 aired last week’s Bassmaster Elite Sabine River Challenge and I thought they did a fantastic job of showing the rest of the viewing world what we have known for a long time…..Orange has far more to offer visitors than its world cla...
HOLY WEEK-- SPECIAL TIME FOR CHRISTIANS Well, it’s come on Easter week. Come Sunday, 40 days of Lent would have flown by, Christy will be able to eat candy again and everyone else who gave up something for Lent will be able to indulge again. The annual Easter cold snap came in a few days early but the wind will move to the south Thursday, after that, with the full moon arriving, it will be just the right time to get a garden planted. If you are a Catholic, you’ll have to wait until Saturday to plant. Old time Catholics don...
Anyone that resides in the Orange area could have immediately told you there was a helluva crowd in attendance at the Bassmaster Elite weigh-ins both Saturday and Sunday afternoon well before they neared the launch site. I have never seen trucks and cars wedged into every available space from Green avenue all the way to Bluebird fish camp in my life! The crowds the first two days of the event had already been praised by the pros, but they easily doubled in size on day three...
“First in line”, “Early bird catches the worm”, “second place is the first loser” and so on, all phrases that conjure up the idea that we have to be in a hurry. Fishing too fast is a common problem that many anglers have, especially when the fish tend to gather up and school in big bunches. Saltwater anglers who chase schooling fish along with freshwater fishermen who also key in on flocks of birds over hungry groups of stripers, hybrids, and whites are perhaps the worst. The frenzied activity puts everyone on the boat in...
WELCOME TO THE NEW YEAR Well, we made it through another year and 2013 blew in dropping over two inches of rain. In the past year we lost a lot of friends, that’s the sad part, and the New Year will probably bring more of the same. I had a good year on my predictions. I got an email where someone complimented me on my guesses. Too much goes into what I do to call it guessing. An email from Mike says, “You’re not always right but I’m impressed with how seldom you’re wrong.” Then one from J.B. asked, “How do you do that?” It...
We thought it would be nice to drive to Houston to watch the Texans clinch the AFC South Division championship against the Indianapolis Colts—the team that used to own that AFC South title until the Texans snatched it away last year—at Reliant Stadium Sunday. As luck would have it, sitting right in front of us was a burly old man dressed in a Santa Claus outfit. Fans come to NFL games decked out in many different get-ups, but why this time right in front of me. During halftime I asked the gentleman, “Do you get to watch...
“Don’t go patting yourself on the back too fast,” admonished my client in the rear of the boat as one of his partners flipped another keeper trout over the side.“These little lures are idiot proof!” While the comment was intended to be mildly derisive and was taken just that way with only a hint of a knowing smile, it was both a fair and generic description of the 3-inch Swim Bait……not the fisherman on the other end of the rod. That term is most often reserved for the lipless...
It is always the intent of any fisherman to do battle with a mighty fish, a giant of epic proportions that will live forever in memories for years to come. For most folks who do not regularly inhabit offshore waters your choices of really big fish to catch are rather small. The occasional redfish of 35 to 40 inches are often the biggest boys in the neighborhood next to alligator gar or maybe a big catfish. You can add a pair of names to the list of heavyweights that routinely make a name for themselves during this time of...
