It Ain't Over 'Til It's Over

I had gone the entire day without a citation.  I went to an old trusty spot to finish out the day and missed two good takedowns.  I decided to call it a day and was in the process of reeling in my poles to go home, when this fish hit!  Last minute save!  It went 43# and put up an excellent fight:

Day's Tally:  43, 29, 20, 16

Offshore Deep Drop

Went offshore Saturday aboard the Rum Runner with Maniac (Jon) to do some bottom fishing.  Hit the triangle wrecks and got good pullage throughout. Pulled up a bunch of sea bass, alot of them doubles. Also got a flounder, and a big bluefish. The bluefish hookup was cool, me and another guy were bringing up sea bass, when our rods doubled over at the same time and drag just peeling. We weren't sure what was going on. But when the first fish came to the surface, all that was left of the sea bass was the head that went up the leader, and a big blue on the hook! Same thing happened when mine surfaced. Those things put up a great fight. We were pestered by dogfish all day though. Had to work through them to get to the other fish. Caught probably 20 of them.  It was a choppy ride though, and one guy was sea sick puking the entire time. I got a touch of it at one point myself.  But luckily, once I blew, I felt fine the rest of the day.
We went trolling for striper at the mouth of the bay on the way back in, but no hits. Worked an area where birds were continually dive bombing the surface, but the fish either weren't there or weren't hitting. Set up at dark at the Hi-Rise along with literally over 100 other boats in a one mile stretch of bridge to eel along the pilings. What a clusterfuck of boats! We didn't stay long, and didn't catch any stripers either (word was they wouldn't be coming through until 10-11pm, but we didn't stay out that long). We had a good day fishing so we decided to head back in.