Just Another Day at the Office

Signs of spring were everywhere you looked (and listened) around the OTW office in East Falmouth, MA this week. Ospreys have been gliding by the windows with herring in their talons, spring peepers have been peeping as the last person locks up after work and short-sleeve polo shirts have taken over sweaters and long sleeves as the preferred office apparel.

With the April Issue put to bed and temperatures in the 60s for the third day straight, this past Wednesday at 1:30, publisher Chris Megan declared a jailbreak and brought everyone down to a nearby trout pond. Waiting for us on a pond-side picnic table were some hot pizzas, some cold drinks and a host of instruments of trout destruction.

We have a small, but tight-knit crew at On The Water. One thing all of us have in common is, at the very least, an interest in fishing. And quite often, our group fishes together. There aren’t many workplaces where the employees spend so much time together out of the office, both after work and on weekends. But rarely do we have the opportunity to get everyone in one place on the water.

The scene at the picnic table looked a little more like a bluefish blitz than a business lunch, but trout were rising, and the crew was eager to get at them. Chris was offering $25 to whoever caught the first fish, and $25 to whoever caught the biggest, to make things even more interesting. We fanned out around the pond, some in waders, some staying dry and casting from shore. Andy Nabreski was guiding some of the shorebound bunch in his canoe, while Chris paddled around in a kayak and I struggled to navigate the pond in a float tube.

The trout were biting, and almost everyone brought a colorful rainbow to hand. The ribbing and joking, sometimes being shouted across the pond, was as entertaining as the fishing. OTW circulation manager, Bill Dean, took both prizes, first trout and biggest trout, and credits Andy’s expert canoe positioning for his trout contest sweep.

When 5:00 passed, our numbers thinned, but Chris remained, catching trout as a cool fog rolled in off Vineyard Sound and dropped the temperature, signaling the end to just another day at the office.