Hall of Fame pitcher Dizzy Dean had a home-spun way with words. He did color for televised baseball games in the late 50's. Kind of a good ole boy version of Bert Blyleven. He made up his own words for past tense verbs. Like "he slud into home but was tagged out." His past tense word for stay was stood.

Well this morning, instead of answering the 5:30 a.m. bell to hunt geese, I should have stood in bed.

When I walked to my blind I noticed my full-bodied decoys, which I left out overnight, had frosted backs. They looked almost ghost-like. Then at 6:30 a.m. the first flock of the morning, instead of coming off a lake a mile west of me, were going into the lake. Not a good sign. They likely had taken advantage of the brilliant full moon to feed at night and were now ready for some water and rest. I watched several other thirty-bird flocks head into rather than out of their watery roosts.

As I sat sipping coffee and hoping all the geese weren't at rest with full bellies a chipping sparrow alarmed me when it landed ten inches from my face. It perched on a barnyard weed I had placed in front of my blind and tried to catch some warmth from the just-risen sun. My fingers told me the sun was casting more light than heat. The tiny bird was evidently unaware of my presence. But when I puckered and tried to mimic its song it flitted away. A song with wings.

Finally, about 7:30 a pair of low-flying Canadas headed for my set up. I greeted them with my call and got confirmation they heard me. When they saw my decoys they swung (or is it swang) into final approach, wings locked and double clucking their intent to join a dozen plastic buddies. But as I waited for them to fly into my field of vision, they didn't. Instead, a moment later I heard them ka-honk a goodbye as they overflew the blind and kept going. They didn't flare, they just left.

Was it the frosted backs on the decoys? Or my frosted breath coming out of the goose call? I'll never know because they weren't saying as they slud on by.