When I was stationed in Germany I had some time off from my assigned military duties. During my leisure, I made every effort to secure a bag of German pretzels that in no way compare to anything I've ever eaten state side. We have little glossy covered, almost a dry consistency, far too crunchy and a size that borders on small or cheap. And for me, they don't even seem palatable, so I have over the years, just given them up. Over there, they were fresh baked, usually just about lunch time and the smell would draw you in, you couldn't help yourself, I know I couldn't, and soft to the touch inside and out, thick as a polish sausage, and the flavor was something even now, over thirty five years later, I still long for. Once I secured the bag of pretzels I headed straight for a rivulet that flowed through the town next to the base I was stationed at. Here standing on very small bridges at water crossings I would look down into the flow and see brown trout, honest to goodness German brown trout, in of all places, Germany, that more often than not, were the size of my arm and every so often one would swim in and out of view that appeared bigger than my leg. Oh did I want to go fishing. I started asking everyone in my best English, since I couldn't speak any German, and my answer came back, without any translation required. I could not fish for them. Oh I checked into it and it was not going to happen. The fees were staggering, and I would need to be recommended to a fishing club and I knew no locals, not to mention the exam required, made it impossible during my stay. So I fed them chunks of my pretzels off the bridges, they ate with the same zeal as me, and thinking one day, I would sure like to hook into one of those. Little did I know? Well somebody with the same problem as me, only with much deeper pockets, brought that strain of trout to the good old USA and stocked them in the Milwaukee harbor. Seeforellen brown trout, not to be confused with German beer, is a German brown strain of enormous proportions, even bigger than German beer bottles; easily exceeding twenty pounds and often reaching weights of thirty to thirty-five pounds are there now. One of them this past week bit, and not on a piece of pretzel. The trout whisperer