If you could read my mind, it's a short read; you would see a simple placard that reads, "Gone Fishing". Try to imagine gray aged barn wood, maybe a six inch by foot long board with black charcoaled letters hanging from old bailing wire. What it's hanging from is shrouded in mist. So since it's my head and my sign, I will day dream with that. It's a misty rain and I know sitting in my cubicle at work that my favorite brookie creek is starting to swell. The phone rings. So I become the professional person they expect and I answer each question with legal crispness. I have to, it's my job. After hanging up the phone, I add the request to the next day's schedule. Now where was I? I can see my hip boot toe stirring the rain in the mud gravel mix. Just a little brown puddle as I string my fly rod. My face is rinsed with soft rain drops. It's warm, but I arm into my rain coat and trout vest. Shuffling so as not to slip down the bank, I peak over the big blue stem grass and see fish rising. Crushing unseen field mint, the fragrance fills my nose. Casting to the pool inlet I get an immediate ….put it in my in box, I spoke to them yesterday and they will pick that up tomorrow. Thank you. Ahh, I can never go back to the same day dream once something disturbs me. I know I'm on the company dime; I'm not addicted to drugs or gambling. Im not the closet alcoholic, mine is a mental disorder. Yes, I'm supposed to concentrate, but that's why the other guy in the office is my boss and I'm the underling. He's focused and driven. Im focused out the window and driven nuts by office work. I have no employees. I am the bottom of the food chain in this office. I have no problem with that either. I have worked hard to get where I'm at, and if all goes well I'm never gonna get promoted. I do not want or need the meetings and political correctness that goes with all that so called extra annual salary. I like walking out the door at quitting time knowing I did a good job. Then as I drive away from work the miles and distance between my home and my job become an abyss, anything work related, cannot cross. Don't get me wrong, I like what I do for a living, I just don't need to super-size the job. When I'm fishing, I never get distracted by work thoughts. But I'll be danged if I can get through a work day without thinking about some upcoming Fishin adventure or mentally rehashing one just past. It's all about priorities. If fishing was a brain disorder, I would be in deep psychological counseling mandated by my employer. Luckily for me, it's not. My exterior cubicle wall has a real sign. It keeps track of who's physically in the office and whose out. What meeting a co-worker is attending and various scheduling requirements for each inspector. That sign never knows what's carried out in the mind. My brain just likes to focus on the imaginary sign telling me and for no one else to see…that I'm gone fishing. The trout whisperer