SpudNuts is Approved

First, a little background information; When we arrived at San Lucas Cove, everyone we’d meet was quite taken by the fact that we were from Idaho. I guess there aren’t many other Idahoans excited about towing a boat 4000 miles to go camp in the dirt and fish all day. Anyway, lots of comments about potatoes, trout tackle, Boise State Football, and more potatoes. So of course, Rick and Alan set to work on a nickname that somehow involved the Idaho tie-in. These nicknames are used primarily on the radio over the course of the fishing day to call back and forth between boats and camp to see what’s going on where, and you immediately become known by your nickname because many of the boats haven’t or never will even meet you in person. Initially they’d call us Idaho, then over the next few days migrated to Spudmobile, but no individual nicknames were coming clear….until the battery incident –
One afternoon, while out fishing, we had trouble with a dead battery. We thought at first that it was simply drained from running the aerator pump, so Steve pull-started the Johnson and we headed back to camp to swap it out. Rick volunteered to charge it for us while we were out the next day. Upon return to camp however, he greeted us with that ‘you Idaho Idiots are in trouble again’ head shake and proceeded to tell us about nearly blowing up his new generator on our shorted-out-nine-year-old battery. Syd and Syd’s Brother just sat there muttering in bewilderment about ‘planning for two and a half years but you don’t buy a new battery???’ Hey, at least I brought a spare. So Tator9 (Steve) and TatorTot (Sam) was borne on the spot.
After the long drive to the East Cape and back, Steve and I agreed that Spudmobile just wasn’t working for us, as we much preferred the SpudNuts that was mentioned by someone at some point (neither can remember when). But we knew that Alan had already deemed Spudmobile “DONE, IT’S DONE I SAY” and it was going to be very difficult to change his mind. So Steve drafted a petition that included lots of legalese and hithertos, describing in great detail the many reasons why SpudNuts should be our legally adopted boat name. Primarily the manliness inferred therein. We gave Alan the petition late that night, and after growling over it for a few minutes, all he said was “After the council has met, you’ll know if it’s approved by what we call you on the radio in the morning.” Turns out that Alan was banging on Rick’s door at 5a the next morning, talking a mile a minute about those crazy Idaho boys while Rick was just trying to get his wits about him. Sure enough, our efforts don’t go unheeded and “SpudNuts, what the heck are you guys doing over there??” crackles over the radio the next morning.



The answer of course is 'trying to squirt Steve with a squid'.