Kickass and trout floundering

Kickass, the doorstop dog, too smart to accompany the keeper on any of his trout floundering, reports that he—the keeper, recently stood waist-deep in the middle of a high-water trout stream and watched his treasured wooden landing net float away to oblivion.  The net, given to him many years ago by son Larry and grandsons Nick and Tony, drifted around the bend after it had been used to land a 14-inch trout, and the keeper had been unable to return the net to its rightful place because he can no longer reach the very clever storage clip up between his shoulder blades.  Then the back-up cord broke, and the net was gone.  Those who have never stood in the middle of a rapidly moving, four-foot-deep, rock and mud bottom stream will perhaps not understand why an elderly man—who uses a wading staff to stay upright—just why there was not a rushing pursuit to simply retrieve the net.  There was, in fact a brief, instinctive move, which resulted in the keeper stepping into water deep enough to flow in over his waders and shockingly cool all of his body parts north of his nipples.  So it was a typical trout outing.  A later bank patrol of the stream did not produce the net.  The sodden keeper went home net-less, and he and Phyllis shared a trout dinner with extra wine.