James Niggemeyer – An Eventful Week

It’s been a pretty eventful week! I started out a little bit ahead of schedule and headed up to Table Rock Lake in Branson, Missouri for the Second Central Open. We’re really excited about that event. I’ve never seen water come up so high in all the years I have been fishing and so fast, like I did there in Branson. It’s terrible; there is a lot of tragedy going on there a lot of flooded houses and water coming right in the front door. It’s just terrible like it is in many parts of the country, Alabama and parts of Mississippi, with a lot of tornadoes. It’s been a real stormy week!

It started out celebrating Easter with my family there at the campground at Table Rock State Park. We had a little egg hunt inside the camper and just had a good time and we didn’t give them a bunch of candy, but we got them some treats for Easter and we got some puddle boots.

I mean it rained, literally, just rained with lightning and thunder continuously for four days, and then, if it quit, it started back up soon after that. It was so much that we were pretty much confined to the camper. I didn’t go out practicing because there was so much lightning that it seemed like I was a little foolish to get out there and take my chances.

The tournament got called off on the morning of the second day of practice. The water level went from about 915 feet elevation when I got there and it rose to 933 feet, which is a record high for Table Rock; it was incredible. They ended up sending it over the spillway and down to Lake Taneycomo which is where there are a bunch of houses down there and so much of the flooding was an issue. That is also the area where the new Bass Pro Shops is in Branson, and a lot of those areas where little restaurants had to be closed down because of propane issues. You always read about those areas that are getting hit by extreme weather, but it was different to actually be in one of those areas where it’s coming through.

On another note, at home, my mother in law told me that there was a tornado that touched down real close to where I live. It just seems like all over the country or this part of the country has been hammered by a lot of extreme weather.

We were able to celebrate Resurrection Sunday, Easter Sunday with my family and we just kinda hung out and and hunkered down there in the camper with all the lightning. It’s a real special time for us as a Christian family. It’s nice to just be able to hang out with the family, typically I don’t get to have them with me during holidays, but it was great that I didn’t get to miss out spending this time with them.

On the way to West Point; we visited the guys at Strike King and then just continue to move on. I’m looking forward to this next event at West Point; I’m looking forward to a better second half in the Elite Series. Hey, it is exciting and I am looking forward like I said to having a great second half and doing well.

We were trying to meet up with some friends of ours at a church there in Tuscaloosa, which was really badly hit. We were planning on dropping off some supplies like diapers and things like that, so that they could distribute to some places that were really badly hit by the tornado between Tuscaloosa and Birmingham.

But, my truck busted a hose on the radiator and after dumping seven bottles of water into it, we finally limped it 22 miles into a Ford dealership where they fixed it up on a Friday afternoon. I wish we could have been some help in Alabama; the destruction from the tornado was terrible. Really the first time I have ever seen anything like that; we felt SO bad for the people and with Marshall law and National Guard being deployed it was really surreal.