Early 80's, fishing Possession Bar with the old man. For proper perspective, the guy was a very dangerous to salmon in the salt from Alaska to Puget sound and not prone to "ah [censored]" moments on or off the water. Down rigger pops on his rod. In a second or two, he pulls the rod out of the holder and cranks down on the fish. For some unknown reason, he places his right hand below the reel seat and uses his left to crank up the DR while setting the hook hard. Crack! He's left with the rod butt in his hand and the fish takes everything else over the stern and into the briny deep. It was one of those rare occasions when I asked him what prompted him to do such a (stupid) thing. He didn't have a very good response other than to try to remedy the matter at hand. We troll around for several minutes hoping to pick up the line on the DR cables. Nothing. Then I notice a guy doing an overhead hand-over-hand a couple hundred yards away until he pulls in a nice 'nookie about 15 lbs and then a rod, sans butt. We pull up next to them and ask if we can have the rod back to go with the butt. He goes, "Sure, you want your fish too?" After a bit, we had both the rod, the fish and the guys phone number. Dad fished with this particular sportsman for many years after that. Maybe he wasn't momentarily stupid after all....