Savage Words: ‘A nice day to walk your fish’

Whenever it rains a lot, I have a tried-and-true line that I’ve used a thousand times in my life. 

“It’s a nice day to walk your fish.” 

I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve said that to people on a rainy day. Most of the time it’s met with a chuckle. Occasionally, it conjures up a confused look. 

I first heard that line as a child when I was watching qualifications for the Indianapolis 500 four decades ago. It had rained fairly heavily at the Speedway and qualifying was delayed because of the persistent rain drops in Indianapolis. 

To fill network television time, ABC went around the garage area and talked to many of the drivers who were waiting out the rain delay.  

They caught up with Howdy Holmes, a Michigan native who qualified for seven Indianapolis 500s in the 70s and 80s. Holmes was known as a jokester, a driver who always had a tale to tell and he was liked by almost everyone in the garage area. 

When the ABC trackside reporter got to him during the rain delay, his joking demeanor took over.  

“Well, it’s a nice day to walk your fish,” he said with a grin on his face.

At least I think that’s what he said. 

After seeing the waters rise at Huset’s over the weekend, I couldn’t help but think of Holmes’ quip 40 years ago on network television. 

But as the waters continued to burst its banks near Huset’s and I pondered what to write for this column, I started questioning myself. Did I really hear him say that, or was it just something that’s manifested in my mind over the last four decades?

Holmes was an interesting character on the television screen. I have no doubt people loved him at the race track, but that charisma clearly oozed out of the television screen and into homes around the world. At least it did for a teenage kid in South Dakota. 

Not always, but Holmes’ cars were very recognizable because they were sponsored by the Jiffy line of baking mixes. His grandmother invented the mixes in 1930 and Holmes is now the President at Chelsea Milling Company, home of Jiffy. His family founded the company in 1901. 

Because I wasn’t sure if what I heard –or what I thought I heard was real – I decided to give Howdy a shout, completely out of the blue. 

I’d never met him, never talked to him. I’m not sure if you’d consider him a childhood hero, but he was certainly someone I was aware of and admired. In 1984, his white and blue No. 41 with big JIFFY letters on the side of the car qualified in the middle of the front row between Tom Sneva and eventual winner Rick Mears. In IndyCar circles, those two names are heavy hitters, and Holmes stuck the Jiffy baking mix mobile right in the middle of them at the start.

So I called him. I looked up the Chelsea Milling Company’s phone number in Michigan and gave it a shot. I told the receptionist that I was a reporter in South Dakota and I was hoping to chat with Howdy Holmes. 

“Hold for his voicemail,” is what she said. 

That caught me a tad off guard, but I left a meandering message on Howdy’s voicemail, telling him who I was and that I wanted to confirm a story he told 40 years ago on ABC.

That was it. I hung up and thought it was pretty cool that I left a message for a quasi-childhood hero. I certainly didn’t expect to hear back from him.

But about 10 minutes later, H HOLMES showed up on my phone as an incoming call. 

After a 10-minute conversation that had me grinning the entire time, Holmes confirmed that he did indeed say it on ABC 40 years ago, and he chuckled as we reminisced. 

“I didn’t think that was the story you were talking about,” he said. 

I asked him to please elaborate. 

He told me of a weekend at Laguna Seca Raceway on the California coast several years ago. On Saturday’s qualifying day, the weather was perfect. However, Sunday’s race day called for horrible weather. 

But when Sunday morning dawned, it was another beautiful day. 

“I saw a man of the cloth,” Howdy told me. “I asked him if he was responsible for this great weather.”

Howdy said the pastor paused for a couple of seconds before answering. Then, he looked him squarely in the eyes.

“Son, I’m in sales, not management,” the priest told him. 

“I’ve told that story 10,000 times,” Howdy told me last week behind a big laugh. “I thought maybe you’d heard it over the years.”

I hadn’t heard that story, but just having a conversation – and now a story of my own – with Howdy might just be a mid-year highlight for me.