reevesr1

When they came to south Texas, everyone said "they are no threat, they only sell freshwater stuff". Turns out, shock of shocks, they do a bit of market research and had a fully stocked, well thought out saltwater selection as well. Same will undoubtedly hold true for fly fishing gear. But will they compete with the specialty fly shops? I doubt it. They will certainly compete with Wholesale though.

They have keyboards designed for regular hands. They are called keyboards. I am typing on one now. It would be hard to fit in in a holster on my belt however, and a bigger PITA to hold up to my ear. Maybe we could go back to the days of the suitcase phone? By the way, I wish I was the knot head that designed the blackberry! As to fly boxes, seems they are trying to hit an unreachable design criteria, or at least conflicting ones. Same with phone keyboards I guess. Make them too big, and people complain they are big and klunky. Too small, and the designers are knot heads. (is it knot head or knothead?) Shack nasties affect us all.

Thanks to Lynn and Mike for putting this on. It was a very nice morning, wonderful food (healthy pancakes and all) and great to see everyone. We will keep the tradition going next year as well!

I know what a toilet is. It's the thing you leave the lid up on. A bit unclear on the other two. Probably not important anyway.

Pretty blonde's with a green mask? And another man in the house? Hey, just like home!!

Crap. I was only going cuz you were going to be at your seminar. Maybe we can both show up at 7 am or so. Scariest wake up call Mike and Lynn would ever have!

The good news is the lack of flowing trout filled water up in that neck of the woods. Hope there aren't any pike!

Thanks for doing this Lynn! Work has me busier than a one legged man in an ass kicking contest. Looking forward to seeing everyone.

Back home, I always had somewhere right on the water to clean fish, and almost never had to clean them at home. I hate cleaning fish at home. But next time I guess I have to. My wife wasn't too happy that I didn't bring any back. She is resigned to the fact I won't keep trout, but she did not understand not keeping the burbot! No Walleye's. All burbot, 1 pike.

Funny you should mention that. I thought of keeping some, but as soon as Steve said you had to skin them, I lost all interest. All of ours were released.

Darn Rob, sorry we missed you. Steve, thanks again for the invite! It was a blast. And the stars were beyond spectacular. Since the last couple of trips to the Bow have shown I have lost my ability to catch fish in moving water, it was great to actually land some fish. Even if they weren't exactly sophisticated!

Happy Birthday Brad!

Gee guys, step right up. Oughta be a hoot fishing with the bitchy and crabby girl. Don't know what you call entertainment for high testosterone, but apparently we have different ideas.

It would be hard to be grumpier than I am right now. Can't fish, can't ski. WTF else is there to do in this god forsaken country? Watch hockey? Crap. I did take the kids skiing yesterday to Sunshine and sat in the car listening to football games and reading "Season's of a Fisherman" by Haig-Brown. I wanted to take them to Castle (189 cm reported mid mountain), but I thought I might kill myself or someone else if I couldn't ski myself AND had to drive over what was sure to be an open Crowsnest. Would have been to hard for me to take. On the Livingston/Oldman question: Where would everyone go then? The Crow? One of the Castles? Racehorse? Elk? etc, etc. I'm not sure what the answer is, but restricted access/rod days? Do you really think that would work? Do we have the enforcement necessary? I'm not altogether against it, but I don't know if it is feasible. And I do fear the pressure on other bodies of water.

Best quote from the replies to the article: "Kudos to the Missoulian for stepping up and giving its readers another press release story. PETA clearly does not think that an MT high school will actually change it's name, they simply operate under the premise that any press is good press. By running with the story, even if the writer is just making light of it, the local paper just plays along with the game, encouraging more inane press releases from more inane groups, and in turn more inane topics to write about. PETA's not to blame here, they've just realized that if they send out whacky press releases, someone at the Missoulian will bite on it." I wonder if the "will bite on it" was a pun? And to hijcack a hijack: There was a discussion above on deer populations, specifically that the number of deer in Texas is larger than the entire population in Canada. I have no way to verify that (or am too lazy to), but lets take it as fact. There has been far more development in Texas than in Canada. Vast, vast tracks of Canada are still relatively untouched. Further, if you go to Austin, you will see more deer in the city than anywhere else. They thrive in the hill country communities. So I'm unsure how much development has an impact (though this is purely an unscientific observation). My bet is (again, totally unscientific) is that the population of deer in Texas has always been larger. It's a biomass issue. The deer in Texas are significantly smaller than the deer here. The first time I saw a whitetail here, I was in shock they are so much larger. They have to be to survive the cold. I don't think the north country could ever support the population density of the tiny deer down south. Back to PETA, I don't think we have felt significant impact yet in North America with respect to number of fishermen or hunters. They will never be able to convince the recreational fisherman or hunter to abandon their activity. PETAs goal is to make it politically unacceptable for hunting and fishing to continue. Convince the voters and the politicians will have to follow. Pipes, Be careful about talking about exposing new people around here, or you'll get flamed for creating overpopulation on someones favorite river or stream. If you do expose someone, always take them somewhere they have no chance of catching or shooting anything to avoid making some other hunter or fisherman mad.

Oh, I don't think the decline in the numbers of hunters and fishermen have anything at all to do with PETA, up to today anyway. If and when PETA gets it's wish, hunting and fishing will be done, totally. I agree with your reasoning for the decline. As society has shifted, the need for subsistence hunting has ended. What's left is us, the recreational hunters and fishermen. I am a completely selfish C&R guy myself. I do care about the fish's welfare, but really only so I, or others, can catch him again. I know there are lots who feel differently, and I totally respect that opinion. Jayhad, From mine too!

Not a bad marketing ploy I think. While it seems totally silly to us, it shows they are thinking long term as this is obviously targeted towards kids. If they get the kids on board, only a matter of time before we all have to take up golf. We tend to dismiss PETA as a bunch of fruitcakes. While they may be just that, they are getting more and more members. Their operating budget this year was 30 Million dollars. 1.9 million people subscribe to their e-mail list. And they are only going to get bigger. While we tend to write them off, it's always been interesting to me how often people who fish can echo PETA views, to a point. We care about the welfare of the fish as well. Some of the biggest debates on this board are over fish handling or ethics associated with how we catch fish. PETA just takes that talk to it's logical conclusion. We think it's ok to catch them, but not harm them in other ways. They think catching them is harming them, so it should be banned. At least they aren't hypocrites about it. I'm not defending PETA here. I completely disagree with almost all of their stances. Of course I do as I think they are a direct danger to my favorite past time, and will probably win in the end (though that is far down the road). But just because I disagree with them does not mean I underestimate them.

I suppose it was just sleepy drugs, but happy sleepy drugs. While i was only lucid for a couple of seconds, it was a FUN couple of seconds!

I've only had anesthesia once, when I got the ole colonoscopy. What a party that is! Anyway, did the count backwards from 10, made it to like 8, then don't remember a thing. Woke up just as they were finished. Nurse asked, "how much do you remember?" "Nothing, I was completely out of it." "No you weren't" she said. "You were telling stories the whole time." Typical. I even tell stories in my chemically induced sleep.

Codeine for me! I expected LoyalEddie you to link the video, but I guess I'll do it:

If you dont drink or dont smoke, what do you do? Is it filled with innuendo? Is it something inside?

Happy birthday Dave!

As I've said before, I am a bait fisherman. A pussy however? Arm is not broken. When the doctor told me I said yaay! I can go skiing this weekend. He said "no you can't". Anyway, hope I can fish in a couple of weeks.

Not yet. Xrays back this afternoon. Max, I don't think anyone has to apologize to me for hijacking a thread. I would be the word's worst hypocrite if it bothered me! Edit: By the way Tylenol 3's at work=GOOD.