Mark K

Pretty good response Ron.

Thank you guys. I fell off the face of the planet the last few months. I've done little more than remove rubber from the bottom of my shoes. It was particulary rough this winter. I'm still tired and feeling like I have been run over by train. Qualifying for and running Boston, is nothing short of an honor. It's the oldest marathon in the country, steeped in tradition and just plain better. Boston is a one way course (the same as it was 115 years ago). It's held on Patriots day which is a huge Holiday in Boston. The kids are off school, so they use the school buses to transport you from Copley Square in Boston to the tiny ass town of Hopkinton. Where you freeze your ass off at the highschool for two hours. The course is a tiny road (with 27,000 runners) everyone is trapped in their house. They are BBQing out front, drinking beer, drinking beer, the locals hold out water (and beer??!!) and orange slices and there are rows of kids holding out their hands to high-5 you. I SWORE to myself, I was going to avoid every single one of their germy little hands and cut every corner and shave every second off... But you just can't...cause your running Boston! The people are so wonderful, you can hear them coaching their kids on how to hold the drinks out. At mile 10 you go thru Wesleyan (sp?) College. It's known as the Weslelyan tunnel. You can hear the roar from 1000m away. The girls from the college try to get you to slow down and kiss them. All I'm going to say is..."What happens at Boston, stays at Boston". Seriously, no stops. They all look like kids to me. Though an innocent peck for tradition sake, would not have been a big deal or in my opinion a violation of dad/husband ethics it might have more importantly f'ed up my time. By this time I had realized that I was kicking arse and needed to stay focused. It's down hill most of the way up till mile 16, when you hit a series of hills thru the town of Newton. They are not particularly steep but if you went out even slightly too fast...you are toast. They end at mile 21. This hill is affectionatly known as "HeartBreak Hill". Then it's downhill and into Boston. Where you are surrrounded by Red Sox fans, waiting for the Patriots Day game... another much larger tunnel. Here is where you see the carnage of runners that went out too fast. Limping with miles to go. Here is where the risk lies. Anyway... I was pushing hard. Real hard and felt okay till mile 24. I never came totally unglued but the last 2 miles all I'm gonna say is I was out of my body. I was pretty close to passing out after the finish. So... Gary, to answer your question. Yes Chicago is next. But to quote Frank Shorter, "You have to forget your last marathon before you try another. Your mind can't know what's coming." Are there still smallmouth around Chicago?

It is dependent on whether or not the illinois is frozen or not. You can call the visitor center or Starved Rock State Park for an update. I would say late Feb is too late. In spring the waterfalls are spectacular.

I took this on 1/9/2011

I think a bigger consideration than brand (as...there are a lot of nice reels out there) is whether to go righty or lefty. If you are going to do a lot of cranking, without imparting a lot of action to the lure. I would go righty (assuming you are right handed). If you fish a lot of lures taht require twiching or whatever. I would go lefty.

LOL!

Blue loctite you should have no problem getting off. red requires heat. a lot. Personally I like the teflon tape idea.

Exactly my thought. And overall, petroleum sucks.

Easy. They are armed. HA! I believe there are cases where birds get lead poisoning from fishing tackle, especially fish eating birds. Putting my money where my mouth is, I have been trying to use non-lead where possible. The bullet sinkers are da-bomb far superior to lead.

Gill lice in the driftless region. There was a pretty good article on this, for the life of me I can't find it. http://forums.flyfisherman.com/forum/midwestern-states/gill-lice-popular-driftless-area-stream

http://troutunlimitedblog.com/alaska-enacts-statewide-ban-on-felt-sole-wading-gear/

I looked over the Center for Biological Diversity's website. Hate to say it, but the only thing I find disagreeable is the lead ban. http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/ And they sound well intentioned but misdirected, if you ask me. You gotta appreciate the thinking behind the Endangered Species Condoms. http://www.endangeredspeciescondoms.com/ I like the Snail Darter one LOL.

I've tried 7" Power Worms and similar Culprit worms in the Kank and can report 0% success rate. I have no idea why but most likeley a confidence thing.

First make sure your core is warm because of it gets cold your body works to keep your organs warm, sacrificing extremties. Someone posted this tip when I complained about cold fingers. It's true. Second, blue jeans and cotton s the most worthless fabric of all time. It really has no redeeming value. It sucks in every way possible. Go poly propylene( like Under Armor, not Walmart stuff) followed by a layer of fleece. You can buy cheap fleece at places like Marshalls and TJ Max. Actually you can find nice name brand stuff there. If you are old school, wool is the way to go. Actually, I think wool, especially nice wool is a truly wonderful material. Third if I had bad knees I would bandage up a chemical warming pack, like hot hands on each knee cap.

Oh yeah. September rocks. Normally I don't bitch about summer, but the heat indexes were relentless. I feel really bad for guys that do physical labor outdoors. Last year's summer was nice IMHO. Fall sucks because it's pretty for like two weeks, then grey and ugly AND it's a precurser for a long miserable Chicago winter. Snow screws my life up big time. I hate it with my whole soul. I'm praying for mild snowless winter.

What a miserable, worthless summer. For the first time in my life I'm looking forward to Fall. Hopefully we'll have a mild winter.

Ron- quit being crotchety. that's a fine day's fishing. Good Job Mike and John.

I had the opposite problem today. Fishing at lunch. It made a great topwater smash, jumped twice then crawled under a rock. I couldn't get him out and I wanted my damn lure back cause it's a kick ass bait and I wasn't sure they still make them. So I rolled up my pants best I could and waded in knee deep. It was a big rock, but I flipped over and he took off again. I got him in raced back to work a few minutes late and with my pants half wet. I work in a pretty nice facilty,where they are walking customers thru all the time, so I cowered off into my corner wet pant legs and all. Just glad I didn't fall in. . Let 'em jump I say.

This thread makes fly fishing sound entirely too complicated.

I was thinking about getting this one. http://www.williamjoseph.net/products/product_31.aspx

Did you call Simms? They might send you a new pair. I had a the soles on a pair of Korkers fall apart. I called the company and they sent me a brand new pair. Really out of fairness to Simms, you ought to give them a ring.

Mike, The Lemonweir River, below the dam in Mauston is an option. At one time it was a morning bite bonanza but I have not done as well in recent years. I was there a few months ago, did well on a J9 chartreuse rap. I did get a 19", but that was around '04. I've caught pike and nice gills. Saw a huge, huge LM caught on a sucker (and get bucketed) Unfortunatly I wont be there this weekend or I'd show you around. Worth checking out if other options don't pan out. Fishing can be good in New Lisbon also, but you are getting into more a drive. Good luck Mark

I have an Olympus stylus 1050 sw. The only thing good about it is it's waterproof. Other than that it sucks. It just cannot handle any kind of contrasty situations and totally screws up the exposure almost every time. I retouch everything in Photoshop. the worst camera I've ever owned. Plus Olympus uses an XD card also pain.

Steve, I'm not sure exactly how it's inteded to be used, but if you pin a zinger just above it, just right it serves as a sheath to keep your nippers from flopping around. Here is a picture illustrating this: http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.orvis.co.uk/orvis_assets/corpimg/071307_FishingLuggage.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.orvis.co.uk/store/product.aspx%3Fpf_id%3D96y1&usg=__85F6bZQQi4X17PLkjttU3e42W54=&h=135&w=560&sz=22&hl=en&start=17&sig2=BkgYViCnGA_JsZQth5EanA&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=JTQ7U9J9CVPESM:&tbnh=32&tbnw=133&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dorvis%2Bsafe%2Bpassage%2Bsling%2Bpack%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26sa%3DN%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26tbs%3Disch:1&ei=TZpDTJyDEcKA4Qa8j_CaDw But frankly I'm not clear on how you would pin the thing that deep in the holder. If you pin it just above the sheath the nippers will be covered but just in reach from the bottom.