I buy shit.

But sometimes it can turns out OK.

Before.

After.

Fucking off the CWA, historians, and a select population of stringer janglers.

Now you see it...

...Now you don't.

Thanks in no small part to the efforts of the Monocacy Creek TU Chapter, the City of Bethlehem, and the many people who are responsible for the festering sore of shit known as Musikfest (coz flooding is bad for business, and you know they cried about it endlessly, lost revenue, etc etc etc; Money is our God), the dam in Johnson Park along Monocacy Creek is now gone.

Actually, it has been for awhile now. I just don't care to do updates because, honestly, this is pretty lame and I realize now. Not "this" the dam removal, "this" a ridiculous egocentric blog wherein I tell you all about whatever shit I've done gone and bought (that'll be the next few installments).

Anyways, let's get on with the good bits. I tried to be useful, and tried to take some before/after pictures, and figure we'll just post them because that is interesting.

That said, lemme specify when I say "I tried," I sort of forgot to take more corresponding pictures of further up the damed section, which was basically a long, slow, flat and shitty pool unsuitable for anything other than the poor bastard stockies which hadn't been slaughtered, some fat carp, and more ducks than you'd know what to do with.

No more frog water.

Now, however, about two weeks after the breaching, and after the work crews have completed and moved on there's some great riffles, some holding water, and the newfound ability of fish to move further up the creek rather than be stuck at a lowhead dam and able to be murdered easily by the creeling masses of the greater Bethlehem area. Ha ha, fuck you and work for it, assholes.

So, after the cut, way more fucking pictures of things that aren't very important to most people, including alot of very-nearly-the-same perspective pictures.

Superfine Touch 904-4 build.

Last rod project completed, I'm done building shit because I don't really foresee much less I don't own, I didn't really need this one, either, but I wanted a longer rod that would also be light, which meant graphite.

There's not much out there in the way of slower action, full flexing, graphite except for the venerable Orvis Superfine, except I couldn't afford a $500 rod, hence building and the sudden burst of activity (I'd been sitting on those other blanks for a long time).

The blank is an Orvis Superfine Touch 904-4, only Mudhole.com sells Orvis' blanks, and they Superfines are built-to-order, so prepare to wait 3 to 6 weeks. Like the last two rods, I used a cheap Fenwick-style half wells grip, an aluminum featherweight downlocking seat, and PacBay lightwire snakes and TiCH stripper. Orvis provided spacing, and guide size was determined by expanding the data provided by Tom Morgan Rodsmiths in his guide charts (st8-2-1-1-1/0-1/0-1/0-2/0-2/0-2/0-tip). Thread was PacBac midnight black nylon, and Gudebrod red/black twist both in size A with two coats of Flexcoat CP and finished with two coats of Flexcoat Lowbuild.

Now, if only I could find free time during the day to use all these new toys.

Yearly trico fuckstory.

Its 5:34am on a Monday morning when most people are heading into work.

I could be standing in the middle of a well regarded trico stream fishing banty drakes to stupid fish in about 30 minutes from walking out my door.

I have a fully rigged rod, plus a spare leader, a little jar of trico spinners, and everything I need sitting in the car.

The entire thing is ready to go for my yearly trico ritual.

And... I don't care. Its a stupid hatch for stupid people. Tricos are assholes. I'm going to bed.

Kabuto 8053, pt 1.

The second rod I've started is done, a Kabuto 8053 in the translucent white.

I think I ordered the blank nearly two years ago, and was probably sitting on it for 18 months. I decided I needed to finally do it, and put it together.

I was, honestly, originally planning on making this some sort of magnum opus for me, the ultimate rod, one rod to rule them (etc).

That was when I only fished dry flies. Shit, now I only fish wet flies, so, well, fuck that one rod shit, huh? That said, I only had it out a little bit, but I'll wax poetic on it after I've used it for awhile.

There's few times I feel like I'm doing a public service with this shitty blog, but talking about an obscure fly rod you'll never see in a shop might be one of them. I'll do that after I've had some more time (and fish) with it.

Anyways, build details follow.