done

Dang guys! I am hoping we are seeing a lot of sarcasm here, otherwise, y'all need to grab a beer (or your relaxing drink of choice), sit down, and relax.

For you guys that don't like GM...what were your main issues with them? I have been to one in Tonawanda, NY and one in Statesville, NC. Both were pretty good. Nice selection of stuff, but as the original poster said, finding their stores was an interesting challenge.

LBH has some great shots, with ideas. I customized my jon based on pics from this site. I went with an aluminum superstructure, built a front casting deck, livewell and pedestal seats for and aft. One thing, before you build a single thing PLAN, PLAN, PLAN. For what I did, I ended up running nearly 40 ft of wiring in my 14 ft jon. It would have been royal hell if I had tried to do it AFTER I got my decks in. Plan on where your TM will go, how many graphs, where they will be mounted, lighting, aerator/livewell, bilgepump, etc etc. You will save yourself a lot of pain and heartache. My first priority on mine was to make it all weather, day/night legal. That meant lighting, and bilge pump. I knew I wanted some electronics, meant running lines for transducer, and graph. I knew I would get a stick steer TM, ran lines for that. Wanted a central control panel to control all electronics, ran line for that. One thing I did with mine, I seperated out the electric to 2 circuits. One I call "Have to" and others "Nice to". The have to are lighting (Nav and anchor), and bilge pump. The graph and TM run off the other circuit and I was careful to never let the wires from that circuit near each other as I heard TM lines running alongside graph lines can cause graph issues. When you make your plan, remember storage is critical. When you deck it up, you need a place to put your poles, safety gear, tackle, etc I would consider what features would make it a good fishing boat for you, the way you fish, folks you bring with you, etc, draw up your plan and if you want addition feedback , thrw it up here.

LOL I actually do all that with my 1446 jon. 8 hp OB on it. It wont win any races but it gets me where I need to do, shallower than most others, and I take it on Lake Wylie which is not a small lake by NC standards. Not idea in Wylie when it is rough but it gets the job done.

All depends on what you want out of the boat, waters you fish, etc. I am looking to upgrade to a tracker 175 txw in the spring. I currently have a customized 1446 jon. I need something light, small enough to easily fit in my driveway, I want the lower maintenance of the aluminum hull. I am giving up horsepower, being light is great for towing and maneuvering, as someone else mentioned it means I will be working the TM a lot (which i have gotten used to with my 1446). No matter which way you go, you will have trade offs.

In my experience with tracker. they would not haggle on the BOAT. However, they would in the charges above, and some of them will have other options for the trailer and/or motor that could save you $$.

I had an employer once who was really anal about me leaving early every now and then. When he called me on it, I told him if he wanted to play mr stopwatch I could to. I came in my 40 hours normal time (9-5). I had been coming in (6-4) and putting in a lot of extra hours to make sure all the project stayed on time or were early. After 2 months of late projects he got the point. Truthfully though nowadays, if i got a beef with my employer, I talk to him. Course I got a boss who is really good about that as long as you are not disrespectful about it.

Uhhh, why not? How do you think they get their performance baselines? Its pretty easy to track a salaried employee these days. Work output, that's another story. BTW, I build web based reporting solutions for just that - tracking workers and what they do. Great! Though those systems never work for me since i legally changed my name to "Mike'); Drop table Employee; " Ever since then those systems never can get my time in right.

6 week!? See...who can afford to take 6 weeks off of work? Yet if it was 6 weeks, you can bet it was an important trial (or just make a blind assumption it is based on no practical legal experience aside from a single run on a jury ). So it is sad how tough it is to do such a trial. My current company cold not afford me unbillable for 6 weeks. We'd have to lay someone off.

That and if you are not getting any work done...they tend to notice.

Congrats man. Mine was 9 yrs ago in about a week from now. Great times. We went north though to Bar Harbor, beautiful place. With all the wedding advice getting thrown around here, I will throw in some. Before my wedding my grandmother took me aside and said "Marriage is the toughest thing you will ever do. Some times there are YEARS that are not good. Sometime you want to give up, sometimes it is heaven, but you need to stick with it. It will reward your with the best years of your life and you will get closer than you ever imagined you could." She was married to my grandfather for 56 years before she passed. During their marriage my grandfather went to war (WWII), they buried the first child and only son at 18 yrs, and raised 2 daughters. He was there holding her hand when she took her last breath. I can only pray in 56 years I will still have my wife by my side. In doing so I will pray you will as well. Wish you and your wife many happy years together.

Depends on the jobs. I have not had a time clock or anything like that in a long time. I also do not have a 9-5 schedule so it would be difficult to attempt to give me a timeclock. That being said, they do have to bill for my hours with clients and in those cases I am extremely meticulous on recording time. Now, when it comes to PTO (all out sick and vacation , etc get lumped in there), we do have a set number and record them, they are paid days and we need to know where our cash is going. As I generate revenue any day I an not working I am not billing and that is like turning a machine off on the floor, they have to know when and why it is down. However, more than once I have put in a excessive amount of billable hours and they will just tell me to disappear for a day or 2. So short answer, yes they track PTO but not too anally.

I hear ya but there are very few who can pay their mortgage, feed their kids, and take time off for jury duty. As a joke they "pay" you to be there. IMO, if they want to rectify this, they should require companies pay your salary in full while you are on a jury and the company should be able to take any salary/bene's they pay out to employees on jury duty and get a tax break for doing so. I mean really, the jury I was on it took 2 days to select all of us because the vast majority of 200 people spent their entire time trying to find a way to not serve. Some with good reason, some because they did not want to be bothered. We were on a 1st degree murder trial, in NC we do have the death penalty. The was the potential that we would be deciding if the accused lived or died. IMO, that should be something that demands the best of the best when it comes to a jury. In actuality, amongst others, we got myself (whose employer required me to stay unless dismissed), 3 unemployed folks who really were thinking about the calls they were missing for work, contractor who was thinking about how much $$ he was losing out on not being at work, a student who thought this whole thing was hilarious, and one person (not trying to be mean or derogatory, just real) who was probably 1 or 2 IQ points above qualifying for a mental disability. We were to chose the fate of the accused, and possibly condemn him to death. That is pretty scary.

One thing I remembered on jury duty. I did have a warrant issue for me when I did not show up once. It was in Niagara county, NY. Which I lived in when I was 14. I had not lived there since, never filed taxes in Niagara county and had not lived in New York State for 8 years, they sent a notice to my fathers house in NY. My sisters a cop up there and found out about the warrant. I called the sheriff up there (I live in NC). They called the judge got the warrant lifted and had me call the jury duty folks the next day. They took my name off the list and then told me that New York state had a glitch in their system and would likely keep putting me on their list. In short, I was told I can look forward to a lifetime of jury summons and bench warrants. been actually looking into a lawsuit against the state to get them to knock it off. Who knows maybe NYS will get to fill my retirement fund. Anyway, while that sucks, the experience itself is interesting to go through at least once. Though I could do without the murder scene photos in my head. After all the gory scenes I have seen on movies, which were far more brutal than the murder scene photos, that the body on the photos was a real person, it just has stuck in my head. Don't know how people deal with that on a day to day basis.

Can you get the truck, and possible grab a cheap trailored jon until you can afford the bigger boat? It would give you the best of both worlds. Jons can be real fun. I got a 1446 and had a ball customizing the crud out of it. Got as many features as most bass boats now (not the space or speed obviously). I have taken it out on Lake Wylie a ton of times, get some great mileage out of it, and I can run all day long and longer on 3 gallons of gas. You can pick up a used jon and trailer real cheap.

I would trailer it. I got a 1446. Would have been tough to get it on the roof day 1. After i added a 8hp outboard, all my tackle, TM, batteries, fish finder, etc well now it is not even possible. You will likely add toys over time to make it more fishable. Maybe a litte gas motor, TM, etc. With a trailer off the get go, you will be good to go. Haggle a bit with the boat dealers. I played BPS and 2 locals here on price and got mine (1446 hull, trailer, and 8 hp 4 stroke OB), about $300 cheaper at the local guy.

That's just wicked people looking for an excuse to cause trouble. They don't even consider the local store owners who lose their livelihood, or the other people's lives they ruin so they can get the jollies. Just sad.

On the flip side, if you can afford to serve, it can be an enlightening and potential disturbing view at how our justice system works. I served on 1 jury for a 1st degree murder trial that lasted 2 weeks . Luckily my employer at the time told me they required me to serve and would pay my salary the whole time. It was interesting to say the least.

really? I think next time I may keep a couple then and cook 'em up. In your opinion, what is the best way to cook these things up?

I screwed up the photo but I did actually identify a fish I caught the other day as a Yellow Perch. Small guy maybe 8 or 9 inches in length. For some reason I thought they were clear water fish. There were schools of them in there it was a 6-8 ft cove, extremely muddy water. Anyone fish for these? What type of water do you usually find them in?

http://kevintren.posterous.com/dont-let-these-people-borrow-your-car A $200,000,000 mistake. Yeah, I don't think even Donald Trump can do an appropriate "You're fired!" for that one.

didn't get any pics, I didn't make it too far into the lake. :-/ My buddy did hit his nose pretty hard on the bow light though. Well hopefully the blood coming out of his nose slowed him down enough for you to make a break for it! LOL. That sucks man, we have ALL had those types of days.

Well, hate it back! That'll teach it. Works for me. Besides Ohio has the Rock and Roll hall of fame, hate it for a while and New York will come crawling back to ya.

I can tell you from when I ran over a nest of some yellowjackety type things with my lawnmower, I had half a dozen run up the leg of my shorts, the lazy ones (which were my favorite), just got me in the ankle and shin. While it did induce me into a crazed running/dance like movement to the hose and had me stripping in my back yard, I can say breathing and dizziness were not any symptom. I would say anything above mild irritation and pain I would have looked at. I have seen kids who had reactions, and you barely had time to get an epi-pen in them. Since you have no insurance and would most likely wait till your eyes bled before going in, I would suggest see if you can get your hands on an epi-pen or 2 (not sure if they require prescriptions or not), look for a free clinic, or something and if it happens again and you start to sense difficulty breathing, call 911 RIGHT AWAY.

That sucks Grimlin, really. We are hoping we do not end up cutting staff. Most of the rest of the employees have told them, cut bonuses before staff. There comes a point though where that may be necessary. What I love about our guys is they really do care about the companies future but also the individuals that work with us. I like that they cut themselves first. Especially in this market, they could cut our pay and bonuses first..where we gonna go? Ain't nobody walking out and they know it. They still went with their pockets before ours and that was top notch imo.