ROCbass

Go around to all the local fishing clubs and get the members to write their congressman or other applicable governing body (city council etc.).

Abu Garcia C3 or C4 are good reels in this price range if you like round reels. I use the 4600 size for bass fishing.

Does anybody here have the Carrot Stix Wild? What do you think of it? I handled one the other day in Gander Mountain, and it seemed like a nice rod, but I wanted to get some opinions before I went ahead and got one. I was looking at the 7' medium moderate to use with a Curado E5 for cranks. Any feedback on this specific rod, and/or other cranking rods in the $100 or less price range would be appreciated.

I just set my drag a little looser when using heavy braid so it will slip in case I set the hook into a log, and I've never broken a rod this way.

How much backing do you use? I fill a little less than half my spool with backing and I can regularly cast down to the backing with certain lures after retying a few times.

6'6" M/F

That's a nice bike, but the first thing I noticed was the emblem on your truck. Did you have that custom made?

Its a bummer that you'll have to miss LAX, but don't try to be a hero and overdo it. 4-6 weeks isn't that bad. When I did my ankle, the prognosis was more like 4-6 months. (I broke my fibula and tore several ligaments and had to have 2 screws put in my ankle). It was almost 2 months before the doc would let me bear any weight on that leg at all, and I was still in the boot for a few months after that. Now a couple years later I still have the occasional ache, but i know it could be much worse if I hadn't followed the doc's advice. In the grand scheme of things, 4-6 weeks is nothing and you're gonna want your joints to work properly for the rest of your life.

A ziploc keeps my camera dry just as well, and is much lighter.

The lake has a southwest to northeast orientation, and is separated in the middle by a bridge in Edwardsville. Its a shallow, weedy lake, with the deepest spot around 30' and an average depth of 10' or so. The part of the lake southwest of the bridge is rockier and deeper than the northeast section. My buddy has a cottage on the lake and I usually go at least once a year, although last year I was unable to. I've mostly fished the northeastern section since his boat is pretty small and that's where his cottage is. We catch a lot of LMB on plastics in the weeds and shallow running cranks. The pike will hit just about anything, and you might be surprised by the occasional channel cat or bowfin. The keeper length for bass is 15", and there's good numbers of fish within an inch either side of this. If you're just fun fishing its not a big deal, but If you're in a tourney I would imagine it would get frustrating catching lots of 14 1/2" fish that aren't keepers, lol. Overall, Its one of my favorite lakes. It's pretty well known throughout NY and gets a decent amount of pressure in the summer, especially on the weekends, but the southeast shoreline is almost completely undeveloped which really cuts down on the amount of pleasure boaters.

That's a good question. The shoes use European sizes, and on their website they have a conversion chart based on the length of your foot in inches. For example, my foot is 11", which translates to a size 43. If your second toe is longer, you would just measure from your heel to the end of your second toe. On my left foot, my first and second toes are the same, but on my right the second toe is about 3/8" longer. When I wear my fivefingers, my right big toe just has a little bit of extra room at the tip but this amount of difference doesn't affect anything. If your second toe is too much longer though, you might need to go up a size, or you might not be able to wear them at all. The size chart is a useful guide, but I would recommend getting fitted and trying them on at a store if you have one near you that carries them if you are considering getting a pair and are concerned about how they will fit your feet.

The only one out of the ones you listed that I've used is the Mojo. I have the exact model you listed. The biggest complaint I've heard about them is that they're tip heavy. In my experience this hasn't been the case and I love mine, but if you're already feeling that way from picking it up in the store you probably won't be happy with it in the long run.

lol they do look bad Says the guy in women's sunglasses :

I think you'd be surprised at how well they hold up. I've had my first pair for about 7 months without any durability problems. I'm normally pretty hard on shoes and I wore them almost every day from July through the middle of November, when it got too cold out to wear them. As far as the soles not being very thick, you're right, they're only a couple millimeters, and you can feel rocks/twigs underfoot. I've done some hiking in mine on some pretty rocky trails, and it does take some getting used to. In my experience, once I was used to walking in them, I could feel the rocks I was stepping on, but they didn't hurt, and I felt much more in tune with my surroundings. I noticed an improvement in my balance on rough terrain as well.

Nope, wasn't planning on getting a Shimano. I wanted to get a carbonlite, and a new crankbait rod for my curado E5. My original plan was to use the trade in coupon on a carbonlite, then get a crankin' stick, but then I saw that the carbonlite combos were $180 bucks, and they have a 7' medium moderate carbonlite rod. At this price, the combo would have been cheaper than the carbonlite and crankin stick together, but I'm not sure now which will be the better deal once the coupon is factored in if it can't be used on a combo.

I love my Fivefingers. I currently have 2 pairs of KSO's. I have an all black pair that I bought over the summer, and a black and orange pair I just got a couple weeks ago. I plan on adding a pair of flows to the collection next. The black ones I got over the summer are just a little too big, which is why I got a second pair of KSO's. Well that, and I like the color of my new ones. Bassclary, the purpose is to simulate a more natural, barefoot walking/running motion, while still providing some degree of protection for your feet. By simulating a barefoot footstrike, which is on your forefoot instead of your heel, you will strengthen the small muscles in your foot and ankle.

Does anyone know if you can use the reel trade in coupon on a combo, or only on a reel purchased separately?

Here's one with a factory offset line tie. I can personally attest that that I get virtually no line twist with these, and pike love 'em. http://www.luhrjensen.com/products/spoons--spinners/shyster

have you tried any inline spinners with an offset line tie? this should eliminate twist because with an offset tie, you're pulling from slightly above the spinner's center of gravity instead of in line with it's center of gravity, which allows the wire to spin with the blade and twist your line.

I really hope that the dispute gets resolved before games have to be interrupted, although I don't see much reason to believe that this will be the case at this point. The one silver lining I can see is that if there is a lockout, it might drive enough fans away to convince the teams that lower ticket and merchandise prices are needed to win fans back. Again though, I don't really see this happening even though its the best case scenario if there's a lockout. For every person the league drives away with a lockout, there will be others who will gladly take their place, especially in cities like Green Bay with enormous season ticket waiting lists. The NFL isn't like MLB or the NHL, and I don't think a labor stoppage will have the same effect that it had in those sports. The NFL is much more popular, and the opportunity to see games in a 16 game season with individual game playoffs is much less than in a 162 or 82 game season with best of seven playoffs. Because of the popularity of the league and the limited opportunity to see games, I think if the league takes a year off instead of driving fans away, they will be climbing the walls to get back into the stadiums when football comes back. Baseball and hockey were easier to ignore because they were less popular to begin with and with so many games, people approach them with the attitude that they will get around to seeing one eventually, instead of making it a point to go. Even in hockey, which is a fringe sport in much of the country, teams in traditionally strong hockey markets had no problem selling out games shortly after the work stoppage. The entire country is a traditionally strong football market. If there is a lockout, no matter the outcome as far as the arrangement between owners and players, the biggest losers will be the fans. Unfortunately, instead of taking a stand and seeing what the league will do for us to win us back, I bet too many of us will just be glad to have football back, and let the league continue to charge ridiculous amounts for merchandise and tickets.

a pair of these in black and orange: http://www.vibramfivefingers.com/products/Five-Fingers-KSO-Mens.htm

TT, has a flea market type section too, but the hot deals is something different. In the flea market, its members selling their used/unwanted gear. in hot deals, you post links to tackle stores that have good deals. For example, if I wanted to sell my Avid, I would post in the flea market. If tackle warehouse was selling Avids for $80* and I thought other members would want to know, I would post in hot deals. *disclaimer- this example was used for demonstration purposes only. None of my gear is currently for sale, and I am not aware of any closeouts on Avids at ***.

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The 90's were WAY better. Granted, I was too young to remember the first two superbowl losses, and too young to fully appreciate the next two, but even through the late 90's when I knew more about what was going on, it was great watching football that was at least competitive along with a few more playoff appearances, knowing that they might have a shot at going back to the Superbowl any given year. A while back we were talking about this on a Bills forum that I belong to, and one of the guys there summed it up best when he said that of course he would rather the Bills won at least one of those 4 superbowls, but he would also rather have them be 0-5 in superbowls than 0-4. I would gladly take another superbowl loss over 11 years of no playoffs.

Oh man, I love that. I keep moving in the snow, but I have a 4x4 pickup - much different than a heavy SUV. All the 4wd in an SUV does is get you up your driveway. Ford Exploders are the worst offenders, too, LOL. I'd rather have the SUV actually, pickups are too light in the rear to get good traction. I feel like I shouldn't have to put the car in 4x4 just to back down the driveway without spinning the wheels because of a little snow or ice, and in my mom's Explorer I don't. Can't say the same for either of my dad's pickups ('98 f-150 and 2011 Silverado). That said, I'll take my AWD Subaru in the snow over any of them. Just keep a ton of snow in the back to weigh it down. Helps me out. I don't have those issues with my Sierra. Maybe its the tires? More weight = greater stopping distance. Could be the tires I suppose, or it could be our driveway. it has a slight hump to it, and the only time the trucks spin the tires is starting out in reverse on ice or packed snow going uphill over the hump. Not really that big of a deal, and they both do fine once I'm actually on the road even in poor conditions. Still the point remains that I've only had this happen in the pickups, never in the Explorer.