Being a self employed person all my life , I have made my own retirement .
If the economy of the country goes south , it greatly affects my retirement situation .
It seems that state or government employees have it better benefit / retirement wise as than most everyone else .Set for life . The retirement / benefit based on the last 3 years of employment seems a bit much ( for lack of a better word )to me . Teachers with seniority take on coaching or other position or other employees nearing retirement work the overtime that is saved for them by others so when it's their turn they can do the same to up their dollars so they can get more in retirement .
Politicians court the union vote and give them these great benefits to get their endorsement . Basically buying their vote with taxpayers money . Like paying off school debt .
When the economy gets bad , taxpayers still have to fund these guaranteed benefits .
The population is living longer and the better health care we get has gone through the roof . And a huge portion of the population is retiring at the same time . So taxpayers are paying way more for many years longer and it's only going to get worse.
Social security is broke and these pension funds are grossly underfunded . Wages are down . I can't see taxing our way out of it . Especially when we are sending gazillions of dollars all over the world. Every person that moves out of the state , and a lot are ,leaves the rest of us who stay footing the bill .
There sure looks like there is a financial train wreck coming .
I agree with you 100%
I would hate to see the current administration of this state look any more anti constitutional than they already are ,if that is even possible . But they seem to push that envelope more each day .
I fish a little most every day , sometimes 3 times a day , certain times of the year .
Sometimes it's great and sometimes it's not .
When it's really good , it can become quite tiresome hauling all those big fish in . When the kings are in I got tendonitis in my left elbow 3 years in a row .
But I guess we all have our crosses to bear .
The pictures are all in my mind
Besides , if I got all the big fish I caught in my life mounted , I'd be broke and need to put an addition on my house .
Well I guess we will never know for sure , not that it matters much . All I do know is I feel fortunate to have hooked and landed it and get it back in the water to swim away . If I would have measured and weighed it ,it would have most likely died .
I'm blessed that I have a place where I can fish that whenever my float drops , It could be a 3 " perch , a bass , trout ,salmon, carp , sunfish , or a nice pike . And that's fun .
No I did not measure it but I think it was 44" or so but it was fat .
I have a hard time judging weight of pike as some are skinny so you can't go by weight. I say it's all of 15# .
I almost didn't take the pic . I wanted to get it back in the water .
It's our there for someone else to catch .
The clouds made it a bust but it still was pretty cool . I fished through it and caught a few . But I could not see my float for a few minutes .
A stiff NE wind started blowing about 1 . When it started to get a little dark about 20 min before it calmed right down . The rooster across the creek started in . Also all the creek dogs started to howl .A bunch of fireworks was blown off. Then it was over.
Highly overplayed . Wife and I took a drive through Brockport and the college . More traffic for graduation .
Pike was caught on a 1/32 oz chart curly tail under a float 4# tippet.
My Control King works great . When I hit my electric downrigger it will surge . I have whoever turn the control unit off when I mess with the rigger . I contacted the manufacturer and he told me to wire it directly to the battery .
Center line of the path is about 350 yards south of my house . That's pretty exciting . But I think I will be at my cottage .
What gets me is the accuracy of the long term precise predictions of such an event . There are some real smart people out there .
I think you have to be smart about it . If you want to go to a population center for the party , then expect craziness . Get a room maybe 150 miles out of the zone .Get up early and drive up , maybe on some back roads . Find a small town and see it there .
And the Egg Cream is the official drink of the eclipse .
If it's cloudy , I'll put some Vodka in it .
2 nd week in July to 1st or 2nd week in Aug midlake .Oak , to Sandy . Weather is usually pretty stable then .
After that the majority of kings start to migrate east to the Salmon river . If you find them you can have good days . But you also start to get the winds of Aug which can keep you off the lake then .
I feel some of my diver rods are to stiff. They seem to pull smaller trebs
( 1/0 or smaller ) out of the fishs mouth . I have a custom made and older Eagle claw that have more of a parabolic softer action i like better .
I built about 40 rods in my day . Most pre graphite or it was new , expensive ,and not great.
I enjoyed doing it and still use my long drift rods to this day .
I keep wanting to build another but first , you can get any premade you want . And a custom built is not that much better . Or even worse if you dont set it up correctly with the right components and guide placement etc .
Second , to build a decent rod will be double to quadruple what a premade is.
Blank
Handle set
Guides
Epoxy
Thread
Finish
And non of this is cheap .
Man , that's a loaded question
Summer could be 60 ft
Could be 400
But generally , depending where you fish there are usually at least some kings off stucture 75 to 200 ft.