Just noticed that I last posted in September, yikes!  Just posting a quick note at work, but some things I'm looking to talk about tonight are:

• The two new to me rods that are now part of the family
• Product notes on other new gear acquired
• Advances in my fly tying endeavours thus far
• The first thing I should say on this topic is, due to it being winter here in Rochester, NY and due to the fact that I haven't made much of an effort to get out and do some fishing when its cold, I've been concentrating my fly tying techniques and trying to produce some flies that'll hopefully catch some fish this coming season
• The wonderful thing I'm finding that tying allows me to do is to get creative with the patterns, the first one here, an emerger style on a size 20 hook, is a combination of the features of the Shipman's Buzzer and a CDC emerger.  Antron yarn was caught in at the head and folded back over and secured to form a loop.  The waste ends were intentionally left long, mimicking the head of a Shipman, the body was a single layer wrap of orange sewing thread (Gutermann) to try and get some segmentation, and that's it.  As with the rest of the patterns below, they're all some of my first attempts so I have no idea how they'll actually perform and I'm sure there will be some tweaking as with any prototype.

• Easy trico recipe:  http://www.charliesflyboxinc.com/flybox/details.cfm?parentID=110
• Detailed fly pattern tutorials, popular patterns:  http://www.troutflies.com/tutorials/index.shtml
• My other new adventure...hydroponics!
• http://www.helpfulgardener.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=32071
• http://www.hydroponics-simplified.com/raft-lettuce.html