Shock Leaders

Well it was so foggy this morning it was pretty much raining and the wind was blowing ~20mph but the tide was pretty good so I decided to go try some fishing off a jetty. After about 30 minutes of fishing my hands were wet from the fog, and so cold from the wind I could hardly feel or move them, and it was really screwing up my casting, either letting the line slip and the lure going straight up or letting the line go too late and the lure dives into the water. On one cast I either screwed something up badly or my line was worn from the rocks but there was a loud snap behind my head, and my lure was gone. If you are fishing with no one around this is okay, but in a group of people a lure flying away can be pretty dangerous. A solution to this is to use a shock leader, basically a heavier line that wraps the spool 5-8 times then goes the length of the rod and back down to the reel. Most people seem to use 10lb test per ounce they are casting. I was casting 2 ounces with 12lb test. You might be wondering why not just use all 20lb test, well on the reel I was using I could probably only hold 100 yards of 20lb test, so with a 25-35 yard cast, then a big fish that wants to swim away you could run out of line.

Annoyed.

So I am curious about other peoples reasons about why they moved away from home. I was living at home, going to school, and working part time.  I guess it was a pretty good deal no bills to speak of but it got to the point where I couldn't stand living here anymore, so I decided to transfer to a school several hundred miles away. Now when I come home to visit, before hand I look forward to it, when I get here it is nice not having to cook, and in general being on vacation from normal life. However after being here for a week I am starting to feel like a live here again, and I think it is a feeling of a lack of independence. Today I woke up early went for a run, and then went down to the beach and went fishing, got home at 1 pm ate lunch and took a nap, but I got woke up and "in trouble" for sleeping rather then helping my dad clean the garage. So for those of you who visit your parents as a vacation, do they let you have vacation or act like you never left?

Visiting the parents.

So I am visiting my parents this week, which I guess is pretty cool because I don't get to see them much anymore, but there are some funny things about it. Even though I haven't lived here is several years there still get mad if I don't show up for dinner. They also like to barge into the room I am sleeping in without knocking, I guess they aren't used to closed doors. My dad also likes to bother me by waking me up in the morning and telling me I don't need to get up, but then turns the radio on in the shower so I can't sleep anyway. So I usually get up and go to work with him, help him carry stuff around and wait in the car if he can't find a parking spot.

Fishin on the Fourth

Got up early to avoid traffic/crowds and for a good minus tide to get out to some different rocks to fish. Landed 5-6 perch and a smelt and had a few more that got off. I had a bigger rod further out hoping for a shark or something that would fight better but no bites, but thats why they call it fishing not catching.

While fishing I started thinking about how people meet, I tend to think I look pretty unapproachable, I kind of have a constant look of disgust while out in public, and for no real reason other than habit I wear all black. When I look at others I always worry that talking to them will somehow inconvenience them, if they are in a hurry, and I ask them for directions or something, they might not want to be rude and help, so I generally don't bother people unless it is obvious they have nothing to do.  Then I started thinking about various people I either met online or talk to online but haven't seen them in many years, or something I don't have experience with but I think about when other people mention it, online dating. So much of what we think about people is based on out first impression of them, and generally that is their appearance. Where as online you might get to know someones personality before you even know what they look like, and at least for me, personality is far more important than appearance. I have talked to some people about this and they seem to think it is an unnatural thing to be friends with people you have never met face to face, almost as if they are imaginary people. What do you guys think? I think with the amount of time people spend online it is only natural and will only increase.

Holiday Traffic.

So with the holiday weekend and the nice weather here, everyone is outside going to the beaches and I guess anywhere other then their houses. I wanted to go fishing but the traffic was pretty bad, tried to get to a new spot but after 15 minutes in traffic that hardly moved and about an hour to go I turned around and went to the normal spot, but there was no parking so I came home and decided to sit in the yard and work on my reels and tie up some leaders for the next trip. I guess it was an okay day.

I forgot about making a twitter before the break so I figure I will update that, at least with new blog posts. http://twitter.com/#!/RemoteRumbles

Hobbies

I've been thinking a lot about a hobby I would like to get into. There were some conditions:
1. Not too expensive, I really don't have any spare money so the cheaper the better.
2. Some element of danger, other then a paper cut or inhaling too much glue.
3. Something that most people have seen or heard of so I can use it in conversations.
4. Putting me in contact with people, something where I need to go outside.

So with that in mind I looked at things I have done before, or have some interest in.
1. Rock climbing - Have enough gear to go to gyms and climb but nothing suitable for outdoor climbing.
2. Auto racing - Could get a car pretty cheap to work on, but there are no tracks nearby other than a drag strip
3. Surfing - I have a knee board I can use, and a wetsuit.
4. Fishing - I guess this could already be one of my hobbies but I kind of stopped doing it.
5. Offroad motorcycling - Have a motorcycle and gear.

There were some other but I can't seem to remeber them now. I think I am going to get back into fishing. There are a lot of sharks and such near where I live so I think I will target them rather than the smaller stuff. I figure I will make me go to the beach, and there are people there, so maybe I could talk to them. Also Sharks fight pretty good so that should be fun, and pulling a shark out of the water is sure to get peoples attention, and fisherman(hopefully women) always want to talk about fishing so well see how that goes.

I have gone fishing the last 3 days, and plan to go the next 2, so far the fishing has all been on secluded rocks that most normal people wouldn't climb so I hardly saw anyone, and the fishing was pretty slow, but it is much better then sitting around at home.

That took longer than I thought it would.

Well that was a long but I think necessary break from not only blogging but "Life" in general. After writing so many papers for school that looking back at were a waste of time except for getting a grade (they did nothing to make me further understand the topics they were about) I was pretty tired of sitting down and writing. The concrete guy I was working for turned out to be not entirely truthful about the hiring process, turns out he over hires, sees which people show up the most, then fires everyone else. So going to school meant I hardly ever was able to work and didn't make the cut. Then I started to realize that many of the people I had gone to school with were graduating, getting jobs, married, having kids; I got pretty demotivated for a few weeks, I have pretty much wasted 4 years going to school, constantly changing majors trying to find something that I could live with. I think the final thing was a realization about The World of Warcraft; I have devoted almost all of my free time to WoW, so when I moved to a new city leaving the few friends I had hundreds of miles away, rather than going out a meeting new people, I sat inside with the guild. Well when the guild feel apart, some of the friends I had made simply quit the game, and others moved on to other guilds I am not really comfortable with. On top of that some relationships greater than friendships developed between some of these people, leaving me feeling like a 3rd wheel of sorts. So all of that left me pretty discouraged and I don't want to say depressed but I guess that is the word that fits. After a few weeks, a couple weeks of vacation and camping and mostly thinking, I think I can use it all as something positive. WoW has become incredibly boring to me, I still log on to see whats going on, but it seems without hardcore play I really have nothing to talk to my friends about. I am trying to find ways to meet some new people which is somewhat difficult because I don't drink or do drugs and can't stand being around people who are inebriated, and living in a college towns means that is how most people relax. Also sitting inside leaves me with nothing to do now, So I am trying to find some outdoor hobbies that might put me in contact with possible friends. I want to continue this blog but not having any clear topic is also more problematic then I thought it would be. I was thinking I could write my philosophy on life and how people should act, but that would probably be boring and get me in trouble. So maybe one of my potential hobbies with lead to a good topic.