Monday Morning Coffee March 14

Phhhhnnnuuuuggghh....what happened?  Yawn, stretch, scratch, repeat..... where did this David Ruimveld mouse pad with a brook trout on it come from?  Ohhhhh....it's coming back...the drive, this big place full of people talking about fishing, Henry's wild tales, something about the worlds most expensive dubbing at Saks in Somerset, and Irish jigs at Conor O'neills.  I need some coffee, and so do you.  Have a sip.  Did I mention how good this french press stuff is?  I'll give you a minute.  Good?

Whewwww!!!, what a wild weekend at the 2011 Midwest Fly Fishing Expo.  Who knew that the fly fishing community were such hard partiers?  Kidding- I had a long list of friends to visit and get caught up with, and I didn't hardly get to see them all- next time.  I have a lot of exciting news, products and people to share with you, which I will dribble out over the next few weeks so as not to do one of my characteristic loooonngg posts.

I've decided that Monday Morning Coffee is a weekly feature, as it got such a positive response last week, and it allows me to address various odds n ends.  Such as...

Will the real fly give-away contest winner please step forward:  That's right, Shane, commenter #11, who won the egg fly give-away still hasn't contacted me, and I'm unable to contact him through his comment profile.  I've already sent his flies to The River Damsel (I know how to get in good with the ladies), but I'll tie more if he gets in touch with me.  It's fontinalisrising@gmail.com.

Fly tyers- I'm still running a contest to give away a granite pedestal base from The Granite Fly, so don't miss your chance to enter.  Story and details are in the Outdoor Profile post.

I'm very pleased with the modest success of this blog- thank you all by the way, for tuning in.  I'm starting to get a little cocky though, and now I have demands.

I want two widgets to add to my blog, and I need your help finding them.  The first is a jealousy counter- that's right, something that only I can click that will tally the number of times I've gone fishing this year, so that all you city-bound office types can seethe with jealous rage as you watch that number tick upwards on a daily basis while you wait for your one week off, IF your spouse doesn't "accidentally" remove your rod and waders from the car as you're leaving.  There'll be free FR stickers in it for the person who hooks me up.  fontinalisrising@gmail.com.

FR makes the save

The second widget I want has to do with my love of hockey, and yes, I am a Red Wings fan.  Now, I know that the Wings dropped out early in the play-offs last year, but so would any team who's played that much hockey over the last several years.  They've played an extra two months of hockey for years while your team is playing golf, so there.  So what I want is a widget that tracks their progress- their standings, playoff position, last score and next game.  I particularly want this out there to taunt my Vancouver, L.A. and San Jose friends-  I'll wager that San Jose is back to its old ways- stellar season, sucky playoff run.  Vancouver has been on a tear this year, but can they really keep it up?  With all the Wings key players healthy and looking sharp, I'd call it curtains on Luongo and Co.  Should be a great spring! Again, free FR Stickers to whoever hooks me up with this widget.

Lastly, I'm looking for a patron- that's right, someone who will pay all my bills and thus allow me to do nothing but write and go fishing do "research".  I'm not high maintenance, and there will be no wrecked hotel rooms/run-ins with the law/Charlie Sheenesque adventures or rants.  I just have some really good stories in the pipeline that are going to take six months at the current rate of burn.  So, if you're out there, are a sucker philanthropist/supporter-of-the-arts (I use this term loosely), then you know how to get a-hold of me.  Oh yeah- there's stickers in it for you as well.