A cold winter's night!

This time of year is usually crazy for me, but right now everything is kind of up in the air. I'm working on plans for the coming year, taking a look at maps, having "power meetings" with the players, diversifying this and strategizing for that. I own a couple of small fly shops in Bozeman and this is the time of year that makes me think about next year. In early October, I couldn't wiat to get off the water...now I just want back on! It's too damn cold though, too much snow to shoot birds in so I'm forced with impossible task of being a responsible business guy.

This is the time of year that I lie awake at night wondering about all the what if's that happened this year. Would Henry's Sinket or Xink made the difference on that Leviathon of a Brown Trout on that windy little oxbow in New Zealand? Should I really start using water balloons for indicators? Why would those fish eat a size 18 lightning bug and not a size 18 flashback pheasant tail? Why did I catch exactly one fish every time I switched flies that day? Is ciabatta better than rye? Where the hell did all the piggies go in August?

The only certainty right now is that it is too damn cold to fish right now. A few years ago I may have considered an outing 25f, but know I'm more rational and don't even thingk about it until 30f! I've fought the ice on the guides too many times and found that nothing..wd40, ice paste, and armor all just doesn't make a difference. So, when it gets up above 30 again and I have a day off and there's a bit of cloud cover...then I'll fish again.

Unitl then, I guess I''ll tie some thread midges that I used to fish with success all the time. The last few years, I've been into the Hurricanes, Miracles, Discos, JuJu this and Wired that. I was thinking tonihgt that those red uni bodies, silver ribs, with a peacock thorax were more effective than any of these other fandangled patterns. Maybe I just get a better dead drift with a junk fly?