Thank you to all the people who stopped by to have a chat with me in Charlotte, and Putter, and John Knight and Billy Vivona for sitting in for me while I was away doing seminars and demos. I had a blast.

Ken, you're a true gentleman. I was embarrassed when you got back from your presentation, to se me propped up in your seat, wrapping a but wrap, with 3/4 of my rod building components from New York strewn about your table. Not to mention allowing me to leave my rods on the side of your booth as a booby trap. I really appreciate that., thanks.

I will be in a booth next year, one way or another. That was a great idea you had to get a "hang out" booth - I really enjoyed the conversation with you, John, Putter (who's WAY TOO happy, lol) and Mike. And the hundreds of others I had the pleasure to meet, and almost instantly forget their names. lol.

What a BLAST.

Billy ---

All about learning; seeing and doing. Nothing to be embarassed about, nothing at all. Especially with you doing a wrap next to David demonstrating Visual Wrap --- a natural ' one / two combo'.... Maybe we should go in on a "hang out double or triple wide next year . Just set up some
lathes and make a mess out of the convention center floor Putter's epoxy drippings, your thread tags and I'll rip out some cork handles with EVA & hypalon/wood inlays. I think I had the BEST location of all at the show. I had Bob McKamey from Custom Tackle supply and Coach Paul across from me; Mudhole on one side; the Guild on the other; Pac Bay across the aisle; Dean from DonArt next to PacBay; Flex Coat on the other end and
Andy Dear of Lamar right across from Mudhole & the American Tackle 'showcase' as well. It should have been a SHOPPING spree for everyone! A true smogasborg. Check out the blanks from Batson & Mudhole; grab som great cork and wood to turn from Andy; composite color cork from Roy across from Bill Batson; wander down & check out more blank selections from Mudhole; pick up all the thread, glues and epoxies from Mudhole; the bargains galore from Bob at CTS, lots of really experienced builders "floating'" in the booths with demonstration rods for spiral wraps. What a show! It's really a shame we didn't do a "theater in the round" area of rod builders doing nothing but continuous demos. All the demos were fantastic!

We're going to install a new type of "continuous" demo for the 2006 event. I think everyone will be very impressed.

.............

Thanks Ken for a great booth. Lots of cool experiments and demos were done there. I met a lot of people while hanging out at your booth!

repeat sorry...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/28/2005 07:24PM by John Meyer.

John - pleasure meeting you Saturday night.

Tom - was a pleasure meeting you and speaking with you, I was fortunate enough to chit chat about an array of topics with you.

Ken - that's a great idea. One of the things Tom had mentioned to me was something along the lines of a fly tyers aisle for rod builders. Whatever happens, we should soordinate as Andy's Jet lathe went to waste sitting underneath his mandrel table. We could have pulled it out, turned some wood, cork & foam, and made a complete mess of teh entire area, lol.

The wheels were spinning in my head from the time I hopped in the car service in Charlotte at 9:45Pm, until I finally forced myself asleep at 3:30AM. Lots of ideas were spurned over this weekend, great @#$%&, learning, hopefully teaching - couldn't ask for a better time. As dumb as I thought it was, nametags should be a neccesity, it's really tought to keep track...unless you were a really bright shirt like Jim Rippe - lol.

Ken,
It was nice to meet you and thanks for letting us use you dremel for cutting down those blanks, wish I would have had more time to strike up a conversation but I know how after a long week-end everyone was ready to wrap it up and get out of there.

Oh! And so sorry for knocking that rod out of the dryer ,that was embarrassing. ( OK Billy, l can hear you now) " What else could we expect from a West Coast fly guy "

Thanks to you, Ken! What a great person this guy is; couldn't run across another like him in another 50 years! Let me take over his booth for an hour - like Billy; can't say enough about this guy!

Putter

Billy same here. Next time I'm up visiting my cousin I'll give you a call...

You guys have a great ideas about a big booth some lathes. The show was awesome but that would be something good to add next year.

I saw some people wrap a guide for the first time in Ken’s booth. I bet they left the show with some supplies for their first rod.

I was really happy to see Putters demo on marbleizing in person. I already made a few pens that came out pretty good! Found some good pigment at hobby town by the way. A real dark blue like you had putter but it is a real thick liquid.

Thanks Tom. The weekend was really awesome. Meeting everyone was great and everyone was sharing ideas and techniques that they had developed and I was soaking it up. I went from one demo to another, not wanting to miss anything..

Ken, I was afraid you and Putter might experience trouble getting home. From the postings I assume you had no problems. I got up this morning to discover 6 inches of snow and I am just 2 hours west of Charlotte. The ground was warm so most of it has already melted off the roads. This snow must have been just rain at Charlotte. Next rod I build i am going to sparkle it blue like you did in the demo. Great to meet everyone.

Ed Smith

I still have to get out of DC (Dulles airport) tomorrow morning and it's still snowing here in Dumfries, Virginia. I landed here at 11:00am with a 550' ceiling; they shut the airport down at 500', so I was kinda lucky to get this far. I see it was still snowing at Ken's house in Maryland when he got home by his picture on the board.

Nice to have met you, Ed! It did just rain in Charlotte.

Hope it lifts by morning so we can get back to sunny North Dakota (and leave this "blame Putter, he brings it with him" behind me).

Putter

Ken,
I enjoyed meeting you , and seeing you work.
capt. ray - fishsticks4u