I know ihave been mentioning Big Rock lately. The truth is I am petrified by the dude so I keep writing so man don’t give me a beating.

Ok, not really. Russ is a sweetheart of a man and gentlemen in every way. He makes some great swimmer and today I will give you chance to win one.

I like people who develop their own style of lure, their own signature shape. Nothing wrong with making copies of great, Lord knows we all used them and caught fish on them. But it cool when you see a shape of a plug in someone hand and you say ” that Big Water “or “Big Rock” or whatever. As many of you know, my artistic ability stops at drawing stick figures and that is on a good day so I can really appreciate uniqueness. Like what YoDude does with mag layout. Or Charlie Sores does with a pen for On The Water magazine.

We did get to chat with Chris Megan for OTW for awhile at Asbury. They are doing a great job with that mag and they genuinely are good people across the whole mag. Again my apologies about the pictures but unfortunately they  were mistakenly erased from my card.There is always next year…

So here is the plug one lucky surfcaster will win

but there is  a catch 🙂

Good Luck to all

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Those of you that are coming to our last seminar class , remember it is tonight, Tuesday at 7 30 instead of Wednesday. We’ll cover rods with Lou and rig some eels…oh yeah, one of you will walk away with a custom MAK bag….in addition to hundred or so prizes we already gave you.

I want you to check something out. The boys from Jersey Island featured in this issue of the Journal had an inspiration :-)….and started their own (quite successful I might add) online magazine. Issue two is now already up…but here is the link to issue # 1

http://issuu.com/jerseybassguides/docs/hrfw

They even gave thanks for inspiring them to start their own publication. Really good people and I expect a lot from them in the future.

Some of you asked how was attendance at Asbury and some of you were afraid to come down because of the crowds…from what I have heard the attendance was up compared to last year. But there were no lines of yesteryears when 500 people waited till the door opened and rushed in. By 9 am, 20 minutes after door opened there was no line, you could walk right in. The place wasn’t empty at any point, people were walking around. I think the madness of waiting at 3 am to buy a certain plug is over. You’ll never see me on that line unless someone is selling rigged eels for a buck.

Bad news about Asbury? I deleted all my pictures by mistake yesterday. I reformated the card and the pictures went poof…. no one ever said I was bright…sorry about that. Not too happy with myself this morning….

btw…I added about dozen new images to the rotating image galery on the top. hope you enjoy it

as far a giveaway….I got a special plug for you ……………..tomorrow….but not today 🙂

 in the mean time, enjoy the new issue

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Lets announce the winner of Green Point tackle sharp eye lure

the randomly selected winner is….carmine tango  ctango307@aol.com

Congrats……….you have 5 days to email us at info@surfcastersjournal.com with you mailing address

Good to see a lot of all friends at Asbury…I took bunch of picture which I hope to upload to the blog in next few days. Guys from Asbury did a great job as usual. We sat back to back to Big Rock and his family  . Tommy and I sat on one side and Big Rock, his  wife and daughter, with chairs touching our backs . About 15 minutes before the show ended and after we traded numerous barbs by sitting in close quarters Big Rocks pulls me aside, gives me few lures and ask” I want you to give these to Tommy. Are you going to see him soon “?

I turned around and said,” Why don’t you give it to him, he has been sitting next to you for the past 7 hours…lmao

I never knew they were never formaly introduced

you can’t make this stuff up.

I think those two will be close buddies from now on 🙂

I came home and took an inventory of stuff we had left. As you know, we are not in the retail business, our main objective is to promote the mag. With gear from the store we offset some of the cost and many of you have told us you proudly wear SJ gear. We were talking about SJ shirts or maybe sweatshirts in the car on the way back. It will happen in the future but not in the way you might expect. We might “pre-sell” the items and only print whatever it was ordered. Like I said, we don’t have place, money or energy to carry extra inventory. It’s something we will be working on for future….

We also hear you on ipad thing, it’s something we will be exploring in the near future

Btw

The new “Old School” hats are at our online store. Only about dozen and a half so if you grab want one, we suggest you grab it.

MTK shirts in Bay are only available in Medium and only few, all other sizes are gone

Oyster color, all sizes are in stock but few of each

All Mtk t-shirts that are left are reduced to $20

Mtk Sweatshirt are reduced to $45 and only M,2XL and 3XL  available

There are only 3 blue reel covers left with SJ logo, green bags are gone

as always, no additional shipping on anything in online store

www.surfcastersgear.com

..

Asbury bound this morning…if you guys are attending, stop by the table and say hi. If it’s like past years, you might have to wait unlit Cyclone line dies down to even get close to us

I got a question for all you Ipad and Iphoe users….I know you guys can see the world most awesome publication on your phone or a pad. I been thinking about a way to somehow maybe figure out of a way to make it available. Is there enough of you out these to look into this? I am not sure what the expense of process would be..if someone has a clue feel free to chime in

Speaking of Asbury and lures, Rob at LI Outdoorsman sent me a note that he will be carrying Lemire’s lures this spring. Maybe when he gets an order in , he can let us know.

I been thinking about these shows lately. I don’t know if its that the wood craze is over, or is because the economy and gas prices pout a real hurting on our wallets but the attendance is suffering. My fear is that big shows like risaa will be fine as manufacturers need them and these small type flea market will get by but the regional shows, the smaller weekend shows in NY and NJ, I am fearful of their future. I hope my fears are unfounded as these guys put in incredible amount of work to make it happen.

I will try to announce the winner of Green Point lure tomorrow, little pressed for time to do a drawing. If you are not  going to any shows or doing yard work, I can’t think of a better thing to do then read the Surfcaster’s Journal 🙂

When I was working on the story on UNIMOG last year with Lou Derricco, the owner of the beast, his biggest concern was the reaction the readers will have. I understand many of you don’t know Lou but to understand his concern it helps to know the guy. So let me paint you a picture.

One of the moist thoughtful, friendliest, generous people you will ever come across in your life. One of the better surfcasters of this generation who travels extensively in the search of better opportunities than he might find closer to home. Someone who takes the sport very seriously yet manages to enjoy every moment with the friends.

Why am I telling you this? Because Lou’s primary concern was that the UNIMOG be featured as the fishing vehicle. Meaning that all the features were installed and added to assist in either catching fish or making life more comfortable while on the beach. This rig is definitely not made over the top with spinning disco ball and fuzzy dice hanging on the mirror. It’s a lean, mean fishing machine that tops out at …..50 mph ! 🙂

I think we accomplished our mission but there is no better way to learn about a subject then to listen to them talk to you direct.

So here it is, Lou talking about the UNIMOG

 [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KidKt5LGc6I[/youtube]

I think it’s time we do a giveaway…you know, the ones where people who don’t want to read type “I am in” 🙂

I know , I know…..but am fried from serious talk, seminars, mag and videoS. Maybe I’ll even enter the contest, I am feeling lucky…  🙂

Kevin from Sharp Eye lures shoved this lure in my hand at Berkley on Sunday and said “This is for your readers”. He makes some really cool stuff by hand at Greenpoint Tackle (www.greenpointtackle.com).

Check out their whole line, I just looked at it and was surprised to find such a wide selection to be honest.  

 Good luck to all, it’s almost weekend…Thank God

I hope you guys are enjoying the new issues of the Surfcaster’s Journal Magazine. We really busted our butts last week and I want to again that all the contributors for their contributions and especially Tommy for really turning it up the notch with a design. He never ceases to amaze me with his talents.

I on the other hand have no talents, I am just as persistent as a Dalmatian donkey. What I lack in skills I make up in effort. To show you just how insane last two weeks have been, we got a Mac almost a week and a half ago and I managed to sit down in 10 days exactly once to push the power button. This is why I offered to someone to come over and go over this thing  for me…I know they have classes at the store I just don’t have time to schedule something

Then yesterday, for some inexplicable reason, just as we finished uploading the magazine more than 600 old emails, some as old as 6 months ago came rushing in my mailbox….WTF…I called Optimum and all they can tell me there was no problem on their end and to try disable leaving the copy of the email on their server…by the time I got home yesterday I got overt 1700 old emails on my PC and of course same 1700 on my  Droid…you want to deal with 3400 emails and make sure you don’t miss any important ones? On a day our new issue debuts? Holy crap what a disaster…but by afternoon they stopped…do you think other publications are attacking us, trying to drown us in emails?…..lmao…just kidding

 On the way to seminar, tonight I will sit down and just enjoy listening to Manny Moreno talks. The dude is without-a-doubt in my opinion the best surfcaster I fish alongside…ever….Sorry, I don’t mean to put anyone down, I have a lot of respect for many people I fished with over the years…but that is my opinion and has been my opinion for a long time…and you know what they say about the opinions…:-)

For Christ sake when we go places we look at rocks in the middle of a freaking ocean and we say “that’s Manny’s” rock. Continue reading →

We are proud to announce that issue # 6 is now live at https://surfcastersjournal.com/

You will also find two new videos by clicking on a YouTube button in the story, one on a Unimog and one on how to clean and cook a skate with Chef Andrew.

Enjoy the read and remember, next issue is only 8 weeks away 🙂

btw…that issue will be nothing like you’ve ever seen before in a magazine

I bow my head once again to incredibly talented Art Director Tommy “YoDude” Corrigan …special thanks to and Charlie Sheen for inspiration

Good Monday..if there is such a thing

Then again, any day you wake up it’s a great day. How many of you are taking a peak at www.surfcastersjournal.com to see if new issue is up ? C’mon, you can admit it 🙂

Sometimes in the next 24 or so hours baring any major screw ups.

I took my son with me at the Berkley show yesterday. After worrying about waking him up so early and driving  for 2 hours to Tom’s River he was remarkably into it. In fact he asked if he can come again, something that melts the heart of this old geezer who always feels like time spent with kids is insufficient.

He got a kick out of taking a picture with NJ Custom Lure Builder Russ “Big Rock” Pauline. If you remember, we profiled Big Rock in our first issue.

The show attendance was down as it is with every show in last year or two. I feel the economy has a great deal to do with this. I just don’t think people have money to spend on hobbies, Not when you paying a $3.80 for gas and as of this morning a oil is up another $2 to $106 a barrel. You should see gas at $4.00 a gallon in few days.

Only few tables were crowded, nothing like the old days of plug insanity but still noticeable more crowded than any others. RM Smith was definitely feeling love of the crowd. The remarkable thing was that Ryan walked around the room, never spending a moment behind the table. Jig Man , East end Lou and the rest of the crew took care of customers. It was good to see so many guys, Charlie at Choopy, Billy at RuRu, Don at Afterhours, Guppy Lures boys, Kevin from Greenpoint, Larry from North Bar and many more. Seeing fly fishing great Bob Popovics and chatting with his is a special treat. Having him tell us that he is so proud what we have done with a magazine was a cherry on the top of the cake..

All in all a good day…next week Tommy and I will be at Asbury but right now, trying to make sure the issue #6 of the most awesome publication in universe is ready to go, all 200 plus pages. Tommy got few surprises for you, can’t WAIT till you guys lay your eyes on some special pages

Hope you guys are enjoying the weekend…when it comes the time for Asbury and Berkley shows, you know spring is just around the corner…

I will be at Berkley tomorrow while Tommy will join me next weekend at Asbury. More than anything I am looking forwards to seeing many of my friends. Stop by the table and say hi.

Unfortunately, the MAC has been sitting at my desk all week, never even had a chance to power it up. Today was my first chance, Darn, this is going to take some time. Any of our readers familiar with final cut express? I’d gladly pay for a tutorial….I am not the type to watch tutorials on YouTube

Tommy has been burning the midnight oil putting finishing touches on Issue #6 of the Surfcaster’s Journal Magazine. With all the hours that dude put in the dark…Charlie Sheen would be proud.

Few more days, we are just coming trough it for some last minute adjustment. I like it a lot, it has a little bit for everyone, fly fisherman, plug ho, beach buggy, food and yes, even some timely spring advice. Here is a list of contributors: John Skinner, Bill Wetzel, Manny Moreno, Dennis Zombratta, John Papciak, Lou Caruso, Dave Anderson, Andrew Chase, Kevin and Keith White, Nicola Zingarelli, Pat Abate, Gary Soldati, Don Giumelli, Russ “Big Rock” Paoline, Paul Apostolides (also known at Paulie’s of Montauk..lol), Toby Lapinski, DJ Muller, William “Doc’ Muller, Dave Dennison, Steve McKenna…(are you dizzy yet)…but there is more…Janet Massineo, Rich Troxler, Bob Popovics and Flip Pallot…yes, that Flip Pallot 🙂

all put together by the incredibly talented dude, our Art Director Tommy “Yo Dude” Corrigan,

Speaking of whom…we had a contest the other day where we asked you to try to guess Tommy’s favotite picture. It turns out thathios chaoice was same as mine few weeks ago..page 32

the first dude that guessed page 32 was…. RGugs87 rgugs83@aol.com

Congrats pal

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