Well it explains a lot. I ran the first Monster Midge Swap, and haven't been the same since! It was a lot of fun. Rene hosted the update page at his site, Posted photos of the finished swap along with the recipes.
BobH -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of KEITH PASSANT Sent: Monday, October 04, 2004 6:38 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [VFB] Stoneflies Nick I know what you mean about first time. Nearly put me in the mad house. Where some will say I deserve to be anyhow. Of course the next logical step is for you to meister your own swap for the first time. Now that WILL put you in the madhouse. How Byard ever managed the great Caddis swaps I dont know. I only ever did one. Imagine it. 100 tyers supplying 100 caddis flies.. That eqautes to around 600 ties on your current perfectionist ways. Ooooh can I sell you the materials please sir???? LOL Got to go. Nursey says its time for my medicine. Keith ----- Original Message ----- From: "Niclas Runarsson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Monday, October 04, 2004 10:07 PM Subject: Re: [VFB] Stoneflies Noupp Rene... not fishing for compliments. I'm absolutely honest there... from my own point of view. This first swap of mine turned out to be a true nightmare and even though the flies may look better than I can accept, the swap wasn't as fun as I thought it would be (at the time). I was really nervous and it made my head work the wrong way. I had to make everyone to look PERFECT... which technically meant that I needed to tie 20 EXACTLY identical. This turned out to be a very hard thing to do. And the more flies I finished and placed beside eachother, the more obvious it became... and with that grew also my self-critisism. In my brain this meant: "If they don't look the same, then they aren't good enough." So I tied and stripped and tied and stripped. I'm not sure how many, but as I stripped down the entire first set and actually started over, I'm sure the total number of tied stones exceeds 60. (Even my girlfriend called me obsessive more than once.) The feelings during the swap time went from nervousity to frustration. And when they were sent, it was with the feeling of giving up. After reading this story about my first swap, maybe a couple want to write encouraging things to make me feel better about my tying, but it's not nessecary (emphasizing). My head works in another way now and I know that my life doesn't depend on "qualifying". I have also realized that 20 flies lying beside eachother won't look IDENTICAL to eachother... but can still look GOOD lying one by one. I'm convinced that I'll get this confirmed when I see the few ones I get back. They'll be looked at from another perspective and I'm sure I'll think more of them now than I did when I sent them away. The best word for my thinking during this swap is 'stupidity' and I laugh at it today. I'm in other swaps now and with a pinch of rational thinking this time, I feel much more comfortable and can also enjoy the tying. Fact is that everyone has to start with being a newbie. I just took it to the next step: A STUPID newbie... ;o) /Nick -----Ursprungligt meddelande----- Fr�n: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] F�r Rene Zillmann Skickat: den 4 oktober 2004 15:31 Till: [EMAIL PROTECTED] �mne: Re: SV: [VFB] Stoneflies Fishing for compliments (The fishing relevant required part of the message) I'm sure, that your flies are of excellent quality. Still stoneflyless in Germany Rene Niclas Runarsson wrote: >It seems something went wrong then. If you compared your with the >others and came to the conclusion that your was the ugly one... >obviously you never got one of mine. I have to send you one of the >returned ones. > >/Nick > > > >-----Ursprungligt meddelande----- >Fr�n: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] F�r Richard Zieger >Skickat: den 4 oktober 2004 14:58 >Till: [EMAIL PROTECTED] >�mne: [VFB] Stoneflies > > >Got some great looking stone flies in this am. I did the very ugly one >compared to the others. Thanks to the other tyers and to the >swapmeister. > >Rick > >PS I should meet Scott in the next few days as is parents live here in >town. > > > > > > >
