Good morning ER's
                      It's 35* and cloudy here on my hill.
                      H2l..........Congratul ations on finding the car your wife wanted. I agree with you, I like being in control of the car. I prefer to buy a car
               than lease. 
                      Eddie.......It is a crazy world out there. Back in the day the police were respected.
                      Wally.......The weather is iffy for getting the boat out after Cooper goes home.
                      Steve ......I'm glad that your B I L is improving 
                      zcm.........Housing cost rose after pandemic because of the people working from home and moving out of the cities. But cars sure have risen
               in price to an untouchable price for many.
                      I hope everyone has a good Friday either at work ir out. Stay Safe and Healthy.

               IW

 45,cloudy and breezy

@Papa Sly, there is a learning curve to tying steel. Some knots just don't work well, they cause the ends to become curly. The best I have found is a basic Uni knot. The only real trick is after you tighten up the tag end, push the knot down with your fingers, don't just pull the line to slide it down. Sometimes it's a little back and forth, gently tighten the tag, then slide the knot down, then tighten tag more, and push knot some more. Once you figure it out, it's easy and you can knot leaders right on the spot anywhere. Crimps work fine, they just add bulk, but it's not horrible. If you ever want the most discrete, knot for lack of a better word, on a coated steel leader, the best I have found is a fusing technique from the book Pro Tactics: Northern Pike by Jack Penny. Basically you twist up the ends and use a candle to fuse the coating. It produces a fantastic leader, but it's kind of a PITA. It's definitely something you can only do at home, not in a boat or on ice. It wasn't worth it to me, I knot all my leaders now.

What color

Good evening, yesterday's rain went into the overnight hours before ending. Cloudy skies today and a temperature drop with the day's high only around 50 degrees. I talked briefly with my sister looking like my BIL is improving resting less often so hopefully he will be over the pneumonia soon and keep his hydration under control. During all of this in communicating with other relatives learned my great aunt will be having two cardiac procedures done later this month a stent/stents installed in one or more arteries. She is upbeat about all of this and looking forward to after recovering from the surgery attending one of her granddaughter's wedding this June and dancing at the reception. Hopefully all goes well for her and she will get to attend the wedding and make it to her hundredth birthday this November .
Ice Wander sorry to hear you are still not seeing improvement in your arm's range of motion. may you be able to lower your diabetic numbers.
Zcm-82 glad you are not dealing with a high mortgage in addition to the cost of living these days.
Hunts2long congratulations to your wife on her new CRV. I would read up on how to switch for gas to electric may save you some money to use electric power for part of NYC trips. Happy that you received a good trade-in price and the new vehicle was not to higher priced compared to the cost of last CRV.
Wallyworld the news of police officer shootings in your area made my local newspaper's website. Sad to hear another police officer was shot recently in Albany. Looking like you will have to use your mower's highest blade setting whenever things dry out enough for you to cut your grass.
Eddie glad it was not one of your friend's on the Albany police force who was shot and wounded. may the shot officer make a full recovery. Thank you for the well wishes for Cornwall Lacrosse team. I need to look up Our Lady of Lourdes record for this year. It was good to see a close game Cornwall lost  half of the team to graduation in 2023. So I'm not expecting a great season.  I see the high level minor league baseball season has started the team by me part of Yankees organization one it's first game of the season on April 16 Th. Depending on the level of the team close to you their season may also have started.

Keep safe,stay healthy. Best to all fishing.
  Steve

great conversation, thanks all for sharing the tips!