This kind of thing makes my day.....

• I appreciate it hugely when I get an email from an angler who has found something really helpful or useful in the TV programmes or DVDs we have made, and a couple of days ago I received this from Gareth Roberts (thanks for letting me post it here) :

"Just a short note to congratulate you on an excellent DVD on Bass fishing. Took some tips off it about the bass rigs using crab as bait. Result a 70cm bass nudging 8lb from the Menai Strait , 30m out on a running ledger using soft crab two varivas 3/0 pennel style as suggested on the dvd. Your reports on the bass fishing in Ireland are 'awesome'. Might hop on the ferry to try it someday."

• To get feedback like this really makes me feel good about the stuff we have made, for fishing in the end is a continual learning process for all of us - trust me, it is impossible to know everything about fishing, and you would to well to steer clear of anybody who claims to know it all. The very word "expert" sends shivers down my spine !! If I don't learn something new every single time I go out fishing, then I have done something wrong. Well done to Gareth for catching a fantastic bass, and thanks for telling me about it - get yourself over to Ireland, you will not regret it. You can get the bass DVD here I believe.

• The photo today is from my recent trip over to Ireland, just as the sun was going down over a flat calm sea. I love this time of day, but for some reason the bass were playing hard to get that session. Nowhere is perfect......

• Just before I flew out to South Africa a couple of weeks ago, I put a post up about all things extreme metal, and I thought some of you might like to see a video of the title track to the album I was talking about - check here for it. Amon Amarth have made a monster of an album, and this video is stirring stuff. This without doubt proves, as I was saying, that extreme metal DOES make you more of a man - look at those swords, check out the costumes and the hard as nails expressions, bang your head relentlessly to the pounding rhythms and then copy what they are doing on the video. See ? Music does influence you. I reckon I could have been a hell of a good extra in that video shoot - my talents are wasted on presenting fishing programmes, when I could be out pillaging across the countryside on my (would have to be very strong) horse, wishing that I could have been a rock star. Anyway, back to work........