Paul Arden | Tuesday, 9 April 2024
I find it incredibly disconcerting that I get deep fake “Quantum AI” adverts featuring Elon Musk in my Facebook news feed. Surely FB has to take responsibility for this. Instead they are making money from scammers, who are scamming money out of FB users. Just imagine if we did that on Sexyloops. I mean, really??? They allow scammers to advertise deep fake adverts? Unreal. For me that’s as bad as the scammers, maybe even worse, because Facebook lends it credibility. You have to be responsible for who you allow to advertise on your business. And when it’s obviously a scam (and you have to Google around to check, although the same scams can be on Google too) then don’t allow it. Surely it’s easier for them to check than us, and they must know. Apparently however, they have no morals whatsoever, to allow and profit from this thievery. So it needs to be legislated to make them entirely responsible for scamming adverts and also fine the buggers. Absolutely disgraceful. Profits above integrity.
Anyway I won’t post this directly on FB because they’ll probably just block me and then you won’t be able to read it.
On to more interesting and exciting stuff… fishing! Last week I had a couple of Canadian friends visit, not to fish, but to hang out in the jungle with me aboard the Battleship. This was a great time had by all and I got to go fishing! And did rather well with a fish a day in the boat for the first four days. The fifth day I didn’t find any fish, but four fish in five days is still good here. Two off babies and two freerisers.
We also saw a couple of elephants in the water, feeding on plants, uprooting them with their long noses, sploshing them around back and forwards, to rinse the earth off, and then munch and repeat. We watched each for about 15 minutes. Made some videos and so on. And on the guests’ final night we had a memorable campfire. Great times.
This week all of our HT stock is heading to Spain — I wonder how long it’s going to be held in customs? And the Hot Tortuga label is looking pretty sexy. I have four rods on back order. One customer has asked for the Hot Torpedo label, which we still have of course. And the other three want the flaming Tortuga. Curiously the Torpedo request was from a chap in Spain :))))
I have a lot of Zoom lessons on at the moment. Two yesterday, with two very fine casters indeed. And four today. Well it should have been four but my early morning one had a time zone mistake (by me) and so there will only be three today. I’m really enjoying this still, and I love it when it all comes together for them. Drills are the way forward. No question. And I think what I love about teaching flycasting the most, is the creating of drills! I will get these up into the video manual for those of you who want to train and improve your casting, but without the direct and fun help of the yeti coach.
Mika and Satu are over soon. Really looking forward to catching up! Hopefully they stick plenty of fish this trip. Freerising is just beginning. The water was 34.4C last week. Which is rather warm, and in fact the hottest I’ve measured. Some of these days peak at 37C at the moment. That’s up there, especially with the humidity. I think Mika and Satu should prepare for this time by spending their days in their sauna.
Life is all peach baby doll at the moment. Apart from the Malaysian roads of course. This is mad time of year. I drove my Canadian guests to the Langkawi ferry in Perlis which is a 4hrs drive each way, and also picked up another boat seat for The Ronan. Actually it’s not to be used as a seat, but a step. Anyway, heading back there was almost a head-on collision by some wannabe race driver idiot passing me. Had I not had fly fishing fighter pilot reactions he would be dead. And quite a few others as well. It was nice to save someone’s life, even a complete idiot like this one. And then I saw a moped hit in Gerik. He may not have survived. Certainly he had lost his helmet and was laying unconscious on the road. Not much I could do to help but others were there. And on the road I use to travel from Gerik to the lake, on the same day there was a horrific head-on collision that killed three people. Of course this is a crazy time of year for accidents. Drinking and driving is a problem in many countries. Here the problem is fasting and driving. Dehydration and low energy levels muddy both decision making and reaction times, and for some unknown reason either doubles or halves your normal speed. All of which is a deadly mocktail. Coupled with busy roads that feel like a race track, and you have some unbelievably dangerous driving. For example overtaking multiple cars and lorries on blind bends at high speed. Very thoughtless and cynical for the safety of others, particularly for the small unsuspecting car coming around the corner with unseatbelted children sitting on someone’s lap or else inbetween the couple at the front. Yes life is cheap.
Consequently I’ve stocked the Battleship and I won’t be driving anywhere for the next 7 days!! Sure I drive a tank, with steel bumper protection both front and back, but you can still get totalled and I have a lot of fly fishing and living yet to do with my exciting life.
Have a great week. And if you are in Malaysia then please take care.
Cheers, Paul