Fish on.

I feel like such a baby. I spent a little money today replacing some lost gear (fuck you burglars!) and learned a new trick--a trick I probably should have learned a long time ago. The trick is: take advantage of those pre-tied loops in your leader. Buy a leader one notch up from what you want and by some tippet material. Put a perfection loop on the end of your leader and to the end of a length of leader. Now you have 2 loops that you can tie together, and it's easy to take that knot apart. This way, you have a length of tippet to tie flies to. Once this tippet gets short, you can take it off the leader and put on a new length of tippet. This way--your leader never gets shorter. It will really lengthen the life of the leader.

Really glad for the advice. But like the shop owner said: the advice is always free.