David Siskind | Sunday, 26 April 2026
Home sweet home Los Angeles. It’s been a minute. The world turns, the world burns. What a mess. Interesting times. It’s very hard to know what’s going on these days. The legacy news sources (NYTimes, and networks) all announced the impending departure of fric and frac to Islamabad for negotiations with Iran’s foreign minister, while many independent sources said it wasn’t gonna happen. It didn’t happen. I’m a little disgusted with the Times. They’ve pretty much become a puzzle app with some news features. They’re not meeting the moment. I do like their puzzles - solved the Wordle in 2 tries two days in a row! I’m home enjoying my secret little family of roommates and my 18 year-old cat who took a couple of days to realize I was here. He’s now returning to papa, with greasy fur and bad breath asking for his sugar and napping on my chest.
I'm back writing on a keyboard for the first time in a month. Using my thumbs is a chore, and the small phone display makes editing difficult. I read through my last post and found it disjointed and a little confusing. Sorry about that. Besides waking in the middle of the night in that fleabag EconoLodge to write, I had taken a hard adventurer's fall hitting my head during the day and was a little off kilter. This developed into another medical adventure when, three days later, nausea overwhelmed me and I went, on doctor’s advice, for a precautionary brain scan. I may have shit for brains but there was no sign of subdural hematoma. I had a bug (probably a rotavirus per the assays of LA sewer effluent) which is now sweeping through my household. Gross.
After a fishing experience I like to ruminate and recall all of my fuckups and little victories. I finally got to address these through practices yesterday and this morning. My casting on my trip was good. The most persistent problem I had was stripping fast enough to keep tension as fish swam aggressively toward me and ate without turning. At least four or five seemed to be hooked but came unbuttoned after a minute. I know this seems silly for someone who’s been doing this for over fifty years. I went to the park and tried some new ideas using the “going through the gears” drill, retrieving all the way in as fast as I could manage. Also, on the water, I sometimes miss the grab while stripping. This isn’t frequent, but even once can ruin a conversation with a fish. I’ve tried a few ways of bringing my hands together reliably but apparently I need to practice this more and mindfully. Something that seems to work is bringing my middle and ring fingers into the mix, holding the line a little away from the rod and providing a more substantial target for the grab. I’ll ask Paul what he does.
Another thing to sort out is the formation of a belly in the line during a retrieve in a drifting or otherwise moving boat. Without naming names, I’ve gotten conflicting advice. Most tell me to point straight at the fly. But some suggest keeping the rod pointing tangent to the curve. On reflection I’ll go with the majority opinion here. In any case I think most problems can be avoided by minimizing waves in the cast, turning the fly over properly, starting the retrieve promptly and NEVER missing the grab. The worst result when I let the belly get too pronounced is that I swing the rod and trout-set to make up for it. I’ve lost some nice fish that way.
I’ve been messaging Ben Crump, my local carp partner and Paul’s student. We’re all set to hit the beach soon to try to find some corbina in the swash. I asked for his availability. He said, “I’m getting married tomorrow but any time after would be great.” Respect! Congratulations Ben.
On a sad note, a high-school friend passed away last week. Joe McEleavy. He was a darling guy. He arrived fresh off the boat from Ireland in ‘63 sporting a brogue that we all struggled to understand. To know him at all was to love him. My best bud down the street, Marc Griffin, was the first to greet and embrace him as a friend. He’s gone too. I miss them both.I lost touch with Joe after high school. I don’t think the “present” me would have. It makes me wonder. We live imagining ourselves to have some sort of consistent nature but our actions on review are sometimes unrecognizable. A little like a loop in a flyline. The form is there but it always lives in a different piece of line. (oy sorry about that - but there it is).