Holed up, reading but not posting since the end of September, I've been
studying the sort of thread which generates greatest interest and to which
the forum membership trip over themselves in haste to say their say. I
wanted to start one like it by way of wishing all of you Happy Holidays.
Negative posting, I discovered, is the runaway favorite. It finished several
lengths ahead of good Samaritan efforts to explain how to clean a cork
grip without ridging it and even in front of photos of handsome rods with
handsome fish attached. I've been especially inspired by Scott's "The worst
device ever invented" and, like so many others, by the loss-of-direction threads,
a clever double whammy allowing posters to be negative no matter which side
of the issue they favor.
Finally mustering courage to emulate them, yet still all atremble, I'm
experimenting with this topic: Our Worst Casts Ever. It has the advantage
of dealing with our own sins with bamboo now that we've pretty much
covered those of others. I won't spare myself. Here is my personal worst.
I have a friend those of us who know him best call "Smirk." Smirk is a
wonderful fly-caster, better than any of us, almost as good as he thinks he
is. He relishes playing Sixty-Feet-into-the-Teacup with us. One afternoon
he had just performed the feat flawlessly and so was feeling generous.
"Here. Let's make it easier. I'll stand and hold out the teacup. That way
you'll have a clearer target. Double or nothing?" He waved the portrait of
Lincoln which I had just handed him in my face.
"You sure you want to do this again, Bill? Well, okay. Now don't be nervous.
Just point the rod tip directly at the teacup in my hand, and the line will go
there." Then, almost in a whisper, "Maybe."
After three false casts, I did what Smirk had advised. The loop was tight and
the line took a straight path. When it wrapped a few times around Smirk's wrist,
I set the hookless line reflexively. The teacup shattered at Smirk's feet. My
WF5F, banded firmly around his wrist, pulled Smirk's hand up so that he slapped
himself smartly across the bridge of his nose.
"Oh, Stanley," which is the name he caught at baptism, "Stanley, are you all right?
Just when I thought I was finally getting the hang of it, too."
studying the sort of thread which generates greatest interest and to which
the forum membership trip over themselves in haste to say their say. I
wanted to start one like it by way of wishing all of you Happy Holidays.
Negative posting, I discovered, is the runaway favorite. It finished several
lengths ahead of good Samaritan efforts to explain how to clean a cork
grip without ridging it and even in front of photos of handsome rods with
handsome fish attached. I've been especially inspired by Scott's "The worst
device ever invented" and, like so many others, by the loss-of-direction threads,
a clever double whammy allowing posters to be negative no matter which side
of the issue they favor.
Finally mustering courage to emulate them, yet still all atremble, I'm
experimenting with this topic: Our Worst Casts Ever. It has the advantage
of dealing with our own sins with bamboo now that we've pretty much
covered those of others. I won't spare myself. Here is my personal worst.
I have a friend those of us who know him best call "Smirk." Smirk is a
wonderful fly-caster, better than any of us, almost as good as he thinks he
is. He relishes playing Sixty-Feet-into-the-Teacup with us. One afternoon
he had just performed the feat flawlessly and so was feeling generous.
"Here. Let's make it easier. I'll stand and hold out the teacup. That way
you'll have a clearer target. Double or nothing?" He waved the portrait of
Lincoln which I had just handed him in my face.
"You sure you want to do this again, Bill? Well, okay. Now don't be nervous.
Just point the rod tip directly at the teacup in my hand, and the line will go
there." Then, almost in a whisper, "Maybe."
After three false casts, I did what Smirk had advised. The loop was tight and
the line took a straight path. When it wrapped a few times around Smirk's wrist,
I set the hookless line reflexively. The teacup shattered at Smirk's feet. My
WF5F, banded firmly around his wrist, pulled Smirk's hand up so that he slapped
himself smartly across the bridge of his nose.
"Oh, Stanley," which is the name he caught at baptism, "Stanley, are you all right?
Just when I thought I was finally getting the hang of it, too."
