Week of March 31, 2025

On the first week of my sabbatical:

I went fishing

I helped a friend level part of his backyard

Automattic laid off 16% of their employees

I helped with a trout release and macroinvertebrate identification for a school field tripe with Trout Unlimited

I checked some things off my to-do list around the house

I cleaned up my workshop and started turning a bowl with my new old Speed Reducer

I spent lots of time outside

The fishing was a bit slow. The water temp is still pretty cold in most places around here (mid 40s), so the trout are fairly sluggish. I did get to check out some new locations, and I landed three, hooked but lost four more, and had more strikes without hookups.

A few highlights:

I caught an early black stonefly hatch Thursday afternoon when it warmed up to 70F. I was surprised by how much more effective my tenkara rod was during this brief window. I got 2-3x as many drifts in as the guy with the western rod downstream of me, and also had 2-3x as many takes for the hour of the active hatch.

During the hatch, a large creek chub took my pheasant tail parachute! I didn’t know they’d rise just like trout.

I saw some nice sized fish in the water.

I saw a fisher! It is the first time I’ve seen one. It was darting in and out between rocks across the stream from me. Probably trying to catch a trout, too.

A watersnake swam by me in the river. We left each other alone.

Lowlights:

I forgot Tuesday was the first day of the regular “take” fishing season, so there were a ton of spin fishermen out. That is fine, they are out having fun, too. Unfortunately, I ran into some pretty rude folks who walked up and started casting right next to me, giving me zero space, and a guy who stomped right through the water I was actively fishing. I packed up, ate lunch, and drove to a different spot.

Tips for avoiding them in the future:

They usually stick to the deep pools. They can’t fish the riffles and pocket water very effectively with their spoons and rapalas, so fish those instead of the pools.

They don’t usually wade, and they move spots quickly. Be patient.

They often stick to the stocking points, so either go to wild streams or hike a little bit away from the stocking points (usually road overpasses).

While helping my friend Dave level out a part of his backyard by hand, my phone started dinging like crazy. I had a dozen text messages in the span of 5 minutes. My coworkers were texting me that Automattic laid off 16% of the company.

I’m a bit shocked. I had no idea, and five great people who report to me were let go.

I am thankful to still have a job, but it is going to be strange coming back to a company and team that looks very different in three months.

The market isn’t looking good this week. I am feeling grateful that I pulled out the money for our imminent siding project early Wednesday morning before the worst of it.

Thursday I helped the local Trout Unlimited chapter do a trout release and macroinvertebrate sampling with a school field trip. It was a lot of fun! Longer post on it soon, but we found:

Stoneflies

Rock caddis

Stick caddis

Scuds

Cranefly larvae

Crayfish (lots!)

Mayflies

Hellgrammites

I’m helping with another one tomorrow morning.

Lots of fun outside in the warmer weather with Charlie.

First time using the Shopsmith Speed Reducer to turn below 700 RPM. Took me six months to find one for a reasonable price. It reduces the speed by a factor of 7, so the new base speed with it on is 100RPM. Very handy for roughing out big stock without the machine jumping all over the place.

Made good progress, but need to stop for the night. Probably will finish it off on Monday.

The forsythia is blooming, our radishes and cilantro are sprouting, violets are coming up in our yard, and the bumblebees are loving the daffodils.

Light fly tying this week. Just some Killer Bugs (the only takes I had on Monday were on Killer Bugs… I tried multiple flies and got takes when I switched back to Killer Bugs, but nothing on the other things I tried) and some elk hair caddis to finish out a gift box.

A bird finally took up residence in our birdhouse after no interest the last two years.

Charlie is very excited about it. We are, too. Can’t wait to see the baby birds.

Some small house projects I got done this week:

Fixed the door closer on our front screen door.

Added a handle at Charlie’s height on our back screen door. He can reach the one inside, but there is a step down outside and he can’t reach the outside handle. Now he has his own.

Hung a pot rack on Charlie’s play kitchen.

Re-hung a towel hook that got pulled out of the wall in the bathroom. Now it is screwed in to the stud.

Epoxied my cracking wading staff.

Relocated some rose campion that migrated out into the yard to the flowerbed out by the shed.

Sowed dill, lemon balm, and seeded some bare spots in the yard with clover seed.