Its never easy

I managed a quick session on my local water today and it occured to me that I havent had a single carp yet this year! To be fair though I havent really had chance to put the nescesary time in either. This time I at least managed to get myself and my car to the lake without incident. I picked a swim in the furthest corner and decided to drop one bait in the corner against a reed bed to my right and the other slightly right and tight to weed bed. As a bit of a distraction I also set up a float rod with a single magot on a size 18 hook under a small insert waggler.
The float rod was a minor success from the word go bringing small roach and perch to about 4oz and a couple of small skimmers to 8oz.
The weed rod gave a couple of line bites before finally screaming off. Even though I was on the rods the fish was well into the weed before I was bent into it. Predictably with my luck a few moments of holding it hard the hook hold gave and it was gone. Should I have given some line and tried to win it back later or hold it hard?
After recasting both rods I was seriously contemplating recasting the bait against the reeds into a bay in the same weed bed as the other when the swinger twitched and dropped back. On striking I thought I'd managed to miss it but on winding in I discovered a bream of just short of 5 lb had taken the bait.
The reed rod was duly recast to the weeds and shortly showed a rapid line bite. It wasnt long again before another screaming run developed out of nowhere. I picked up the rod and struck.... nothing. I rebaited and was just about to recast when I remember something that Pete R had told me about a recent trip of his. On checking the hook point I found it turned out. I could have kicked my self and as far as I'm concerned that would have been a fish on the bank.
One day I'll remember to check all the small things that make for a succesfull session. Lesson learnt, THE HARD WAY!