No Profanity Allowed!!

This weekend a friend of mine got married, my brother officiated the wedding...his first. Everything went really well and the wedding was good. Anyway, their reception was at the local Eagles Club following the ceremony. We all loaded up and drove over to mingle a little bit before the party started, and when we walked in the following sign was hanging on several of the walls.


It reads: "Absolutely no Profanity allowed in Bingo Hall"

Me and my brother found great humor in this...given the average age of most bingo players (yes I'm making a generalization here), that they would have to post signs telling them not to cuss over a bingo game. So as you can see, me and another wedding going took pictures of it.

One little, two little, three little does

I've realized that I'm an afternoon hunter, it's takes everything in me to get out of bed at 5:45 in the morning to go sit in a tree stand. What makes the mornings I do get up even better is when I sit in a tree stand for two and a-half hours and watch a herd of cattle have breakfast...not seeing a deer or other animal (except the hawk that had a squirrel for a mid-morning snack).

In reference to my entry below about the sick horse, I received a gift from a nameless person (though I think I know who did it...Darla), with the quote of 'The Year of the Horse' and a picture of a horse on it. If anything this year will be known as the 'year of the horse'...I'll have that story to tell around the camp fires one day.

Yesterday, Tuesday, I rushed home from work to meet my dad (who was at my house) and we jumped in the truck and headed out to the woods. He set a stand up for me out on my uncles in-laws land...because there's deer everywhere and they think that will make it easier for me to actually shoot something. We get out there about ten to six, jump out gather up our gear and head to the tree stand...if you can call it that. Maybe we should call it a tree seat, it resembled that a little more than a true 'stand'...didn't do much standing. The maker of this 'stand' (term used loosely) couldn't have weighed more than 80 pounds. I make it up the ladder and sit down, with barely an inch on either side of my hips (diet time!!) and my size ten shoes barely fit on the foot rest...but we survived. My dad barely did...he let me climb up then brought my bow up to me (he forgot the bow elevator...known as a string). On his way down the ladder I accidentally knocked my backpack off the foot stand part and it hit him in the head...actually landed on his head since he was going 'down' the ladder. He calmly brought it back up to me...luckily I had already taken some of the stuff out of it and it wasn't as heavy as it could have been. After getting situated and sitting for awhile, I ended up seeing three does. They came up on my left hand side out in the woods behind me...two big and one little. Dad and I actually jumped them on our way to the stand, and they apparently circled around and was trying to make it to the field a different way. They caught my scent and ran away. So still no meat on the table...but memories galore. At dark thirty, I climbed down and walked back to the truck, meeting dad out in the field. I have to get a flashlight in my bag!

Until later,
ERM

Sick horse?

I'm about to tell on myself, the avid hunter that I am, and what a blundering idgit I am when it comes to being the 'Great Deer Hunter'.

This past Monday (Oct 2) I go out for my fifth time bow hunting so far this season, it was around 6:15-ish. It has been grounded into my head that the deer show up at dark, and it's best to try to stay on your stand until about dark thirty, so I was doing good I had about an hour before dark. So I go traipsing out to the woods in a white t-shirt (I had a camo shirt to put on once I got to my stand, it was a little warm to wear long sleeves while walking), with my backpack on my back that had all the essentials in it (release, face mask, hat, long sleeve camo shirt, gloves, grunt call). I make it out to my stand, not a care in the world, not trying to be quite at all...I drop my sunglasses at the base of the tree, bent over picked them up and put them in my backpack. Attached my bow to the string and then climbed up the ladder. Half way up the ladder I hear this whizzing blowing noise, the first thought into my head is that my dad's horse is sick. I continue up the ladder, sit down, pull the bow up (meanwhile this whizzing blowing noise is getting closer and louder), put my backpack between my feet on the stand platform, and continue thinking that my dad has definitely got to check his horse out...it's SICK. Before getting everything on (shirt, gloves, mask, hat, release), I look for the 'sick horse' and turn to my left and look over my shoulder...there's a buck sitting there, blowing at me because I invaded his territory. So I calmly sit very still and stop breathing...maybe he won't see me in my bright white shirt. So I get my bow ready, by putting an arrow on it, being slightly hidden by the tree. Me and the deer play 'watch that thing' for awhile, and then he walks behind me and comes up on the left. If I hadn't had the bag between my feet, I could have stood and got a shot off, he turned around to watch the highway as a car went by (perfect opportunity to get set up). But instead of having a nice four point hanging in the barn, I have another 'deer story' to tell and a lot of ribbing for the fact that my dad has a 'sick horse' that's whizzing and blowing.

Good times, good times.
ERM

Speeding Bullet: Time

Wow! It's already been about a month since my last entry...time is flying by and it's already October. Several things have happened this past month: Bow season opened, therefore I'm hunting again. I've been out four times and saw deer three out of the four trips. I dropped my arrow (duh) and missed a perfect broad side shot on one of the evenings. Hunting will keep a person very humble. Things at work are possibly calming back down. When I returned from my trip to Honduras my receptionist and one of my billing department personal left that week, and then I had some major turn over in the tech department. One of the guys we hired did not work out, so I then had to start all over again. It's been a little crazy around here. I think we're finally on the path to normalcy (whatever that is).

Tickets for Christmas at Our House go on sale tomorrow. This is a dinner theater our church does every year. They've changed it up so that 'everyone' has to either call the church or go online and purchase tickets...without getting them in advance. That's how crazy it's gotten...people would probably 'fight' for tickets. But it is a great way to kick off the Christmas Season...and the food is AWESOME.

There's been some minor vandalism/stealing going on at our church. Whoever is doing it is a very good vandal, we've yet to figure out anything. Last night during service there were some thugs breaking into cars on the parking lot. The ushers did a high speed chase (on foot) after them. They heard a motorcycle start up and then wipe out...we're unsure if that was their get-a-way bike or not. The cops were on the scene so maybe we'll find something out (though it is 'One Horse Town' we live in). Crazy things.

That's about all for now...until later.

ERM