[Today’s run: 4 miles]
It has been an interesting day.
My wife and her sister are down on the Florida Gulf Coast for an ultra race. This time it is a 100K. Some of the Starkville runners are also at that race. Between that and stormy weather, the Starkville group didn’t meet for a run.
Also, I had a bit of work for the office to be done.
I got myself up and got the storm-fearful dog through the morning of boomers and rain. Then we got the office work done.
It was dryer and warmer outside, just after noon, and I was putting on my running clothes when the neighbor called. We had talked recently about going hunting. He said today was a good day because the wind would be from the West. He brought me half a 5-gallon-bucket of corn to put in his deer feeder which is overlooked by the stand just south of my house on the other side of a line of trees. He said he was not going, I was on my own.
I then went on my run and quickly remembered that my #1 Son had mentioned he wanted to go hunting this winter if we could figure out how. So I called him and he got in his car headed this direction. I finished my 4 miles and arrived back home.
I rounded up my rifle and ammunition. The only one I have that is at all appropriate is a WW2 M1 Garand with open sites. It would definitely do the job if I could hit the target. I also got my blaze orange stuff, some bottles of water, etc. I took some of the supplies out to the hunting stand and I put the corn at the feeder as instructed.
There is a little stream in the line of trees. I think today I’ve crossed that stream 6 times. It’s been raining. The ground is mushy and the stream is full, about 3 ft across. It’s a muddy day.
After a bit I went back out with the rest of the stuff and sat in the folding chair in the little two-person hunting shack. When #1 Son arrived I went back toward the house a little bit and met him and then we both sat in the shack.
We had some binoculars and we watched the birds and talked about this and that. I suppose we were out there about 90 minutes, something less than two hours I think. It was starting to get darker, still overcast, getting windy and colder.
We finally saw a buck cross from the thicket on the West over the open area toward the feed station. He didn’t stop at the feed station but continued on toward the woods on the East. Number One got a good bead on him with his firearm (a more conventional hunting piece with a scope) and fired. I kind of jumped, so I wasn’t sure where he went. But we walked toward the spot last seen and there he was on the ground, expired. Good shot.
We called the neighbor, as he had instructed, and he came with his 4 wheeler and we loaded up the deer. Then we slogged back in the cold wind, gathered our stuff and went to the house. I fended off the dog while Son came in and we both warmed up a bit. Then we drove to the neighbor’s house and transferred the deer to my pickup truck.
From there we went to the processing place over by the race track and dropped off our prize.
And then we went to Waffle House and had a good dinner.
At dinner I received a message from my wife that she had been thwarted again in her effort to finish 100K. But she was generally OK and philosophical about the results.