Barb and I went to a Halloween party last night:
A couple years ago Barb and I hiked to Annette Lake. A couple weeks ago we hiked to Lake Ann. Since it was late in the year we expected there would be few people. We were wrong. Short of national parks, this was probably the most crowded parking and trail we have ever been on. Still, the weather was nice, the views were great, and we enjoyed hike.
I don’t get it either. And I can’t understand why people don’t get their fill of horror from watching politics.
Sheryl isn’t a first time shooter. But she didn’t have much experience. She recently moved here from the Philippines and Calvin, her former Marine husband, did teach her to shoot. Calvin likes to drive up in the mountains on Forest Service and even unmarked dirt roads and yesterday they showed Barb and I a wonderful viewpoint east of Snoqualmie Pass:
After getting off the mountain we went to the range where both of them shot a .22 with a suppressor. I gave Calvin a couple of suggestions and let him shoot by himself. I spent a lot more time with Sheryl and here is the result of her first target from about 10 feet away with 10 shots per bullseye:
I then had them shooting five shots with the requirement that each shot be on a different bullseye from the previous to simulate a Steel Challenge type stage. Then I put them on the shot timer. I told Sheryl that I thought with a little practice she could do it in about five seconds—one second per shot. “No way!”, she said. I told her at first I expected something on the order of seven or eight seconds but we could get her somewhere in the range of five today.
It took a little bit for them to settle down and not get misses but when we were done Sheryl did better than Calvin with one string at 4.44 (IIRC). Calvin’s best was 5.15 (IIRC).
I moved them back to about 20 feet and Calvin did better. Sheryl kept trying to shoot the same speed as at the shorter range and had misses. A another trip or two to the range is going to be required before I take them to a match.
I then put them on my STI Eagle chambered in .40 S&W with low recoil loads:
They both did well but Sheryl, in particular, had problems with the gun not fully cycling. I gave her a few major power factor loads. She did just fine with them but with the heavier gun, large grip, and her small hands I could tell she was getting tired. It was time to clean up and called it quits for the day anyway so that’s what we did.
Last Sunday Barb and I hiked up Mount Catherine. We were hoping that by driving east of Snoqualmie Pass and getting up near 5000 feet in elevation we could get out of all the forest fire smoke around home. No such luck, but it was a nice hike anyway. We probably will go back sometime when the air is clear and we can see something in the distance other than the haze.
The drive to the trailhead really requires a high clearance vehicle. Even with my Ford Escape we bottomed out once on some particularly high rocks. The trail is pretty nice. It’s not a walk in the park with a wide smooth path, but it’s not one of those trails which “you have to believe it in order to see it” either (been there, done that, got lost, it wasn’t our favorite outing). The last little bit near the top is steep and it little more than dirt steps in the side of the mountain. No big deal when it’s dry but it could be treacherous when it’s wet.
I prefer rifles.
Sherry Suen-Mizell
August 11, 2018
[Sherry was on the Huffman family farm and was given an opportunity to throw a tomahawk at the end of a log. She wasn’t interested and gave this as the reason. This was an excellent way decline in a manner which endeared her to me.
Also, from the same day, she acted as a chair for my grandson Bryce:
We didn’t get to the rifles or the Boomerite this weekend. We will make it happen someday.—Joe]
Last weekend Barb and I went to Idaho. We delivered more chemicals for Boomershoot 2019, trimmed some trees along the road to Boomershoot Taj Mahal, and attended my high school reunion. The weather was a little on the warm side but not bad. We took a few pictures during the trip:
I believe this was west of Colfax on Highway 26. We found the clouds quite pretty.
This is the lentil field just south of Boomershoot Mecca.
I”m planning to repair these steel targets at the tree line before Boomershoot 2019.
I was trying to do the equivalent of this one from almost exactly 10 years ago:
Another view of the hay bales with the shooting line in the background.
For many years Barb had digestive issues with wheat. Those issues mysteriously went away a few months ago (Barb is skeptical of my suggestion it was Dr. Joe’s cure for everything, and I’m skeptical of her hypothesis of a spiritual/energy something or other healing). Here we have her next to a field of Huffman Wheat.
Last Saturday and Sunday Barb and I hiked various trails around Crater Lake. I’d been there a couple times before but hadn’t really done any hiking.
Our first hike was to The Watchman Lookout:
At over 7000 feet above sea level there was some snow but nothing blocking the trails:
The weather was wonderful with visibility probably exceeding 100 miles.
With such clear skies the water was intensely blue (this is straight from my phone camera, no color adjustments):
The incredible blue color is not new. 1853 prospectors named it “Deep Blue Lake” and in 1862 another set of prospectors named it Blue Lake. The color is because the water is extremely clear and deep. In the deepest part it is 1,943 feet deep. It is so clear that person in a submersible vehicle at the greatest depth was able to see the flag on the vehicle with only the sunlight which made it to those depths.
The island is called Wizard Island. The crater on the top of the island is called Witch’s Caldron. If you take a boat to the Island you can explore the entire island. We decided not to invest the time (the better part of a day) to go on that excursion.
From the other side of the lake we saw the island named Phantom Ship, a bald eagle, and some very tiny flowers:
There were several other geological features to be seen in the park which we visited on Sunday but the highlights as seen above can easily be viewed in a single day without strenuous hiking.
Barb had never been in a cave before and found the experience less than enjoyable. It wasn’t claustrophobia because we didn’t get to anything particularly small and she has been in small confined spaces before without issue.
Yesterday Barb and visited the Big Obsidian Flow in central Oregon. As is the case with many volcanic fields it is somewhat other worldly. It’s a flow composed of about 25% obsidian mixed with pumice. It is an easy hike and very worthwhile.
There are huge chunks of the black natural glass all around you:
You need to be careful when stepping on it because it is very slick. You are told not to bring your dog with you on the trails because, well, broken “glass” is everywhere.
The native Americans who lived nearby used the obsidian for tools and traded it with other tribes.
Because the chemical makeup of the flow is distinguishable from other sources scientists were able to trace tools found hundreds of miles away to this flow.
Barb and I hiked on Mount Hood today. The weather was great. The air was clear enough that we could easily see Mount Jefferson over 45 miles away and Three Sisters and Broken Top (to the left of Mount Jefferson) nearly 90 miles away:
Here is the same view of the mountains with a 125 mm lens instead of a 43 mm lens:
We talked to another couple hiking down as we were going up who told us that yesterday there were 60 MPH winds. We were very lucky with our date selection!
We hiked up to the the ski lift junction at just under 7000 feet elevation. I wanted to make it above 7000 feet so I went on up the hill a short distance to what my phone GPS said was 7054 feet above sea level.
My view from there:
Yes, it was July 3rd and there were lots of skiers. Here are some more:
And here is a cropped version from the lower center of the picture above:
Today, at 11:00 AM, while on top of the peak “The Watchman” overlooking Crater Lake Barb said, “I want to talk.”
This was the view from our vantage point over the lake:
Okay. This is a little odd. She can talk as much as she wants whenever she wants. Why is she announcing this now?
“I want to talk about our relationship.”, she continued.
I was seriously confused now. I thought things were fine. And why at this semi-public location does she want to have what appears to be a very serious conversation about our relationship? Is she breaking up with me? What did I do?!!!
I didn’t have to wait long. She explained, “Since my food intolerance went away I have decided I want to be married now.”
Oh! OH!!!!
I was all choked up and could barely talk.
Wow!
She then got down on one knee and said, “Would you do me the honor of being my husband?”
I gave her a hug and said, “Yes, of course.”
This picture was taken a few minutes later from the same place:
The picture below was taken from across the lake a few hours later. There are two peaks above and to the left of Wizard Island. The second peak to the left is the one we were on when she proposed. Excellent choice!
From NRA Shooting Sports USA:
John Vlieger won High Overall at the 2018 USPSA Michigan Sectional Championship at the Detroit Sportsmen’s Congress in Utica, MI, earlier this month. Vlieger finished with 1196.4947 match points and a time of 115.44.
Picture from Ammoland:
John is my son-in-law.
Does it ever strike you as odd that people pay a premium for water that is exceptionally clean but pay an even higher premium to have water strained through ground up vegetable matter?
Daughter Jaime was rereading a Calvin and Hobbes book and claimed that Calvin’s father had a lot of similarities to me. I didn’t recall him being a particularly good match. She then presented her primary exhibit, this comic:
When I stopped laughing I conceded her point.
Barb has some rhododendrons. We weren’t really watching them and hadn’t noticed the profusion of blooms until the neighbor mentioned it to her. From our perspective it was just grass, trees, and green shrubbery until POOF! It’s a collection of blossoms taller than our heads:
Nice!
I usually have QOTDs up for the time before and slightly after Boomershoot so I have time to concentrate on Boomershoot then just veg out and recover afterward. This time I did not get ahead on the QOTD stuff for this blog. I’m going “radio silent” for a few days.
Nothing to worry about. I’ll be back online when I feel like it.
Last weekend Barb and I went over to the peninsula to have dinner with some friends. This involved a ferry crossing and I took a picture of this girl pretending to fly like one of the seagulls floating in the air ahead of the ferry:
I visited daughter Xenia this last weekend. She recently moved to Kentucky. It’s a little damp and cloudy but it looks like it will be very beautiful when it warms up and the trees get their leaves.
We did a little bit of sightseeing and this was one of the more interesting historical items we saw:
She and John have a few acres with their new house and we took the dogs on walks and looked at the trees and birds trying to identify them. There were several trees like the one below. I thought trees like this only existed in scary Disney cartoons. It’s the kind of tree I would expect around Sleeping Beauty’s castle:
Xenia says it’s a Honey Locust and is also known as a Thorny Locust. I prefer the name Xenia gave it when she first saw it, “a Stabby Tree”.
He mobilized the English language and sent it into battle.
Viscount Halifax
1940
Referring Winston Churchill’s speech in the movie The Darkest Hour.
[For Valentine’s Day Barb and went to this movie (she chose it). It is a very good movie.
Mobilize the English language and send it into battle. This what gun owners need to do. It is either that or face our own darkest hour and/or a bloody war.
I have often thought something like that is what I was doing. I try look at things, change the point of view, and articulate a vision which makes obvious we have the high moral high ground, we should always attack, and we must always make our enemies defend.
But I had never articulated it even one tenth as clearly and succinctly as Halifax did in the movie. The movie inspired me. Henceforth, I will make better use of words. If these words are properly crafted into powerful weapons of war we can win the battles needed to defeat the forces of evil in this country and avoid a war of bullets and blood.—Joe]
