Sierra's home!

She's narrating a slide shore of her pictures on the TV.  This one's called the Mona Lisa because the gun seems to follow the viewer.

Baby bunny

Aspen caught Copper mauling this baby bunny.  We are hoping that his mommy will come get him in the morning.  Or we have a new pet bunny.

Sierra's about to land!

Baby's almost home!  Plane is due to land in 10 minutes!  So excited!
Chris is picking her up, and hopefully they'll come straight home.  Mommy excited!

I made her enchiladas suizas and rice for dinner.  She's jonesing for Mexican and Asian food after three week of Irish-only.

To keep our minds off of waiting for her, we had a busy day.  Aspen and I went for a walk with Cathy at 9, then borrowed her juicer to juice all of our grapes.  We pasteurized it, then mixed 4 parts of grape juice with 1 part honey to make mead.  We've got 5 full quarts.  We've got to stir it daily for a week, then let it rest for a month.

Pat finished scraping the lawn off of the front yard inside the circle drive so we can build our little western town of sheds up there.  We're tired of the marsh in the winter and the yellow grass in the summer, so we're going to let the airport dirt provide a stable building surface and parking area for guests.

Aspen and I have been refinishing our dining table (looks awesome so far; we've completed day 2 of the process).  We went to Carl's Jr for lunch, then came home for a nap.  Paid some bills, then worked on my Psych 309 course (I needed to change some things about the class).

Then we watched Bill O'Reilly, and Grandpa Marv's letter got read!  That's his 3rd one.  I can't get one read!

I've been tracking Sierra's flights since I got up this morning, and I think I did a good job of filling the day so time would go by quickly.  And now it's almost up!  Yay!

Doing a little yard work

Gotta get rid of all the marshy areas before the trains come back.  We're having a gorgeous early fall!

Aspen and Copper, watching me work.

I'm mowing the lawn because Pat its too sore after his recreational day yesterday (poor baby).

Aspen's back after he laid on my new bed-of-nails acupressure mat.

Aspen trying to clean his intake valves to fix the weird sucking noise his car is making. He did a great job, but it didn't fix the problem.

Our newly expanded front flower bed, with stacked-stone wall.

Leather jackets and Quads

Pat and Aspen headed out early to go quadding in Belfair.  Aspen's been champing at the bit to go out since our trip to Beverly a few weeks ago.  They loaded their quads, packed their lunch, and hit the road by 8:30 am.

I chatted with Sierra a bit, and learned that she was interested in the $650 leather jacket I found at Wilson's Leather yesterday, discounted to $65. 

So I headed out to the Super Mall to pick it up, then hit Carpinito Brothers for some produce.

I got home, put my orange beets in the oven to roast, and had a PB&J for lunch.  Then I took a nap, and got to work prepping for classes.

For dinner, I had the beets with some balsamic vinegar, then made some kale chips, which were awesome.

The boys finally came back around 9 pm, full of harrowing stories of rolling their quads as they attempted to ride on trails carved by motorcycles because the quad trails were blocked by logging trucks.  Here are a few pics:

Aspen riding off to the side, so his quad can get traction on the rough hill

This is the face of a man who just got rolled by his quad

Selfie in the forest!

Aspen's artistic shot

Adios el coche de muerte

Pat sold Aspen's truck to Mike Girard for 1/4 of what he paid for it.  Mike's step-son is going to hone his mechanic skills on it.  We're just glad to have it off of the front lawn!

After a nice walk around the block with Cathy, Aspen, and the dogs, I came home and did a full-body stretch.  Then I gave all of the red chickens massages (they loved it), and then got cleaned up and settled in with some work. 

Very exciting day!  Lol

FIXED LINK: Hammy and his baby sitter

Hammy in a ball and his baby sitter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zwh_yXH1OUg

Aspen's faux hawk

Reminiscent of Sanjay on American Idol!

Felling the tree by the carport

My colleague from BC in the sociology dept has a husband in the tree removal industry.  He and his lumberjack came over and felled our tree today.  Here are some photos:

Seriously. . . This has got to be my last down day!

Spent today doing very little.  I found a Rehab Addict marathon this morning, and watched and knitted while using my massage pillow and my hot bean bag on my sinuses, neck and back.  Stayed in my jammies until noon.

The tree guy came to give us an estimate on felling the big pine next to the carport.  He's going to drop it tomorrow, then Pat and Aspen will burn the limbs and make rounds of the trunk.  Not sure how we'll remove the stump.

I got into my work clothes and started dusting and vacuuming, then Sierra replied to my messenger and we started chatting.  I miss my girl!  She's having so much fun and doing such cool things.  I'm really jazzed for her.

After our chat, I did a little rearranging of furniture, then took a nap.  I was itching to get some work done, so I recorded some lectures on sensation.

Yesterday, I finished analyzing the data from three studies, and I got some interesting results.  Now to write them up!  Ugh.

When I came downstairs from lecturing, Aspen and Pat were out back, Pat shooting his bow and arrow, Aspen throwing the Frisbee for Dash and getting bit by mosquitos.  He's got every wives' tale explanation for why mosquitos love him:  he was wearing a white shirt, he has a fast metabolism, and he eats a lot of sugar.  Lol

We had some excitement in the neighborhood to the north of us today.  Apparently there was a domestic dispute, and then one of them lit the house on fire.  About 10 police cars and 3 fire trucks raced past our house, then a helicopter arrived, so we turned on the local news, and there it was!  Live!  Very exciting.  Saw the shirtless guy being arrested on his front lawn.

Now I'm watching Rick Steves, but he's in Europe, not Ireland.  Sad for me.  Maybe I can find his Ireland one on Netflix.

After 8 full hours in regular clothes, I've showered and am back in my jammies.  Tomorrow is going to be more productive!

Hammy misses his mommy

Last night, Hammy was jogging in his wheel, so I put him in his ball and brought him downstairs.  He ran around while Brodie baby sat him (she was so adorable, following him, then laying down to watch him).

At bedtime, I tried to cuddle him, but he needed to run.  Sometimes a hamster just needs to jam, you know?  So I put him back in his cage, and he jogged until I fell asleep.

When I got back from my walk with Cathy and Aspen (during which I had a little panic attack because of my breathing due to my cold - felt like I was suffocating aka having a heart attack), Pat came out and announced that Hammy was missing.

Aspen started searching his room, while I started searching the sewing room.  There he was, hiding in the corner behind my cutting table.  Pat called him, and he came right out.  Once he was back in his cage, he drank and drank and drank, then curled up in his bedding and went to sleep.

I wonder what kind if harrowing night he had?

Turns out I put his tube in the wrong hole the other day when I cleaned his cage.  He just waited until last night to take advantage of it!

Riding princess on Spring Lake

The boys and I took a paddle this evening.  What a way to adjust one's attitude!  The water was like glass, many neighbors were out enjoying their lake front, and the evening sun was perfectly warm enough.

Aspen took the lead

Pat provided maneuverability

Mt. Rainier is shrouded in clouds.

Taking a nap with Copper

Getting back to normal

After what seems like a week of illness, Dad and I are both on the mend.  Lots of phlegm loosening up, but it's finally almost over.

While sorting the laundry today, a gigantic spider came out of Aspen's pile!  I screamed, killed it, and sent Aspen to clean his room.

We cleaned Hammy's cage, too.  I used the shop vac to remove the litter, then got it all back together.  Hammy seemed pleased.

Also refilled the wild bird feeder, potted my ivy that I've been rooting, and cleaned the shower.  Then I took an hour-long nap.  Tomorrow I plan to do some grocery shopping.

Dad rearranged the dogs' sleeping area, and put Brodie's crate back out there.  She is NOT thrilled to be between Copper and Dash.

Aspen put Dash in the house and threw the ball for Copper, and Copper played!  We were so excited to see him take a break from chicken-staring.  He's a little out of chasing shape, but he should get better with practice.

Pretty busy day for people who really needed a lot of breaks in between tasks!

Hammy is a martian!

So cold. . .

Copper is so cold!  "Holdya??!"

Enough already!

My summer cold has kicked in for real now.  Let's just say it's an upper respiratory infection, and let it go at that.

I spent a quiet day posting grades and processing data for my study of how men and women differ in their interpretation if sexual interest.  The data's looking pretty good now that I got the insight that I needed to calculate my own factor analysis of the items before computing my statistics.

If you're still awake after reading that...  Aspen has been completely ODing on his video games for the past two days.  He's taking advantage of Pat's and my illness.

Key to my survival will be getting my sinuses clear so I can sleep tonight.  We all know I cannot breathe through my mouth!

Back to archery!

First I tried to take a pix of Pat shooting his bow and arrow, but he forbade a shirtless pix. 

Then I took this pix of his perfect bull's eye, and he complained that the score of all arrows together isn't very high. 

Shows that he's feeling better -- he's shooting, and dissatisfied with a perfect bull's eye from 40 yds.

SOOOOO uncool!

So, Pat came down with a cold on Sunday, and I tried to be a reasonably decent caregiver -- I provided medications, fluids, and bland foods.  Yesterday, his head was really congested and he was coughing, and he had a headache.  Poor baby!

Despite my awesome attention as a nurse, I still got cursed with the same malady!  The nerve!  I'm on Day 1, with the periodic opening of my nose-faucet, alternating with the complete stopping of all air through my nose.  Perfect for napping.  I'm not really coughing -- knock on wood.  I'm sure that's tomorrow.

Long story short:  I'm sick!  :-(

I still managed to record my Chapter 4 lectures, so I'm a trooper.  I've been working on my data from my sexual interest study, and I'm completely flummoxed by it. How can men and women be scoring the same way?  I don't understand. . .  I've tightened up everything I can think of across three studies, and I keep getting this weird pattern.  Sigh.

Pat is feeling way better today, but we both took it easy today.  He kicked back on the recliner on the back porch for much of the afternoon.  Aspen's the only truly healthy one, and I'm not comfortable placing our survival in his hands.  LOL

I think Hammy's going feral.  I went to get him last night, and he was sitting in one corner of his cage, where he's kicked out all of his litter.  He was sitting upright on his haunches, front feet tucked up to his chest, with a look like a prairie dog. 

I opened his door and tried to lure him out, but he got one sniff of my hand and fled through his tube to his other cage.  He adopted the same stance in a corner of that cage; I opened the door over there, he sniffed my hand, then recoiled to the back of the cage.  I finally grabbed him (he didn't bite me), and took him to see Pat.  He climbed around a bit, with the overhead lights on so we could see him, and when Pat gestured (causing a shadow to pass over Hammy), Hammy dropped to his stomach and froze -- like a hawk had flown over.  That was pretty cute.  But he didn't really want to explore after that.

I took him down to see Aspen, and he squeezed upward in my hand so that only his lower hips were in my hand, then froze in that position.  It was really weird.  I put him back in his cage, and he fled for miles in his wheel.  I think he misses his Mommy!

Tuesday at home

Poor Patrick has a cold.  He's coughing, his head hurts, and he feels nauseated.  I begin this post with this description because it's the reason that I delayed my walk with Cathy from 8:30 to 9 am this morning.  And I'm so glad I did, because Sierra Skyped us at 8:30 this morning!  I answered on my Galaxy Player, so she couldn't hear me, but I could hear her.  And we could see each other.

It was funny trying to respond to her, first with rudimentary ASL (which she doesn't know), and then with little signs Pat made for me to hold up.  I think Sierra was as glad to see us as we were to see her.  All of our antics cracked her up!

After our walk to the boat launch (I rousted Aspen out of bed so Dash could come, too), my lungs were pretty thrashed.  I've detoxed from my daily 24-hour allergy meds, and am completely clean now.  But it feels like I've got asthma when climbing hills.

I got online and paid some bills, then the boys and I headed out for lunch at Quizno's.  Mmm-mmm-mmm:  Toasty!  We haven't had Quizno's in ages.

We headed over to the motorcycle shop to pick up the belt for Pat's quad, and Aspen tried out the different quads that they have for sale.  He's really interested in getting a bigger quad.

Speaking of which, he had his phone interview with Home Depot yesterday.  I don't know what the next step is supposed to be, but at least they let him know that it's a 20-29 hr/week stocking job.  They said NOT to go to the store to inquire, but it seems like he should go to the store and make himself known.

He's still on the waitlist for his classes, and no one has contacted him about the entry code for the one class that is not full and for which he has all of the pre-reqs fulfilled.

I am plugging along, updating my online lectures, and am getting ready to start working on my report on my inferring sexual interest study.  Different things keep interfering with my getting to work on that. . .

The weather is beautiful up here right now. . .  upper 80s and sunny.  It's great for our break from school.

Brodie and Hammy

Brodie and Hammy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cD9Zod2DsQ

Sunday at home

We had a busy day at home today, full of glamour and thrills.

After watching Sunday Morning and drinking our coffee, I sorted the laundry and got it started.  Then I sanded the front door, stained it, and varathaned it.  Meanwhile, the boys worked on the shed.

Aspen and I made chicken salad for dinner while Pat practiced his archery.  During dinner, Pat brought Sierra's hamster down in a plastic container so he could play in the same room as us.  Brodie found that fascinating!

Now my shoulders and forearms hurt from my day of labor, and we're relaxing in front of the TV.

Saturday at home

OK, getting sick of sleeping fretfully.  But when I went to bed last night, Sierra was just starting to cross Hudson Bay!  What a scary image, flying over a dark cold expanse of water.  Pat told me to just tell myself that she's at Girl Scout camp in Carnation, and that little trick let me fall asleep.

At 1:24 am, we realized Aspen was still up editing his game narration video (you can check his postings at Fmily), so now we're both awake, trying to kid ourselves into going back to sleep.  We figured that Sierra was somewhere over the North Sea at about that time, which also seemed scary.  I managed to fall back asleep after some tossing and turning.

Awoke to a cricked neck, but the realization that she must be alive -- no phone call from the airline!  We've waited patiently all day for her posting on her travel blog, and were richly rewarded by an outstanding description of her first day in Ireland.  I'm so happy that she's absorbing the full details of her trip.  She's the perfect person to be traveling, because she's got such a curious mind.

Pat headed out to Flint Tip archery club to try to make some new friends, so I feverishly knitted to make up for yesterday's deficit.  I'm really coming along on his new archery vest.

At 10 am, Aspen appeared, and went out to play with Dash.  He knows that he's responsible for filling the buddy void that his sister left, so he resigned himself to sitting in Pat's chair to keep me company, when I remembered we have two Doctor Who specials on the DVR to watch.  That made him very happy!  And then I reminded him that the new season starts tonight, and he's over the moon.

We headed out in his GTI to return his rented Comm Studies textbook via UPS, then to Taco Bell for the lunch he's been requesting for the past week, then to Carpinito Brothers for the produce I've been requesting for the past week.  I also picked up some phlox to replace the spent sweet peas in the window boxes.  They smell so good and look so pretty!

I turned on the TV to discover the Little League World Series was on, and realized that baseball is interesting when played by 12 yr olds.  I used to love to watch my brother play, and I loved to play softball, but I hate professional baseball.  That's because it's boring compared to watching little kids!  I made Aspen come in and watch the Nevada coach's pep talk when the team was down 7-5 going into the 6th (and final) inning, because it sounded exactly like Coach Feist.  Brought tears to my eyes!

Pat got home just as nap time arrived, so I settled in with my nap-inducing "People's Court," and took a power nap.  Now I'm ready to go record some more Intro Psych online lectures, before our 7 pm viewing of the first episode of the new Doctor Who season.  If I plan this correctly, the guys will have to make dinner while I'm working.

Sierra's flight trajectory

I figured out how to track Sierra's flight with a map and trajectory on it, and it looks so creepy!  She's flying over Canada, headed for the Arctic, skirting Greenland before landing in Ireland tomorrow morning.  Just seems like she's heading into the unpopulated areas of the world. . .

Sierra left for Ireland today

After a fitful night sleep, I awoke to the realization that the day has come:  My baby is leaving for three weeks in Ireland.

Even her brother, who hasn't risen before 10 am in weeks, got up to give her a farewell hug at 7:30 am this morning.  (You can see me in the mirror in the bathroom, if you look closely.)

So, she piled into her boyfriend Chris' Passat, with only 44 lbs of checked luggage and a backpack for her carry-on.  I stood on the porch and waved as they pulled away, and came back inside.  Pat had his archery equipment in hand, kissed me goodbye, and headed out to the range to meet a new member who wanted a tour.

I couldn't settle down to my normal morning routine of knitting, drinking coffee, and watching TV shows on my DVR.  I had a restless feeling, so I used my energy to record some lectures for my Introductory Psychology online class (you can check them out on YouTube -- my channel is creatively named jillseiver).

After finishing the chapter, I decided it was time to go harass Aspen, who had returned to bed after Sierra's departure.  His dog, Dash, was sleeping on the foot of the bed, so I decided to tease Aspen by trying to get Dash to jump on him.  "Get your Daddy!" I exclaimed, while tapping Aspen's hip.  Dash gave out a low growl.  "That's weird," we both agreed.  So I tried again, tapping Aspen's hip and saying "Get Daddy!"  Dash growled louder.  Was he playing, or was he really trying to protect Aspen?  One more tap provided the answer, as Dash yelped, jumped to his feet, and clamped my forearm in his mouth.  Aspen growled, "NO!" and pinned Dash to the bed (I'm pleased that my retired wrestler can still win in the 65 lb Border Collie category).  Dash was confused, and submitted immediately.  Then Aspen banished him, and Dash fled to hide under Big Pop's desk.  Aspen is determined to eliminate that biting behavior, and immediately took Dash out for a vigorous bout of Frisbee, followed by some training.

After a yoga session, I sat with Aspen to get him to sign up for his fall classes.  He's been dragging his feet all summer, and now we have only 4 weeks until the quarter begins.  He has two classes in his major that he has to take as prerequisites for all of the other classes he must take (he's majoring in software development).  Of course they're both full with waiting lists.  He's pretty lucky though, because one class has only one student on the wait list, and the other only has 4.  It's possible that people could get dropped for non-payment and he could get rotated in.  But this close to the start of the quarter, it's not a sure-thing.  He is learning that he should listen to my advice regarding school!  :-)

He finally got a call-back from Home Depot about the job application that he submitted last May.  But again, he foot-dragged about calling back until he finally called 15 minutes after the call center closed.  So now he has to wait until Monday.

Did I mention that he's 18?  It's so fun to fulfill the stereotype.  LOL

My student from Eastern WA University with whom I am conducting a study came over to analyze the data that has come in so far.  It may sound weird to have a student over to my house, but this whole thing is sort of weird, because her kids attended the same home-school group that my kids did.  Her oldest son and Sierra were pretty tight a few years ago (friends, flirty), and Sierra was the lead in the Shakespeare plays that my now-student directed.  It's all very inbred!  Small town!  Anyway, unfortunately we did not have adequate respondents in two out of the three categories of participant that we need, so we're back to recruiting.  At least she was here to help me be brave while Sierra is flying around.

After my student left, Aspen went out to start the briquettes for grilling the steak.  I came down from my evening shower and asked what was burning.  Pat said I was smelling residual smoke from starting the briquettes, but I thought it smelled like current smoke.  Finally, after dinner, Pat smelled the smoke and noticed that no smoke was coming out of the BBQ.  That's odd.  So he looked out and saw a lot of smoke under our back porch roof.  That's odd.  He went outside to investigate, and saw smoke coming out of the storage closet where we keep our Girl Scout style fire-starters (egg crates filled with dryer lint and candle wax).  The door was slightly ajar, and as he walked toward it, he saw the flashover as the smoldering fire burst into real flames.  Three 18-egg egg crates were fully engulfed inside of our storage closet!  He grabbed the crates and rushed toward the backyard, inadvertently fanning the flames, so he threw the crates onto the stone patio as soon as he could.  Here are the remnants:

OMG -- that could have been a disaster!  He managed to catch it right before it became a real house fire.  My rescue swimmer is still my rescuer and hero!  Aspen is completely unaware of anything that could have caused those egg crates (which he had carried out to the BBQ, broke off one, lit the fire, then returned the extra crates back to the closet) to catch fire.  But logic tells us that some heat got close to those fire-starters, and they smoldered to life over the next half hour.

As we all recovered and caught our breaths, Pat said, "Sierra's right -- we couldn't even make it one day without her!"  She's known it since she was little -- we're incompetent and need her to live.

We miss you, Sierra!  :-)

Another attempt.

So, it's raining...I've been shooting between the squalls. I keep hitting my nose and lip. Jillzee, thinks only a man would play a sport that leave wounds...LOL. I'm shooting well. I just need to remember to cast down my arrow twice before releasing, then just let the string pull away from your finger tips. Simple!
***tangent = ***
A new thing I might try is to just in the middle of a thought add in a shirt or album or even a song title, then get back to the main topic. Am I the only one...really...ok then.

I think Gregg Gutfeld should have been asked to do a late night comedy chair, that would have been BOLD. America in Hollywood are pussies. Well, dicks really. Pussies can take a pounding, balls are fragile. From France...call back.

Listening to punk rock. Just finished the dishes. Still raining, so I thought I might try this. I'm gonna load some pics of where I shoot. Well, I can't remember how to, so I'll relearn from my sweetie.

* CLEAVAGE...LOOK INTO IT.
* CAMELTOES...RIDE THE WAVE.
* BABY BOOMERS SUCK
Why  can't people see that even though they like their leaders, their work is sub par. And to think that you know this and still follow them...that is stupid. What's wrong with the truth?
* NOT EVERYONE THAT SHITS ON YOU IS YOUR ENEMY...
            NOT EVERYONE THAT GETS YOU OUT IS YOUR FRIEND.
The simplest things are the ones that take the most detail. Like being happy. listening to the wind flow threw the tree tops. I thought writing would be hard. The ideas!, not the pecking.

I'm gonna leave this on while I take a 20 minute break and check the fire. I'll try and get close-ups of the girls.
It's Miller Time. brb

The Beginning

What came first, the chicken or the egg.
I don't know where to start, so I am going to jump in with just my thoughts and ideas in no particular order.
This year, I wanted to compete in the International Bow hunters Organization, (IBO) Northwest Triple Crown. It includes three shoots in the Idaho, Washington and Oregon area. For 2014, the three shoots are being held at Evergreen Archers (Spokane WA), Selkirk Archers (Bonner's Ferry ID) and Grand Ronde Bowmen (La Grande OR.).

On March 31st, I went to Evergreen Archers for the first leg. I compete in the traditional class (TRD), because I shoot a modern recurve bow. It's known as a ILF recurve. The plan was to take the family and visit my sister who also lives in the area, but like they say "Life is what happens after you make plans," so my daughter wanted to work extra at her job to make some money for her trip to Ireland this August. My son said he had a gig to ref a wrestling tourney, and the cherry on the top, the love of my life caught my cold and didn't feel well. So, I was in quandary leave my love and go alone or skip it altogether, after all it's just archery. Well, there is some history to why I wanted to go, even maybe needed to go, and this is the story.

Back in mid 2010 and even before then, I started to miss something in archery. I was shooting compound bows and I just kept thinking I was missing something. Like when you feel like your being stared at from afar. Anyway, I was thinking about getting into compound target archery, why, I don't know. So there I was floundering around, I knew archery was still part of it, just where and at what level.

It was August, a warm day and I was doing something at the club/range. I pulled into the area at the flat range to talk with some other archers. There were some archers talking and shooting. I walked up and started to listen to them talk. One guy was looking to sell his bow, a recurve. As I stood there the guy selling the recurve, asked me if I wanted to fling some arrows from his bow. I laughed and said YES! I grabbed the bow and nocked an arrow, as I raised my arm and drew the bow back, I had no real idea of how to aim, stand or the release. As I looked down the shaft of the arrow and stayed solid in my anchor, I eyed the spot where I want the arrow to go. BOOM...that arrow almost hit the spot I was looking at. Well, my brain noticed something, but I was too excited to truly noticed it. I thought "beginner's luck."  I drew another arrow, and it landed even closer to the spot...this went on for the next 8 arrows.

When I set the bow down, I knew right then that traditional archery was what I needed. His name is Tony Lama, and the bow was a 60" 58# Bob Lee take down recurve. That bow shot an arrow right at the spot I was aiming, without me even thinking about it.

I will talk more about the many steps and bows between then and this year's IBO shoot. I put down my compound and bought a late 80's, 66" 64# Stottler one piece off the shelf recurve, that was February 2011. I'm shooting it in the photo on this blog.

I was also wanting to get out of only shooting at Cedar River Bowmen shoots, my club, and see some other clubs out there. I had no idea what an IBO shoot was or even the rules, but I went for it anyhow. I shot horribly on the first leg of the 2012 Triple Crown -- way out of the running. I didn't care since I was so new at it. That year the second leg was held at my home club. I shot it and did about the same, horrible. Had a lot of fun, just struggled with the learning curve. The last leg was in the La Grande Or., up in the Dead Mans Pass area, what a name.

At the end of the third leg, we were sitting around and looking at the score board. I noticed the scores from the other TRD shooters. They had it all written out: 1st leg, 2nd leg and 3rd leg. I noticed that the TRD board broke down like this for most of the shooters: 1st leg score, 2nd leg blank and 3rd leg score. I also noticed that the other TRD archers had higher total points on each of their two shoots than I had combined on all three shoots. My face became red; I knew what was coming. In order to win the Triple Crown over-all shooter, one needs to attend all three legs. I felt like the family dog that ate a roll of toilet paper. I knew I had won, but I didn't feel legitimate about it. I have learned a lot in the years since I started and I wanted to go back and win or lose it legitimately.

I won the 2014 first leg with a score of 263 out of 440. I can and will do better in Bonner's Ferry. To be continued.........