Well, that was fun.

As seen everywhere else, these were some of the fine people who attended:

Jay
Marko
Lissa
TOTWTYTR
Liberty
JD
Doubletrouble
Ted
Weer’d Beard
Bruce

… and special guest star …

Paul - From State Line Gun Shop

Now, the shoot was on the 20th, and I believe I had the most driving to do, so I was up at the crack of 0-dark-30 to get my butt in gear, inhale some caffeine, and start driving. The driving was rough going through Northern Siberia, across the Arctic, through the Canadian wilderness, and finally down through NH on my way to pick up Marko. Bingo! We have met our first other blogger, and I’ve only been on the road for an hour at that point.

I learned a little bit about everybody on Sunday, and thought I’d share my impressions of this most excellent event. First up, Marko, who I need to devote some extra space to, considering we rode together for four total hours on Sunday.

Marko was both an excellent navigator, and simply great company on an extended drive. I’ve never spent two hours in a car with someone I’d met in person only minutes before, so you never really know what’s going to happen in that situation. No sweat, though. We both have a tech-type background, we’re both at-home Dads, and even found that we share a similar nationality! At least in part. All in all, the perfect start to a great day, hanging with someone you have quite a bit in common with. We shared some laughs over Stephen King’s “It”, he gave me an excellent tip regarding Windex and corrosive ammo, and we talked about all things Dad-like. Turns out he believes - much as I do - that the Terrible Two’s don’t exist, but the Threes downright suck.

And he has the same opinion of the movie Mr. Mom that I do. Namely, the next person who mentions it when I say the words “stay-at-home-Dad” will get an enthusiastic beating.

We showed up and were promptly greeted by smiling faces, enthusiastic handshakes, and just a general warm brotherhood all the way around.

Oh yeah … and there were guns … EVERYWHERE. Friggin’ AWESOME!

And what did I learn about everyone else? In no particular order …

Lissa makes damn good cookies, is impossibly sweet and good natured, and I quite honestly think I had more fun watching her experience all sorts of firearms for the first time than I did shooting my own. I think part of the reason shooters enjoy new shooters so much is because we’re re-living that experience ourselves, at least in small part. I remember my first few shots with the mosin and the SKS. And Lissa and I took our first shots with a fully automatic weapon just a few minutes apart at the blogger shoot. Read her amazing perspective of the day. She gets it.

TOTWTYTR. Any owner of such a fine rifle as the Enfield No4 Mk2 is okay in my book. And a fellow Mosin M91 owner! “Too Old To Work, Too Young To Retire” … maybe, but just right to hang out and shoot with for an afternoon!

JD, I wish we spent more time chatting. I have to find out AFTER the shoot that you’ve been in Martial Arts for years and years. Dammit! Everyone at the shoot was smiling, having fun, and sharing funny stories about anything and everything, JD was no exception. And he’s an engineer!

And on that topic, if I may digress … ever notice that there are an abundance of techy-type people who are also gun-lovers? Perhaps it’s the love of simplistic machinery that goes bang when you pull a trigger instead of giving you an error, not allowing a bullet to exit a barrel because of a firewall, or requiring hours upon hours of coding to do something stupidly simple such as projecting a hunk of lead downrange into the plastic skull cavity of a furby at 2000 feet per second.

Doubletrouble. Our most gracious and kind host who was trusting enough to hand over his backyard to us all. One day, I want a backyard that at least temporarily contains enough weaponry and ammunition to invade a not-so-small country … twice. And the dude has a cannon. A CANNON! I mean, come on, how cool is that!

Ted. Ted brought the Teletubby, a Sun workstation, and an NT machine to a shooting range with the explicit intent of laughing while each of those objects gets fired upon. That’s just impossibly cool. Another fellow tech-person, a Dad, and yet another new friend met at the bloggershoot (that makes it sound as if though we launch bloggers into the air and shoot them …). Ted’s another person I met Sunday that I wouldn’t mind hanging out with at the range any time. If only I didn’t live in Moscow! Heh.

Weer’d Beard. One of the most knowledgeable firearm owners I’ve ever met. And he has some badass weapons of his own. How the hell do you look at an ejected case from a Mosin-Nagant and immediately point out, “Oh, that’s Hungarian ammo!” He’s a Scrapple fan with some highly entertaining views of French-Canadian cuisine. Like deep-fried lard dumplings in grease sauce. I had always wondered what that sound was at night - living a mere three hours from Montreal, I now know for a fact it’s the sound of arteries hardening across that border!

Bruce. Bruce started out the day by handing me twenty strippers! Err … stripper clips. We shared a meatball sandwich together, though rumors of it being similar to the scene from Lady and the Tramp are completely untrue. Bruce was highly entertaining and it was great to get to know him. He showed off his wicked good New England accent, and I’ve been laughing about the potato song since I left Sunday afternoon. Something about a spud patch or something like that. Dammit that was funny. He’s also a hell of a shot with that 10/22, nailing a 3-inch tall baby Shrek with ease.

And last but certainly not least, Jay. What can I say about this loud, wild-eyed organizer of the event other than, “he’s damn cool”. Bayonet charge on a teletubby? Check. Shotgun with a razor-sharp blade bayonet? Check. A few times during the event the thought crossed my mind … “He’s somebody’s DAD …. that’s friggin’ AWESOME!” He has some impressive firearms and was a major reason this event was the success it was by being the organizer and head range honcho, blowing the whistle loud enough to make dogs explode and simultaneously shooting enough ordnance towards Massachusetts to make liberals explode! Our kids are roughly the same age and I’m fairly certain our respective critters are going to have moments as they’re growing up where they are positively mortified at their parent’s exceedingly goofy (and quite likely remembered as hilarious) behavior.

I will save perhaps my most generous compliment for him. If ever there was a zombie apocalypse, I’d want Jay watching my back.

It’s easy to feel at ease around strangers with warm personalities around, and I think all of us were nutty enough to make this a rousing success. I can’t wait for next year!

Also a special thanks to Paul from the State Line Gun Shop. Paul loaded up and let me get behind that 9mm Submachine gun. After I emptied it, he was mightily impressed at my accuracy with the full auto. Now let me tell you - any person who compliments me by saying I have excellent accuracy with an automatic weapon will always be all right with me.

Damn that was fun. Let’s do it again!