Goings On Lately

Sorry I've been a little behind on bloggin lately, but life has accelerated, and bloggin just hasn't happened. But, here I be, with an update on my livin's.

Two weeks ago, life took a tangent. Our Church had our yearly prayer advance, of three days in the desert seeking God. It was absolutely amazing. The subject was on prayer, and the results of that weekend has been affecting my prayer life ever since. Fun fun stuff.

Sitting around talking with some of the men - heavily armed men, that is.

The yearly sword fight's aftermath photo. 

Fire - good ole fire. I wish I had a picture of when we through an entire dead pine tree on. Wow, I literally thought we were going to burn something down that we didn't want incinerated. 

Ah, the physical highlight of the trip. My brother and I shot our first rattlers on the trip, coming down a wash after dark.  My snake's head got cut off post haste, but Noah's snake still has his attached in this picture. 

Noah's rattle on the left, Mine of the right.
Just a note for anyone who ever guts a snake - doesn't matter how long it's been dead, it will coil and twist and flip every which way when being gutted. Rather odd and slightly disturbing little fact I recently discovered.

So after that fun filled weekend, life went back to normal, right?

Ha, wrong.

We got home Saturday afternoon, and then left Sunday after church for Las Vegas.

Ha, scared you a bit there didn't I? Thought I wen't to take a spin through sin city, didn't you?

But don't worry, I did something far more redeemed and profitable. Me, my Dad and my brother, and another family in our church, all went to the best firearms training center - definitely in the U.S., if not in the world. It was north of Vegas, way out in the desert flats of Nevada.  

The Logo at the main entrance.

Two days of shooting = epic fun.

Me on the first day lining up for the second shot of a "controlled pair". If you look closely, you can see a beautiful hole in target 19, in the middle of all that tape. 

Life got really fun when I found out that you could shoot a full auto - either an UZI or MP5 - for the right price.
Obviously I went with the old classic UZI, actually the mini UZI, ever so slightly smaller, but fires a lot faster.

Getting all set up

If you count it, there are 6 shells in the air in that split second. 

$30, 25 rounds and hardly a second later, I was a happy chap. 

John, one of the instructors, giving a lesson on sight alignment and sight placement. 

On the second day, we were doing two shots from the holster at 3, 5, 7, 10, and 15 yards, a few repititions at each.

This shot is probably from either the 7 or 10 yard mark. 

My best target of the trip. We started at the 3, did 2-3 controlled pairs from the holster, and then moved back to the 5, 7, 10 and 15, doing the same at each distance. An occasional head shot was thrown in at the discretion of the range master. Only when you did all the distances did you get to come forward and see and tape your holes.

I learned so much on that trip, and my shooting skills went through the roof. The shooting house was the best, especially considering I got some sorta special privilege and got to do it twice. Once for the actual training, and again once everybody else was done at a faster speed with more targets. I don't know why I got that special privilege, but boy-oh-boy did I love it.

After we came home, life started to resume to normal, but oh no, that didn't last for long. I am on day two of late nights watching a mare who refuses to have a foal. So even as of yet, life still isn't normal.

I guess life might get normal someday, but right now, that seems pretty far away.