Its late, and I'm day dreaming

[SquarePizza]

So my buddy and I are sitting here waiting for our ambulances to roll and we are talking about all the vintage rigs we would like to get our hands on, and play with. And then it hit me.

Vintage Sniper Challenge match like the Mammoth or Competition Dynamics events. Only smaller and closer distance.... and with period equipment matched to the era of your rifle.

Make it totally for fun, and donate all the entry fees to a veterans charity. But it would be a wonderful way to run around the woods for a weekend, lugging around your 303 enfield sniper and cup of tea, while the team ahead of you is navigating to the next obstacle with the civil war era gear because they are decked out as confederate snipers.

 

[BangBangBlatBlat]

That'll be a hard no from me. I shot Mammoth when it was in Kentucky and it sucked even with new aged military shit.

 

[Greg Langelius *]

These days, I can just about manage getting from the van to the bench while lugging my shooting gear.

Up until a couple of years ago, I helped run events where shooting was done at the same time, at identical targets, both prone and bench. The two modes were scored in separate groups. This at least gave the less robust among us an event we could manage to complete, and a chance to compare apples vs apples, and oranges vs oranges. It was run what ya brung, and some of the stuff folks brung was mighty dandy, and a lot of it was quite mundane. Scores got published on The 'Hide, and that was the full extent of the loot, i.e. none. I owned last place and guarded it jealously.

That Gung Ho, over hill and dale stuff became untenable for us elder farts years (decades?) ago. But we can still shoot and we like to/want to; it just seems like the rest among us have written we elder farts off.

Before someone says I should run this myself, I did, for well over a decade (the Odessa FV matches, with some excellent collaboration from STP), and now, maybe it's someone else's turn.

Greg

 

[sirhrmechanic]

My friend Jim (from Berlin SF) just spent the week up here at Schloss Nitrocellulose hanging out.

He had his SF Assn. T-Shirt on that said:

"Don't let the grey hair fool you... we can still kick ass."

Age and guile beat youth, innocence and a bad haircut.

I recommend the book!

https://www.amazon.com/Guile-Youth-Innocence-Haircut-ORourke/dp/0871136538

And shooting is a sport that knows no age. When I was in my '20s, I used to deer hunt up next to the Saratoga battlefield. Farm there owned by a 90-YO WW2 veteran... he had been in the pre-war Army. Tougher than woodpecker lips. I hunted with my buddy Bull's family which had hunted on that farm for generations. The owner was too old to walk to his stand, so he got carried up on a hay wagon, before dawn, to his standing position on top of a ridge. In 1989, I was privileged to be in the stand next to him, about 50 yards away, with the admonition 'keep an eye on him.'

At dawn, I was getting worried about him. It was bone chilling damp and cold, I was shaking. He was really shaking. I almost walked over to his stand to make sure he was ok. Right about that time, there was a snort and three bucks trotting across the field. That guy raised his rifle, not a quiver in him, and calmly at about 150 yards tracked left to right and dumped the biggest buck. Drilled him right through the heart. Buck nosedived into the field. Guy lowered his rifle and went back to shaking. One of the most remarkable shots I ever saw. I dressed the deer out for him and we rode together on the tractor. Never got any stories out of him. In fact the only words he ever said to me were "Good morning.' And "Thanks" for helping dress the deer.

Old guys rule!

Cheers,

Sirhr