The Cracker Crew Rides Again

The Cracker Crew is going to EOT....well at least part of us are. Jeff Shelleen, Moog,  Deadly Sharpshooter( Original CC Member) and I will be attending along with Madam Moog and Purdy Sharp. Deadly and Purdy have been making their way out via Steel Horse on the Wagon Trail. The rest of us are riding in on a Steel Horse in the sky.  Either way, we're wanted dead or alive (Bon Jovi reference). Amaduelist and his Grandson, Jake on the Take, were kind enough to haul my shooting irons out west for me. Haven't heard from them but I'm sure they are having a grand trip out. Little Man and Rocky Creek Shooter are driving out as well as Hollifer A Dollar and Kay Sadeeya. Florida will have some good representation out there. 

Man......my excitement level is building!!!!! Tomorrow is going to be a great day of being parched and choking on dust. This ole Florida boy dries up worse than a raisin out there. I've never looked so forward to being miserable as I have for this match. If they could just add about 60 to 70 percent humidity I would be good to go! LOL. Jeff Shelleen is excited because he finally made it through a monthly match this past Saturday without a gun breaking! Life's small victories. I feel his pain....... 

We get in late tonight.....Tomorrow are warm-up matches and a lot handshakes and hugs. We'll be looking around to find our Bounty Hunt numbers courtesy of the Action Shooting Network which is a really cool idea. Look for updates tomorrow evening.....if our flights are interesting maybe we'll give you guys a good story about them. I did remember to check in about 3 hours after the window opened on SouthWest which got me C11. If you've ever flown SW then you know C11 ensures that I will not have a good seat......Oh well it's only 2 hours for the first leg of the flight!

Day 1 Friendships renewed- well we got to the hotel at 1am and decided we would sleep in until 8 and go shoot the midday warm up stages. Apparently my body thought we said 6am EST instead of 8am Mountain. I just knew it had to 7am....NOPE...tosses and turned for a few more hours and got up at 6. Breakfast opened at 6:30 and soon after Aberdeen, Billy Boots and Non Stop showed up and it was like old home week. It sure was good to see those fellow first thing.  Jeff Shelleen who suffers from the same wake up malady was down as well. The Moog’s weren’t that far behind so off to the range we went around 8. We collected our carts from Deadly Don and Amaduelist along with my guns. Thanks guys for hauling our stuff! Next up up was check in...by the way the weather is awesome and the ranch is GREEENNN!!!! Flowers are blooming and everything looks great. We made our way to the office and were greeted with big smiles by Misty Moonshine and her wonderful crew. We got our ASN numbers (mine is 1077) and found out the Madam Moog’s number is 1077 as well. Hot damn a match right off the bat! We signed up for the midday warmups and the Deuce showed up and we started shooting a little early. The warm up stages were good and the stages seemed to have quite a nice mix of size, distances and movement. The main match should be incredible thanks to Deuce, Lassiter and their crew. We’ll report more on the stages tomorrow after side match day  I also got to fondle a Cowboy Carty 73 Winchester. It’s so damn slick that I’m sure it’s illegal unless I buy one of course then I’m sure they are fine. It has to be the smoothest 73 I’ve ever shot. We got to shoot with with some folks from Australia and Canada as well as the Carolina Crew which is always a joy! After the warm-ups were over  Shelleen had to to and find a part for his 97. Imagine that he broke a gun!  We grabbed some snacks and sat under the big tent with all our fiends  telling lies about how well we shot the warmups or how poorly we shot them. Then it was time for the TG Meeting led by Black Jack Zak. There was some good discussion but nothing earth shattering. Fast Eddie, the current GA State Champion and fellow TG, gave me a ride back to the hotel and it was good to catch up with him during the ride. A quick clean-up and off to supper at a Mexican Restaurant. They brought out some mild salsa....if you’re from back east that means lava hot. It was tasty but only for a few seconds. After that all my taste buds were burnt off. We made our way back to the hotel and had a night cap then up to the room to clean guns. Did I mention it was nice and breezy today? That’s a nice way of saying we had fine talc like New Mexico dust in our actions. Oh well, a small price  to pay for the opportunity to see TONS of old friends.....and to start making new ones! The trip was a success before the first round went down range today and is only going to get better!

Stan, Shelleen, Moog and Madam Moog