Range Report:

I suck.

Ok maybe I don't suck, but I am seriously out of practice. Went out with the intent to murder a few little plague carrying varmints today and managed that... but very few.

I just need more time behind the trigger on the 10-22s in order to get my skills polished back up.

Used to be I could lob one out there about three hundred yards and not be completely amazed if it hit a prairie dog... today... well yeah, I sucked.

Anyway, .22 ammo is cheap and plentiful and I'm sure the 'rents won't complain about me borrowing their rifles to get some practice in killing the little rodents... because I gotta get my rifle skills back in shape before Blogorado or I'll embarrass myself....

In other news, while I make fun of him for driving a girl car, Justin's Element is actually pretty snazzy for parking on a hill and killing furry plains creatures with. Since the back seats are completely removable you have a nice place to prone out in the shade and wait for the little buggers to show themselves.

(I gave him enough crap about that this weekend that I felt like I needed to say something nice, publicly. It helps that it's also true.)

Want!

Snuck away last night with Justin from Way of The Multigun. (Did ya'll hear he's being sent a Hi-Point to settle one of those long lived internet arguments?)

Anyway, between discussing the vagaries of GPS navigation vs following someone who actually knows where he's going (sorry, Farmmom, couldn't resist) I mentioned that I wanted to fondle a Nook.

So Justin immediately found a Barnes and Noble and ferried me there, where we spent twenty minutes playing with the display models and I came away with a one word opinion:

WANT.

No really, this can serve as official notice to the family as to my birthday list. That's all I want. Go together, get me the Nook, (the Wi-Fi version please) and a B&N gift card to buy some books, and I'm content.

Ok, I'd really love to have the rear cover in gravel and this case too but I won't get greedy.

Seriously, my 20 minute handling review:

Love the size, the feel, and being able to turn the page both ways on either side of the screen. The touch screen seemed to have a few moments where it didn't really want to respond, but it was a display model and god only knows how many people have handled it since it's been calibrated. I love the ability to view your library as covers. The interface is fairly intuitive (for me, anyway) and the e-ink display...

Ok, I haven't had a chance to play with e-ink before. I've never handled a device that had the technology, because I live in the back of beyond and we don't have newfangled things like bookstores or electronics stores. So you'll have to forgive me if I'm all excited about something everyone else in the world already knows about.

I adore the e-ink display. I've heard the hype that it was just like looking at a paper page, but I figured that it was just a better way of displaying things in the sun, and the just like paper thing was hype. It's not *just* like paper, but it's very close. Farmgirl approves.

It's a lovely little device and I want one... oh how I want one....

Of course my want is only increased by seeing five books in a quick glance through the sections I shop that I have been waiting for and want very much that are available in hardcover for more than I can afford to spend, versus half the price in e-book...

Busy Busy

So, yet again, (or still, depending on how you look at it) life is kicking me in the butt.

Got the Paso Finos in Friday and have been working with them, so far the biggest problem is tack fitting (halters and such, tiny heads!) and *catching* the buggers... they're not horrible they can be caught when they realize you aren't going to give up... and when they remember that the first day when they refused to be caught they ran their butts off.

Rode the sorrel one yesterday and didn't have any major problems, for not being ridden for a year I think he's doing well. Need to punch holes in the bridle before I get on the black because it was just a touch long for the sorrel and if it's long for him it's definitely going to be long for the black.

Riding them any more will be delayed to this weekend though, as today I have too much to do to get ready to go to Denver tomorrow. Farmmom has an appointment, and we'll be up there over night. Four pm appointment plus five hour drive one way? No way I'm coming home afterwords.

So we'll be playing in Denver tomorrow afternoon, picking up some odds and ends for us and for Blogorado, remembering why exactly we don't live in the city, you know, the usual.

Then it's home to life kicking my butt again. This weekend my other family is taking Little Brother's dwarf race car to Garden City... the track there wants to honor him, and I think one of the brothers is going to drive it in the race he was scheduled for. There has been some gentle hinting from Other Dad that he'd like for me to go with them, but since I'm going to have company in this weekend that all depends on whether he wants to go or not.

Sister hasn't been gentle or hinting at all, flat out telling me that Other Dad wants me to come, and that she could use the moral support too, so if there's any way I can bat my eyelashes or show some leg or something, do it.

We'll see if I can pull it off.

Anyway, blogging to resume on a fairly normal schedule... well... whenever I can. This weekend though, I'm pretty well going to be out of touch, because I can be and because I kind of need to be for a few days.

The Races

It's been a busy week with more to come, and that, along with the lack of anything really interesting to post about, explains the lack of bloggery.

Friday and Saturday nights, though, I did something I've never done before. I went to the races.

No, not horse races (although I've never been to the nearby horse races either) but dirt track automotive races. Specifically, I was there to cheer on the men of my other family.

W, S, and J all race in the econo or hobby truck divisions so at the nearby track that means they all race in the same race. Imagine, if you will, a Farmgirl, hanging out in the pits, up near the fence of the back side of the track, watching the cars go, feeling the engines roar (believe me, you feel the roar of those engines...) and screaming out "Go W Go S Go J!" as her friends all speed by, roughly bumper to bumper.

Yeah, eventually I gave up and cheered for W since he was in the lead of the guys I cared about on Friday night.

Last night though, there was an extra special bit of redneck fun. See, that particular track has a "race" called Anything Goes. Basically, you scrape together whatever car you can, load up yourself and a passenger, arm the passenger with squirt guns or water balloons, and go participate in what really amounts to a demolition derby with liquid filled projectiles. To win, you have to knock over an old Ford van, and every race weekend that the van survives, the bounty on it goes up. The bounty is sitting at four hundred dollars, now.

There are no cautions, no restarts, and no real standard for the cars, as far as I can tell.

Oh, and did I forget to mention they soak down the track and turn it into a slimy, soupy, slippery mess for this race?

Gawd, it looks like fun!

If I had the disposable income, I'd totally have W and S help me put together a car for it. Alas, I don't, so a car to go bang into other cars with in the mud will have to stay on the back burner, although I may see if I can talk the Fam into donating one of the old junker cars for the project and talk W and S into building it for themselves, if I can ride shotgun.

Who says rednecks don't know how to have fun?

Just a Note

I survived the day, and so did everyone else.

The hard part is over, now.

I Am Not Actually Inexhaustable

Despite what rumors might say.

I'm swiftly approaching the point at which I will do one of these things:

1. Curl up in a ball and rock back and forth humming tunelessly to myself.

2. Begin throwing random items at people, walls, vehicles, whatever happens to be near me at the time.

3. Be arrested for:

• A: Public intoxication, after which it will be discovered that my BAC is actually .000
• B: Assault on one of two females who seem to be hell bent on making Every. Damn. Thing. About. Them.
• C: Desecration of a grave site/unlawful discharge of a firearm. (I still say he'd think that rolling a keg into his grave and shooting it before they put him in the hole was awesome.)
• D: Any combination of the above.

4. Commit any of the acts described in 3 and manage not to get arrested for them. Far less likely.

Yes, it's rough. No, I'm not really ok. I actually don't really want to talk about my feelings because I can't adequately put them into words. Anyone who has been through it knows, and anyone who hasn't just doesn't have the reference. It doesn't make them bad people or mean that they can't sympathize, just that they won't really understand no matter how much you explain. Kind of like child birth.

I've almost got everything taken care of for his parents, I'm almost to the point where I can stop being efficient and just let go... but when I get to that point it means it's time to say goodbye and I am definitely not ready for that. But then, no one is ever ready to say goodbye to a baby brother, but we aren't given much choice.

So, I'll put on the shirt bearing his number and nickname in the morning, and I'll put on makeup that I'm just going to cry off (hey, he's wearing makeup, the least I can do is wear it with him) and I'll make sure that everything is right, and ready. Then I'll sit with my other family and we'll cry on each other as we realize that we really have to let go.

No matter how much we don't want to.

(I think R is running the betting pool, so if you want in on that you're gonna have to find her.)

For My Little Brother, May He Rest In Peace

Brother,

Blood never bound us, our DNA will never match, but you were my brother all the same. Your sister started it, my friendship with her started it, but it didn’t take long to include you, and your whole family, and count you all as mine.

We teased and taunted each other as kids, were yelled at by your mom, mostly encouraged to learn the hard way by your dad. I guess he figured those lessons stick better, and he might be right.

It’s not fair, that you were taken from those who love you. Not fair that your life was cut so short, that you’ll never see your daughter’s first date, or see her graduate high school, college. They say life isn’t fair, I know, but sometimes it seems to leave a hole in my chest. An emptiness that I didn’t realize was filled with the knowledge that I would see you again, until it was gone.

I can’t bring you back, no matter how many tears I cry or how much I rail at fate or accident or even God. I know you won’t come back, but it doesn’t stop me from wishing you would.

I wish I could tell you how proud of you I am for the way you’ve raised your daughter. I wish I could tell you that you’re a good man, that I admire your work ethic, that you should be proud of yourself. I wish I could tell you so many, many things, but most importantly, I wish I could tell you how much I love you, and how much you mean to me.

That’s one thing we never really talked about. We never said I love you. Instead we shoved playfully at each other, smiled and traded insults. I never told you how important you were to me, how much I cared, because I considered it unnecessary. It would just have embarrassed us both, I know, but I wish I’d said it.

Now, it’s too late for you to be embarrassed. I won’t see you shift your weight and duck your head, or look at me like I’m crazy. I can say it now. I love you. You will, forever and always, be my little brother, and I will miss you.

Safe journey, little brother, to wherever we go when this life is finished. Safe journey, and I hope that we’ll see each other again someday.