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Reagan1k

Certifiably Surly
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Everything posted by Reagan1k

  1. @YGIFS My head starts spinning when I wake up. I think of past events and replay them in slow motion. Re-feeling all of the emotions. I play with them like a toy. I’ll decide what I should have said, what they’d have said in response. On and on. Or, I’ll gin up a future event…. It’ll be this, I’ll do that, they’ll do this. Pretty soon I’m living in a ditch during a nuclear apocalypse. Booze turned the volume down on that and I could breath and stop the Catherine Wheel from moving. It was my solution and being sober was painful. When I dried out, I still had all those feelings, jumbled up with new goals and dreams because I was feeling better. I was a mess in my head. That’s still my default position but I now have a tool to stop that living in the past or projecting into the future and frankly laugh at it most of the time….. there I go again. If I can’t, I have someone to call and tell out loud, past my teeth what I’m feeling. That takes the power out of it. Hearing it through my ears instead of bouncing around in my head changes the game. I get feedback and instructions. I take action and I get relief. it frees me to live in the moment and be present. Making clear minded decisions unclouded by fear more often than not. I don’t create as much wreckage and when I do I go back quickly and clean my side of the street. Booze were the only reliable tool I’d found to help me quiet the noise and catch my breath. Now I have a sufficient substitute that brings me more peace of mind. I just didn’t know how to get there on my own.
  2. If I, alone, in my own mind could have solved my problems, lord knows I put in enough time in my own head to do that. But my mind can't fix my mind. I deal with the inherent contradictions by taking guided action. Action leads to changes in my outlook on my own life, my perspective on others, and my perspective on the past. I don't know how or why. I just know that if I take the actions I get results. It doesn't seem like it would, and I can't tell you scientifically how it works, but I can tell you that by taking those actions with the help and guidance of someone who has been there before, I get answers to the same questions and issues you cite above. The burdens are lifted- in a way that can't be achieved by just thinking through it or processing it solo....not even in sharing as part of a group or in meetings. I no longer feel unique when I experience the taking of those actions with someone else. I get consistent feedback and direction from a point of contact that keeps me centered in a solution working toward a common goal. Inch by inch those actions produce palpable results in the way I feel about myself and others - in a manner that introspection or therapy didn't. That's been my experience as an overthinking, introspective drunk. That and $14 might buy you a latte at Starbucks, but probably not.
  3. Yes - even better way to judge. Typically the fawns hug closer to mama and the yearlings roam a bit but you can see the connection and they are often moving together. Always nice to get 3 different perspectives on relative age....especially when the spots fade. I don't ever like shooting a solo doe or even one of two clones without another body against which to judge. Even experienced hunters can misjudge body size and end up shooting a yearling or button buck. Lighting, weather, etc. all come into play when playing the age game. When its cold and they fluff up their hide, it adds weight/size to the eye. Another reason we don't wait late in the year to shoot doe is that we eliminate the risk of shooting a buck that's dropped his horns early. Plenty of bucks have been mistaken for a big 'ole doe.
  4. Pretty please, get a sponsor. A drunk fell in a hole and couldn't get out. A businessman went by. The drunk called out for help. The businessman threw him some money and told him get yourself a ladder. But the drunk could not find a ladder in this hole he was in. A doctor walked by. The drunk said, "Help, I can't get out." The doctor gave him drugs and said, "Take this, it will relieve the pain." The drunk said thanks, but when the pills ran out, he was still in the hole. A renowned psychiatrist rode by and heard the drunks cries for help. He stopped and said, "How did you get there? Were you born there? Were you put there by your parents? Tell me about yourself, it will alleviate your sense of loneliness." So the drunk talked with him for an hour, then the psychiatrist had to leave, but he said he'd be back next week. The drunk thanked him, but he was still in his hole. A priest came by and the drunk called for help. The priest gave him a Bible and said I'll say a prayer for you. He got down on his knees and prayed for the drunk, then left. The drunk was very grateful, he read the Bible, but he was still stuck in that hole. A recovering alcoholic happened to be passing by. The drunk cried out, "Hey, help me, I'm stuck in this hole." Right away, the recovering alcoholic jumped in the hole with him. The drunk said, "What are you doing? Now we're both stuck here." But the recovering alcoholic said, "It's okay, I've been here before, I know how to get out."
  5. Another benefit to shooting doe during bow season (or early MLD time slot) is that it gives you an opportunity to identify older, potentially barren doe. In October, many of the fawns are still running with their mother and it gives you data points. Having multiple "generations" of deer easily identifiable early in the season allows for comparative aging that is more difficult as the year goes on. It isn't an exact science, but given the choice of shooting a doe with a yearling still hanging close, or a doe of equal or larger body size who doesn't have a yearling in sight, I'm telling our guys to shoot the solo traveller. It is still accomplishing the same thing as randomly shooting doe to fill an allocation so even if she isn't barren it isn't a loss, but comparative harvest at least gives you a puncher's chance to ever so slightly improve the health of the heard and doing so over years or decades produces results. I'm no biologist, but it makes sense, and the results indicate that it works. Fewer doe during the rut means greater competition among bucks. Fewer bucks means a higher probability that the dominant bucks will breed the remaining doe. Fewer overall mouths means that the range can better support all wildlife during the winter. And, getting that all done and over with while the weather is nice and hunters are energized by a new season means that people are less likely to slough off the responsibility on a cold, miserable weekend in December or January.
  6. Agreed, with the exception that puzzy is undefeated. We use bow season almost exclusively to hit our doe and cull buck numbers before anyone shoots a mature deer. Most of us have been hunting on this property for decades and we don't even venture into our sanctuary areas until we're hunting hard (collective we - I don't chase horns any) after we've reached our management goals.
  7. And that's fair - but when there are 3000 uncleared acres and those oaks are prevalent across the entire property it gets a little tough to pick which woods to hunt. I'm not salty. I hadn't even traveled with my bow. I was just there to watch, cook, and clean.
  8. Google Earth will take the place of most aerial surveys. If you can't do a food plot, the next best thing is exactly what you're doing which is habitat improvement. Creating sanctuaries, and even going so far as nurturing the natural food you have to improve that output/performance.
  9. Too much food on our place in hill country. Total bust even for hogs. If you’ve got what I call white oaks, take a good book to the blind. Pin/post oak acorns just starting to bud out.
  10. Rattle a tin bucket full of corn, whistle and see what happens on opening morning. That’ll tell you if it’s genetics or an actual escapee.
  11. Yes it is! John Lazzeroni let’s you choose whether you wanna be a land or groove guy. I stick with just saying Patriot - whatever you call it, call it hard hitting, especially for a short action.
  12. Damned phone.
  13. New pills for aoudad control.
  14. I'm intrigued at first glance and looking at some of those prices. Is that for real on their billet pricing?
  15. Really good to hear you mentioning the steps. Sounds like you've got a sponsor who is ingraining the difference between the program of AA vs. just being present in the fellowship. Kudos. Keep doing what your sponsor says and follow the marching orders as described in the book. It is literally an exact recipe for emotional and physical sobriety for a drunk like me. Page by page, action by action, and prayer by prayer. When I simply do as it says in the black ink I find relief and peace. Godspeed.
  16. Little north and west of F'burg in the bottom of the triangle
  17. Here's one I "guided". Almost caused a divorce for this fella. He was sure it would make a lovely addition to their home decor and he was WRONG. Tough goat. Took a .300wbthy in the shoulder, didn't flinch, and kept eating for a few seconds until it realized it was dead.
  18. Few more the guys just sent over.
  19. Yeah - We pressure the shit out of them. Every cousin, customer, and some sworn enemies have skull mounts to prove it. Even have ewes ground up for dog food. (Poor dogs). Can't control them - only keep them tamped down. There's some rugged county on this property and they THRIVE in it - won't budge. We can usually keep them off the feeders during hunting season but they're never far off. Honestly more of a pest than the hogs at this point. I can smell that picture from 600 miles away.
  20. You recon I could bribe someone from Lackland to accidentally drop some napalm?
  21. Not always......some years especially when weather has been extreme either way, I've seen early drops. Probably could been have phrased better - Any indication of an early drop is better question. Heard from a client that has a weekend place in Caldwell that he's got some trees full and some trees already falling - pigs were his clue. Curious if that pattern is showing up to the west.
  22. For you guys local in Central TX, what's the acorn crop looking like this fall.......Fredericksburg / Llano / Mason area ?
  23. Based on my observations / experiences, a lot of the inflation I've seen is protective in theory at the quotation level, but becomes very sticky once a PO is cut. It doesn't take getting burned too many times before I throw on some lagniappe into your price with the idea that it'll cover me if I get whipsawed. The fact that 10-20% of that price was lagniappe is easy to forget when the PO comes in and I don't go back and true-up based on factual pricing. Holy shit, I can't believe they bought this.........instead of .........Hey, that price has some fluff in it I can trim out now. That's the nature of a true inflationary spiral. Getting cash out of your hands as quickly as possible and converted into something that'll be inflationary - regardless of the actual underlying input costs.
  24. The only people seeing pushback are the ones facing the end user who's asking WTF. Everyone else just takes an increase, tacks on a few points for themselves, and passes it through for someone else to pay. Last man standing in the commerce flow has to explain it to the end user.
  25. 100% - In my industry, many have moved from reactionary price increases to anticipatory price increases and they'll continue as long as the market will tolerate it. Increases began as targeted and specific pricing moves. These days, it appears someone wakes up one day and says fuck it, let's go up 15% and see if anyone blinks.
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