Monday, March 21, 2011

At last, I have a shooting sister

Not to say anything bad about going to a shoot and having your partner/spouse as a shooting buddy, but from a woman's perspective, it is nice to have a female friend along.
Jeanette's husband has been shooting for many years and now that she has retired, Jeanette has the time to enjoy the sport along side her sweetheart.
Yesterday Sunday, Mr C and I were up very early ( I woke up at 4am, groan, and could not get back to sleep) so we could catch the ferry at 6:35 am to take us across to the mainland for the drive to Puyallup . The ferry ride is usually about a 20 minute ride across to Mukilteo but the dock there was closed over the weekend for repairs, so we docked instead at Kingston, a 50 minute ferry ride.


This was just the second time Jeanette has competed in a match, and I must say she did very well indeed. All the practice she has put in certainly shows, as she is a very accurate shooter and will gain speed as time goes by. I know she was nervous, but we all are when we first start out, and still are at times.

The stages at this particular match were a challenge indeed. Some called for concentration and accuracy instead of all out speed. This stage had three small steel white plates in front of a large black one, and on the other side, three small red ones in front of a large white one, and waaay back, in the center, a very small white plate, called the penalty plate.. You can just see it above Jeanette's shoulder. Here is where the concentration and accuracy played a part.
The object was to not hit any of the white plates, if you did, you could take a shot at the penalty plate, and if you struck it, the penalty for hitting one of the white ones, was canceled out.
On one string, I missed one of the red plates, muttered "oh crap" sent up a nano second prayer for accuracy, gritted my teeth and sent a round down range at the small penalty plate. Whoo hoo! I hit it, whew! it would have cost me a 5 second penalty if I missed.
Jeanette also had to take a shot at the penalty plate, and she also manage to save herself from a five second penalty by striking it.
All in all we had a great day, even though it turned out to be an unusually long match due to many shooters showing up, some shooting more than one gun, then after the match, seven of us went to the Hanger restaurant for dinner, and of course sat around talking. Mr C and I left Puyallup at 7:20 pm and instead of taking the chance of a long wait for the ferry, decided to drive back to the island via deception pass.
We arrived home at 11:25pm I was in bed by 11;36pm and thought I would get a peaceful nights rest. Jeez! my mind would not shut down, so today I feel like a zombie, thank goodness I have just one two hour shift at work.

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