I don't remember if I mentioned it, but I got to take Heidi and Donovan to Oklahoma. While there, we picked up Katie and Connor and got to spend nearly a week and a half with the family. I tell you what, I really needed it. It's always so great to go home...it's really cleansing, in so many ways. This trip had some stress in it, but overall it was still a great trip. Below are a few of the highlights, complete with some photos.
The first highlight was going by this house of crazy Christmas lights. I had never seen a house with so many lights on it. I don't know how many of you are familiar with "Christmas Vacation", but this made me think of the scene where Clark Griswold lights up the hundreds of thousands of tiny twinkle lights on his house, blinding his neighbors.
One day, Mom, Heidi, the kids, and I all went to a really great place called Incredible Pizza. Incredible Pizza has a wonderful pizza buffet, a cool arcade, bowling, minigolf, bumper cars, and even go-carts, ALL INDOORS. It also happens to have karaoke, and so I convinced Connor and Donovan to go up and sing "Who Let The Dogs Out?". I don't know if you've ever tried to sing it, but the words are very challenging to keep up if you don't know them well, so mostly the boys just belted out the "Who Let The Dogs Out" chorus every time.
There's also a shot of us standing next to a '57 Chevy in the lobby, with a cool Route 66 mural behind it.
Next was something that has become a great high point for most visits with my Dad. Those of you who have been reading my blog for a while know that I've become a pretty big fan of bluegrass music, courtesy of my mom and dad. Dad has been playing guitar for close to 40 years and he's been playing banjo for the last 5 to 10 years, I think, so he's pretty good. I've taken up mandolin, but I'm still not very good; I've only been playing a year and even then, I haven't had lessons or had a huge amount of time to practice. However, every time Dad and I get together, we play or sing together. This time, we played. I've learned some chords on the mandolin and so as long as he tells me the chords, I can play along with him on the lead on his banjo. I backed him up while he picked out "Foggy Mountain Breakdown". (Click here to see a nice video of it being done by a collection of great artist, including...Steve Martin. Yes, THE Steve Martin. How many of you knew he played the banjo?) He's a pretty good picker...I just play along. We did a couple of other numbers, and Heidi even got some video with her camera. Maybe I'll post that later.
The final highlight was when I got to take Heidi, Connor, and Donovan to do a little shooting out on the ranch of my parents' good friend, John Kannady. John's a real great guy, music leader of my parents' church, and a volunteer fireman for the City of Bixby to boot. He also happens to own quite a few fine firearms, and he loves it when I come into town because I always like to go out to his place and shoot. Now, I'm no gun nut, but I do like guns and I love to shoot. (Long-time readers know my position on concealed carry, as well.) I own a Walther P99 .40 S&W, the same model of pistol that Pierce Brosnan during his time as James Bond. Dad also has a pistol and a few rifles, so we loaded them all up and headed out to John's place.
Here's Donovan with Dad's P22, with a little help from me.
Both boys also tried my P99. It packs a little bit of a punch, especially for small boys, so I had to help a bit. Here, Connor tries it out, with me helping him hang on to it.
John owns a Russian-made SKS assault rifle. It's not fully automatic, but it DOES have the bayonet attached under the barrel...AND it can shoot small rifle grenades (sold separately). Here, Dad puts a few rounds into the log we were using as a target.
Now, as it was John's place, after all, he had some fun of his own with his 12-guage pump-action. I recommend you don't try the magnum loads...they just about blow your shoulder off. He tries it from the hip.
In this one, I have a go with my Dad's Marlin lever-action .30-30. It's a very nice rifle with a pretty good scope. As a testament to the quality of the rifle and the scope (as well as a nice reminder that I hadn't lost all of my shooting skill), I was able to put 4 of 6 into a 4-inch log about 100 yards away across the pond.
This last shot is my absolute favorite, for a few reasons. First, I took the picture; Heidi had taken all the others, but obviously she couldn't take this one herself. Second, notice the muzzle flash. The slug was just barely out of the barrel, perhaps just outside of the picture, as well. That in itself is enough to make this one pretty cool picture...my timing was pure good luck. (Maybe I should've bought a Powerball ticket that day...the odds are probably about the same.) Finally, there's nothing as sexy as watching my beautiful wife shoot my pistol.
Thanks for reading along. I'll post again soon...seriously.
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