By Mac Arnold
Editor-In-Chief
Writing is life.
Detailing what I've done in the woods and on the water is what I do, and I see I did not make a single post in 2018.
What a shame.
It was a pretty awful year all the way around.
As the wind whistles away outside the glider window in my fairly recent place of residence, I realize I never can escape the howls of a whirling life.
We moved three times in 2018.
It was unsettling. Too unsettling to write about? Actually, that is the time TO write.
It's such good therapy, although some might find happiness in my undoing. We all have certain people in our lives that take such pleasure. They are to be pitied. What a weak and feeble person they are in doing so.
Someday I will unload on what went down these past few hectic years of uncertain financial times. It surely wasn't fun. Or deserved, in my opinion. But that's how it went down.
We are climbing out of it ... somewhat. Anyway, that will be a story to be told when the time comes.
Being it's nearly four months into this year, I pledge to get back to the keyboard and document my outings in the great outdoors.
As busy as I am now, the time out is much less, that is true. And it will likely be that way again as some of my favorite times of the year come about: spring gobbler, baaaaaaaaaaaass fishing, bird hunting, and of course, King Deer Hunting. Which will be my top focus now that I'm in Ohio where I see many great beasts conquered on a hunting site I belong to. However, I did not see a single deer on the hoof in the three times I was out in Ohio last season.
Three times. I scoff at such feeble amount.
In years gone by, I would be out during the first archery season close to 20 to 30 times.
Seems also more difficult to train properly with the compound bow but I'm thinking it might be easier to find places to practice with the recurve and the Black Hole target. Covert places. (Whoa.) The main problem is travel time to practice locations with high-speed archery gear.
Long distances are not as necessary with the recurve, and I never take very long shots in the deer woods anyway, so don't judge me.
Even with all of the time constraints I've always got some type of outdoor event in mind. In fact I heard a midnight goose honking in the wind overhead outside just a minute ago and prompted a deep-sleeping Lab Augustus to my awful goose mimic call.
He barely budged ... LOL. Oh well. He will once we get on them again for real.
We still manage to practice retrieves even if it is in the street here at the apartment complex.
Hopefully today I will get to replace the Lynch's Fool-Proof Hen Call that went crunch during the fall season in 2018 when I had to bust out of a blind 12 feet in the air after stirring a yellow jackets' nest. I also ended up getting stung four times. Funny now yet not so funny then, and I was really hoping to drop a turkey after setting back up to shake off the pain. No, it wasn't in the blind. The wasps won that one.
With spring turkey season nearly upon us, I can't even imagine not having that call in my pack. Many a time a repetitive light yelp and cluck from that old box call would bring in a nice tom.
The Lynch's one is all I believe in so forget about the rest.
Happy days for small victories.
Howl on wind. I'm here to hear you.
