thirteen thousand

Although it is not important to everyone, I note that in the past hour my stats counter has logged over 13,000 visitors to this site since I began counting on December 15, 2004.

Your patronage is important to me, and I am grateful that the few dozen people who frequent this website choose to return again and again. Even if the only reason for your visit is to see what indignity I perpetrate next upon the authors of the IPSC rulebook or the English language, I'm glad you came to visit.

This might be called a 'vanity' exercise. I write because I have to, and because . . . uh . . . okay, that pretty much sums it up for me.

I don't write to my family as often as I should, because I don't know what to say to them much of the time. I get tired of saying "My job is about the same, I spent last weekend going to another pistol match, just as I did last weekend and the weekend before that, I am in good health and I hope you are the same." I know they get tired of hearing that, too. Because my interests are not the same as theirs, I don't write to them.

But perhaps my interests do coincide with yours, and so I spend my time writing to you. If you don't like what I have to write about . . . pffft! Don't read it. I wouldn't.

I've been spending a lot of time taking pictures at IPSC matches lately, and I've occasionally conned SWMBO into believing convinced SWMBO that it was at least as much fun to take pictures of IPSC matches as it is to shoot them. She will never believe me again, but at least she took a SLEW of great action pictures before she became entirely disenchanted with photography. She shot a club match this weekend, and had a great match despite her extended hiatus from competition. In recognition of her patience, I made a point of leaving the camera in the car. She appreciated it.

In appreciation of her great contribution to IPSC history, I would like to present a very short video she took a couple of weeks ago, of someone performing an unsafe act at an IPSC match, leading to a match disqualification. This isn't necessarily a criticism of the competitor. I came within a hairs breadth of making the same mistake, within a few inches.

In IPSC, inches matter. A lot.

Anyway, as I say I would LIKE to provide you with a short video, but I won't. I need to turn it into an animated GIF, and the software I have (JASCO Animator, part of the Paint Shop Pro 9 software package) is still new to me. It will take more time than I have available tonite.

The Hobo Brasser is a hard taskmaster, and as Communications Director of the Columbia Cascade Section he expects me to send him the Points Match Standings for the first Points Match of the 2006 season. I haven't got it done, due to circumstances I won't go into, and I won't get it finished tonite.


But I can get a good start on it, so that's what I'll be doing from now until bedtime.

Tomorrow is a school day, and I have a job to do.