OK, moving right along.....The Next Time Out: (5/6/01)

  Yep, FUN. That's what it's about. Another 7½ hour playday. Only this time, ...well, you can guess. No wild moose
charging out of the bushes. Made a huge difference. Let's put the FUN back into pain...        say wha' ?

  Don't know if I mentioned, but we have a favorite spot - a small, fenced-in piece of land about 3 or more acres, maybe
(I sure don't know how to estimate land size - but it's about the same size as my place), with soft ground, bushes,
trees, a small arroyo ( ditch, to you easterners ), then some bottom land with tall reeds. The land then sharply slopes up
into some more trees & bushes. It's a protected game preserve, and the forest ranger is ok with us being there. I'm
the 'adult', I guess, the one holding the 'R' word ( 'R' - Responsibility ), making sure we all do the safety trip at all times,
wearing the mask ALWAYS until we're out of the zone. And, I find a bit of general gun safety tips isn't hurting, either.
My guys have been around things that spit out projectiles since they were literally knee high. BB guns, pellet guns, bow and arrow, and high powered hand guns and rifles. They're not all that into shooting, 'though. I've been trying to figure
that one out, maybe it's because of a couple of things, 1: I was pretty adamant about the safety issues, and 2: targets
don't shoot back....boring.

  Ah, but when you get targets shooting back, it's an entirely different story. I figure since they're sort of sports junkies,
they must miss the adrenaline rush, or something. And, let me tell you, there is some adrenaline being manufactured
at times. Like say, when your other teammates have been shot, and you're holding off 4 guys by yourself, just knowing
it's only a matter of time before you get wasted or run out of ammo - either way a loss.

  We managed to squeeze nine of us into that little Dodge Caravan   ( - it's a Car! ...it's a Van!.... no, it's a CaraVan! ),
with all the gun cases and bags, cases of paint, drinking water, and the bag of potato chips I bought for 'food'. Did I not
acknowlege last event's lack of food? Like a small bag of Sour Creme n Onion chips was going to last all day among 8
growing (hence, starving) teens and me? Maybe next time we can actually be prepared a little better. It's easy to forget
stuff when all you want to do is unpack, load up and get with the program; stuff like, food, and.... what's that, Terry, you
forgot your shoes? What, you ain't tuff enough to do the cactus thing with sandals? Hey, you GOT socks on!   blah,
blah.... good thing one of the guys had some extra shoes when we picked him up. Heh.  That little van's tires looked
like big ol' oversized donuts a cop would start salivating over. I was afraid we'd get stopped just so he could touch the
things.... well, ok, not really on that part.

   Anyway, where was I ? Oh, yeah, out to the preserve. Unpack, load up, and let's shoot something! Well, first, every
body had to shoot the local rocks, just to see if they were going to break paint, etc. Mine was leaking CO2 live a sieve
and I had to take the whole thing apart and try to figure it out. Something I should have done before we left, eh? I think
it was a funky O-ring, ( by the way, ALWAYS have plenty of the different sized O-rings on hand ), so after putting it
back together, it worked. [ side note: after coming home and taking my gun apart and thoroughly cleaning it, checking
O-rings, etc, I took my advice and tested my gun, to find out that there was a MAJOR leak in it this time. So I replaced
some of the suspicious looking rings and triple checked the reassembly, and it fixed it. Like I said, ALWAYS have
plenty of the O-rings your marker needs ]

   Overall, what a day! I had no intentions of staying that long, but we played until nobody had paint or air left. Might as
well plan on that in the future. Even though we were getting tired towards the end, it was always, 'just one more'. I sat
the last one out, starting to wrap up the area and get out of the sun. It's getting pretty warm, and the sweat pants and
sweatshirt I wear for protection under my cams were soaked. Where's that Gatorade we were going to bring? Oh, yeah,
it's still at the store with the rest of the FOOD !    duh.     Ok, next time....I swear.

  Speaking of swearing [while I'm there], for young boys, either they grew up in the Navy aboard ship, or it actually
does hurt when you get hit. Since we're in the high desert mountains, I'd have to go with number 2. Thought I heard
some combinations I'd never quite heard before, and not quite sure if moms would approve of them. That's why moms
stay home. Well, that, and moms can't really picture going out and shooting their sons for 7 hours, I guess.

  Remember that scene where Mel Gibson and (dang, what's her name? Rene Rousseau or something like that) were
comparing scars from old bullet/knife wounds? For some strange reason, everyone I've seen will do that at the end of
the game. Badges of Courage? Medals of Bravery? Nah, how about, "ain't no escapin' it, I got NAILED" Proofs of Carelessness? heh. I've got some, too. Terry double-tapped me on the left arm this time, and that's really the only one
that shows. I got him back a bit later when he popped up out of the arroyo ( ditch, to you easterners ) right in front of
me, and I got him in the shoulder from about 10 yards. Later he told me my gun shoots pretty powerful, and I had to
remind him I was using that cheapie Stingray I'd turned down almost all the way. Just a good square shot from a close
distance. Yeah, but the sun was in my eyes, he countered. Reminded him again that the sun was at his back. Oh.
Couldn't see where you were. - It was planned that way, Grasshopper. Oh,   ....well it worked.

   Out of maybe 10 games or more, I only 'won' one. Capture the Flag using two teams and two flags. Each team had
to both guard their team flag and venture forth to capture the other flag and return it to 'base'. I volunteered to capture,
and took two trusty troops with me. I think one got nailed pretty quick, as there were only 2 of us moving forth. What's
the plan, Terry's Dad? Well, I think we ought to locate and take out the guards first, as Terry's gun already jammed and
that leaves only Dylan to get ours, I think. Wouldn't be prudent to only have one guard at your flag. So, we sneak, stop,
and peer into the darkness of the cover. I move in the open once in awhile to see if I can draw some fire, and it worked.
I located one guy that way, settled in behind some bush that had one little opening I could squeeze a ball through. Got
the first guy after a few shots and the second one started firing - aha - that's where you are. A few more carefully aimed
and timed shots, and I sauntered up to the flag and nabbed it. We slowly made our way back to our 'base' and I spot
Dylan out in the open just a little ways away. I snuck up on him from behind, and called him out from about 10 yards.
Nice thing about this game, if you're close enough that you can hit someone with absolutely no question, you give them
the choice of being out or having a shootout, which they'd lose immediately. Saves a lot of needless welts, even though
it's really disappointing that you got out without firing a shot.

ALL YUOR FLAG ARE BELONG TO US !!

  
One more thing. I'd say the luckiest of all of us was the jack rabbit we saw tearing through the brush like no tomorrow.
I think there may have been 4 or 5 markers trained on him, but everyone had the sense not to blast the poor thing.
Rabbits look really good in their natural grey/white color with no help from Sherwin-Williams. Besides, I doubt if anyone
would have led him enough to actually hit him anyway. All I saw was a white blur. Guess all that popping skeert him.

  I'm stopping here. I can drone on forever if you let me. I'd also like to encourage my band of merrymakers to dive right
in and contribute to the journal, so you may get to read some other points of view. Just trying to make it not seem like
a school assignment. Gimme 500 words on "What Happened Sunday in the Church of the Great Outdoors" by Monday.

Son Dylan stayed up for about 30 some hours straight this weekend, and decided he'd try his hand
at telling HIS side of the story.... Way to go, D !!

 "Let me begin by saying this was a highly anticipated day. We crammed 9 people into a pretty small minivan and headed out to our claimed territory for another episode of paintball. All of the shooters were around the same skill level making it even more fun for everyone. We got our guns, masks, and paintballs, and set out to play. With 9 people, there are a few different combinations of teams you can do, and of course, the most common that day was 3 vs 3 vs 3.
  During the middle of the day I found to be one of my favorite games. I was on a team with 2 friends, my dad was on a team with 2 friends, and my brother was on a team with 2 friends. After playing with father and brother for weeks in a row, you begin to learn how they play and what their strengths and weaknesses are. My teammates and I set out for a nice sniping spot, hoping that targets would come to us. After about 10 minutes of waiting, we knew that wasn’t the case this time. We had started from one edge of the fenced area, so we had only one way to go. The three of us set out hunting, covering every move of the other person. Two of us would stop and snipe anything that moved, and the other would walk about 15 feet ahead, then stopping and covering for the next person.
   We were as careful as anyone could have been. All of a sudden we hear a huge battle in the distance with all kinds of different sounding guns shooting. Being that there were only 2 other teams, we figured that both teams were far ahead. Right away we became less cautious and started moving a lot quicker to the battle sounds. As we got closer to the sounds, we could see a lot of movement in the trees, but the sun was glaring in our masks, and we couldn’t make out any targets. Before long, the battle had suddenly stopped, and we didn’t see any more movement.
  So once again, we set out on the move. Finally we got to the open field area, where there is a patch of huge reeds you can hide in quite nicely. That is, if nobody sees you walk into them. Me, making the mistake of not watching for snipers, walked right into the patch of reeds, hoping to gain a nice sniping spot. When I was at the edge of the clearance, just before going into the patch of tall sticks, I glanced over my shoulder and saw my dad spot me at the same time. He was borrowing my cheap stingray at the time, and I had his Piranha, so I wasn’t worried about him shooting at me. That is until, I saw him turn his whole body in my direction and start firing like there’s no tomorrow, literally. I immediately got to my knees, knowing that no paintball could possibly get through all those sticks.
  Yeah, I laid low for a second, until I saw about 5 paintballs break all over the sticks that were feet away from me. After being shot at for what seemed to be eternity, I decided it was time to get out of there. Not knowing where my teammates were, I turned 180 degrees around, and ran as fast as I could, taking about 50 sticks with me. Suddenly my dad stopped firing, (what a surprise) and called "OUT OF AMMO". Silly rookie, I said to myself, and worked my way behind an enemy I had spotted. I got a little ways away, and stopped for a clean sniping shot. As soon as he turned the corner around the bush, I shot 3 times, hitting him cleanly.
   My teammates had managed to sneak around and shoot the guys I couldn’t even see, and so all the other people were walking back to camp with their hands up, and we didn’t even lose one team member. It took a while, but my inflated ego calmed down again, and it was back to walking like one of those "bad guy" guards in the video games that can’t see an intruder if he walked in front of them. Yes, I’m pretty clueless when it comes to sneaking around.
   I await our next adventure, this Saturday with the same people, and I’ve finally ordered my Piranha. I’m going for at least 5-1 the first 6 games. All too many times I’ve said, "If I just had a better gun, I would have won." We’ll see. (Dad, right now it's 4:20 am and im just trying a science experiment to how long a student can stay awake...guess i just needed some free time to write the stuff and i guess 7 hours of no interruptions helped...hehe) see yah" -the Dylan
  
There may be some pictures on the next page