Once Upon a Time...

Once upon a time, there was a woman who loved the outdoors. She had 3 kids, however, and so she could not always do the outdoorsy things she loved. So while her hot cowboy husband was riding the range,

She was inside, tending to her crazy kids.

Sometimes it was so much fun. Sometimes it was just alot of hard work. She loved the children very much, and so it wasn't really a sacrifice. But sometimes, just sometimes, she wanted to be outside, roaming the hills and enjoying the fresh air, like she used to do before the babies came. So she got an idea...

She went on the internet one day, and ordered a hunting license. She wasn't sure what she would do with the crazy kids, but she decided that she was at least going to try to go hunting. She hadn't been hunting for 4 years. She missed the woods. The early-morning fog and coolness. The excitement of listening to crackling twigs, padding footsteps, and coughing ants. (ok, maybe she didn't actually hear the ants coughing, but it seemed like it.)

So when fall came, she begged her cowboy husband to babysit one Sunday afternoon, and she took the 30.06 and drove out to where the antelope gathered, and went hunting. She walked miles. There were lots of antelope, but they were wary and ornery and obnoxious. They stayed between the woman and the Registered Black Angus Cattle. The cattle that the womans' husband was paid to keep alive. So she couldn't very well risk killing one. She hunted till nightfall, and no luck. Just tired. The woman wasn't used to walking for miles at a stretch, so she went home and crashed.

The next evening, she repeated the process. Again, no luck. By now, the woman was getting frustrated. She knew how deer thought. and where they would tend to go, and where to find them. But these antelope were a different story. They stood in the middle of a 5,000 acre field, and just watched her. How could she deal with that? So one afternoon, her cowboy husband took her and all the crazy kids in the truck, and drove through the fields. "The antelope aren't as spooked by a vehicle, as they are by a human on foot," he explained. But there was a problem. The woman was so intimidated by her cowboy husband watching her shoot at an antelope, that she missed 2 perfectly goood shots. So she gave up in disgust. She was a bit embarrassed, too. And perhaps her pride was hurt just a tad.

The next day, she decided to go at it again. This time she piled all three crazy kids in the front seat of the Ford Ranger pickup. It was the middle of the afternoon. She didn't bother with the camo pants, the orange vest, or anything like that. She just grabbed a knife, and her rifle, and a few extra shells, and jumped in the pickup.

They bounced and jounced out through the ranch, over rutted two-tracks. Suddenly, there was a small group of antelope ahead. She slammed on the brakes, jumped out of the truck, and leaned on the hood of the truck. A shot rang out. Oops. Clean miss. But the baby was now crying. So the woman calmed the baby, and drove on. The antelope had stopped again, so the woman again jumped out and leaned on the hood of the pickup. This time when she pulled the trigegr, the antelope in her crosshairs went down. The woman tried to still her shaking hands. She could hardly believe she had actually got one. Finally.

After about 3 minutes, she drove slowly over to where the buck had went down. Well, that buck jumped up and limped slowly away. Uh-oh. Gut shot. Bummer. So she waited awhile, then followed it on foot. Several hundred feet later, she came to a fence, where she stopped and fixed the buck in her scope again. This time the shot went right through the heart, and it went down for good.

Now for the hard work. The woman managed to crawl under the fence, along with all the crazy kids. It took the woman several minutes to drag the buck out to the truck. That boy was heavy! Then she gutted it. Now to get it home. Hmmm. It was so heavy, that she could barely get it on the bed of the pickup. She finally used a board to use as a ramp, and managed to get it up. After splashing some water on her bloodied hands, she got in and drove her kiddos home. It was quite a day.

ps - and that woman can't wait for next antelope season.