Today was one of those very interesting days. It rained most of the day and I didn’t do a lot. Then with an hour left of shift a lady was in labor less than a mile from me. To make a long story short…I got to delivery a baby today! A healthy baby boy. It makes all those really bad calls worth it! Got my stork pin!!!

We got hit with a snowstorm/blizzard just before the second weekend of rifle season. It made for some tough hunting this past weekend. My wife and I were sitting in a brush pile hopeful that a buck might show. With about 20 minutes left of shooting time a nice buck showed up. My wife shot and hit it but not a killing shot. We found blood and backed off until the following morning. With the help of my brothers and nephew we tracked it and finally got it. We earned this one. Lots of deep snow in some very hilly country. I was pooped after dragging this one out! This brute had a huge body and was 19 1/8 wide inside! Unfortunately a tine was shot off but the taxidermist is going to fix that.

My nephew shot this buck (his first) the day before. It was a good weekend.
Lots of memories made this weekend. I had posted on Facebook that I love hunting and hate hunting…lol! Sometimes you just have to embrace the suck and push on through to get the reward in the end.

I wanted to use my 1500 post to thank Waltons for creating Meatgistics. Austin this is one of the coolest places around and I’m grateful I found it. Jonathon thanks for all your videos and the how to knowledge and making this place fun. Also thanks to the Meatgistics users that make my days so much better by sharing info and the fun banter we have on here. What a great community this is!!!

Finally able to do a little low and slow smoking. Did two racks of baby backs. Worked out perfect as we were doing some yard work while the ribs did their thing. It was a good meal.

I was bored earlier today and was looking on a local marketplace site and saw an add for a smoker. It was a Lil Tex 1400 for $60. I opened the add and it said he’d take $50 for it. I couldn’t call him fast enough. They are selling new for over $600! I can’t afford a PK100 right now so I will make this work. I plugged in to check it out and I’m rolling smoke! Score!!!

Christmas in June at my house today! My Waltons 11 lb stuffer and Waltons #22 grinder showed up today!!! Opened everything up and inspected the boxes. Everything was packed well and arrived safely. Now just need to schedule a day to make some stuff. Too hot out right now!

I’ll play…pork belly burnt ends

Beef kabobs and a turkey breast

I’m sitting at the airport in Chicago after flying a redeye flight from Anchorage. Alaska is an amazing place. I will post more later after I get some sleep. Jonathon, yes we saw brown bears! We actually had a young male about 10 feet from our boat fishing salmon. I represented some Walton’s gear too while I was on the Kenai Fjords tour. I snapped a selfie at a glacier.

I was able to take Saturday and Sunday off to go deer hunting. I only had a doe tag but I’m very picky with does. I have passed on many this year. I have also gotten a bit soft hearted as I’ve gotten older. I won’t harvest a doe that has fawns with her anymore. Today I shot one but the bad thing is she was 1.5 miles from the truck in a spot where you have to drag them out. Sleep will come easy tonight and Thank God for a good game cart! It was windy as all get out today too. 15 degrees with 27 mph winds.

FINALLY! My son and I finally got to go out on hardwater and do some fishing. We caught about a hundred small perch with no keepers and 7 walleye with 1 keeper. It was just fun to get out!

Tex_77 thanks. I will give it a listen when I get to the airport.

Tex_77 I am training in San Antonio right now so I have just caught some blurbs on it. Sounds like that bad guy was linked to a double homicide in Arizona too.

chippewa thanks for the support! I like this post. It is really pretty neat to see how much diversity is amongst us.

salmonmaster Willies tastes moreish. Meaning…you eat one you want more. My Grandpa used to say beer was moreish…lol!

Deepwoodsbutcher a nice quiet place like that is my happy place!

Jonathon hahahaha! This is my first time here. The Riverwalk is a pretty cool area.

Jonathon hahahaha…this is funny. I am in San Antonio, TX for training this week and we saw a opossum down along the Riverwalk. I was thinking I should catch him for you guys to eat!!!

calldoctoday you’re welcome.

GWG8541 yep…I may make another batch soon since I have another bag of gluten free steel cut oats.

Deepwoodsbutcher and there’s nothing wrong with that!!!