So now that I'm in Montana I have to hunt. If you live here you either hunt or ski, if not both. I've yet to learn to ski, but I know the basics of hunting anyhow. So last week I went out and purchased my Conservation License and my Deer Class A License. This would allow me to shoot an Antlered Mule Deer, or either sex White Tail Deer.

Well Bill (my father-in-law) and I went out Thursday, November 16th, 2006 to go hunt. We went out to a ranch that is BLM or Block Management land. Basically it's private property that's registered for public hunting. We saw lots of deer, however they were all on private posted property, so we could not shoot them. Today however was a different story.

Bill is friends with a gentleman who owns the Climbing Arrow Ranch, which is situated right along the Madison River in Montana. The land is all posted No Hunting, but when you have permission from the land owner that changes. Apparently Bill and Phyllis have hunted there many times over the years. So the three of us got up at 4am this morning to head out there. It was a cool 19 degrees when we arrived, so we layered appropriately.

After dropping Phyllis off at "the tree" Bill took me out to the old "Bath House" in another field. Apparently there is or was a natural spring there of some sort. It had been fenced in and then turned into a giant concrete pool type enclosure. Well it hasn't been used in years and is falling apart. However what is left of the rotting fencing that surrounds it makes for amazing concealment. Since in Montana you can only shoot 30 minutes before sunrise I was a bit early. Sunrise was officially 7:36am. I took my position at 6:45am.

So I found a spot to sit down in the overgrown weeds and watched toward the east (away from the river). No sooner than I had sat down I noticed a small black spot bouncing along about 300 yards to my east. I watched quietly know that I still couldn't shoot anything for another 20 minutes. Sure enough as the next 5 minutes passed it moved closer and closer, until a decent little White Tail buck came within 50 yards of me and passed by the Bath House. Now normally one might have tried to follow him until it was legal to shoot. However, Bill tells me that Doe are better eating, plus the land owner prefers to leave the antlered deer for his paying hunters. We were hunting for free... so I let it go. Though it was tempting.

The sun was just barely showing its rays over the mountains to the east. I was wondering if that buck was alone or not, when I spotted two more spots bouncing along. By 6:55am I was watching at least 10 deer slowly move along in my general direction. They nibbled grass, moved a few yards, nibbled more, and were entirely oblivious to my presence behind the Bath House's rotting enclosure. I patiently watched their slow movement, checking my watch for the time every two minutes or so. I sat crouched, my toes cramping. I shifted to my feet, they heard and saw nothing. By 7am I was aiming at them through my scope, trying to pick out my intended target. They were still about 200 yards out and the sun wasn't giving the clearest picture just yet.

Five more minutes go by, I'm crouching again, waiting patiently. My breathing is heavier as I anticipate their direction of movement bringing them within 100 yards of my position. There are probably 20 of them, spread out into groups of 2 to 3 anywhere from 150 to 250 yards away. Which one? Which Doe is the biggest? Which is the closest and easiest target? By 7:10am I was plenty legal to shoot. I waited patiently, I couldn't believe I hadn't exploded and starting fire rounds at them all yet. But I waited, I found a good size White Tail Doe and trained my 4 power scope just behind its front shoulder. Then it happened.

That buck that bounced passed me minutes before came running into my scope's view from no where. He bounded in a circle around the two Doe that were closest. It was obvious he was trying to get them to chase or follow him down to the river about 400 yards west of my position. The two Doe jumped and ran about 20 yards, then stopped. My footing and position had to change, I couldn't shoot at their new location from my angle in relation to the fence line. I had to move my feet and turn. They heard the dirt and rocks under my boots, froze and looked my direction. I knew I had to take my shot now before the buck go the whole herd moving, and now before they made out my human form among the fence line.

The adrenaline was pumping, my legs shook as I tried to firm up my footing. My breathing was difficult to keep slow and deep. I trained the cross hairs in my scope on that Doe again, and then there was a bang that echoed throughout the valley. The whole herd ran immediately, and then simultaneously every one of them stopped, most only running about 20 yards or so. It was obvious they had no idea where the shot came from as they all looked around. But my Doe ran too, surprised I quickly pulled back the bolt on the rifle and chambered another round. My doe was the only one not looking for the shooter. She stood still as if sick, her head lowered, front legs partly bent. After about 30 seconds he legs folded up and she fell to the ground.

I waited, not sure how far away Phyllis was. The whole herd was still, watching. I waited, my scope trained at the grass where my deer went down. Watching to be sure she was truly down for good. As if my shot had been the opening bell, I heard 2 or 3 other shots throughout the valley area, echoing off the hills. It was as if all the hunters had been stalking their prey, waiting for someone else to officially open hunting season for the day.

I walked out to find my kill, round chambered and gun in hand just in case she still had some fight in her. As I walked up I could see her stark white belly. Her coat was a perfect tan color, except for that bit of blood that spit out of her wound when I'd shot her. She lay still, her chest unmoving. Excited I pulled out my cell phone and was very surprised to see that it had a perfect signal. I called Bill who was still in the Suburban, sitting on higher ground watching Phyllis and I through binoculars. He brought the truck down and made very short work of cleaning the deer. Since I had never done it he showed me how it was done, though pretty quickly.

We loaded my deer, and headed out Phyllis' way. We would now head out on foot to drive another herd of deer toward her position. We drove to higher ground, spotted her location, and then headed down ranch roads to get behind the deer. By now we noticed her wandering around the field in plain view of the entire herd of deer. Bill grabbed his binoculars and noticed she was waving at us. It turns out she had just shot her own doe and wandered out into the 3 foot grass to find where it fell dead. What a shot too. Her deer was facing almost straight towards her, her shot landing right into its neck. She said it leaped into the air and fell straight dead to the ground. We were guessing the bullet hit the spinal cord and killed it instantly.

It was quite fun really, its to bad you can only shoot one per year. Our next task however should be another learning experience. After spending 30 minutes calling every big game processor within 50 miles we finally found someone who could take in our deer. That saved us from having to butcher them ourselves. The guy was nice enough to skin them for us immediately though, and we kept the skins from both. Bill and I have salted them and plan to attempt to tan them ourselves. We've got plans for the tanned hides, but that's for a future entry. Lets just say we hope to make use of the whole animal, perhaps its skin can keep our feet warm some day....

Video Games: Short Reviews

So I haven't posted anything on any of my blogs for a while. So I decided I'll give a couple really short personal reviews on a couple games I've purchased lately. I have to admit I'm a computer game junkie, and would be worse if I had the money to buy every new cool game that came out. Not to mention having the money to upgrade my computer everytime faster processors and video cards come out!

Anyhow, I purchased the games Blazing Angels and Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter. Both were 'published' by UbiSoft (www.ubi.com). They are both drastically different games...

Blazing Angels
Publisher: Ubisoft

I have to admit that I actually bought this game rather than another one I was tempted to buy. I went into the local Game Stop store to pick up a copy of Darkstar One, which is a space combat flight sim type game. This was all pretty spontaneous and a result of my boredom. However none of the three guys at Game Stop (all amazingly much more nerdy/geeky than I am) had even heard of Darkstar One! One of them commented, "And that can't be good." So I looked around a while and found Blazing Angels.

Seeing a newly published WWII combat flight simulator I was hoping for something with superb graphics and a lot of serious dogfighting. I immediately began recalling my days playing Aces of the Pacific and Aces of Europe (both published by Dynamix/Sierra). Those games ran on a 486 processor and required something like 3Mb of harddrive space. Yeah, major difference compared to today's games. Anyhow, I was also quite excited that the game boasted it has 42 aircraft you could fly.

So I asked the Game Stop employees if it was any good. One of them told me, "Multiplayer is. It's pretty difficult actually." So I decided to give it a shot. Difficult means fun dogfights right? Boy was I mistaken. I had no idea what was to come. After installing the game I immediately checked the game website (http://www.blazing-angels.com) for any updates. There were two updates for the game. After reading the forums on the site I quickly realized that both updates were extremely meager attempts to resolve major joystick issues. And judging by the number of complaints it appeared that neither patch resolved anyone's issues.

I immediately found that the game itself is simply a port from the XBOX360. Even the game's in game training level tells you to do things like, "Pull the left trigger". Most joysticks only have one "trigger". I soon realized that all the directions in-game on which buttons to press were referring to the XBOX360 controller. Not much work was done to port the game over apparently. Basically to play this game you either have to use the keyboard to fly your plane, or your mouse. Now if you've ever tried to make a plane turn 180 degrees with a mouse you've found out quickly that you have to move the mouse to the side numerous times to turn completely around. You just cannot put constant movement into a mouse.

So I fought, and fought, and fought with the game's control setup program. The problem is the game doesn't actually recognize Joysticks properly. Since joysticks work by using numerous axis (Z,Y,X) plus sliders for throttle and such, the game must be able to determine not only IF you are applying pressure to the joystick, but how much. Unfortunately Ubisoft's botched patches only allow for enough fix that the game can be tricked into thinking that each 'movement' of the joystick is a "button". This means that pulling back on the stick brings about 100% climb. The same goes for throttle and any other directional pressure on the stick. This makes for pretty jerky controls and makes dogfighting more of a pain in the butt than anything else.

In fact I can only use the first patch v1.1, as V1.2 suddenly causes my audio to pause, freeze, skip, jump, etc. I was thoroughly disappointed in Ubisoft with this game. Ubisoft generally puts out pretty good products. The graphics for the game were not to bad. However everything gets a target around it, so you're chasing little red brackets around the sky more than you are planes. I don't want to "target" the enemy plane... isn't spotting it with the naked eye part of the fun of dogfighting??

Overall: Until they actually fix the joystick problems for this game, I wouldn't recommend anyone buy it. It's a wasted $30 for a game that will just frustrate you. Once they truly resolve the joystick problems (if ever) it could be a remotely fun game.

Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter
Publisher: Ubisoft

I have to admit I actually bought this game after Blazing Angels, and didn't realize it was an Ubisoft game until I already had decided to give it a shot. After my extreme disappointment with Blazing Angels I did have a slight temptation to put this one back on the shelf. However, I knew that the Ghost Recon series of games has done extremely well, even though I admittedly have not played any of them prior to this.

The graphics I had seen in teasers for this game looked great. I'm a big graphics freak. If the game doesn't look good, it isn't fun. Now although that's not really true, I just can't seem to make myself play old games that aren't the latest and greatest in visual quality. That's just me. So I must say that this game does impress in that category. The other thing I always look at when purchasing a game are the system requirements. Most people look at these to make sure their computer will run the game. Me on the other hand, I won't buy a game unless it requires a system nearly identical to mine. If it doesn't push my system, it probably doesn't look good enough.

What got me interested in this game is the fact that it appeared to have a bit of effort put into the single player portion of the game. Having the ability to give commands to your squad members was something relatively new up until recently. Brothers in Arms is a game I purchased for its graphics quality, plus this exact feature. It was the coolest thing I'd ever seen. How come nobody really thought it up before? Anyhow, GRAW (Ghost Recon:Advanced Warfighter) goes even farther. The game even lets you switch screens to actually see what your squad member is seeing, no matter how far away they are from you in game.

Having played the game on its Normal setting I honestly being the noob that I am had to put the game on Easy. Of course I've died numerous times and had to reload save points I cannot tell you how many times. Though this is annoying considering I have it set on Easy, it is pretty realistic. The game touts what it claims to be a "one shot one kill" system. I can't say I've had to shoot a single enemy soldier with more than 3 bullets to actually kill them. Many times I really can drop them with a single decently placed round, and we're not talking headshots here either. This must make for some pretty exciting and tactically inclined multiplayer I'm sure. Unfortunately due to my shared internet connection at the moment I have yet to try this.

The game runs pretty well on my system. Running an Athlon 64 3500+, 2GB Corsair DDR, Audigy 2 sound card, and an nVidia 6800 PCI-E graphics card I am able to run the game with nearly all the settings on high, Edge Smoothing turned on (which makes it look way nicer) and 4x anti-aliasing. Granted my FPS is typically in the 20's at 1024x768. But the graphics look pretty nice. Nice enough that I've realized the Mexican Army you fight in the game seems to well dressed for what I would have expected the Mexican Army to look like.

I've really enjoyed the challenge this game has posed me with its single player campaign. This is not a run around and shoot everything that moves kind of game. Although once your squadmates see an enemy soldier they do get a pink diamond to point them out on the HUD, they are still difficult to spot on your own at times if you find them first. The AI seems pretty decent as well. Most of the time they will use adequate cover if it is available around them. However sometimes they simply kneel and shoot back. I have also seen a few times where the AI has shown less than normal peripheral vision, but they always seem to see or hear you before you can actually walk all the way up to them.

Overall: I think this is a solid game. However, I assume that like other games of this genre it was primarly designed for the multiplayer aspect. The single player game seems pretty challenging thus far and should give the player quite a bit of fun. Graphically speaking however, don't try running this game with anything less than a 6 series nVidia card just like the game's box says. Without running things on the High settings, especially with "Edge Smoothing" selected, I wasn't to impressed by the graphics. Once I checked the Edge Smoothing option everything looked much nicer. If you're not the patient type, and would rather have a run around and shoot everything that moves type game, this may not be your best choice. By design I think this game forces you to think a bit more tactically.

Wife Swap?

So my wife and I have been watching this TV show called "Wife Swap". It's kind of an interesting show I guess. At first when I learned what it was about I really had no interest in it. I guess with all the immoral shows on TV such as "Desperate House Wives" I assumed it was similar. It turns out however that Wife Swap is actually aimed more at helping married couples appreciate each other more. Here's how it works:

Two families are chosen and matched up. By matched I mean that they are complete opposites of one another. One family may be very clean, the other disorganized. One family could be very religious, the other nearly anarchist in their beliefs or lack there of. Essentially they are always polar opposites. The idea is that by swapping wives they can each learn from one another.

For the first week each 'wife' is obligated to follow all the rules of the household they are placed into. They must act as if they were the real wife of that family. The second week they get to make all the rules for the family. It's interesting to see how different families deal with different changes or views on things. Whether it's religious views, family values and practices, cooking habits, cleaning habits, work ethics, etc.

What I have found very interesting, and personally convicting, is a trend I've noticed in which families seem to gain the most, and seem to welcome the learning experience provided by it. One family typically seems to stand out among the shows in that it always seems more humble than the other. This family seems to get along better, the husband and wife respect one another much more, the children are better behaved, and they are all willing to make positive changes and sacrifices for one another. So which family is this?

Each episode shows different families. However, there is very often a common trait in one of the families chosen (but not always). This trait I refer to is expressed in The Bible. The man (husband) is the head of the household. He works outside the home to provide food and money for the family. The woman (wife) stays at home, cooks, cleans, disciplines the kids during the day, provides for her husband, and in some cases teaches the children. In each of these families that run in this manner the women openly state on the show that this is how THEY believe the family should operate. I have also noted that these are the same families in which you will notice during the show a Bible somewhere in the house, a cross on a wall, or something else to signify they may be Christian.

I have found it impossible not to notice the difference between these families and their counterparts in the show. At the beginning of the show my wife and I almost immediately pick out which family seems to run better, and happier. In the end of the show, this is the same family in which the husband and wife BOTH express that they feel they should do more for one another. In many cases this is the family in which the husband comes out and says he wants to help his wife more. The counterpart family typically seems to argue over all these details much more and makes noticeably less 'changes' for the better.

In realizing all of this after watching tonight's episodes I have realized that even if these families are not "Christian", and do not run their families based on Biblical values, it is quite evident the mere fact that they operate their families as God as drawn out for us in The Bible has given them an amazing advantage over their counterpart family in regards to how well their family runs. They seem much happier, more content, the family members relate to each other better, they show more respect for one another, are more willing to help one another and sacrifice for one another, and seem to appreciate one another more and bicker less!

There's something to be said for God's blueprints for how a family should operate, even if you AREN'T Christian.

A Wedding on 7/29/06

Yesterday my wife and I drove 3 1/2 hours to attend a wedding in Stevensville, MT. One of my wife's friends was getting married, in fact this friend was a bridesmaid in our own wedding. So it was definitely a wedding we wanted to be a part of. The couple getting married were also a part of our church.

Unfortunately due to having to run and get an oil change before we could make the drive, we forgot to take our camera with us. So I have no pictures. I'm sure we can get some from some of our friends though. It was a pretty nice wedding however, although hot. They held the wedding at a bed and breakfast that was owned and operated by another couple in our church. Small world huh? The wedding was held in a vacant field behind the bed and breakfast right along a river. The backdrop for the couple was the river bed itself, water slowly flowing by, liked on the other side with so many green trees, which were backed by a few clouds and mountains. It was very nice.

They held the ceremony outside, and the reception outside under a few canopies. Unfortunately I think my wife and I were the only people who didn't get the message that the wedding was not going to be an extremely "formal dress" occassion. I showed up with dress shoes, pants, shirt and tie, and sweat it out pretty bad in the heat. I also managed a decent sunburn on my forehead and scalp. On the other hand, the groom himself wore sandals, a pair of dress pants, and a simple blue button up shirt (similar to a hawaiian style shirt but plain blue). The only person as well dressed as I was turned out to be the minister himself. Everybody else was pretty casual and low key.

We had a pretty good time though. The little flower girls were hilarious, and so cute. They had four of them, whom should have walked up in pairs. Well, the first pair started off to soon and were told to stop, they then wouldn't go again. So the video camera was trained on them for quite a while as someone kept whispering, "go..... go...." They walked up the isle without throwing any of their flowers. One of the two little girls was so little she still had a pacifier, and kept squeeling some word repeatedly because she saw her dad somewhere ahead of her. Everybody got a laugh out of that. The second pair walked along and split up. The younger of the two didn't quite understand the idea behind throwing flower pedals. Her mother guided her and helped her throw some onto the ground. The little girl then immediately began picking them up and placing them back into her small pale. It was quite cute.

The groom being a good natured guy was smiling and laughing the whole time. What probably made this wedding the best though was watching the groom start to cry as his bride walked up the isle and got closer and closer to him. His face got all scrunched up and even in the second to last row I could hear little squeeking noises coming from either him or the bride. The groom even had to take off his glasses to wipe the tears out of his eyes. I love Christian weddings, the love between the two just seems so genuine.

Anyhow, we had a very good time and got to meet a lot of people. I was glad we were able to make the drive to be there. I'm also glad my wife got to attend one of her best friend's wedding too. That's not something anyone wants to miss.

New Work in a New State

With moving to a new state comes having to find a new job. I suppose also that having moved to such a completely different environment may also merit a change in type of employment as well. So I've spent my time sending off resume after resume, going to local job agencies, reading the classifieds nearly everyday, and talking to friends at church. Eventually I found a job that was quite a bit different from what I used to do, and seemed like it could teach me some things.

I've certainly never sold a hot tub before! But I applied anyways, because who knows I might like it. It turns out they offer a pretty decent health care package after 90 days, and pay sales people a base salary plus commissions. A local job agency set me up with an interview with their general manager. I wasn't really sure what to expect, but I think things turned out pretty well.

The general manager seems like a very good guy. He of course had a lot of questions for me in regards to my previous experience in sales oriented work. He told me quite a bit about their business, their views on being customer service oriented, and about the history of the company. As the interview went on I found myself liking the idea of working for them more and more. He made the company out to sound like they were very much so focused on being customer service oriented, fair to every customer, and treating employees well. They have won numerous awards in the hot tub industry, however most of those awards are hung on the walls upstairs where only employees can see them. Why not flaunt all this for customers you might ask? Because they are only concerned with their employees realizing the standards of business, customers will see it through actions of employees.

They called me back in the next day for a second interview. This time I was interviewed by the owner, the general manager, sales manager, and an administrative assistant. The four of them had many questions for me in regards of course to sales, my views on customer service, working with other employees, team work, etc. This interview also went very well and inspired me more so to believe that this was a good company to work for. And if not to work for, to at least buy something from someday. I really enjoyed the ethics and service oriented nature of their business mentallity. They told me shortly after about their benefits package and asked me if I'd like to work for them. I of course told them yes. And so this last week I've worked for Mountain Hot Tub.

As I said earlier, selling hot tubs is entirely new to me. So I've had to learn quite a bit in the last week. I can honestly tell you though that if I've learned anything at all, its that I have a lot left to learn. However, the owner of the company tells me that I'm catching on quickly. I'll just have to take his word for it. After only five days working for them I have decided that I enjoy it. Granted we are in the slower period of the year for their business cycle, it is a generally laid back environment. I seem to be working with genuine people who are honest and fair, and care about their work. The general manager and owner see extremely knowledgeable about their business and products, and are very easy to get along with as well. They also appear to be very supportive of their employees, yet also extremely customer oriented.

Their business sense is also very fair. While talking to them both about our pricing, and how promotional events work, they explained to me that they do not want sales people working deals for individual customers (as you might expect at a car dealership). Their approach is that if they will offer one customer a promotional deal or discount, they will offer the same price or package to every other customer as well. In other words, when you go to Mountain Hot Tub to buy a spa, you're paying the same fair price everyone else does, regardless of whether you can "wheel and deal" or not. I find this to be a very ethical business practice and am inspired to see that one can still find such a practice in this day and age.

On top of this, they also sell a very good brand of hot tubs. Having read all their brochures, played with them, looked at them, seen the manufacturer's website, and compared to a few others, I think they definitely sell the best line of products on the market. I enjoy the idea that I can sell someone a product that I myself would buy, and would trust and know to be a quality product.

So if you're looking to buy a new Spa in the western half of Montana, look up your local Mountain Hot Tub and stop by one of their three stores.

Down to Earth Interests

This change in atmospheres having moved to Montana affects you in different ways. It has me at least. I've found myself finding interests in things that I really wasn't into in the past. Granted I'm finding myself much more open to many different job opportunities as time passes, but it's much more than that. It's in the areas of hobbies or things of this nature that I'm finding my interests peaked.

Every blessing that we receive is perhaps more than we truly know it to be. We typically see only the face value of the blessings in our lives until later on in life true wisdom is revealed to us to examine everything that truly came with it. For instance, having married my wife I initially thought the blessing I had received was that of finally finding a loving woman to marry, be happy with, perhaps someday have children, and so on. But much more has come along with this than I would have ever stopped to think about. Married life is certainly not all perfection, this I can attest to. Married life brings out challenges within you that you'd never before have found, imperfections in your own self that you were oblivious to. These can certainly be blessings if we take heart to them in the proper way. I can also attest to the fact that I have certainly not perfected this action either!

But, along with marriage comes other things, such as a new extended family. In this case I am refering to the "in-laws". Yes, the "dreaded" in-laws as many would call them. Yet in my case I would certainly not refer to my in-laws in such a manner. In fact, having moved to Montana, and from the time spent with the in-laws now and previously, I'm actually finding myself opening up to a lot of new ideas. Not only the food they eat which I'd never had before, but even hobbies. My mother in-law is very much so into gardening activities, and pretty much anything that has to do with plants. Though this is not my personal interest, it is still kind of interesting to learn a few aspects here and there.

But, mostly I have picked up on some of the more "male" hobbies I suppose. My father in-law is the kind of guy who is active in fly-fishing, hunting (both deer/elk and pheasants). He's also quite the craftsman when it comes to anything made of wood. Having his own workshop complete with a band saw, table saw, you name it, he can make just about anything he sets his mind to. Recently he refinished an old desk they had in a dark yet vibrant cherry finish. He just simply could not settle for anything less than perfection and the result is gorgeous. To bad the desk is about the size of a sewing machine table.

However, his niche seems to be in the design and construction of black powder rifles. Yes, the kind of guns used back in the civil war days. You know, when people were stupid enough to stand in neat rows 50 yards from one another and take turns shooting at each other? Though the guns may have no real modern day use, though some still hunt with them believe it or not, they can certainly be a work of art. My father in-law, being very much into American and Montana history (especially Lewis & Clark) created a piece to commemorate the bi-centennial of the Lewis & Clark expedition. He spent hours upon hours just researching historical locations, facts, times and dates, Native American pictography, rifle designs, among other things, just to create this one rifle.


Much of the work involved he did entirely on his own. Melting down metals to form specific pieces, hand carving both the wood stock and metal engravings, creating sights for the gun, trigger guards, 'bluing' the flint assembly, finishing the wood, and did I mention he actually formed the gun itself from a piece of wood that originally was similar to a 4x4 wood post?

Anyways, his work with black powder rifles is pretty good as far as I'm concerned. I've only compared his work to a couple of other pieces but hands down he had those beat. But it's not the black powder rifle that has my interests in particular. All of this has simply been a sample of the things which have caused my mind to open up some. I am finding however an interest growing once again in such things as fishing, hunting, perhaps some camping, hiking (how can you not? It's beauitful out here), and maybe some small woodworking someday in my future. Little stuff though, I can't see myself making a collectors item like my father in-law's rifles.

There's just something about this place that kind of makes you want to learn about some of the simpler things in life. Granted I may never lose my interests in computers and everything digital/electronic, but perhaps I may fill more of my life with more down to earth interests...

Photos and the item photographed are Copyright © 2005 to William Madden Jr. If you would like to see more of this rifle you may visit it at the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center in Great Falls, Montana.

Welcome to Montana

Welcome to Montana, "The Last Best Place" as some call it. A land that seems almost untouched when compared to the busy city life I am used to. Imagine living someplace where you can find hiking, skiing, fishing, and hunting all within 30 to 60 minutes from your house! Imagine a place where you can find lakes with water that's still clean enough that you can actually see the pebbles of the lake bottom. This is no imaginary place, although perhaps one of few places that man has yet to entirely corrupt.

It's the kind of place where even the wildlife can relax and enjoy their surroundings. The kind of place where man has yet to utterly destroy all of nature's habitats and drive our animals extinct. This is not to say however that man is not trying, slowly but surely he moves in. But for now nature here is serene and full of beauty such as I am not used to. Weather changes suddenly during the day and night, yet remains peaceful enough in spring that creatures abound and man seeks outdoor activities.

It's the kind of place where the simple things sometimes seem so picturesque. A humble lone tree in an open field catches the eye. You begin to wonder how nature works sometimes, how that branch broke off and found itself where it is now.

These are the things which I will be facing in the coming time. For now I have been enjoying spring and summer in the last couple months that I've lived here. The future undoubtably will bring even more questions to my mind, as well as challenges. Summer will take its course, fall will come again, and winter will creep steadily toward me as I prepare for its white features. All this will contrast so starkly beside the desert landscape I have grown up with. I have left behind the busy city, the polluted air, the crime ridden streets, the securities of custom, and now I seek out a new life, new career, and adventures in this profoundly different land.