Well, another Spring Fling has came and gone at Tannehill State Park. It was awesome, in my opinion, the best turn out for a shoot I have ever seen. There were a ton of awesome vendors with a wide array of products for you to choose from. To list a few, Black Widow Bows, BCY("Half Ton"), ciders for sell, leather makers, Monty Browning was there, Big Jim, a ton of other vendors as well, I just made stops by those booths.
This was the most fun I have ever had at a shoot. I got to shoot with a young man from Tennessee(Kit Phipps) on my last round who will be a mountain of a man one day. I am not a very small guy(6'1", #225) and he was just as large as me as a 15 year old!! I hope he doesn't miss his calling for being a comedian because I have never laughed so hard on an archery range in my life. I will try to tell you a few of the stories, but judging my by wife's reaction to them last night, it might be one of those situations you would have had to have been there to fully comprehend it.
I'll still try though, maybe one of you will get a good laugh out of this guys stories..
Well, Myself, Jay Sykes(Arriverdog), and Jay's son Trey were shooting our last round sunday morning when this individual caught up to our group and I told him he could shoot with us. There was quite a line of people in front of us, so he might as well join us instead of just waiting on that alone. Well, it wasn't long when I realized this wasn't your average kid. He was 6', 15 years old, and his shoulders were more broad than mine. We exchanged names, and his was Kit Phipps and he was from the Tennessee mountains. We were walking up a pretty steep "hill"(mountain to us flat landers) and he quickly began to tell us of dragging a deer up hills much steeper in Tennessee. He was shooting a vintage Locksley recurve. He shot very well considering all of the things going against him. The first thing I check out, being a string maker, is how he doesn't have a nocking point on.
I asked him why he didn't have one and he replied, "because I hate those things". I asked him what he meant, he then began to tell me how, "those suckers will move up on you and you wont have a clue, then you'll be shooting from the wrong nocking point the whole time". In my mind I thought, how in the world do you know where to put the nock now, he said, "I just put it on, pull back to the fulcrum, and and release". The crazy part is, Jay and I, could see his arrow flopping down range, just short of doing flips and he ALWAYS hit the target.
Jay asked him about what poundage he was shooting and he replied, "heck I don't know, my dad bought this bow off **** from a guy who bought this bow off **** from a guy who bought this bow off ****, and it doesn't have any writing on it at all". I told him to let me see it, within 5 seconds I found the writing on the bow and told him it was #40@28, we all laughed at this because he had had that bow for a good while and didn't know the weight, he just "gripped and ripped".
We were sitting at a target waiting on the group in front of us to finish their turn. One of them accidentally shot a tree. When that happened, Kit yelled out, Mama always told me you have to eat your vegetables(referring to shooting the tree) and you have to eat what you kill. We all got a good chuckle out of that because we had never heard anything like that.
We eased our way through the course and made it up to a coon target and something told me that Kit had ate a coon or two in his life.. I shot and put a good shot on it. I said, "looks like we will be eating coon tonight boys". Kit soon erupted, "boy if you took one of them coons and threw him in a pot with some lemon, taters, and onions.." and then said, "I can't get my grand mother to give me her coon recipe for anything". We all laughed out loud at that one. The funniest part is yet to come, and to fully understand this part, you would have to understand Jay(ARriverdog). He is very reserved. A man of very few words, but when he does speak, it is something worth hearing. He has been pretty quiet up to this point, just making small talk with Kit.
Just as I was about to draw back, I hear from Kit, "oh no! I forgot my SWORD at the house". Jay and I looked at each other like
. Kit then went on, "I hope no one stole it". Jay broke silence and said, "What are you calling a sword?" Kit replied, with one of the most baffled looks on his face, "a sword, what else?!, I have a 30" sword I carried around all yesterday." Jay then broke silence again, "how did you make it to target 30 and not realize you didn't have your 30" sword?" Our group erupted. We laughed for a solid minute. Someone asked Kit, "do you mean a bowie knife?" He said, "No, I have a bowie knife, but all my friends kept calling my bowie knife a sword, so I got a sword to show them the difference." We laughed again.(i am laughing while typing this).
Kit told us a lot of other stories throughout this shoot and we all enjoyed them. I hope to see him at the howard hill or the IBO shoot in Tennessee. He was a very genuine, simple guy. He knew how to extract skunk "essence", he love his spot light
, and was a real pleasure to shoot with.
This kid is a true country kid. Look for him to be on his own reality TV show soon.
I understand that may not be very funny to read, but in person, it was the best time I have ever had on a range. I hope to see him again.
Topic: The story of Kit Phipp.. a Spring Fling story.. (Read 390 times)
