Remembering the good ol days

Times are tough, and I'll leave it at that. Is times like these that one must find resolve in places they hadn't looked in years: their childhood. Nothing was more adventurous, more freeing, and more badass than getting my first wrist rocket as a young boy, probably about 10 years old. It was a beeman, with a leather strap with two rivets across the leather that stretched over the wire frame. I had broken a set of bands, and so my dad got me pink ones, which I was at the time, too ashamed to admit, was truly, and still is, my favorite color.

Truth be told, mostly what I got into was mischief, and the empowerment that carrying it around with me all summer long felt like, or bringing it to a friend's house whose parents wouldn't allow. There were whole sleep overs and parties based around this item, it was a symbol, and a big part of me would love to be able to watch all that like it was a movie or something.

Anyways, about 2 weeks ago, I was bored, and having just been payed for a knife I completed, I was feeling flush, and decided I had some money to blow. All this social distancing and solitude at home has meant I've needed to pick up new hobbies - but most of the hobbies I have end up feeling like work. Somehow, slingshot came into my mind!

I reached out to a friend of mine, because I remember he had one at a camp out a couple months back, and I wanted his suggestion. He sent me a link to the simple shot scout XT. I thought to myself, "that's not the one!". Did some clicking around, and figured out that a wire frame wrist rocket is what I'm after. Found one on Amazon, for $15 it was at my door in about 2 days. I set up a cardboard box in the backyard, pasted a shoot and see, and then had at it with clay ammo. My shots were all over the place! What the heck!

I'm a marksman, nothing professional or anything, and I don't mean to toot my own horn, but I can put together tight groups in most shooting sports, and I thought for sure I must have been good as a kid (having no memory of actually hitting anything as a kid). But alas, I wasn't putting together groups that would be anything useful to me, so as an adult, where was the fun?

So I decided to look at the link my friend sent me again, I clicked around, drank the Kool aid, and decide to buy an axiom oculeris in black, and some 1/4" ammo bands for my clay.

2 days later, and I get the thing, set it up, run out to the back yard and start shooting.... And I'm even worse!!! WTH!?

Frustrated, I go search around for how to videos, watch the simple shot one, and eventually stumble onto the fowler's makery how to, and it all clicks. I go outside, and start taming my body to do what it needs to do, and as the sun comes down, I'm putting most of my shots into a 11" diameter circle from 20 feet.

I keep it up, practicing about an hour per day, because seriously, I can't watch anymore Netflix. I even practice at lunch at work, because everyone else has been layed off, and my boss is a great guy, but you can't have lunch with him every day, haha. Maybe 2 days of this, and SNAP! My bands broke, and only the stock bands for 7/16 ammo remains. I try it and obviously it's no help unless I want to get heavier ammo, and since I'm still not shooting reliably, I decide I need to order the band material to make my own, and while I'm at it, I order a scout lt.

Wow! The scout Lt is so awesome! So much easier to set up the bands, so much easier to get a clean draw, im in love, and my groups are becoming consistent.

A couple days later, and I've started thinking about making my own. My first instinct is to go forge one out of blade material and wrap it in wood like handle scales.... Hardening, tempering, sanding.... But that sounded an awful lot like work, so I left it on the drawing board and ordered a scout XT instead. I was hooked! And having more forms in my hand was really helping me learn more stuff about my own body mechanics and preferences.

The scout was due to arrive this coming Monday, but I was already feeling the itch to shoot something different, and so on Saturday morning (yesterday), I woke up and carved out a bubinga OTT tie in frame, modeled after the scout lt, but with quite a bit narrower forks, shorter overall, and not quite as skinny at it's skinny points. Go check it out!

Sunday morning, after the Danish oil had a time to cure, I tied on a set of experimental bands I made, and got to shooting. I'm real consistent with it, I shot 35 1/4 bearings within a 8" circle from about 20 ft before I had a miss (just outside 8"). It is shooting a little high, but that might be my bands. Time Will tell.

Thanks for being here everyone, I'm excited to share and learn and flip with all y'all.

Tombo