After a slightly exhausting week, the much - postponed party finally straggled in to Reid and Connie's country manse in Parker CO on Saturday. Not every one could make it (Smokey Paul and Lynne met us at a Santa Fe highway exit to hand over a pistol for Carlos -- we still live in a free country where a poet can hand a handgun to a writer to pass to an ornithologist, and pass it through three states, all legally!)
I am not sure what the "Theme" of the party might have been-- probably NOT blogging, though it had brought some of us together. But only Reid, Arthur, and me met primarily that way
. Andy Wilson has known Libby from Outward Bound days, 40 years and more. Many of the others were members of what Carlos and the (absent ) Gerry Cox facetiously call the "Sewing Circle", a bunch of writers, academics and artists fascinated with fine guns. Guy Boyd, who is holding the iconic Purdey, came down from Fort Collins; our first contact was through birds I think, as he flies a pursuit Gyr named Darwin, but I have also worked editing his yet unsold thriller ms. Chas Clifton blogs at Nature Blog, but we have known each other forever; he went to Reed College with Tom McIntyre, is a retired professor of English literature and comparative religion, knew "Seasonal" writer Ed Engle (who once remarked after a hike in the San Mateos that we had seen a redtail catch a squirrel, but "if it had been twenty yeas ago, we might have seen Mescalito!", and, if memory serves me right, first read me in the rather odd venue of
Chronicles, in a nature- themed issue put together by Chilton Williamson and his legendary damned Patagonian conures!
Themes were guns, books, ideas, and food, plus a standing desk of splendid oak for me (thanks to Laramie based
novelist Brad Watson); horses (Akhal Tekes) and dogs (Aussies- ours had stayed home) and a little mostly Chihuahua named Rainbow. And GRILLED MEAT-- thanks especially to Carlos, and to Arthur for bringing lovely chile- flavored booze for a marinade.
And of course the Purdey, which is exquisite, not just the finest for its price but one of the finest hammer Purdeys I have ever handled. But, contrary to what everyone seems to think, despite my trade goods and its relatively good price, I do NOT have the full price yet. Perhaps, as the Nature Conservancy's Matt Miller suggests, I should swallow my pride, and try a little crowdfunding-- it looks like now or never... ideas, please!
This set all by Andy W:
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| Chas sights Broomie with Steve & Carlos in enthusiastic discussion behind |
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| The younger set--Arthur and gunsmith Adam (not in this set, brother Oliver) |
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| Novelist Brad Watson (check his new book on Amazon), Carlos, Steve |
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| Reid with MEAT |
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| We do love our food-- and guns ... |
