A Very Hick B-Day To ME!

If you haven't heard by now here is the whole "Hick" Birthday that I had. The whole "hick" thing started with Maria of course. So I've been talking with a few friends from work about hunting and since I have never hunted a day in my life I felt inclined to try it out. I borrowed a rifle from a co-worker, and I asked Sari for the necessary licensing to go hunt legally for my birthday present. After much thought and discussion she agreed to it.

Now opening day is a week before my actual b-day so I had made plans to go hunt with a buddy up around Lake of the Woods area just of highway 140. Not a bad drive, just around 60 miles out or so from home. Now I got up around 4:30 am that day to get out to the camp to meet up for the morning hunt, they were leaving regardless at 6:15. I had plenty of time to get there, but I missed the road to head for the camp. Sometime later I turned around figuring I had gone to far. By now it was daylight so the little road marker that I was looking for was much easier to discern; however the morning Hunting party had already left.

My only thought at the time was that I should find the camp and then decide what to do from there. Easy enough it was to find the camp ground, but now it was time to sit and do nothing, maybe sleep. So trying that for a bit I found myself too wound up, I had to do it, I needed to go and explore. Explore I did, driving here and there doing the road hunting thing, seeing nothing.

Now there was a three way split in the road, one of which ran through to another road, the one I suspected my buddy to be on. Trying the first on my left I noticed a car ahead going slowly and stopping every few feet, obviously road hunting didn't really care to be stuck behind them so I turned around. Went down the next road until it ended suddenly, ok back up the road and down the next. Now this one looked to go all the way though but after a bit the forest opened up to reveal a clear cut. Then the road became very rocky very suddenly, so trying to be smart I thought 'hmmm I should turn around and get out of here before I get stuck or seriously damage the car'.

Picking out a spot that looked good for turning around I began the process yet again. Unfortunately I had picked up an unfriendly rock while turning around. It was making quite a racket under the car, but nothing horrible, a couple of knocks and bangs as I rolled over it. But as I was finally turned around and starting to drive back out, the noise maker made one final loud bang as I left it behind. My initial thought was I hope I didn't break anything, and kept driving on.

As my confidence that nothing had gone wrong increased I began thinking about where I would like to explore next, maybe down that first road. Soon faint noxious fumes, very reminiscent of gasoline, crept up to my nose. Without further thought I pulled over to the side of the road got out and got on my hands and knees, looking for the reason why. I could already hear it, that light sound of fluid pouring out and hitting wet dirt, but where was it coming from. "Ah crud!"( actually it was different, more choice for the situation) there it was the stream of fuel pouring out onto the red dirt. There was only one thing left to do at that point. Oh the irony.

I jumped back into the car and sped off as quickly (and safely) as I could go. My first instinct was to get back home but that wasn't happening, not sixty some miles out and a leaking fuel tank. Heading back to camp was the only logical thing to do even if I couldn't do anything about the hole and the leaking fuel. Of course by the time I got back to camp and parked the car the tank was only weeping, little dribbles and drops. So there I waited, grumbling at my misfortune, until some people came back. I did finally get a little shut eye in brief snatches. By the time my friend got back I was ready to laugh about it.

Since there was nothing to do for it at the moment I went hunting anyway and spent much time getting wet and not seeing a single buck. One guy of my group did get his sights set on a good size buck and got a shot off, but on further investigation we found no blood trail or deer, plenty of tracks but no buck. By the time we determined that the guy completely missed his shot it was an hour later, around 6pm. At camp I took a final good look at the damage done to the tank and called Sari to meet me at walmart. By the time I got home it was 9pm.

I did go and get the car the following monday. Mike took me ( Cathy's Husband ) up there, one the way we picked up some epoxy that was fuel resistant. We started to work on the car by getting it up on blocks to raise it a bit to make it easy on us to work on it but of course more fuel dumped out and we had to wait a bit. Once it was dry enough Mike got out a fairly large screw and some electrical tape and we stuck that onto the screw wich was inserted to the hole in the tank. Then we took some of the epoxy and placed it over the head of the screw and tape.

Now there was a curing time that needed to be waited out. What better thing to do when I've already got a tag than to go hunting. So we wiled away the time in the woods stepping on braches and over fallen trees stalking deer on their trails. I saw lots of evidence of deer but not a single actual deer. Oh well maybe some other time. Obviously we took way longer than an hour to hunt but the epoxy was definately cured by the time we returned. Don't worry the tank has been replaced, I'm not that big of a hick to run around with a screw and epoxy sealing up my tank.

So as Maria declared to Sari, "that was a very hick birthday."