Grandpa Moore Story

When Tom & I were pre-teens we liked to go hunting and just shooting. I don’t remember exactly when it was but one summer we were at Grandpa & Grandma Moore’s farm. Maybe it was a time we were left there when Mom, Dad, and Marj went to New York City for a Nation Student Council meeting.

We discovered that Grandpa had one or two Guns, maybe a 22 rifle and a 4-10 shot gun. We of course wanted to use them. There was a small wooded area to the Southeast corner of the Indiana farm and we went out hunting. I don’t remember too well what happened but I do remember that the woods there were much different from the woods we were used to in Western Colorado. I discovered the same thing when I spent two year living in Virginia. First the humidity is much higher and it rains more often. The density of life the environment supports is much greater. The woods are alive. One of the things one finds is a high density of mosquitoes and other insects. There is a thick layer of decomposing things leaves, logs, etc. The trees grow dense and block out the sun in the summer. So we hunted there. I don’t think we shot anything but I felt a creepiness all the time I was there.

Grandpa loved to tease and he was a great practical joker. After we came back Grandpa told this story about how when he was a young man. He and his friends always carried shotguns. He described the structure of shot gun shells, which had a metal base with a firing cap but the majority of the outer cover was cardboard. I had taken many of these apart myself to make homemade fire works so I knew exactly what he was talking about. Down at the metal or cap end was the gunpowder. Then there were a couple of cardboard plugs and all of the buckshot and finally a cardboard stopper at the top to hold the buckshot in. When the shell was fired the gunpowder would explode and force the buckshot to fly out the shell and then the barrel in a pattern that got bigger as it flew. He and his friends would cut around the outside case of their shells at the joint between the gunpowder and the shot. They would cut just enough so that when the shell was fired it would separate and a bundle of shot would fly out of the gun still wrapped in the outer shell. This was more like a single slug except when it hit something it would explode with shot flying in all directions. When you hit something with these they were much more destructive.

The story he told was about hunting with a friend one day. He said to his friend, "I’ll throw my hat up in the air and you shoot at it and then you throw your hat up in the air and I will shoot at it." This seemed reasonable to the friend and he agreed. Grandpa of course had a cut shell in his gun. So Grandpa took off his hat and when his friend was ready he threw it as high in the air as he could and his friend shot at it and missed. Grandpa picked up his hat and dusted it off and put it back on. Then his friend took off his hat and Grandpa got ready to shoot. His friend threw his hat as high as he could. Grandpa watched the hat go up and then come down. When it hit the ground he shot it. The cut shell went out hit the hat and blew it all apart. Grandpa turned to his friend and said, "I didn’t say we had to shoot at it when it was in the air."

Tom & Eini Take a ride

Hi all,

Eini and I had the Sunday blues and decided to jump on the motorcycle and see where we ended up. The weather did not say rain, but high overcast and so we dressed for Colorado weather and headed south. We headed for King City about 50 miles south of Salinas and took Jolon Road west. It takes one on a back road that leads to Hunter Legget. We got to give the thumbs up to several military convoys and other than that had the road pretty much to ourselves. This part of the central coast has lots of oak trees and is still pretty wide open spaces. At Hunter Legget, we turned left and headed for Lockwood. Robin had told me that Dianne lived in a mobile home in Lockwood. Just for curiosity sake we turned left in Lockwood and turned into the mobil home park. After asking three people, if they knew anyone that lived in the park by the name of Dianne and coming up with nada we headed on towards San Antonio Reservoir. I might add here that we had taken a motorcycle ride on the same road last summer and ran into a lot of car and very hot weather. This time as we headed toward the Reservoir there was no traffic and the weather was cool, but enjoyable. We had stopped and streched at Lockwood, and as we first turned off at Jolon Rd. So we ventured on to San Antonio Reservior. What a beautiful ride. Lots of curvy roads.

I just remember as we were streching by the store in Lockwood a younger than us man pulled over in his truck and started talking. We had taken the back roads to give God a chance to talk with him. He was planning to move to Oklahoma and leave his family in California. He was divorced with three kids and did not want to move if the move would be detrimental to his life. He told us he was now working in the King City area on a farm with some relative and sending money for support to his family in Bend, Oregon. He had been asked to move to Oklahoma to work in the oil fields, but was not sure yet if he would do it. He just wanted to get away from the daily situation to see if he could figure it all out.

We finally excused ourselves and headed on to the reservoir. We passed it without fan fair and head on the Nacimiento Reservoir. These back roads are great motorcycle roads. I just love the big oak tress and this area has alot of them.

After passing Nacimiento we end up in Paso Robles. We have spent time before in this town. The mid state fair is there in the summer and we have gone to it many times. We were cursing around town and saw a Sizzler. We decide to eat there and also to use the time to warm up. The coolness of the day had finally gotten to us. We do not eat like we used to. After sampling a little of this and a little of that we were off to Wal-mart to so Eini could get something she had seen at Walgreens. She went in and purchased these little hand warmers. They are small bags that when you shake one it put off heat for about eight hours. We both put them in our gloves and headed on the freeway back to Salinas.

The trip back was probably the most enjoyable we have had on the freeway. The wind usually blows down the valley south from Salinas, but today the wind was at our back and we had a great ride back into Salinas.

I might add. I have built some saddle bags out of leather and designed a holder for the saddle bags on the motorcycle and this ride was the test to see if what I had designed worked. We filled the bags before we left and the way I hope they would work, they did.Glad I took those leather classes in Montrose. I enjoy reading what everyone has written. So I decide to try and see if I could post something. So if you are reading this it worked.

Love Tom -- Written by Tom Rutherford for RF Rutherford Family Blog 11/16/2004 01:15:08 PM

Tucson Depressed by the Election

After the election last week I found myself depressed for several days. It was not so much that Kerry lost but that George W won. I am afraid I feel that Bush and the Republican Congress have been very bad for our country. We are getting ourself into a financial mess and I see it continuing to get worse. The war in Iraq has been very poorly managed and we have lost support for our agenda around the world.

I wrote the above because it is how I feel and also to see if anyone is out there reading this who feels differently or the same and would be willing to make a comment.

Thanks,
Richard

Tuscon 11/1/2004 Richard

Friday was Anita’s and my anniversary and also Anita’s Birthday. She would tell you never allow a man to marry you on your birthday.

We decided to go to Mexico. Nagoles is the border town less than an hour south of us. We had been in the US part of the town several times in our trips to AZ but we had never been across into Mexico. We got there about 1 p.m. and parked about a block from the border on the US side. The lines of cars going in and coming out were very long. The foot traffic going in was very heavy, but coming out people were backed up a couple of blocks. I felt some hesitation as I went through the iron turnstile. We were in Mexico.

Our plan was to look for a replacement of some kind for the plaster sun/moon plaque that was hanging on one of our outside walls. Anita has never liked it.

The first couple of blocks out of the gate were pretty bad. There were street hawkers trying to sell all kinds of things. One shoe shire guy had a special "Baby-Boomers" shine. There were pharmacies with I’m sure great prices on all kinds of medicine (viagra, or you name it). We walked on. After a couple of blocks we either got used to it or it got better. We slowed down and actually went in some of the stores. Anita’s guide book for AZ said that the best bargains were in rugs and some of the glassware. It also said people often paid more here than they would across the border.

We were finally in a store that had a large collection of fine pottery, masks, and various other handcrafts. The pots were signed by the makers and very beautiful. They also had metal hangings of all types. When we showed an interest in the hangings the owner directed us up some rickety stairs to a second floor that was full of bronze, brass, and copper metal works of all kinds. We were offered special prices on each thing we showed an interest in. We finally choose a large sun/moon metal hanging and agreed to take it. I pulled out my master card and there was an extra 5% for using it.

By that time we were hungry and asked for recommendations for lunch. Leaving our purchase to pick up later we proceeded. A little way down the street was a little patio restaurant with table near the street so you could watch the people going by and the other patrons. We took a table near the street and ordered a couple of beers, cheese enchiladas for Anita and pork burritos for me. We had a pleasant lunch. These were not those huge plates of food like one gets in the US Mexican restaurant, but very good. Salsa & chips, rice, beans, salad, and entrée. As we sat there street venders came by selling every thing from gum, flowers, and trinkets. Some singers came by and serenaded some of the tables. When we were ready to leave the bill was $16.

We wandered some more blocks looking in windows, checking out baskets, pondering cast iron gates, and generally enjoying ourselves. The variety and quality of shops was great. Finally we wandered back picked up our purchase and followed the streets to the border crossing. On the way back, Anita wandered into a small shop and ended up buying (for half price) a small metal star like one she had see at a neighbors. When we got to the border it was around 4 PM and the exit lines were much smaller. After about a 10-minute wait in line we passed the border patrol and walked to our car. We figure later we will go to Tubac (a local tourist place) and see if we paid too much for things, but we did have a good time.