Be Excellent To Each Other

Army officers have appeared on national television in Gabon to say they have taken power.
They said they were annulling the results of Saturday's election, in which President Ali Bongo was declared the winner.



I'm not surprised, as he died on 8 March 2009.

A Bird of Prey landing on my decking!

Please forgive the horrid quality of the photo, the door to my office has steamed up between the layers of glass. I wanted to take a picture before I stood up, as I knew there was a high chance of it flying away if it heard/saw me.

Indeed as soon as I stood up, it flew off, so this is the best I have

Woah

Thanks for cleaning that up Gaz.

And yeah, it was a big old bird (my view through my misty door, is not as obscured as my phone's camera was.

The bit of decking that the bird's tail is hanging over is about 20cm, which makes it about 60cm in my rough approximation.

Some of you already know this, but a couple of months ago I was looking for a hobby and started archery. 6 weeks of a beginner course and I now have a certificate and everything!

However today I won my first gold medal and a meerkat trophy, which ain't too bad considering some of the other archers had 10+ years of experience...

Now that summer has finally started we did the first full evening film in the garden.

With the “screen” hung off a washing line and weighted down with rocks at the bottom it looks pretty good. If I can find a larger sheet, I can get quite a bit bigger picture.

Well done!

That’s ace! Well done on the medal!

Considered giving it a go myself, especially as I don’t really do air rifle anymore.

Is it expensive to get into?

Excellent stuff!

Are you now looking at getting a fancy bow and other cool gear?

This looks excellent, and it looks like you’re going to have a few nice evenings for it at last.

This also is excellent and sounds like a lot of fun. The meerkat trophy is a bit confusing though Any reason for it being a meerkat?

I believe it's like most other things - cheap to try out and then really expensive really fast as you immediately go and buy all the cool gear.

Or maybe that's just me

And you choose the correct film, good work.

How big will it go? And does it not attract moths and insects?

Well now... if you want info I can dump info!

Cheap to start, you have 2 routes:
1. buy a crap chinese recurve bow, arrows and target set off ebay for about £100, and piss about in your back garden. Bows are classed as sporting equipment in the UK and are legal to use on your own property, assuming you have the space or really hate your neighbours... Obviously the overarching deadly weapon laws still apply, so you do have to be careful, if you hit someone or something that isn't your own, expect to be in lots of trouble. To shoot on land that isn't your own, you need permission from the landowner. It's not legal to shoot on public land (unless you get a letter from the King I guess...)

so the best route is and the one I did:
Go to a local club and do a beginner course for 6 weeks for £45. Use all their kit and get a certificate at the end that you can take to any club to show you know one end of the bow from another and can join their club. You can't just join a club without some sort of proof you have had training, mainly around the range rules etc... which are the same everywhere, but strictly adhered to for obvious reasons. Joining a club will cost about £100 a year, £50 to the club to pay for general club stuff (ground hire, target replacement, club equipment, meerkat trophies etc...) and £50 to become a member of ArcheryGB (the governing body) which gives you insurance and stuff. Every archer who shoots at any club has to join ArcheryGB I think, mainly due to the insurance it comes from.
Depending on the club, they may let you use their kit for a period of time until you know what style you want to shoot. Longbow, flatbow, horsebow, barebow, olympic recurve, compound etc... I shoot a mix of barebow and olympic recurve, as they can both be done with the same kit (barebow is the same kit as olympic, you just take the sight off and change a few things in your form). After a month or so the club will want that bow for other people, so you need to buy your own.

Now it's not as simple as just buying a bow, a recurve bow setup is actually multiple different pieces of kit working together.
Riser (the bit you hold)
Limbs (stick on the top and bottom and do the bendy springy bit)
string (string)
rest (the bit you put on your riser to stop the arrow falling off when you are trying to shoot it)
arrows (the bits that stick into stuff)
stringer (big black dude is surprisngly english you learn in later years)
other stringer (the thing you use to put your string on your bow)
tab (protects your fingers from the string cutting them in half)
armguard (protects your arm from the string cutting it in half)
arrow puller (to get your arrows out of the target)
bow stand (so you don't get it dirty)
sight (for cheats who can't handle barebow)
finger sling (so you don't drop your bow after you shoot)
stabiliser rod (sticks out the end for some reason, I guess I'll find out one day)
plunger button (no idea reallym, apparently it helps the arrow fly straight, but who knows how)
quiver (somewhere other than the target to put your arrows)
bag (to put it all in)

If you go brand new for all of that, for stuff that is good enough to last you a while (apart from the limbs, they have different draw weights, you start light and get heavier, so your first limbs will definitely get replaced at some point), it'll probably cost about £500-600. If you go second hand you can do it for around £350 all in.

Then you can do stuff like pay £900 for some carbon limbs, as that will definitely make you shoot straighter, and you can't seriously expect to be able to hit anything with a £50 sight can you? You have to spend £300 on a top of the range one. Those £8 a piece arrows? Worthless. What you need is some carbon arrows with a custom wrap and 300 grain tip, bargain at £40 each, etc...

No idea, but I expect that is is holding a bow is the main criteria, and the meerkat was a bonus.

That's a double bed sheet which appears to be 230 x 275cm but I've found 4 metre cotton dust sheets that should work. I reckon if I go much bigger I'll lose too much brightness.

No problems with moths being attracted, just a 6 month old kitten pouncing onto the planes!

I always wanted to try archery cos it's cooler than darts. Which is pretty cool to begin with. *pats gut*

But then I saw this guy.



and realised it was even cooler!

Oh God, back in the day Lars Anderson ignited some sort of horrific, all-consuming Holy War in the historical martial arts / re-enactment worlds with his videos. There are still parts of Facebook that are uninhabitable because of the fallout. Tread warily, traveller, lest you unleash forces beyond your ken.

Ha, it's brilliant. It's like Star Wars kid doing Legolas, but actually doing it well.

That's some good shit, cheers. Doesn't sound as expensive as air rifle shooting, so I reckon that's a solid bonus right there

There's probably also more archery ranges around here than there are air rifle ranges (which is likely why, when I was doing air rifle weekly, we had to shoot inside pubs) so easier to keep going with, too.

I'll see if I can find a local archery course at some point, then!

Only shoot outside pubs near me.

It's a mix of indoor and outdoor ranges for archery, indoor is usually sports halls and the like as it's shot at 18m, so needs a hefty room.

Northampton seems to be some sort of weird nexus or archery, we have three clubs in the town alone. I chose the one that was running the beginner course at the time, but they seem a very chilled out and relaxed bunch, and the coaches enjoy coaching as much as shooting, so are happy to give lessons for free if you are serious about getting better.

I'm new to the world and Lars is one of the first things you encounter, so it's still going on
I don't think he is incorrect, but the way he presents stuff gets people riled up. Modern archery is just different, not wrong. It's all about single shot pinpoint accuracy at 70m these days (and hunting if you are a yank), so it's no wonder nobody even thinks about combat shooting, which is what Lars is all about.

Well, the historical people will say that many of his historical claims are not backed up by the historical record and many of the techniques he uses would not be possible with a combat-weight bow and arrows! I guess he's annoying people from both sides of the spectrum!

Indeed, no way you are doing that with a 200lb 7ft longbow!

It’s all really far fletched.

He's the butt of a lot of jokes.

His skills make me all aquiver.

Knock it off!

*cough* nock *cough*

Actually, I don't think this works as a pun, as the usage of the word "butt" here basically is already the archery term - "butt" meaning target.

But take a bow every one who did make a pun.

I’ve gone all of a quiver.

Bzzz repetition

Does that mean I win?

Yes.

I feel like a right shaft now.

I honestly don't think anyone has won here.

Arrows.

My dream address in Bicester would be Crumps Butts.

Giphy "good night everybody!":
https://media3.giphy.com/media/xUOLdPyT7xHLaA9Aff/giphy-loop.mp4

I wondered if maybe it was a fox, like in Disney’s Robin Hood, but that’s definitely a meerkat.

Makes sense, as Sherwood Forest is full of meerkats.

My theory - some factory somewhere made a bunch of Meerkat Robin Hoods as some sort of proposed tie-in with a CompareTheMarket Meerkats marketing campaign that never actually took place. They therefore have a warehouse full of them, and are selling them as cut-price archery trophies as a way to shift them

But fantastic job on winning it!

As a man of generous helpings, I FUCKING LOATHE this here weather we've got. My sister's partner bought me this: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Portable-Blade ... B0B12N5DCP and it's delightful. I recommend the thing and I apologise for the amazons.

Those are ace. I got one after my Ma’s partner recommended it.

Think I just saw a lightning flash from my living room window (which looks South East from Ivybridge)
Thought I'd check a tracker:



Yup I probably did.

It's now full on raining

I can never remember/find the thread where people post about unusual aircraft they see.

An A400M flying over our house is still quite unusual, even in terms of military aircraft that do so. It was probably headed towards Worcester.

As it went back over on its return journey higher up!
https://www.flightradar24.com/BLNHM99/31f79bd5

Going over @maliA's house in a minute I think.