Another Long Exciting Weekend

Well it started with getting out of work and meeting up with Jeremy for some brotherly fun. We went to check out where I would hunt on Saturday morning and then onto main post to head to the PX for a little shopping.

We went home and got ready and headed out to Old Chicago for some dinner. I have never been there and heard it was awesome and it was. More beer than I have ever seen in one place. Wish I could remember the names of the ones that I had because they were awesome. The pizza was some of the best I ever had.

After that we headed to my hang out and introduced Jeremy to some of my friends at Rebounds. We had a great time, but got a little late for me to get up at 3am to get ready to go hunting. After about 3 hours of sleep I was up at it. I got in the tree stand was fighting to stay awake until sunrise. I managed to stay up all day and never fell asleep. I little before sunset I have about eight turkeys walk under me so I know that I was doing something right. I just wish that it had been a nice deer. Never saw one all day. Got home that night about 8 and passed out pretty fast.

The next morning I was up again at 3am and ready to go. Once again I was in the tree before sunrise and waiting on that big buck to come walking by after a night of eating. He never did. At about 1030 I gave up because I was so tired I did not know what was going on. I headed home and took a nice 4 hour nap.

That was another two days of hunting and seeing no deer. I am not giving up yet. I went again on Mon afternoon and saw nothing, but that will not deter me. I am going again tomorrow night after work. Only thing is, I need to go find a jacket to wear because the temperatures are dropping and that is good. Hopefully the rut will start soon and I will start seeing something. I am ready for that first deer and ready to buy a freezer to keep it all in this year. I just hope I do not get caught up in the deployment my unit if facing in May. I would like to be home for a couple years although I need the money to pay some bills.

This weekend I am headed home to see family. I was not going to, but I have huge surprise my family this weekend. I cannot even hint at it hear because they will figure it out too easy. Some things fell into place last night so I can really surprise them. I will head home and see them and of course see Courtney and finally get to watch her play soccer. I will be headed home on Saturday so I can hunt on Sunday morning. I am really excited about the surprise. Oh, and I am loading up the truck with the tree that fell in my yard during the ice storm in Feb for my dad. I know that he plenty of wood for the winter, but a little more will not hurt.

I hope that everyone is having a good time in their lives. I know that everything might not go the way that you want it, but keep your head high and remember that God would not put something in front of you that you cannot handle. I am a great place in my life even if I have to deal with some demons from my past.

On a good note, my neighbor, Jay is headed home. He boarded a plane today and will be home soon from Afghanistan. I am glad that we worked out the issues and differences of opinions we were having about some of his personal issues. We are good friends to each other and glad we both realized we are lucky to have good friends like each other.

Jeremy has caused me to think about my faith and realize that if he can give up something for 40 days, I should be able to do it too. I need to figure out what I am going to do.

Well, there is not much else to share right now. I just wanted to share my deer hunting with you from this weekend. When I finally get that first deer, you can bet the story and pictures will be here. Oh, and I can get up to nine deer this year between Tennessee, Fort Campbell, and West Virginia. Hopefully I get at least half of that.

To everyone that is following this blog, thank you for the support.

Almost forgot. I took a tour of the Fisher House on post the other day and I encourage you to please check into seeing what you can do to support one. You can even donate your frequent flier miles to help. They use the miles to fly family members of injured soldiers to where they are for free. I donated what little I had a few years back. I encourage you to please look into this (http://www.heromiles.org/). Also look into organizations that help with wounded warriors. Soldiers Angels (http://www.soldiersangels.org/) is another good one. I met several of the volunteers from this organization while I was in Germany and they are great people with huge hearts. Please find a way to support your military.

With the job I have, I am able to take groups on tours of post and let them learn things they had no idea about. If you are close to a military post, contact the public affairs office on post and see if you can set up a tour of post for a group. If you need help contacting one, please let me know and I will assist you. The anniversary of Pearl Harbor and Veterans Day is coming up soon. Take the time to see what you can do to help support them. I know that we have more requests for parades and events than you can imagine. And it is not just in this area. It is all over the US.

Once again, thank you for all the support you show not just my brother and me, but all the service members!!

SGT John Strader
Fort Campbell, KY