Our Avatar Story

Well You asked for it Dawgs, so here it is. OUR story. Tell us all how you came up with your avatar. I'll go first even most all of you have heard the story. I'm old and tend to repeat myself, so to bad.

One summer we had a REALLY bad Skunk problem in our little 6 block section of town on the South side of where the Railroad tracks used to run through town. One of our neighbors called me saying that they had a skunk hanging around their house and wondered it I could do anything about it (I had killed a Psyco cat that had been terrorizing the neighborhood some years earlier). I said I would see what I could do.

One day I saw their "Problem" wandering around in their yard so I ran inside the house and grabbed my handy (actually it weighs 9 pounds) RWS Diana model .177 pellet rifle and headed down the street. NOT wanting to get their house sprayed I waited back a ways until it got almost to the street about 60 ft from their house. I took aim at the head about 20 - 25 yards away and pulled the trigger. BLAP, skunk went down but not dead. It started pulling itself along with it's front legs (must have hit the spine or something as back legs would not work and it couldn't spray). I quickly reloaded and let fly with another lead pill. This time, no movement. I waited about 2 minutes and slowly creeped up just to make sure it wasn't "Playing Possum". It wasn't. The Hunters first successful Kill.

Well one thing led to another and by the time fall was beginning I had killed 12 Skunks, all the rest were "One Shot One Kill" hits and by then the moniker SkunkHunter had stuck. BTW the "City" killed 6 in the same time period so you can see we WERE overran with the stinky little fellers.

Heehee! Love it Randy! Wonder what the average cost to the taxpayers was for those six city-killed skunks

As for me, I simply sat down after a long-day's work in the yard and, when asked to pick a name, thought "No clue. How am I feeling?" The answer was clear: Dog Tired.

Back then, I had just started down the road of figuring out I had a bunch of weird medical problems. My wife had only recently made me aware that always hurting and being exhausted might be an issue.

My wife after listening to my litany of complaints about what hurt while laying in bed:

"You know that's not normal, right? Most people don't hurt everywhere when they go to bed. They might be tired, or their feet or back might ache, but it's not EVERYTHING."

At age 36, that was literally the first time in my life it had even occurred to me that everyone's else want always in severe pain too; that pain and exhaustion were not there general normal.

Why the Super Squirrel? I like squirrels. They are quirky, brainless, fuzz balls that people either love or want to kill. Obviously it is my spirit animal

But, like the squirrel, I've got my own secret identity. I have to battle 20 or 30 issues on a daily basis. I know there are people who deal with much more on a more frequent basis, so I am loathe to complain (it can ALWAYS be worse). Increasingly, though, it takes
(what for me is) a superhuman effort to get out of bed and get going... even more so than back when I chose my avatar.

So.... in conclusion, the three words that best describe my name and avatar are:

-- Beat.

-- Brainless.

-- Battling

My avatar choice was not very inventive. I had my Yard knives spread out on the table while I went through the process of putting mineral oil on the blades. I thought that the Bullnose Regulator looked the coolest so I started using it.

Mine is just my pup being herself. I happened to have a camera handy and caught her in mid-snarl.

I won the "Name the knife" contest with my name of DogFather. When someone said that I was the Father of the DogFather, I said "No, Dan Busse was the Father". In turn, Dan Busse named me the GodFather of the DogFather, hence my avatar. I was originally going to use a picture of the old cartoon character "the Sad Sack".
I was dubbed "Private Klink" by my Marine SSgt drill instructor; Hogan's Heroes was still on television but he certainly wasn't going to call me "Colonel Klink".

Reread mine... now all I can think of is:

"Bears.

Beets.

Battlestar Galactica."

Bonus points if you know it. Extra points of you laughed out loud or shot milk out of your nose. Other beverages count too.

But what about your USER NAME Ray? Tell us a story!

So your the GF to the DF...do you get a ring?

If we have the Dogfather we should also have the Queen B. Maybe that can be the super-secret codename for the 1311... which we all know as the MOAD

DT, many years ago I used to collect, restore and use fountain pens. One of my favorite pens was from Italy and named Settanta. When I joined a fountain pen forum I used it for my pen name.

Sounds just "write" Ray!

Oh you are so bubbly you're just like a fountain. Pen, get it, fountain pen... Oh never mind

I NEVER would have guessed that Ray! My son now has a side business turning pens, including fountain pens. Nothing as fancy as yours, I'd wager.

Hey Cool DT.

I got my forum name on here when I was in the Army I used to work with a guy that would always see me surfing a gun forum on the internet, ar15.com, and he would call me banana-clip. So I just used that as a forum name.

My avatar is just my uniform when I was deployed to Iraq when I was stationed in 1st Infantry Division at Fort Riley Kansas. It has a Glock 9mm and Busse Steel Heart in the pic.

Nice story. Thank You.

Another military based name...cool B/C!

DT, I also used to turn pens and hung out at the International Association of Pen Turners forum. I like wooden pens so most of them were plain. The only fancy ones had wild patterned acrylic barrels. Hope your son does well in his business. BTW, turning pens led to a bigger and better lathe and the interesting world of wood turning.

I’m going to remember that comment, Skunky.

It's interesting that we all come from so many varied backgrounds and interests. But that one common interest binds us all together like an extended family, and to me at least it feels that way. If I can't hear from my "brothers" every day I feel as if something is missing in my life.

I hope you don't mind me correcting your East-side grammar.

No Problem Tom. What did I mess up? I've slept since I posted that you know.

I changed your "here" (as in location) to "hear" (as in hearing).

Tom, I’m giving you a friendly warning that correcting East-side grammar is a full time job with no pay. Good thing that you are retired.

Thanks Tom. I know the difference but didn't catch it. Currect Grammer is good and everyone shuld praktice it.

Heehee, sometimes it's fun acting like a stereotypical TV Redneck. It keeps folks guessing as to where you are really like that or you are merely messing with them.

PLUS sometimes it can just bring a smile to your face as you shake your head and say "That boy ain't right".

Next we have to work on your spelling.

Randy, we say that ALL the time!

I had a 2nd Cousin that was in his late 80's. He said that about me all the time. I guess he REALLY knew me.

It looks like my avatar is gone, and so is PK.

I think i used tiny pic as a hosting site, but It looks like they might be charging a fee now to use that service.

I kind of like the little picture tiny pic uses now in my avatar.

Some how it just seems to fit. Maybe it's the boots.

Yes, he looks like a soldier

Or the fact that it looks like he's broke, frowning, and turning his pockets inside out...

The effects of becoming addicted to Busse knives.