Sunday, January 19, 2020

1/18/20 The Range at Austin?

    Technically, we went to the Range at Austin, realistically, we didn't take our guns, so we only walked through, much like a tour.  I have declared this year we will be doing a lot more activities and one of them is getting more comfortable with our guns.  Up until now, I have let Boy handle them, I don't even know where he learned so much, but he has this knowledge of guns, such as cleaning them, making sure they are unloaded, keeping stock of ammo, and everything else that goes with it.
    My plan was to have a boy's afternoon and come to this new place, but I didn't really give them a head's up and Boy does tend to plan up his weekends pretty well.  Since he was not able to join us, I felt uncomfortable grabbing the guns, picking up Javalina and going.  Can I even have a backseat full of rifles and shotguns at a school while picking up a kid?  I decided to play it safe and if Javalina wanted to go we could come back to the house and pick some up.  Of course, Javalina's only concern after school is where are we going to eat?  He does not eat on campus, he says there are too many people and not enough time, I don't know if that is true, but that is his story.
    I managed to keep him distracted enough from food to at least go check out this place.  I picked him up extra early, since the start of the year, he has said to pick him up after 5:00pm, so the traffic dies down, I mean there are 1,400 kids trying to scamper off at 4:30pm, so it gets a bit hectic.  This week though, it was rainy and grey all week, so he wanted me to get him early.  I managed to get myself out of bed early and I was probably there by 4:40pm, not that it was raining, it was just cloudy.  We talked about stopping here and there, I like to get my little shopping needs done during this time, if they don't concern Wife, which she is usually on the road on Friday afternoons?  Javalina had mentioned our curl bar was not heavy enough for him anymore, so I wanted to stop at Academy and buy one that would take Olympic weights (they have a 2" hole, instead of 1").  Javalina wanted nothing to do with this, he just wanted to eat.  With the gun range, he was interested enough that he said "fine."
    The guy at the door was nice enough, he explained the cost to come in and shoot ($25 per person, $10 for an additional shooter if sharing the same bay).  We can also buy a monthly membership which allows unlimited visits at $55 a person and $25 more to add the family.  He said to walk around and check it out.  It is very nicely organized.  You walk around the corner and tot he right there is a room with 4-5 100 yard bays for rifle shooting, then to the left, there are three separate bays which are separated by glass doors and glass walls, I think it is all ballistic glass, but I am not sure.  There were people shooting, but the noise was not deafening like at the Lockhart location which is outdoors and it gets loud as hell as soon as you get off your car.
    They have some nicely laid out lounge areas with fat leather chairs here and there, so it feels like you could hang out, if you wanted to.  Along the walls, they have maybe a couple hundred guns to show and purchase.  It all looks very new and impressive, I almost felt like buying a gun, except I could tell the prices were a little more than at Academy or Cabela's.  Both Javalina and I lean towards wanting a revolver, I think as a home defense, that would be good.  There is no pulling back on the thing and then wondering if it is ready to shoot, or oops, I forgot about the one in the chamber.  Simply point and shoot.
    So yeah, we'll go back and shoot, but I still think it is better to take Boy with us.  I don't like feeling like a noob in a place like this.

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