During August 28 – 29th `BIG BIRD’ and `SHADOW’ accomplished their prospecting requirement of a long ride and camp out with other club brothers. It was an over night’er to lake Murray, Oklahoma.

You get to know a lot of “CORE VALUE” about a person(s) when you are away from your daily home envirment. When you mix and mingle with strangers in far away places you can better judge how a prospect will represent the general membership. And setting around a camp fire under the stars while drinking FIRE WATER helps reveal all sorts of things about the make up of a man.

Big Bird and Shadow proved their ridding skills were excellent as we sped down the highway 2 X 2 at 80 MPH for many long miles at a time. Shadow was my wing man to the right and I couldn’t help from thinking…he definitely deserves his name. He stuck with my every move like he was my shadow.

They both were friendly and courteous to the waitress and other patrons in the “TWO FROGS” restaurant. Exhibited good table manors and automatically left a 15 percent tip.

Then it was on to a big test. How will they handle them selves in a more challenging situation? We went to a BIG country & western saloon that was full of RED NECK’s and COWBOYS. The place was about 7 miles out in the sticks south of Ardmore. It was called “TEN BUCK TWO” and they were having a special night to celebrate and honor championship rodeo riders and their 10 gallon hat fans.

Security directed us to park our bikes up front in a grassy area so they could keep an eye on them for us. But then they advised us that only cowboy hats or farmer’s caps could be worn inside, that we’d have to remove and stash our do-rags, leather caps, and any knives or guns we may have into our saddle bags. Then they ran a metal detector all over us to make sure we didn’t have any thing hidden. Wonder what they were thinking? All bikers ain’t pack’n.

Every thing went great once inside, in spite of having all eyes trained on our “COLORS”, and their apprehensive frowns. We proved we were just common down to earth friendly folks too.

We shot several games of pool with them and each other. Mixed and mingled gradually getting to meet more and more of the locals. Answered lot’s of questions about our club, where we were from, kind of bikes we rode, etc, etc. It’s amazing how curious people get once they find out you are not there to make trouble. Some of them bought us rounds of beer and for some unknown reason a chick behind a bar kept passing free pitchers of beer to Big Bird.

About 11 PM most of us were ready to head back to camp. Bird and Non-Sense (a patch holder) elected to stay a little longer and continue practicing on that C & W style of dancing.

We got a big fire going and sat around telling jokes and embellished wild stories, while killing two bottles of tequila. Somebody earned his “GB” patch in the process but I ain’t calling no names. I’ll just say it wasn’t me.

Finally our other two guys roared in with a string of other bikers following. I still don’t know how they all hooked up. Big Bird offered one guy a swig off of his flask. The dude gulped a big one in a macho manor and – and – and spit it all out onto the fire. WHOOM the flames went up. “What ta hell was that?” the guy asked. “195 PROOF EVER-CLEAR” Bird responded with a grin.

Next thing we knew the PARK RANGERS show up and explained that “quiet time” started four hours ago and we’d have to knock it off. That they’d got complaints about our loud motorcycles, laughter, and stuff. We broke off the partying, crawled into our sleeping bags, and called it a night.

Sunday morning JQ wakes up on his picnic table with the sun in his eyes and hearing a loud banging sound. He squints one eye and sees a bro in a black T-shirt walking near by. “HAY KNOCK OFF THE NOISE. I’M STILL TRYING TO SLEEP!” The guy near by laughs. “BY GOD I MEAN IT TOO!” “Okay – alright, we’re just leaving any way,” the guy replies. JQ cracks open the other eye just as the man, his wife, skinny legged daughter, and their cat pile into a car and pull off.

“WOOPS…I thought that was one of us,” JQ states embarrassingly. Shadow says, “NAW that was our neighbor. But it serves him right…he’s the SOB that called the COPs last night.

Sept 1st `SHADOW’ was voted on by the general membership. He got the 100 percent mandatory approval and is now a fully patched out BOOZEFIGHTER. `BIG BIRD’ comes up next. But first he’s got some explaining to do before he get’s my vote. Big Bird – how in the hell did you manage to end up coming back to camp with that “TEN BUCK TWO – SECURITY” shirt on?

Note: `Big Bird’s real last name is Byrd. At age 13 he out grew his Daddy and Grand-Daddy. Hence they started referring to him as their Big Bird and it stuck ever sense. During the 1990’s Bird served in the US Marines with a special reaction unit. They performed rescues and secret missions all over the world. He circled the globe twice in the process. Now he is a licensed electricition.

`Shadow’ served in the Army. His specialty is so secret that his records are not for publication. Something to do with his computer skills I’d guess for to this day he is involved in computer engineering. Code breaker maybe? Only the Shadow knows. But we do know – he’s a BOOZEFIGHTER now.

JQ `HISTORY’

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