Lingo Bingo

When I lived in Boulder (yes, its true, but I’m feeling better now) I worked for a video game company that developed games like EverQuest or Worlds of Warcraft. I’d still be working there if it wasn’t for the fact that the games we made we boring and nobody wanted to collectively pay us millions of dollars every month to play them. So, to be more precise, our games were not like EverQuest or Worlds of Warcraft – they were far from it.

As the head of the testing department I had a staff of recent college graduates and nearly-college-graduates to do my bidding. They were a great group of guys and my buddies. As part of the techno-game culture, there was always a discussion at lunch over the latest and greatest gadgets, gizmos, and techie toys. Most of the time the discussion centered on the newest 3-D graphics card, the hottest game controller, or the best CPU to build a computer around. Believe it or not, it was possible for us to waste an entire lunchtime debating the merits of RAM speed, cache size, and bus speed. (If none of this sounds familiar to you, count yourself lucky.)
I’m telling you about this because now that I live in the mountains and my hobbies have changed, I have other lingo to throw around besides RAM, CPU, megabits, and Ethernet.

Now, in my free time, with a different group of friends, I talk about aperture, field-of-view, eye relief, muzzle velocity, and caliber. Hopefully, as a mountain living person you recognize those terms from your last hunting trip. They are the various terms used to describe a scope and rifle, as well as the behaviors of those components.

This past weekend I went down to the Boulder Rifle Club (in Boulder, no less) to get a head start on my shooting practice for next fall’s elk hunting season. I noticed that over the past couple of years (I’ve only been hunting elk for a couple of years) I waited until a few weeks before the season opened to zero my rifle and get in some practice rounds. As any seasoned hunter, probably someone with more than two years under his belt, will tell you, that amount of practice just doesn’t cut it. I know that, so I made a promise to myself that I’d shoot my elk rifle at least once a month, every month, from May to October. My goal is to be a crack shot by the fall. So far I’m pretty happy. At 100 yards my second shot from the bench was a dead-on bull’s eye and every shot I took off-hand from kneeling position was on the target. If I stay on schedule and practice with the kids’ BB gun in the back yard, I might be ready for something more than a 50 yard shot this year.

While I was there I took the opportunity to practice a few shots with my pistol. On the pistol range I was surrounded by all kinds of gun geeks. I say that with great admiration and appreciation for their skill and experience. These guys (and gals, there was one!) obviously knew their gun stuff. One gentlemen I talked to told me how I could modify my pistol by changing out all kinds of parts I didn’t know my pistol had. When I looked at him like he had two heads (the same way my wife looks at me when I try to wake her up early on a Saturday morning) he knew immediately that I was only a newbie, not a master like himself. Without blinking an eye he offered to buy my pistol, probably hoping to give it a better home with the love and attention it deserves. I said I’d think about it and give him a call later in the week.

I guess I find it pretty funny that even though I left the “big city” over 10 years ago I can’t get away from technical lingo jingo. Pistols or computers, everything has it’s own dictionary and the more you learn the more there is to learn. For what its worth, I’m happier talking about calibers than clock cycles any day of the week.

P.S. – To all the new folks that moved to the high county this winter (above 8,000 feet), the missing pet signs you post on the telephone poles won’t bring back your little “FiFi” or “Mr. Snuggles”. Your missing pet has taken their place in the circle of life and provided an easy meal to the neighborhood coyote/bobcat/mountain lion. Say a little prayer for them and contact the local humane society to see what bigger, faster pets they have available for adoption.