2014 SHOT Show Wrap Up

I finally  arrived home late yesterday afternoon from Las Vegas. The shuttle ride to the airport, the flight to Seattle, and the shuttle ride from Seattle's  airport to Whidbey Island all seemed long, tiring, and best of all, uneventful! It had been a long several days at the SHOT  show,  but it was well worth the trip.  I made some new business contacts, renewed contact with companies that I have dealt with in the past, got a chance to see some new and interesting devices ( not all of which were firearms),  met and visited with some old friends, and met a number of new people too!

 what is the likelihood, you think, of ever seeing me wearing an Olympic medal, let alone a whole bunch of them?  You would think the probability would be somewhere in the negative number region!  However, the radio talk show host Lars Larssen,  was broadcasting his radio show from the SHOT  show  one afternoon, and is broadcast booth, rather than being on the main show floor, was down at the end of a long hallway where most people did not even know that the radio show was going on.  I saw a few people down at the end of the hallway, and being curious, decided to walk down there and see what was going on.  To my surprise,  Lars  was interviewing Gov. Rick Perry  from Texas live!  I did not get a chance to talk to Gov. Perry but listening to the interview was very interesting.  I could not help but to think that I wish there was some way to clone Gov. Perry and bring him to Washington state and let him run the state too!

 The next person for Lars to interview after Gov. Perry was Kim Rhode,  the incredibly talented shotgun shooter.  Kim  has been on the Olympic team several times and has managed to bring home a bunch of Olympic medals. After  the interview was over,  I got a chance to talk to Kim myself.  Kim has been shooting and hunting all of her life, and actually got her start with a shotgun hunting ducks.  I suspect the ducks never had a chance!  After speaking with Kim for a bit, I asked if I could have my picture taken with her, and she said sure, and then hung her Olympic medal medals around my neck for the picture! WOW,  What an honor!  I met a lot of really nice people at the shot show,  but Kim must be one of the nicest of all!

Kim Rhode and I. (WOW)

since I was attending the SHOT Show  as media as well as a member of NSSF,  I had access to the press room. All of the posts that I sent out from the show were done in the press room using the Wi-Fi that they had set up for us there.  A big thanks goes to NISSAN for sponsoring the press room.  I have never paid a lot of attention to Nissan in the past, but their new TITAN series of pickup trucks powered by Cummins diesels and built here in the United States certainly do look nice!

Peter Hoffmann of Caliber Magazine and I in the Press Room.

while I was sitting in the press room drinking a cup of coffee  I struck up a conversation with Peter Hoffmann  of Caliber magazine in Germany.  I was familiar with Caliber magazine from my trips to Holland for the European steel championships.  This picture of Peter and I  is especially cool sense I was able to get the incredibly talented photographer Yamil Sued to take the picture for me. Yamil  Is a fantastic photographer,  specializing in firearms and shooting sports competitions,  and product photography too.  I first met Yamil  quite a few years ago  at the steel world championships  in Piru,  California.  We had a good laugh  when I handed my camera (a basic KODAK)  to Yamil  and ask him with a straight face if he knew how to run a digital camera!  Anyhow,  Peter and I had an enjoyable conversation, and he and I both enjoy picking up older automobiles and fixing them up a bit. Peter and I plan to keep in touch, and maybe, even, we may meet up at the European steel championships in Holland this year.

That pretty much wraps up the SHOT  show coverage for this year, but if I find any other pictures or think of anything interesting I will try to get a post up about it.