Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, your guide to
Speaker 1: the Whitetail Woods, presented by First Light, creating proven versatile
Speaker 1: hunting apparel for the stand, saddle or blind. First Light
Speaker 1: Go Farther, stay Longer, and now your host, Mark Kenyon.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Wired to Hunt podcast, which is brought
Speaker 2: to you by First Light. I'm your guest host, Tony Peterson,
Speaker 2: and today I'm joined by my good buddy Greg Litzinger
Speaker 2: to talk about the tree standfall that nearly took him
Speaker 2: out of the game forever. All right, folks, welcome to
Speaker 2: the Wired to Hunt podcast, which is brought to you
Speaker 2: by First Light. Before I tell you where Mark is,
Speaker 2: I need to remind everyone that he and I have
Speaker 2: been putting together a new project called Whitetail Edu. In it,
Speaker 2: we take a lot of the questions we get asked
Speaker 2: over and over by our audience try to break them
Speaker 2: down in video form. You'll be able to watch the
Speaker 2: first episodes dropping on the mediator Clip YouTube channel any
Speaker 2: day now. All right, so you figure it out. You
Speaker 2: know Mark's not here. It's because he's out with an
Speaker 2: injury to his thumb. I know this because he texted
Speaker 2: me a picture of his hand with a caption that said, hey, Besty,
Speaker 2: got myself a little ouchy here, so I'm going on
Speaker 2: vacation for the seventh time this year. I didn't ask
Speaker 2: him what he did because I knew it just meant
Speaker 2: that I'd have to do his job for him again,
Speaker 2: and some might argue rightly, so I would say, do
Speaker 2: it quite a bit better than he does now. While
Speaker 2: I actually don't know how he injured his thumb, I
Speaker 2: did see in the background of that picture a book
Speaker 2: that said getting started in shadow puppetry, and there's a
Speaker 2: bunch of scraps of paper and a pair of scissors
Speaker 2: that looked pretty sharp. There were also quite a few
Speaker 2: tear stains on the paper, so feel free to wish
Speaker 2: him a speedy recovery on his auchi. My guest today
Speaker 2: is a fella you might know of named Greg Litzay.
Speaker 2: Greg is a New Jersey bowhunter with a serious reputation
Speaker 2: for killing good deer on public land. He also had
Speaker 2: one hell of a tree standfall some years back, which
Speaker 2: is what I really wanted to talk to him about today.
Speaker 2: To wrap up this month of episodes dedicated to the
Speaker 2: different ways the ship might hit, the old fan for
Speaker 2: us white tail addicts. This is a good one and
Speaker 2: it's a great reminder to use the right safety gear
Speaker 2: the right way. Greg, buddy, how are you having the man?
Speaker 2: So I gotta ask you right away here. This has
Speaker 2: been Getting this podcast actually booked and recorded has been
Speaker 2: a hell of a challenge for me. And Uh, how's
Speaker 2: your how's your old man doing?
Speaker 3: Uh, it's still all right, he's I guess it's gonna
Speaker 3: put him in a it's gonna put him in a
Speaker 3: facility to help him work through his injuries there.
Speaker 4: Originally I'm gonna do surgery, but they kind of pulled
Speaker 4: back on that. Donna let the kneecap hopefully heal.
Speaker 3: They're going to revisit it, I guess in a week
Speaker 3: or two and make sure it's healing correctly.
Speaker 2: So he's he's seventy five, right, Yeah, and he's out
Speaker 2: night fishing for large mouths.
Speaker 3: Yeah whatever, pointing in the fresh water like nothing, nothing crazy,
Speaker 3: just crappy large amouth you know.
Speaker 2: So seventy five years old, he's out night fishing, and
Speaker 2: what happens.
Speaker 3: He's putting his boat. I think he's putting this boat
Speaker 3: in or out. I got the full like grip, but
Speaker 3: the boats at the boat ramp and you know, you
Speaker 3: got that angle what goes down.
Speaker 4: Into the water. I'm assuming it's dark out. He had
Speaker 4: a headlamp on, you know, and I.
Speaker 3: Guess he slipped off that little apron and I'm assuming
Speaker 3: his right.
Speaker 4: Ankle went down.
Speaker 3: He broke bones in that foot and they come crashing
Speaker 3: down on his left knee, shattered his cracked his kneecap,
Speaker 3: and then in the middle of falling he I guess
Speaker 3: come down and ends up hitting something in his two knuckles.
Speaker 3: So he's got like this giant bruise on his hand,
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 4: And like a typical mail he just drives his boat
Speaker 4: home because he lives in the water.
Speaker 3: Goes up like it's normal, like if nothing goes to bed.
Speaker 3: He wakes up the next morning, you can't move, say
Speaker 3: calls me. When my sister calls me and say, hey, Dad,
Speaker 3: saw down. He's in a lot of paint. Do you
Speaker 3: have any pain meds? Because you know, I'm dealing with
Speaker 3: a wrist injury. I was like, what happened? So I
Speaker 3: called my dad. He's nay, yeah, and he sent me
Speaker 3: a picture of his knee and I'm like, dude, callin
Speaker 3: abelms Man like you can't move foot, sloot up, his knee.
Speaker 4: Sloot up, and like his bedrooms.
Speaker 3: It's a single story house, but his bedrooms like downstairs
Speaker 3: there it's like three steps, but they're big steps.
Speaker 4: I'm like, dude, callin Abilens. You don't have to get
Speaker 4: people to get out of it.
Speaker 3: So it took like three dudes and get my dad
Speaker 3: out of his bedroom and we get to the emergency
Speaker 3: room and we got there and eight fifty at night
Speaker 3: Tommy got admitted to a room. It was eight o'clock
Speaker 3: the following night. So I was up with him deally
Speaker 3: with you know, because he's not a slate. They're given
Speaker 3: like pain pills. So he's like out and then he's
Speaker 3: like awake, and then he had like a breathing episode
Speaker 3: because he has m phaseema.
Speaker 4: So it was like a scary moment there. But I
Speaker 4: was like the whole time, I'm like, man, Dad, you
Speaker 4: were not twenty five. You can't be doing this.
Speaker 2: So let's just I gotta I gotta frame this up.
Speaker 2: Your seventy five year old dad goes night fishing, falls
Speaker 2: off of a dock working with a boat. Somehow whatever
Speaker 2: breaks bones in his foot, breaks his knee cap obviously
Speaker 2: messes up his hand, probably trying to catch himself falling,
Speaker 2: does the totally irresponsible thing and goes home and just
Speaker 2: falls asleep, wakes up in excruciating pain because he's totally
Speaker 2: busted up, and then you finally get him in to
Speaker 2: the er and it's a twenty four hour wait.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah, it's like one Nearth was like they haven't
Speaker 4: seen anything like this.
Speaker 3: Like we go in and they check you in, they
Speaker 3: give him a wheelchair and they're like they have a
Speaker 3: new ergo friend. The wheelchair this trash. If my dad's
Speaker 3: like decrepit, he's all sitting on this thing. You can't
Speaker 3: lean it back, you can't put your feet up. So
Speaker 3: it's like my feet or underneath his feet because he's
Speaker 3: got he's six to one, you know, so it's like
Speaker 3: this is not designed for big people, you know. So
Speaker 3: it's like I have my feet underneath his feet to
Speaker 3: take pressure off his knees in his foot. So every
Speaker 3: time he moved, like I'm trying to like hold his feet,
Speaker 3: We're pushing down the thing. And it's just like to
Speaker 3: three hours get him in the bed. He pultnt X
Speaker 3: ray him because I couldn't get him out of off
Speaker 3: the bed. They had to wait for people to show
Speaker 3: up to put the harness whatever on him, to put
Speaker 3: him up on the thing your cat's skin, X ray's.
Speaker 4: It was just a nightmare, man.
Speaker 3: Like the waiting room was like standing room and it
Speaker 3: was like a concert and it was like So we're
Speaker 3: like sitting in the hallway and the lady's like, you
Speaker 3: can't be here. I'm like, there's nowhere to go. What
Speaker 3: do you want me to do? Like I've been in
Speaker 3: a hospital, Yeah, not for not. I've been in the
Speaker 3: hospital before and instrument and it's been like in and
Speaker 3: out pretty good. So I'm like, we'll go there and
Speaker 3: be in and out. We're all definitely not in and out.
Speaker 2: And so your sister calls you for some help because
Speaker 2: you're you're sitting there with a brace on your wrist. Uh, clearly,
Speaker 2: And we haven't even got to your the actual reason
Speaker 2: we're talking to you here. Yeah, Uh, you got you truck?
Speaker 2: Have you do you? Have you ever done any history
Speaker 2: on your bloodline? Are you just an injury prone people?
Speaker 2: What's going on here?
Speaker 4: Uh? I'm just dumb.
Speaker 3: Most my injuries are reminds to Pitty like snowboarding, like
Speaker 3: hitting jumps way too big, jumping off like fifty foot
Speaker 3: cliffs and stuff like driving them till it was like
Speaker 3: ride up, like n I can do. I'm from the
Speaker 3: East coast, from New Jersey. We don't have fifty foot cliffs.
Speaker 3: I should not be jumping off there. But it's like, well, it's.
Speaker 4: Powder, how hard can it hurt? That hurts pretty good?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 2: So what happened to your wrist?
Speaker 3: I thought work tour ligament, my sl ligament of anybody
Speaker 3: that's a medical background, a small little ligament and the
Speaker 3: scaffoid and the lunate tour that they did a surgery
Speaker 3: to put them back together, and infection on my hand
Speaker 3: had to pull the pins out and the surgery didn't take.
Speaker 4: So now I'm in line to get another surgery next month.
Speaker 2: So you're bumping up offul close to deer season here, dude.
Speaker 3: I'm at the mouth tapping up. I might be ready
Speaker 3: by end of October. Middle of October. There's a few
Speaker 3: a couple of bones together on my wrist, so the
Speaker 3: heel time is going to be like I had to
Speaker 3: cut March twenty fifth, and I try and shoot.
Speaker 4: My ball's a little bow.
Speaker 3: And I could see you on that little bit of
Speaker 3: pressure one night and it's just a little ten town
Speaker 3: ree curve. I'm like, so I'll probably mouth taphim up
Speaker 3: or cross camp. I know, my luck, my luck, I'll
Speaker 3: kill the biggest deer in the world in my life
Speaker 3: with the crossbon and I was saying I'd rather not,
Speaker 3: I'd rather I if I got to do gun, I'll
Speaker 3: probably do mussload. Like my dad's got a few hawkins
Speaker 3: and stuff. I probably go. I got inline muscloater, But
Speaker 3: I've killed a half dozen deer maybe, and there's been
Speaker 3: no connection with the deer.
Speaker 4: It's very like mm hmm. But the.
Speaker 3: Yeah iron sights maybe six yard match by like two
Speaker 3: hundred yards. I just do know personally, I'd take no
Speaker 3: joy in that it doesn't. The last deer, I'm kill
Speaker 3: him with the muscloader. I was actually angry at the
Speaker 3: deer because I was like, way in the back, I
Speaker 3: got drag sight, like by myself at night, and I
Speaker 3: was like angry at the deer. There's no like, it's
Speaker 3: still awesome. It's a big you know, like the eight pointer,
Speaker 3: and I just stood a wrap in the woods. So
Speaker 3: it was like no attachment to deer. I mean something
Speaker 3: that but your shop and everything, but the rap I
Speaker 3: just didn't want the parts of it.
Speaker 4: It's it's just it's weird.
Speaker 3: I don't it's in here like I and I sounded
Speaker 3: like an elite is saying that.
Speaker 4: But it's like for me, like gun hunting, I just don't.
Speaker 4: This doesn't go for me, hun dude.
Speaker 2: I deal with this with the a lot of the
Speaker 2: people at Meat Eater quite a bit where you know,
Speaker 2: I mean there's a lot of gun hunters there, and
Speaker 2: you know, rifle hunting, especially out west is like a
Speaker 2: really big thing obviously with a lot of these guys.
Speaker 2: And I'm like, I just like, doesn't interest me. I
Speaker 2: don't know why, you know. And it's when you when
Speaker 2: you say you'd go to a mouse stab over a crossbow,
Speaker 2: it's a hard thing to explain, like I just did.
Speaker 2: It's like you know, I mean, like, yeah, you have
Speaker 2: every reason in the world just to do it, just
Speaker 2: just shoot one. But it's still like you just know
Speaker 2: that you get to a certain point where you know,
Speaker 2: like I want, I know what I want to get
Speaker 2: out of this, and you know that's not going to
Speaker 2: give it to me.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and like I say, my opinion with the crossfload
Speaker 3: is like anything exhausts all options, like there's still things
Speaker 3: that I can do, Like for me personally, like the
Speaker 3: crossfell is like I've exhausted this, this and this, Like
Speaker 3: if this is all I got to get in the woods,
Speaker 3: then okay, but I really gave it everything.
Speaker 4: I had and then okay, now I'm amazing.
Speaker 3: Like if you got to rent the crossbow and nothing
Speaker 3: against crossbow, and this is going to run some feathers.
Speaker 3: But it's just not if I can put up on
Speaker 3: a rent a gun, it's a cross gun man, Like
Speaker 3: my buddy's got a raven and I can shoot eighty.
Speaker 4: Er groups like this off a rest like it's nothing.
Speaker 2: I'm like, that's it's just different, man.
Speaker 4: It's not the same man. It's not the same.
Speaker 2: No, And it's it's weird too, because if you think, like, okay,
Speaker 2: go out, scout your ass off on public, find a
Speaker 2: big deer, he walks by a twenty yards, your plan
Speaker 2: comes together, and you thump him with a crossbow, It's
Speaker 2: not going to be the same thing. It's kind of like,
Speaker 2: you know, go out, somebody goes out and has a
Speaker 2: target book, right, and he and he comes walking through finally,
Speaker 2: and you've been thinking about this deer for the year,
Speaker 2: five years or whatever, and he's busted off. Aside, like
Speaker 2: a lot of people aren't going to shoot the same deer. Yeah,
Speaker 2: same situation, but it's just like not the same thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I get a spot renover Bridge here in Delaware,
Speaker 3: a little piece of private my buddy has I'm allowed
Speaker 3: to hunt and there's a really.
Speaker 4: Nice feeder on it. It's like Minela.
Speaker 3: I would go with the crossbow, shoot twitter plants deer.
Speaker 4: My biggest one hamper will be the crossbell.
Speaker 3: And I'm like me personally, I don't know if I
Speaker 3: could throw on the wall, it would have to be
Speaker 3: your roomount and be like in the basement or something.
Speaker 4: There's just be no I just that's just my own
Speaker 4: personal Ta.
Speaker 2: Dude, we draw weird line man, And I mean I
Speaker 2: was last year. I've talked about this on here a
Speaker 2: few times. I did. I picked up the muzzleloader for
Speaker 2: the first time in quite a while, and I went
Speaker 2: and hunted some of this public land in western Minnesota
Speaker 2: that I've been pheasant hunting a lot. Because I'm just
Speaker 2: kind of falling in love with a cattail sluze and
Speaker 2: trying to kill a deer out of there and I
Speaker 2: had I didn't I didn't kill when I had a
Speaker 2: blast got close and I was talking to my boss
Speaker 2: about it. I was just out in Montana and he's like, dude,
Speaker 2: that sounds so fun. I'm like, come on out, I'm
Speaker 2: going to do it again this year. And then he's
Speaker 2: really into like precision rifle shooting the contests, you know,
Speaker 2: and so he's like a long range guy and he's like, oh,
Speaker 2: we can get these muzzleloaders. I can't remember what he said,
Speaker 2: but he's like, you know, you can shoot three four
Speaker 2: hundred yards with those and instantly, because you know this
Speaker 2: this country out there is like wide open, right, They're visible,
Speaker 2: there's enough terrain and you know, brush and stuff where
Speaker 2: you're getting three hundred yards from them, it's not that
Speaker 2: hard because you can find them. And like as soon
Speaker 2: as he said that, I was like, that's too far
Speaker 2: for me. Like so in my head, I'm like i
Speaker 2: can take that muzzler out and have a blast, but
Speaker 2: I'm like hunting closer in like in a range that
Speaker 2: in my head is like yep, this is what you do.
Speaker 2: And this will be worth it for you. But as
Speaker 2: soon as somebody else is like, oh, you can just
Speaker 2: do this three times as far, my brain's like no.
Speaker 2: But like why, I mean, I don't know why it matters,
Speaker 2: but it just does.
Speaker 3: It's like like Pa and they had that flip moth
Speaker 3: the muzzle loader.
Speaker 4: Yeah, dude, Like I think that's pretty cool.
Speaker 3: Like there's a you know, they're not exactly one hundred
Speaker 3: yard shooting machines like the the guys that do it,
Speaker 3: you know, they're it requires a little skill, a little
Speaker 3: effort like a bell almost, And like my dad uses
Speaker 3: the Hawkins, no scopes anything. I'm like, if I have
Speaker 3: to gun hunt this year, I'll probably use a Hawkin.
Speaker 3: You know, open sites give me sixty five yards.
Speaker 4: Maybe it's probably a far shot. You know, I basically
Speaker 4: just be bell hunting because I'm going the thick of
Speaker 4: stuff possible. It's like a single shot. Just it's actually
Speaker 4: probably harder than bell hunton.
Speaker 2: Really well you know, I mean so again, that's that's
Speaker 2: what we had here in Minnesota for a long time.
Speaker 2: It was all open sites, and so it was like
Speaker 2: I ended up muzzle or hunting like I bohunt, you know,
Speaker 2: like because you're most of your shots are within forty
Speaker 2: yards and that that was a lot of fun. It
Speaker 2: was because you're like, I have like a tiny advantage, right,
Speaker 2: I guess not like a tiny advantage, but you definitely
Speaker 2: have an advantage. Yeah, but you're like, I'm still playing
Speaker 2: the kind of game I want where I get him close.
Speaker 2: But then you think that would be what you're doing
Speaker 2: with a crossbow, and for some reason it's less appealing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's just the guys. We're at the PA tax
Speaker 4: and I'll talk to people. I know you're going to
Speaker 4: do a cross bell and I'm like.
Speaker 3: And like, I mean those there's a point where I like,
Speaker 3: maybe I could do it, but talking to pill.
Speaker 4: Say, I just I just can't do it.
Speaker 3: You have the one guy and was like, you'll kill
Speaker 3: a big steer line with that, and you'll never kill
Speaker 3: anything bigger. And it's like he got me thinking, I'm like,
Speaker 3: dude's right, man, Like I will never I'll kill him.
Speaker 3: I'll kill Booner in New Jersey with across with a
Speaker 3: cross and be like it's like I would never live
Speaker 3: that down, like from the outside world and me inside,
Speaker 3: you know, it would be like the biggest deer I've
Speaker 3: ever killed.
Speaker 4: I can't put on the wall that I'd be ashamed
Speaker 4: of it. Personally, like it if.
Speaker 2: It makes you feel better. Our mutual friend Clint over
Speaker 2: there at truth from the stand, he's probably gonna get
Speaker 2: a Brazilian jiu jitsu injury here eventually, so he'll probably
Speaker 2: he'll probably be hunting with a crossbow eventually.
Speaker 4: I would say he's pushing. He thinks he's twenty, you know,
Speaker 4: I know he's like my dad.
Speaker 2: You know, he's getting after it pretty hard.
Speaker 3: Uh. This is.
Speaker 2: The reason that I wanted to talk to you today
Speaker 2: is I was looking for somebody who's had a real
Speaker 2: tree stand fall and a real like somebody who hunting
Speaker 2: has taken them out of the game. You know, we
Speaker 2: had Will Jimeno on, you know, the nine to eleven Survivors,
Speaker 2: Zach got a kidney transplant, Tim's dealing with his wife,
Speaker 2: Who's who's got whose cancer diagnosis twice. So I was like,
Speaker 2: this is just those are outside things that took people
Speaker 2: right out of hunting. And to kind of frame this
Speaker 2: up at the end, and you've had you had quite
Speaker 2: an experience, huh.
Speaker 4: Yeah, life changing. I guess put it lightly.
Speaker 2: I guess so let's can we start in the hours
Speaker 2: before the injury. Yeah, just just put us there, man,
Speaker 2: so you can.
Speaker 4: See see the deer with the all the stuff on
Speaker 4: the bottom.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that was my first you know, big deer. Uh,
Speaker 3: I remember killed and the following year and now the
Speaker 3: buck was there. It was watching them all summer. So
Speaker 3: I went in there and I was trump this tree
Speaker 3: and get to stand set and all it do like
Speaker 3: a whole practice dry run.
Speaker 4: And it was right for a hurricane.
Speaker 2: What time of the year is this?
Speaker 4: This is all late August or early August. It was
Speaker 4: right for a hot season, but hurricane was coming all
Speaker 4: my sense and we watched away.
Speaker 3: So I went in there pretty aggressive because I like
Speaker 3: getting close to where they sleep.
Speaker 4: So I never used the harness ever.
Speaker 3: And that February I bought like Alignment's belt and I
Speaker 3: would use it in the backyard, use it sit and
Speaker 3: stands all stuff.
Speaker 4: I'm like, this is kind of nice. So I go
Speaker 4: up to that. It was a maulberry tree. I think
Speaker 4: it's a mall very some type of berry tree.
Speaker 3: And I got the two hang on sticks lowermo six,
Speaker 3: I got to stand setting, like, man, this is great.
Speaker 4: And I've got like the harness on. You know, I'm
Speaker 4: leaning back, and uh, I took it off. And I
Speaker 4: don't even know why I took it.
Speaker 3: Off, but pretty much I just I guess I zaked
Speaker 3: on a shoes.
Speaker 4: Agg and.
Speaker 2: Dropping a rock and uh so did you have a
Speaker 2: lineman's beltown?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I had it all that, but I didn't have
Speaker 4: it on. I had it on me, but I didn't
Speaker 4: have it on. Also used to using it and all
Speaker 4: that stuff. But it's like, you know, and uh got
Speaker 4: used to it, got comftable with it, and then I
Speaker 4: thought it was on, and you know where I went.
Speaker 2: And so hold on, hold on, you thought you had
Speaker 2: it on your I mean you're just kind of like
Speaker 2: thinking in your head, you're going through the motions and
Speaker 2: doing deer chores, and you just you kind of just
Speaker 2: forget yep. So people are going to listen to that
Speaker 2: and they're going to think that's crazy. But man, I've
Speaker 2: had just a few experiences where I'm pretty religious about
Speaker 2: tree stands safety, and I have been for a long time.
Speaker 2: But I have had times where I've gone out and
Speaker 2: this is they stick in your head because you like,
Speaker 2: this is not how you do it. Where I've climbed
Speaker 2: up in a tree and realize that I just didn't
Speaker 2: clip on harness on whole thing. And then you get
Speaker 2: up there and you're like, holy shit, like I totally
Speaker 2: you know. In fact, I saw a video the other day.
Speaker 2: It was quite a while ago, but there was a
Speaker 2: there was a crew film and a skydiving video, like
Speaker 2: back in the nineties. Sometimes it was a while ago,
Speaker 2: and so they had to do multiple jumps in the
Speaker 2: same day. And you know, camera guys jump out, get
Speaker 2: ready to film, you know, people doing this. This guy
Speaker 2: divers jump out. Well, they're filming this guy who had
Speaker 2: done multiple jumps in one day, and as he's free falling,
Speaker 2: he reaches back and realizes he never put his parachute
Speaker 2: on because he's so comfortable he's already done this, you know.
Speaker 2: So it's like that's a professional skydiver making a film
Speaker 2: who died, you know. I mean you can see him
Speaker 2: like realize his mistake in the air. Brutal. Yeah, but
Speaker 2: you think, like you think you can't make that mistake,
Speaker 2: but it's a mistake.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I I mean I worked on them roller coasters,
Speaker 3: you know, high runs, roller coasters, big Ferris wheels. I
Speaker 3: never harnessed up. I put the harness on. But I
Speaker 3: climbed trees as a kid like I was. I should
Speaker 3: have been an armwork, Like I'm not afraid to hide.
Speaker 3: I'm not afraid of doing all that stuff. So climbing trees.
Speaker 4: I never hardened stuff, you know, even everything I did.
Speaker 3: You know, one leg around in three one a round tree,
Speaker 3: I could, like I can throw a hang on and
Speaker 3: everything on, like no problem. But I used that lineman's
Speaker 3: belt just a few times, and I mean I got
Speaker 3: used to it in a handful of times. Being there,
Speaker 3: I'm like, man, this is way easier hanging that stand.
Speaker 3: So muscle memory kicks in and it's like, oh it's there,
Speaker 3: and it wasn't. And I'll tell you one thing. Everybody says,
Speaker 3: I'm going to be able.
Speaker 4: To grab a branch by fall, bull get you fall,
Speaker 4: Like in my head, I still remember that day. It's
Speaker 4: like I'm just grab this branch, Like it's like the
Speaker 4: branch is right there. You're not grabbing the branch, man,
Speaker 4: Like you fall and there's nothing you do about it.
Speaker 4: And I was very very lucky, you know.
Speaker 3: I fell in between like it's like a trade that
Speaker 3: was all like it hit my lightning or blew over.
Speaker 3: It was all like kind of like shredded up and
Speaker 3: I literally scraped the back of my head, you know,
Speaker 3: it was like three into one or another. I probably
Speaker 3: would have been entailed in the back of my head.
Speaker 3: And the irony is no one knew where I was,
Speaker 3: because not many people know where I hunt, you know,
Speaker 3: So it's like, but I, uh, I get a little
Speaker 3: head of myself here.
Speaker 2: But for me, this is very easy to understand and
Speaker 2: relate to. You are the kind of person who has
Speaker 2: no fear of heights, so you're very comfortable up there,
Speaker 2: but you decide to be safe use use a lineman's belt,
Speaker 2: and you get used to that, and honestly, like what
Speaker 2: you said, it's it's kind of a revelation when you
Speaker 2: first start using them because you have hands free. I mean,
Speaker 2: it's just it's so much easier to work in the tree,
Speaker 2: safer and everything. But you in your head because you've
Speaker 2: just started using this thing, you're like, I can lean
Speaker 2: back work on this tree, and you didn't have it on,
Speaker 2: so you lean back with nothing there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And they said that.
Speaker 3: To this day, I think about that. It's like what why,
Speaker 3: Like why, I mean, there is no why you know,
Speaker 3: it's just a human error in a rush because I
Speaker 3: wanted to get a bunch of spots done that day
Speaker 3: for the hurricane. So I was kind of, you know,
Speaker 3: making cutting corners a little bit. Maybe maybe I should
Speaker 3: have slowed down, but I didn't.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, dude, it happens. Yeah, I mean it happened.
Speaker 2: So you're you're how high were you?
Speaker 3: I would say fifteen yeah, my feet, my feet might
Speaker 3: have been like fifteen around that range.
Speaker 4: You have fifteen seventeen feet.
Speaker 2: Yeah, pretty average? Yeah, nothing crazy, and you you lean back,
Speaker 2: you fall, like you said everybody. I can remember when
Speaker 2: I first started bow hunting, we had those. They were
Speaker 2: like a waste safety harness that you know, went around
Speaker 2: your waist and they're built out of like the seatbelt material. Yep,
Speaker 2: big big rope or you know, like a big lineup
Speaker 2: with a arabiner on there. And I can remember when
Speaker 2: my when I started bow hunting when I was twelve,
Speaker 2: my dad bought each of us those harnesses, which we
Speaker 2: know now are terrible because you fall and end up
Speaker 2: upside down and die anyway, you just die like slower
Speaker 2: and in more pain.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: But I can remember the guys that kind of his
Speaker 2: hunting buddies at that time, we're all like, you're wearing
Speaker 2: a harness, like and they said the same thing, like, oh, man,
Speaker 2: if I fall, I'm just going to be grabbing everything.
Speaker 3: And it's like unless unless you're the thing you might
Speaker 3: be grabbing is if you're falling into the limb and
Speaker 3: maybe you get a chance, but if.
Speaker 4: You're like if you have to reach out, like you know,
Speaker 4: I've skyn eyed before. He falls pretty fast.
Speaker 3: Yeah, if there's nothing, if your feet are on the ground, like,
Speaker 3: you're moving pretty good, and you better have some you know,
Speaker 3: Bruce laites at reflexes, man, But the average person that's
Speaker 3: not no.
Speaker 2: And I mean the other lesson there too, you know,
Speaker 2: like with your old man and his injury. You know,
Speaker 2: they say one of the most important things about keeping
Speaker 2: healthy as you age, get to that is grip strength,
Speaker 2: because if you start to fall in the shower, whatever,
Speaker 2: on the boat, landing like little stupid stuff, if you
Speaker 2: can't get a hold of something and hold yourself up,
Speaker 2: you know, or rest your fall, you're in trouble. But
Speaker 2: you're never gonna do it when you're in a tree. Dude,
Speaker 2: I had a I'm gonna let you keep going here,
Speaker 2: but I tell you this, I had the only time
Speaker 2: I ever had got any kind of injury with a
Speaker 2: tree stand fall was when I was pulling a stand
Speaker 2: years ago. That was the last stand in the you know,
Speaker 2: late winter, early spring, pulling all my stands on different properties,
Speaker 2: and that was when we use screwing steps a lot.
Speaker 2: And I was up there working on that stand and
Speaker 2: both of the steps I was standing on pulled out
Speaker 2: of a tree at the same time, so I was
Speaker 2: harnessed in, but I hit my ribs on the on
Speaker 2: the seat kind of the stem. But you think, like,
Speaker 2: if anybody's listening to this and they're like, oh, you
Speaker 2: think that you're going to have like anything to react to,
Speaker 2: like any barrel roll, you're gonna do it. You have nothing.
Speaker 4: You are just huge. I'm not sure.
Speaker 3: Maybe if you're a gymnast and you're used to something
Speaker 3: like you know that, but the average person now you're
Speaker 3: you're just you're pistoning in the windo at that dude.
Speaker 2: I think the Venn diagram of gymnasts and bow hunters
Speaker 2: is it barely touches. I don't think we got a
Speaker 2: lot of gymnasts in our in our ranks, Yeah, definitely not.
Speaker 2: So you you fall out, you knew, you probably knew
Speaker 2: you screwed up instantly when you lean back, you hit.
Speaker 2: You hit the bottom there, and you're in a tree
Speaker 2: that has basically a bunch of wooden daggers sticking up
Speaker 2: because of the lightning strike. You get lucky there. What's
Speaker 2: what's like your first thought when you hit? Well, when
Speaker 2: I woke up, I came to I was supposed to
Speaker 2: meet my buddy for lunch. There was like a timeframe
Speaker 2: of buddy, Kenny, We're going to meet up for lunch.
Speaker 3: I remember falling, you know, and like trying to catch that,
Speaker 3: and I don't know, it's just my brain on replay
Speaker 3: when I came to, you know, Meanwhile, like I'm on
Speaker 3: the edge of water, Like I'm close to the water,
Speaker 3: so the place floods out. So if the hurring Thane's coming,
Speaker 3: where I am is gonna be underwater.
Speaker 4: So when I come to, I can't move, can't move
Speaker 4: my arms, can't move anything. I'm just in the dirt,
Speaker 4: breathing real heavy. And yeah, it's just.
Speaker 2: How old were you here?
Speaker 3: Thirty thirty four? Okay, thirty five, no kids yet? No wife,
Speaker 3: no kids, It's just me.
Speaker 2: But I I couldn't move And did you think you
Speaker 2: were paralyzed?
Speaker 4: Oh yeah. I was like, well this is it.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, and I tell you, this is the
Speaker 3: weird how my brain works. I lived a pretty cool life,
Speaker 3: done a lot of cool stuff. It wasn't like I
Speaker 3: was like regretful that I couldn't move. My biggest at
Speaker 3: the time was like spiders and snakes.
Speaker 4: I'm not gonna be able to have Spider's gonna crawl
Speaker 4: with me and snakes. There's nothing I can go about it.
Speaker 4: That's all. Like I'm gonna drown. I was like, and
Speaker 4: then Spider's next to a crawl on me. Not then
Speaker 4: I can't move or anything. I'm like, I didn't was
Speaker 4: like this is this is how it ends. I'm like, oh,
Speaker 4: I was like, okay, I can deal with this. But
Speaker 4: I'm like, I'm gonna drown, so horrible death probably, or
Speaker 4: I'm gonna just have have anxiety and panic attack because spiders.
Speaker 3: And snake is gonna be all over me, and you know,
Speaker 3: and then like I don't know how long I was
Speaker 3: out knocked out or how long I was having these
Speaker 3: thoughts in my brain.
Speaker 4: And then you know, it was like, what was that?
Speaker 4: Like I thought something might be like on me, like,
Speaker 4: but my body started like coming to coming.
Speaker 2: Around, like you did a hard reset there, buddy.
Speaker 4: Exactly what the guy at the hospital said.
Speaker 3: He goes, your body went in the preservation move when
Speaker 3: you felt gonna preserve all internal organ to stay alive.
Speaker 4: Everything else gets struck down.
Speaker 3: And I was like, that makes sense because you you
Speaker 3: hit head pretty good and then that impact, but it
Speaker 3: basically shattered. You can see a shatteredness to be a plateau,
Speaker 3: just like my dad's left swallowed me.
Speaker 4: I was pretty much in the same same boat.
Speaker 5: But uh, I remember being able to move, and thank goodness,
Speaker 5: my phone was in my bag on the ground, because
Speaker 5: if I would have probably had my phone in my
Speaker 5: pocket when I fell, I might have broke it.
Speaker 3: And so it was lucky I had the phone in
Speaker 3: the bag. And I remember crawling to the bag because
Speaker 3: I couldn't move my legs. My legs still weren't moving,
Speaker 3: so I'm crawling to the bag. Tell my buddy Kenny,
Speaker 3: tell him what happened. And I had to tell him
Speaker 3: where I was, and it was very painful because he's
Speaker 3: known to slide it in your spots.
Speaker 2: When you're not around classic Kenny.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So Kenny and my buddy Tony and my buddy Chair
Speaker 3: is at MT They brought a deer carn out.
Speaker 4: Jerry came out by that kind of brace.
Speaker 3: But I remember trying to pull myself off up on
Speaker 3: these trees and letting go and just fall him right
Speaker 3: back down, like.
Speaker 4: I thought my legs were done, and uh, it took
Speaker 4: me to the hospital. Oh and I remember being being
Speaker 4: in the hospital and the band like I had my
Speaker 4: good pants on and they wanted to cut.
Speaker 3: My pants and I was like, don't cut my pants.
Speaker 3: In my favorite pants and were like dickeys that were
Speaker 3: like I had them for like ten years. I was
Speaker 3: like like I could take them off. This is just
Speaker 3: let me take them off. And they're like, well, cut them.
Speaker 3: I'm like, don't cut my pants. I was like I'm already, man,
Speaker 3: Like my legs were working, but weren't working at the time.
Speaker 4: It was a weird, weird thing. And the hurricane hit.
Speaker 4: I was in the hospital, you know, for plose for
Speaker 4: two weeks.
Speaker 2: So we got a back up here. Hold on, all right,
Speaker 2: you're glassing over a lot of stuff. I want to
Speaker 2: get into buddy. First off, the just let's just acknowledge
Speaker 2: the power of a phobia. You've fallen out of a
Speaker 2: tree stand You're like, I'm I'm now paralyzed. This is
Speaker 2: this is your new reality. And two of your three
Speaker 2: biggest fears at the moment are snakes and spiders crawling
Speaker 2: on you. Where You're not in Africa, right, Like, you're
Speaker 2: not in a place where yeah you might have a
Speaker 2: spider crawl on you, but it's not going to bite
Speaker 2: you and kill you. Yeah, Like you don't have a
Speaker 2: lot of snakes out there probably that are going to
Speaker 2: be like super dangerous to you. But that's the power
Speaker 2: of a phobia like that. It's like, now all of
Speaker 2: a sudden, you can't get away from something that you
Speaker 2: have this irrational fear of. So even though you're like,
Speaker 2: well I just paralyzed myself, you're like, I hope a
Speaker 2: spider doesn't crawl on me.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3: And I was like, you don't seem like the horror
Speaker 3: movies are sitting there and like, right, somebody that is
Speaker 3: like a spider or something's coming across their face. That's
Speaker 3: all I kept thinking about. And I'm like, and why
Speaker 3: I have no idea, I pick up spiders and snakes.
Speaker 3: But that's what I reverted to in that moment. Why
Speaker 3: I have no idea, Like I'm not a fan of
Speaker 3: spiders snakes, I'll pick them up like snakes and house
Speaker 3: I'll take them out. You know, I'm a lot better
Speaker 3: now than I got kids. I should have kids, Like, oh,
Speaker 3: spiders are great. Meanwhile, I'm fifty fifties on spiders, you know.
Speaker 2: But that's me.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that.
Speaker 3: Moment, that that's all I can tell because where as
Speaker 3: I hunt there a lot, there's some big wolf looking
Speaker 3: type spiders, and it's like I just know what's there.
Speaker 3: I see black snakes and see water snakes all the time,
Speaker 3: and I'm like, God, this is it, Like this is
Speaker 3: what's going to happen.
Speaker 4: Or I drowned, So I'm like, but the drowning was
Speaker 4: like number three.
Speaker 3: On the snakes and spiders, like their drowning was coming
Speaker 3: at the bottom, which I don't know why that was.
Speaker 4: That should have been number one, but it wasn't.
Speaker 2: Dude. It's like, uh, I'm sure they've studied this or something,
Speaker 2: but it's almost like you you went back like in
Speaker 2: the time, Like no, no, it's like yeah, like I
Speaker 2: mean it's almost like you went back to like our
Speaker 2: primal roots where you're like, okay, here's here's the actual
Speaker 2: dangers I'm facing. It's nature, you know, like a wild Okay,
Speaker 2: so you get ahold of spots stealing Kenny, Yeah, and
Speaker 2: you're like you gotta come get me, but don't take
Speaker 2: my spot, like this is one of my favorite spots
Speaker 2: close to bedding area. He read he ropes in some
Speaker 2: bodies and they come out with a deer cart. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and they have they have a a neck brace for you.
Speaker 4: Yeah. My buddy, Jerry's not a hunter, he's an AMT.
Speaker 4: I called him.
Speaker 3: Him and his girlfriend came out and they had their
Speaker 3: bags like they they they're they're ready to him all
Speaker 3: the time for dis answers. So they came out because
Speaker 3: he was like, I kept trying to move. It's like,
Speaker 3: don't move, just stop trying to move. But I'm a
Speaker 3: man and like my arms work, and I'm like I
Speaker 3: need to get my legs to move. I'm going to
Speaker 3: keep pull myself off.
Speaker 4: On his branch and fall up. And it's like you know,
Speaker 4: and uh, we're they put me on a neck brace.
Speaker 3: They take all my vinyls and they put me on
Speaker 3: a deer cart and Tony has a picture of me
Speaker 3: neck brace on getting drug getting drug out with a
Speaker 3: deer cart, and every now and again he'll be like,
Speaker 3: you know, I gotta picture you at a deer cart
Speaker 3: in the neck brace and I'm like, I'm sure you do, buddy,
Speaker 3: I'm sure you do.
Speaker 2: We're your emt friend. There were you Was he worried
Speaker 2: about exacerbating this injury or were they just like, we
Speaker 2: got to get you out and you.
Speaker 4: Gotta get stabilized. Yeah. I had to get me to
Speaker 4: the road.
Speaker 3: There's a couple hundred yards to the room where the
Speaker 3: ambulance was waiting, because he was like, the people are
Speaker 3: gonna have a hard time coming back here with the stretcher.
Speaker 4: We're gonna make it.
Speaker 3: Worse, so we'll just He checked me out and he goes, okay,
Speaker 3: we're there's no internal bleeding, like your vinyls were good.
Speaker 4: Uh, your legs worry about that at another time.
Speaker 3: But your your main vitals are good, blood pressure was good,
Speaker 3: all that stuff.
Speaker 4: Man gave the go ahead for the deer car. It
Speaker 4: was like.
Speaker 3: It was like not only just embarrassing, is I Kenny
Speaker 3: is there and I know he likes to talk at
Speaker 3: the bar and tell people what happened, and like, I'm
Speaker 3: gonna lose my spot. Tony's taking picture of me on
Speaker 3: the deer car, you know what it's like. And I
Speaker 3: call him the favor, you know, like if someone comes
Speaker 3: out you get you know, friends will do anything for you,
Speaker 3: but there's like certain favors, like when that happened, you know,
Speaker 3: like use certain favors up.
Speaker 4: So now I'm like, I'm like, I'm like I'm ero
Speaker 4: for three right now, you know. So it's like whenever
Speaker 4: these kids, these guys call, whenever, I'm like, i have
Speaker 4: to drop whatever I'm doing and go. So it's like
Speaker 4: all that this is some I'm thinking, not about like
Speaker 4: being paralyzed, I can't move with my legs.
Speaker 3: I'm like, I have a lot of people favors. I'm
Speaker 3: not gonna be at this year. And it's like I'm
Speaker 3: on a deer car, you know what I'm saying. All
Speaker 3: these things were in my head instead of like what
Speaker 3: I should have been focused on, you know, and I
Speaker 3: just I just bought this house I'm in. You know,
Speaker 3: I also have an all this. You know, I wasn't
Speaker 3: worried about any of it. I was just worried about
Speaker 3: owing people favors which you got to pay back, you know.
Speaker 2: Of course, do you do you think you were sort
Speaker 2: of in I mean, obviously you're probably in shock, right.
Speaker 2: Do you think that you were just you kind of
Speaker 2: just maybe your brain was like not letting you fully
Speaker 2: grasp the situation, distracting you a little bit. Or do
Speaker 2: you think you just didn't think it was that bad?
Speaker 4: I I take I've talked to you know.
Speaker 3: I went to seen a therapist you know about this
Speaker 3: because I was not upset that my legs weren't necessarily
Speaker 3: working like it didn't never, it wasn't important. Maybe because
Speaker 3: you know, I lived a pretty good aggressive I kind
Speaker 3: of did whatever I wanted to do, you know, I
Speaker 3: got I got to a point life when it second,
Speaker 3: it's a lot of cool shit, man, like I'm I'm okay,
Speaker 3: this is where it is, and and he just says
Speaker 3: people just handle trauma differently.
Speaker 4: But I never got upset that my legs weren't I
Speaker 4: couldn't lift my legs up the whole time. They even
Speaker 4: like in the hospital after surgery.
Speaker 3: And coming home i'd be standing up, I'll just fall
Speaker 3: to the ground, you know, like I couldn't do anything.
Speaker 4: My legs just stop working. And they could never figure
Speaker 4: out why that happened. They don't know, I've got scams
Speaker 4: and all that other stuff. They could never figure out
Speaker 4: why signals from my brain.
Speaker 3: I probably got some type of trauma in the brain,
Speaker 3: you know that might come back to bite me when
Speaker 3: I'm seventy, you know.
Speaker 2: But they so they never figured out where the disconnect
Speaker 2: was there.
Speaker 3: No, because it's not never consistent enough, like it would
Speaker 3: happen and then I'd be good and it won't have
Speaker 3: any issues, any problem. So it's like it's hard I
Speaker 3: fix things for a living. It's hard to fix something
Speaker 3: if it was not acting up when you're there, Like hey,
Speaker 3: the machines bobbly.
Speaker 4: You go there and it's fine. They're like, I don't
Speaker 4: even know where to begin to look like they did EKGs.
Speaker 4: And also everything was fine. So I haven't had any episodes. Uh,
Speaker 4: probably three months after the injury was probably like the
Speaker 4: last one.
Speaker 2: All right, So your buddies get you out on the
Speaker 2: deer cart to the ambulance. What's the uh? Are you
Speaker 2: in pain or are you just going with the flow?
Speaker 4: At that point, mixture both traveling.
Speaker 3: Maybe like a little bit of fear, like since aware
Speaker 3: that your feet their legs aren't working very well.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I didn't want to like focus on you know, like, hey,
Speaker 3: I can't move. I'm trying to like focus on trying
Speaker 3: to maintain because I've had a lot of injuries before that,
Speaker 3: you know, snowboarding and mountain biking, so like, I know,
Speaker 3: like the whole injury game where you can't really change
Speaker 3: what happened.
Speaker 4: All you gotta do is just keep looking.
Speaker 2: You know, what you do have, what you not necessarily
Speaker 2: what you don't have, right, I mean, you can't go
Speaker 2: back up the tree and do it all.
Speaker 3: No, exactly, And the any time I was really truly
Speaker 3: in pain, I remember being in the hospital and they
Speaker 3: tried to straighten my leg for some reason, I don't know,
Speaker 3: Like they literally trying to straighten the leg that's grenated,
Speaker 3: like I had like a small little piece of bone
Speaker 3: sticking out on one side of the skin, like it
Speaker 3: was completely grenated. And for some reason this nerve tried
Speaker 3: straightened my legs, and my girlfriend at the time, she said,
Speaker 3: you literally areked backwards, you know, and my head was
Speaker 3: near my ass, like I went like in the hospital
Speaker 3: bed like full like extra style, and it was like
Speaker 3: and she goes, you just let out this weird guttural
Speaker 3: scream and then it just stopped and you were like
Speaker 3: to tent and lady stopped and whoever came in stopped
Speaker 3: making make them from doing it, because I think it
Speaker 3: wanted to put a brace on my leg for some reason.
Speaker 3: I don't know, but I'm like, that's the like, but
Speaker 3: it really felt like pain. And in that moment, you know,
Speaker 3: you're like, Okay, if I can feel that, I should
Speaker 3: be good because if I was like all these things
Speaker 3: kind of like connect at weird different times, it's like
Speaker 3: I felt that, like really felt that, So I'm good,
Speaker 3: good enough, like my leg will work, you know.
Speaker 4: Maybe.
Speaker 2: So in that moment, you were actually kind of relieved
Speaker 2: by the pain because in your brain you're like, okay,
Speaker 2: you don't get this.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, they were moving it like nothing.
Speaker 3: It's like almost numb, like I can feel like I
Speaker 3: can feel people touching me, but I couldn't feel like
Speaker 3: like there was no pain until that that lady were
Speaker 3: really torqued.
Speaker 4: On my leg. There. It was like, all right, cool,
Speaker 4: I'm a I'm a lot better than I thought I was.
Speaker 2: All right, So you get you get in there, do
Speaker 2: you think I mean, I I suppose when they when
Speaker 2: you come in like that, they have to assess you
Speaker 2: for everything, and probably their main concern is your spine
Speaker 2: and just figuring out what's or you know, your brain whatever,
Speaker 2: figuring that out. And then they start assessing the you know,
Speaker 2: the the injuries that maybe aren't going to kill you,
Speaker 2: like your knee, but are gonna gonna be a real issue.
Speaker 3: U do they?
Speaker 2: So you you get in there, they they do. They
Speaker 2: keep you conscious like so they can go through your injuries.
Speaker 3: Yeah, else else in and out. They're giving me some drugs.
Speaker 3: I don't know what they were giving me. What I
Speaker 3: would was it was just knocked me out. I mean,
Speaker 3: it's putting me right out. And then uh, I don't
Speaker 3: remember getting a wheel to surgery. But like it was
Speaker 3: this happened during a hurricane, so like there's a massive
Speaker 3: hurricane going on as I'm.
Speaker 4: In the hospital.
Speaker 3: So the MRI there and got cat scanned, they did
Speaker 3: all that stuff. They said, I had a big scar,
Speaker 3: you know, a big thing in the back of my head.
Speaker 4: They're worried about, they said, the spine in the brain.
Speaker 4: Making sure all that was working.
Speaker 3: But as far as like the the knee injury, I
Speaker 3: don't I don't remember getting wheeled to surgery or like
Speaker 3: anything like or being signing papers to get the surgery done.
Speaker 4: Like it was just like it needed to be done.
Speaker 4: I was probably out and they're like, well, he's not
Speaker 4: he's not on that right. Yeah, I said, it's doing
Speaker 4: a hurricane.
Speaker 3: Like no one was out there in the hospital after hours,
Speaker 3: So it's like after me eight pm, it's on my
Speaker 3: own and like my house flooded.
Speaker 4: We lost power to my house for like two days.
Speaker 4: Like I had friends coming here trying to get myself
Speaker 4: pumps working my basement. I'm getting flooded. You know.
Speaker 2: It was just like it's a dude, they were just
Speaker 2: racking up the favors. Huh yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So do you know do you know if the spot
Speaker 2: you fell flooded in that hurricane.
Speaker 4: It'll it'll flood under a high tide.
Speaker 2: Oh really so not only so you would have been
Speaker 2: underwater there eventually if you couldn't have got a yeah,
Speaker 2: under high.
Speaker 4: Tide, I probably be damn close, really like right close.
Speaker 4: Maybe not drowning, but you know, damn close to it.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean getting your arms back would have helped.
Speaker 2: But yeah, that would be uh yeah right right that
Speaker 2: that's like how they used to uh you know, they
Speaker 2: used to like shackle somebody low tide, you know, and
Speaker 2: then let the tide roll back in and you got
Speaker 2: to think about that rising water for six hours or
Speaker 2: however long.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's uh, it's weird.
Speaker 3: Like I said, to go to physical therapy and like,
Speaker 3: uh see a specialists and all that stuff, and the
Speaker 3: one guy he was like, you don't see him bothered
Speaker 3: by this? I was like, was I get bothered by?
Speaker 3: I can't change what happened. I can't get mad myself.
Speaker 3: I can't like regrets one of those like emotions. It's
Speaker 3: just waste that you're just regretting what. Don't get yourself angry?
Speaker 3: And I already had enough.
Speaker 4: It's just going on. Uh huh. So I was just
Speaker 4: trying to.
Speaker 3: Save stay as positive as I could, you know, because
Speaker 3: literally almost lost his house.
Speaker 4: I bought it, you know, in June.
Speaker 3: This happened in August, so I pretty much wiped out
Speaker 3: everything I had yo and then like I was going
Speaker 3: to work for six months, Like disability don't pay crap.
Speaker 3: Anybody's been disabled for a long time. Four hundred hours
Speaker 3: a week is nothing. I mean when it used to
Speaker 3: making eight or nine. Four hundred is nothing, right, you know.
Speaker 3: So the financial stream.
Speaker 4: Was tough, the emotional pull, but I will say one
Speaker 4: thing and or is it? What theer is it? That's
Speaker 4: this one right there.
Speaker 3: So I went to the doctors and had brace crutches,
Speaker 3: and the doctor was like, I kept saying, you know,
Speaker 3: because I have.
Speaker 2: I got time.
Speaker 4: I was competing, so I'm a archery too, So I
Speaker 4: was meeting with him once it supposed we shoot my bow.
Speaker 4: You know, he's getting the arom on crusts. I'm shooting
Speaker 4: like hunting kept me in a positive light to get
Speaker 4: back that deer there, the doctor says. I was like,
Speaker 4: can I go hut? And he goes. You can try
Speaker 4: walking with the normal brains like.
Speaker 3: A Dondroy yoga hinge brace you know, and try to
Speaker 3: get out and see how that goes.
Speaker 4: So I was like, awesome. Next morning I shot him.
Speaker 4: I crawled. I have I have a lot more climber.
Speaker 4: I go. I go all the way back there and
Speaker 4: I had to walk like maybe like three hundred yards.
Speaker 4: It's November seventh, I think I remember. Gets to your tree.
Speaker 3: I'm exhausted and with a climber, so my knee still
Speaker 3: not good. I'm climbing up a tree, but a climber
Speaker 3: I might have got like ten feet. I was in
Speaker 3: so much pain. It hurt so bad. I remember sitting down,
Speaker 3: was like I shouldn't even be here, like this is
Speaker 3: a bad idea, no ship huh yeah? And then that
Speaker 3: guy shows up. I ended up shooting him. I had
Speaker 3: to call Kenny again.
Speaker 4: Because it was normal week. He's laid off, and I'm like,
Speaker 4: I just shot a bucket.
Speaker 3: I can't come out of the woods. So he comes
Speaker 3: out and uh, he walks them the deer. Deer is
Speaker 3: not dead, so he has to shoot it again. You
Speaker 3: know I have, but so he has to drag.
Speaker 4: He has to drag. He drug.
Speaker 3: He drunk me out in the woods a few months prior,
Speaker 3: and then he stopped dragging that deer out.
Speaker 4: And looks for me. So it was a pretty cool
Speaker 4: moment here.
Speaker 2: You know, did you were you wearing a safety hardness
Speaker 2: when he killed that buck Yeah? Yeah, not a full man.
Speaker 2: I was hoping you were going to say yes.
Speaker 3: Well, I ordered like I hate full body harnesses. I
Speaker 3: always wore the waist spelt that was my thing. So
Speaker 3: I girth hitched waste belt and uh that's what I used.
Speaker 4: But it was like, oh it was it was tough.
Speaker 3: You know, it was cool I killed that buck, you know,
Speaker 3: like the doctor like said, you know, like hunting was
Speaker 3: the other thing that kept me going therapy hard, like
Speaker 3: not taking anything for granted, like really like pushing hard,
Speaker 3: and uh like hunting got me through the darkest part
Speaker 3: of that. It's like okay, like I'm good, Like, okay,
Speaker 3: I did this. And then the lastern I killed the muzzloader.
Speaker 3: I killed him first day, and mussload a couple of
Speaker 3: days after I killed him. Two weeks after I killed him,
Speaker 3: Muscled came in and shot that big eight, nice eight
Speaker 3: with the muzzle litter.
Speaker 4: It's had a pretty good season after what happened, you.
Speaker 2: Know, dude. So like I work in the dog space
Speaker 2: quite a bit too, Like I love bird dogs and
Speaker 2: just I love dogs. And one of the things that's
Speaker 2: really interesting about dog like work, sporting dogs, working dogs,
Speaker 2: is they get a catastrophic injury and they heal up
Speaker 2: really fast. And I've asked a lot, you know, like
Speaker 2: crazy shit, right, like think about a German short hair pointer.
Speaker 2: You let them out of the truck and they go
Speaker 2: a thousand miles an hour over a cattle grate and
Speaker 2: get their legs stuck in there and twist it, you know,
Speaker 2: completely the wrong way, the shoulder or whatever. Shit like that,
Speaker 2: or eating like catfish bait with a treble hook in it,
Speaker 2: running away and setting the hook into their esophagus. That
Speaker 2: kind of shit, right, And I've talked to a bunch
Speaker 2: of different veterinarians about this, and they're always like dogs,
Speaker 2: heel up, so far asked, and I'm always like why, Like,
Speaker 2: what's what's the secret? It's because they don't have a
Speaker 2: pity party for themselves. They don't anyway. So when you
Speaker 2: talk about this is one of the things about this
Speaker 2: month of episodes that's really kind of driven home for
Speaker 2: me is we think about the injury, right, Like you
Speaker 2: think about how how traumatic that injury is, but you
Speaker 2: don't think about the emotional weight for everybody else around
Speaker 2: you or the okay, like you can walk again, that's great,
Speaker 2: you can you know, they worked on your knee, Like
Speaker 2: you're going to be back out there. You're out killing
Speaker 2: deer pretty quickly afterwards. But you've got a house payment,
Speaker 2: a brand new house payment you can't make, and the
Speaker 2: stress of that. And so when people when you when
Speaker 2: you think about this kind of stuff.
Speaker 4: It's like.
Speaker 2: Our audience will understand it to some extent when you
Speaker 2: say deer hunting and the prospect of going deer hunting
Speaker 2: was a lot for you, not only just mentally to like,
Speaker 2: I got to get back out there. That's the thing
Speaker 2: that I need to like fill my cup up, but
Speaker 2: also just go kick ass at PT and get better.
Speaker 2: That kind of thing instead of just sitting there wallowing
Speaker 2: in yourself pity changes the arc of your recovery.
Speaker 3: I've had a lot of I said, before this leg injury,
Speaker 3: I had countless surgeries and one thing I found out. Yeah,
Speaker 3: it's it's tough. It's harsh saying it, but people only
Speaker 3: care so much about your well being, so they have
Speaker 3: their own lives. Like before I had kids. It might
Speaker 3: be different now because they got a wife and kids.
Speaker 3: But when I was alone, it's like I spent a
Speaker 3: lot on you know, I manage it this. In my
Speaker 3: early twenties, I was in the hospital for two weeks
Speaker 3: pretty much alone. People's got their lives going on.
Speaker 4: So yeah, we'll get there tomorrow. We'll get there tomorrow.
Speaker 3: Very few people came and see me, you know, some
Speaker 3: friends and workers, you know, my dad was working. It
Speaker 3: was kind of like, well whatever, so a couple of
Speaker 3: knee surgeries, no one comes to see you, Like, no
Speaker 3: one really cares.
Speaker 4: It's like that that level of caring stops.
Speaker 3: Because well, people have their own lives. There, every own
Speaker 3: problems to deal with. So it's like, while I'm a pity,
Speaker 3: no one cares. While I call it the e or mentality,
Speaker 3: Well with me, no one cares.
Speaker 4: Like I don't want to be around those people. So
Speaker 4: it's like why would I behave the same way. So
Speaker 4: it's like just accept.
Speaker 3: Whatever is happening, you know, and move forward, Like regret
Speaker 3: what do you regret? Regrets all in the past. All
Speaker 3: you got is here now, Like move forward.
Speaker 4: You're busted up. Good work through a problem, you know,
Speaker 4: work through your problem.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 4: Then I came home.
Speaker 3: I'm laying in the hospital bed in my house and uh,
Speaker 3: just laying there just power of them alone, just thinking.
Speaker 4: And I was like, once I got home from the hospital,
Speaker 4: never really checked on me. You know. I was like,
Speaker 4: you know, a girlfriendmost worked, and you know, then my girlfriend's.
Speaker 3: Dad at the time, Like she got six, she wasn't here,
Speaker 3: like I was litterly alone. My buddy's like they got jobs,
Speaker 3: kids and stuff like that. So it's like you have
Speaker 3: a lot of time to think.
Speaker 4: It's like.
Speaker 3: Something that bad ever happens to me, like me falling
Speaker 3: out a tree. If I would have paralyzed, I would
Speaker 3: have screwed everyone's lives off, because not only mine, but
Speaker 3: everyone around me, because now they got to take care
Speaker 3: of me, They got to run me here, they got
Speaker 3: to do this. So it's like you have all these
Speaker 3: time to think, and it's like I gotta mentally get
Speaker 3: myself right and get out and do things I enjoyed
Speaker 3: because sitting in this bed, you know, I was like,
Speaker 3: it's not it's not for me.
Speaker 4: You can probably cut my length off. I'm still going
Speaker 4: out in the woods. I'm still gonna I'm gonna find
Speaker 4: a way to get out in the woods, shoot my
Speaker 4: bet and do things that for my my own mental
Speaker 4: state I need to do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But I mean, that's it. It's so poignant to
Speaker 2: hear you talk about that. Like I just wrote about
Speaker 2: this with uh the situation where you know, the non
Speaker 2: resident resident thing where you know, residents are like, we
Speaker 2: got to kick non residents out so I have better hunting.
Speaker 2: Like there's always there's always a reason. We can always
Speaker 2: find a reason to not be successful, or we can
Speaker 2: always find a reason to not have the fun that
Speaker 2: we think we should or whatever. And I just keep
Speaker 2: looking at this. I'm like everybody I know who's a
Speaker 2: really good white tail hunter, like you, We know lots
Speaker 2: of the same people who go out and kind of
Speaker 2: get it done wherever they wherever they hunt. It's because
Speaker 2: you accept that you have sole agency over this, like
Speaker 2: it's it's on you. You know, you might have somebody
Speaker 2: come in and walk in on your setup at some point.
Speaker 2: I mean, you're going to write or you're gonna you're
Speaker 2: gonna be on Plan C for the night because there's
Speaker 2: trucks parked wherever. That's just like a little part of
Speaker 2: the game. But but you going out and scouting and
Speaker 2: you like planning those hunts and doing doing your thing.
Speaker 2: It's just on you. Like that, just the failure just
Speaker 2: as much as a success. And so when you talk
Speaker 2: about this that's so important to acknowledge. It's like you're right,
Speaker 2: nobody's sitting there like, oh, I you know, they're like, yeah,
Speaker 2: I feel bad for Greg, but I have to go
Speaker 2: pay my mortgage. I got to take care of my kids.
Speaker 2: He's a tough dude. He'll recover just fine. And you
Speaker 2: are there responsible for finding that thing that's going to
Speaker 2: drive you to keep going.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and uh, you know.
Speaker 3: I've gotten over now with kids, Like I still think
Speaker 3: about that, you know, like if something ever happens to me,
Speaker 3: if I'm hunting like now, like like the saddles came about,
Speaker 3: you know, like big so like I gravitated towards the
Speaker 3: saddle pretty much because like the safety aspect of it,
Speaker 3: like Okay, I'm from here there and down like I'm complete.
Speaker 4: I'm you know, I'm connected. I love that part.
Speaker 3: And it's like there are some times I'll stand like
Speaker 3: one stick just and I'll time up set the other
Speaker 3: stick and I'm like I shouldn't be I shouldn't even
Speaker 3: be five ft off the ground, and it's like the
Speaker 3: lineman's literally like right here on my thing. And it's like,
Speaker 3: you know, and like that AWAYS tell my daughter because
Speaker 3: you get in the cars, like sometimes I'll forget my
Speaker 3: safety belt. I always tell ant. I'm like yell at
Speaker 3: me if I forget to put my belt on because
Speaker 3: I'm trying to help you. Sometimes I forget and shivel
Speaker 3: like dad, your belt, safety first, and it's like, you know,
Speaker 3: it's like and it's like, so it's like I still
Speaker 3: forget because I'm I'm strapping her and doing this and
Speaker 3: I put it in reverse, you know, and I go
Speaker 3: and I'm like, I.
Speaker 4: May have my dun on. What's this beeping noise? It's
Speaker 4: a safety belt, And the show remind me. I'm like
Speaker 4: that safety first, and I'm like it's still to this day.
Speaker 3: You know, it's like come on, man, Like I'm forty
Speaker 3: six years old and I still cut corners and it's
Speaker 3: like and you're.
Speaker 4: Running gautlet you know, you take chances with anything. My job,
Speaker 4: I do some sketchy shit sometimes at work and you're like.
Speaker 3: Bruh, shouldn't have done that, hey, but the job's done.
Speaker 3: But it's like, come on, man, like you know better,
Speaker 3: like overreaching to get this boat.
Speaker 4: You're like, I got this, and it's like why you
Speaker 4: even doing on that night?
Speaker 2: Well? And I mean so my my wife is a
Speaker 2: physical therapist, right, and she worked at a pain clinic
Speaker 2: for a long time. She's dealt with a lot of
Speaker 2: people with random injuries, wild wild shit, right, and you
Speaker 2: always think, you know, like in the hunting space, people
Speaker 2: are always like, oh, have you seen a mountain lion?
Speaker 2: Have you ever ran into grizzly, a rattlesnake? Whatever? And
Speaker 2: I'm like, it's it's that's not what's going to get yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, like that's you're going to run a broadhead
Speaker 2: through your thigh doing something stupid, or you're going to
Speaker 2: fall out of a tree. And you know you mentioned
Speaker 2: even you put up one section of sticks, right, go
Speaker 2: to the next one. So like you said, your feet
Speaker 2: are maybe four to six feet off the ground, and
Speaker 2: you're like, big deal, right, well if you fall out
Speaker 2: of that. My wife has treated patients who've been paralyzed
Speaker 2: for falling out of hammocks, you know what I mean,
Speaker 2: Like stuff where you're just like, no, way, that's two feet.
Speaker 2: I did a I was at a media event one
Speaker 2: time years ago and there was a guy there who
Speaker 2: had he was six feet up doing what we're talking about,
Speaker 2: and fell six feet and he shattered both of his ankles.
Speaker 2: I mean you're talking like, like you said, like a
Speaker 2: life changing injury, you know, not not life threatening, but
Speaker 2: your quality of life, the future of your life changes
Speaker 2: in that moment from a six foot fall. You know,
Speaker 2: just it's crazy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like Osha, they always say like most like in
Speaker 3: a workplace fall him or like under six feet are
Speaker 3: someone most fatal, And you're like six feet You're like,
Speaker 3: it's just a step lane, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: But you fall, hit your head, you know, Like I
Speaker 3: know guys that have bumped their head and get brain bleeds,
Speaker 3: they'll know, go to bed and don't wake up.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 3: Then you're like guys that go hiking fall a trail,
Speaker 3: hit their heads, snowboarders like skateboards, all this stuff, and
Speaker 3: it's like he's just you never know, like some people
Speaker 3: just lucky, some people aren't. It's there's no rhyme or
Speaker 3: reason though it's your time.
Speaker 4: I guess it's your.
Speaker 2: Time, dude. I've never had like a bad, bad injury
Speaker 2: in the outdoors, but it is always it's something, you know,
Speaker 2: like I when I had that fence break on me
Speaker 2: in Oklahoma, and I thought I ripped my nuts off.
Speaker 2: I'm crossing the fence. You're crossing the fence, you know,
Speaker 2: I mean, how many times in a year do we
Speaker 2: cross barberer fences? Yeah, you know, or I mean I was.
Speaker 2: I was cutting up a deer one time. This is
Speaker 2: I was pretty young this time, but I was cutting
Speaker 2: like a leg bone with a saw over my like
Speaker 2: above my head. It was hanging up, yeah, and a
Speaker 2: piece of bone came out and hit me in the
Speaker 2: eye and I rubbed it and scratched right across my eye.
Speaker 2: And you know, I mean, just dumb, right, And I
Speaker 2: had it was day one I had the I had
Speaker 2: a five days after a hunt the rut, and I
Speaker 2: killed a dough And the whole time I'm sitting in
Speaker 2: a tree stand with a scratch in my eye in
Speaker 2: that you know, like twenty five degree wind blowing in
Speaker 2: and there's just twears running down my face the whole time,
Speaker 2: and like this is so like such a stupid like
Speaker 2: things like.
Speaker 4: That happen, you know, cattails. So the same year I
Speaker 4: broke I found on a tree.
Speaker 3: So we're gun, honey, We're I'm doing drys for people
Speaker 3: in through the swamp. On this hand here, No, it's
Speaker 3: actually this hand here right here, a cat tail went.
Speaker 4: And blayed me. I'm walking to the swamp.
Speaker 3: I'm like, man, some shut deer's blood everywhere here it
Speaker 3: is me. I'm like, oh my goodness, like everymbe was
Speaker 3: like I take off, like turn me. It's just pouring
Speaker 3: out of my hand. I'm going they we're like knee
Speaker 3: deep swamp and I'm like and like an idiot, I
Speaker 3: put my hand in the water, like to wash it all.
Speaker 4: Well. Know, So I'm like that was a tough idea.
Speaker 4: And I was like, I had to go get stitches
Speaker 4: on the top of my hand.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, from my cat, how many cattails are
Speaker 3: all going through, dude, thousands of miles of cattails.
Speaker 4: Never you know, you get him an eye whenever we
Speaker 4: like it cut me like a razor.
Speaker 3: It was, say, I don't even understand this, and like
Speaker 3: they're all laughing at me because I got this brace
Speaker 3: on my left leg.
Speaker 4: I go to the same hospital I got my legs
Speaker 4: fixed on. It's like like some days it's just not
Speaker 4: you man, Like some years he's CA's the.
Speaker 2: Wrong end of you know. We we think about these
Speaker 2: environments that we're really used to, like you, I mean,
Speaker 2: I mean cattails all the time, cattail swamps all the
Speaker 2: freaking time, And you think like you know, you always
Speaker 2: look at like Africa ors you know, some other Australia
Speaker 2: and you're like, that's so dangerous, like that ground like,
Speaker 2: but we're just used to the ground we're in, right,
Speaker 2: and it's not the same kind of dangers. But you know,
Speaker 2: like you talking about that. Uh. One of my really
Speaker 2: good buddies, he was pheasant hunting in South Dakota with
Speaker 2: his dogs and his dog he noticed his dog was
Speaker 2: sneezing and pawing at its face. So he walked up
Speaker 2: to it and he could see a little piece of
Speaker 2: cattail stem sticking out of his nose and so he said,
Speaker 2: he pulled it out and it was like six inches long,
Speaker 2: and he said the blood started shooting out, and he
Speaker 2: said he ran back to his truck through that dog
Speaker 2: in the front of his truck didn't create him. And
Speaker 2: he said by the time he got to the emergency vet,
Speaker 2: it looked like he had butchered his steer in the
Speaker 2: front of his truck. Yeah, I mean, just from a
Speaker 2: freaking cattail yep.
Speaker 3: And it's like I had a cat. They had a
Speaker 3: piece of grass stuff in his nasal cavity. I'd take
Speaker 3: it to the fan and they wanted to put it
Speaker 3: down because he could put what was wrong. So the
Speaker 3: one vet was I went there and I put out this.
Speaker 3: It was like an eight inch piece of grass.
Speaker 4: It was just infected in there. And they're like, oh
Speaker 4: my god, this is horrible. And I was like, but
Speaker 4: it was just in there.
Speaker 3: Lord knows how long it was in there, and it
Speaker 3: just got an affection down those lungs and everything. But
Speaker 3: I'm like a piece of grass, like a long blated grass,
Speaker 3: almost killed my cat, you.
Speaker 2: Know, right, And it's stuff like that. I mean, I
Speaker 2: had a few years ago. I can't remember if I've
Speaker 2: ever talked about this on here, but I fell through
Speaker 2: the ice pheasant hunting in a cattail slew and it
Speaker 2: was like nineteen below that morning, and I fell through.
Speaker 2: The only time I've ever fallen through were I couldn't touch,
Speaker 2: you know, you fall through and the cattails quite a bit,
Speaker 2: hey touch whatever you get out. I fell through that time,
Speaker 2: couldn't touch, and ended up kind of weaseling my way
Speaker 2: over to get a hold of the cattails next to
Speaker 2: me and pulled myself out.
Speaker 4: Yep.
Speaker 2: And as I was walking out, my dog got Birdie
Speaker 2: right away and I'm like, well, I'm gonna I'm going
Speaker 2: back to my truck, but she flushes the rooster. I'm
Speaker 2: gonna shoot it, and she flushed because I'm like, I
Speaker 2: gotta go that way anyway. Yeah, And I mean it's brutal,
Speaker 2: brutal cold, and I'm walking out and Luna flushed the
Speaker 2: rooster in front of me. I pulled up and my
Speaker 2: gun was frozen from the barrel to the butt. Dude,
Speaker 2: like just a block of ice. It wasn't gonna work
Speaker 2: at all.
Speaker 3: But yeah, that's that's a like bird hunters. My uncles
Speaker 3: were big. They traveled the country bird hunt and ground hunting,
Speaker 3: and they would go out to you know, Fen all
Speaker 3: out west there, and like my I live. We live
Speaker 3: in the coastal area. So it's duck hunters, right, I've
Speaker 3: been duck.
Speaker 4: On some duck hunters.
Speaker 3: There's some there's some hardcore dudes, like they will drag
Speaker 3: their canoe or boat across an ice field, just breaking
Speaker 3: through the whole time.
Speaker 4: Let's go shoot some ducks. You know. It's like, I've
Speaker 4: been duck hunting a few times and it's like this
Speaker 4: is this could not end well for us, because it's
Speaker 4: like you're out the middle of nowhere, the winds just
Speaker 4: going and you're like, we don't know.
Speaker 3: It's just like because it's high time and low tide
Speaker 3: here and it's just ic. So you're walking on like
Speaker 3: you might be three feet from the water sometimes, you know.
Speaker 3: So it's like it's just sketchy. Like I'm not a
Speaker 3: fan of duck hunt anymore. Like if I'm duk on,
Speaker 3: I'm like a fair one of the duck hunter.
Speaker 4: Like, oh, you got a spot behind your house and
Speaker 4: a blind right cool revolves a boat.
Speaker 2: I'm good man, it's right, it's gonna be sixty degrees
Speaker 2: and Sonny, we're gonna shoot some wood ducks in October. Sure, yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm all about that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, thing like right, people that go in that
Speaker 3: sub I don't even I don't even here hut when
Speaker 3: it subs here anymore.
Speaker 4: Like it's just I don't enjoy it. I don't.
Speaker 3: I don't get a reward from him anymore, maybe because
Speaker 3: I'm just old and it's cold. But dude, if it's
Speaker 3: extreme cold, now, I'm good.
Speaker 2: I I still will sometimes, but it never I've never
Speaker 2: hunted a situation where you know, people will be like, oh,
Speaker 2: it's if it's that cold, just go sit the food
Speaker 2: plot or whatever, and they're going to pour in there.
Speaker 2: It's always just been me freezing my ass off, not
Speaker 2: seeing any deer killing anything or you know, you walk
Speaker 2: out and when it gets that cold, the snow is
Speaker 2: like that's squeaky crunchy, just like right, it's just a
Speaker 2: bad idea.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I'll go out winter blow if I
Speaker 3: need some, Like the last week, a couple of food plots,
Speaker 3: I'll it on the ground to shoot it. The birth
Speaker 3: Day comes out and wanted to shoot and by the
Speaker 3: time they come out, like I'm just a frozen popsicle
Speaker 3: and it's like and it's like I'm just pulling. You
Speaker 3: got so much clothes on it, just pull them back.
Speaker 3: You're like, I'm not super active with it. So it's
Speaker 3: like just like twenty yards and under, and it's like
Speaker 3: shoot that deer. It's so cold that deer will going
Speaker 3: like forty yards and it's like you get the arrow
Speaker 3: and the bluffs are like frozen on the air.
Speaker 4: You're like, it's cold, man, this and this is New Jersey.
Speaker 3: So it's like we don't get negative nineteen like we
Speaker 3: might get like twelve thirteen degrees, so I couldn't imagine
Speaker 3: dude negatives with a windshewl like hunting.
Speaker 2: It's it sucks. I mean, we we had I know,
Speaker 2: we kind of veered way off course here, but I
Speaker 2: went out a couple of years ago with buddies of
Speaker 2: mine and we in Minnesota, we can start at nine
Speaker 2: o'clock in the morning for pheasants, nine o'clock till sunset,
Speaker 2: so we're kind of at the truck whatever, and it's cold,
Speaker 2: I mean cold, cold, blowziero all day. But you know,
Speaker 2: in those conditions, those birds are going to be in
Speaker 2: the best geo thermal cover, which is usually the cattails,
Speaker 2: like they're they're in preservation mode. So we go down
Speaker 2: and there's a stream through this slew that we always
Speaker 2: cross and get into the thick stuff and get where
Speaker 2: a lot of people won't go. We go to cross
Speaker 2: this stream and my dog, one of my dogs, jumps
Speaker 2: up ahead of me and breaks through. So the ice
Speaker 2: cracks and my right foot goes in. Nothing, you know,
Speaker 2: no big deal. We get wet almost every time we
Speaker 2: fazen haunts, so it's like whatever. But it was it
Speaker 2: was crazy cold, and I didn't think about it. So
Speaker 2: I started the day with a frozen boot and by
Speaker 2: the time we got to the cat or sorry, by
Speaker 2: the time we got through those cat tails and haunted
Speaker 2: and ended the day, which is, you know, eight hours
Speaker 2: later or whatever. Seven and a half hours later, we
Speaker 2: go to the hotel and I take off my boots,
Speaker 2: you know, and you're just beat up from hunting all day.
Speaker 2: And I look at my toe and it's like black,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, oh shit. And so I texted my
Speaker 2: wife and she's like, I don't know, just like watch
Speaker 2: it and dude, that my toenail fell off. I mean,
Speaker 2: it was like it was like a It wasn't like
Speaker 2: a bad injury, but it was just a straight pain
Speaker 2: in the ass for months. Yeah, just over just just
Speaker 2: because it's you mix water and super cold temperatures and
Speaker 2: it's freaking dangerous.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like uh yeah, extreme cold, extreme heat. Like
Speaker 3: I'll last year and it was like it was hot
Speaker 3: like the first week of the season. I'm just like you,
Speaker 3: I'm questioning what I'm doing out here because it's like
Speaker 3: it's so hot, Like I'm having a hard time breathing.
Speaker 4: It's like get to the trades, like I'm honting in
Speaker 4: some pine and so it's.
Speaker 3: Like there's not a lot of cover. It's just like
Speaker 3: it's a far wall to get right, and you know,
Speaker 3: I'm like I can't breathe. I'm like, I'm just going through,
Speaker 3: like I carry a lot of water. I'm got down
Speaker 3: the water in the early season. It's like I'm just
Speaker 3: just chugging it. I'm like, I'm not gonna have any
Speaker 3: water left for the rest of the day. It's like
Speaker 3: I get to the tree, climb up and it's just
Speaker 3: like oil and go and sweating. I'm like, it's like
Speaker 3: I'm leaking oil. All that were I didn't see nothing
Speaker 3: like walking out so humid, the walking, I was like,
Speaker 3: what am I even doing out here? It's like I
Speaker 3: should have hunting water, Like, oh, that's fun, that's I'm
Speaker 3: gonna hunt this clear cut, this clear cut that the
Speaker 3: state you know, cleaned up for what.
Speaker 4: Man, is that hot? You need to be water. It's
Speaker 4: like water. I would have felt better in the water.
Speaker 4: So I'm like, I have one of the little emergency straws.
Speaker 3: I'm like, I couldn't drink cut a mup puddle it
Speaker 3: was so hot, you know, little stake it was like
Speaker 3: just to moralize, like why am I even going out there?
Speaker 4: Like it's like antelope punting for like and not seeing
Speaker 4: any and it was brutile.
Speaker 2: Dude. I I know that I know that I'm probably
Speaker 2: in like the way minority here, but I love hot
Speaker 2: weather for white tails. I could just it's not fun.
Speaker 2: It's not fun, you know the same thing that the
Speaker 2: last elk I killed a couple of years ago. It
Speaker 2: wasn't fun at all. But I'm hunting water holes and
Speaker 2: it was it was hot, and I'm like, you just
Speaker 2: know something's coming in and you know people aren't going
Speaker 2: to be out there. And that's like if you, for
Speaker 2: my if I had to draw up like a perfect
Speaker 2: scenario for public land hunting, it's gonna be way like
Speaker 2: unseasonably hot, you know, eighties, nineties whatever, and I have
Speaker 2: a water pattern to work. That's my dream, dude, because
Speaker 2: you know, I mean, it's like you said, it sucks,
Speaker 2: like it's not fun. But when you're like positioned over
Speaker 2: a water hole and you know people aren't going to
Speaker 2: be out because very few people are going to haunt that,
Speaker 2: and you know those deer are going to come in.
Speaker 2: They're just gonna come in like, I love that shit. Man.
Speaker 4: Yeah, if you got like said.
Speaker 3: Some spots, there's so much swamps, so I made like water.
Speaker 3: It can be tough in the early season, right, there's
Speaker 3: just water everywhere. So it's like but if you get
Speaker 3: links to this water hole, that's like, okay, there's there's
Speaker 3: a pond, an irrigate, some pond, there's some bean, some
Speaker 3: standing corn.
Speaker 4: If you can get in and out three days in
Speaker 4: a row, you're probably going to see a good.
Speaker 3: Mouth because they had to, right, you know. It's just like,
Speaker 3: well you have to be there three days in a row,
Speaker 3: you're not going to get it. You're not going to
Speaker 3: add success, at least for me personally, I would It
Speaker 3: would take me three days of the same wind, you know,
Speaker 3: hunt the same little hole.
Speaker 4: Your you're definitely gonna kill for sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it's just it's it's so simple, but you
Speaker 2: have to get past the idea that you're going to
Speaker 2: be really uncomfortable. I mean, the one thing I will
Speaker 2: say on that is I have kind of like you
Speaker 2: said about hunting really really cold weather. I'm not I'm
Speaker 2: not huge into being out there and free. If I'm
Speaker 2: going to go freeze my ass off, I want to
Speaker 2: shoot some pheasants, like I don't want to sit at
Speaker 2: the tree stand anymore. Yeah around right, But also that
Speaker 2: super hot stuff. I love hunting it. But if I'm
Speaker 2: in a situation where I'm like camping somewhere, you know,
Speaker 2: like over the road, that is not that appealing to
Speaker 2: me anymore because I have spent a lot of time
Speaker 2: in tents that were like eighty degrees overnight. Yeah, brutal.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I just I bought a pop up last year for
Speaker 3: a family, but I use it twice. An it was nice.
Speaker 3: I'm like, put the little rooftop and strong. I'm like,
Speaker 3: it doesn't it makes it bearable, like you can sleep.
Speaker 4: But you're like, okay, I can get down with it.
Speaker 4: You know, you're not going to freeze.
Speaker 3: You're still sweating. But it's like, all right, Humitte is
Speaker 3: going a little bit, you know. It's like it's nice.
Speaker 3: It's definitely nice, dude.
Speaker 2: Being able to sleep on those hunts game changer. I mean,
Speaker 2: you you execute your plans so much better. You're not
Speaker 2: going to talk yourself into going home early. That's a
Speaker 2: big deal.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: After so after you go through your injury, how like
Speaker 2: dedicated to tree stands safety? Do you get Are you
Speaker 2: like pretty pretty rigid? Are you still kind of like.
Speaker 6: Well, sometimes I'll I'll put a step up and I'll
Speaker 6: catch myself thinking it's like, you know, I still like
Speaker 6: find myself, you know, like eating with the linemans, I
Speaker 6: still wrap my leg around the tree.
Speaker 3: And put around free like and did without. It's like
Speaker 3: it's just like that third points of contact. Because alignments,
Speaker 3: it's not an end all deal. You'll still fall linements, right,
Speaker 3: It's not that you're not so say, I still find
Speaker 3: myself using my leg wrapping around the tree s in
Speaker 3: the next.
Speaker 4: Step, you know, but it's it's just to add a
Speaker 4: peace of mind, you know.
Speaker 3: And the one thing with the linements, a lot of
Speaker 3: people don't lean into linements, and that's where you're going
Speaker 3: to have your problems because they're designed for tension.
Speaker 4: Right, it's not going to stop you.
Speaker 3: If you don't have tension on it, you're gonna fall
Speaker 3: and you're going to hit every stick and they're strolling
Speaker 3: step you put it right, right, and it's super.
Speaker 4: Windy, I'll girth hitch my alignments. You I'll put attachment
Speaker 4: to my bridge and I'll girthitch it. You know. If
Speaker 4: it's really windy or rating. I find myself girth hitching
Speaker 4: going up and down the tree.
Speaker 3: It's kind of paining to ask, but you know, outside
Speaker 3: of repelling, it's probably the best thing you got going,
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 4: Ye.
Speaker 2: Well yeah, and I mean you've got the lifeline option too,
Speaker 2: which is something that I'm just I don't know, I'm
Speaker 2: I'm pretty freaking religious.
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, you know, my daughter, she hunts. She used
Speaker 4: to go.
Speaker 3: She always even she just turned six, ten years old,
Speaker 3: you can legally hunt in New Jersey, so she's working
Speaker 3: towards that.
Speaker 4: And uh, I know I'll have to have those things
Speaker 4: for her lifelines.
Speaker 3: But I have her in the saddle like she's used
Speaker 3: to being up six feet in the air, Like she
Speaker 3: used to understand alignments and like the tethers put the
Speaker 3: saddle getting up in there. So by the time she
Speaker 3: gets to hunting, aids like my dad first first morning
Speaker 3: we sat in the ground, first evening we hunted, sat
Speaker 3: in the ground. And next time he's like, others are
Speaker 3: trees and every it's a wooden tree stand somebody made,
Speaker 3: like back in the day because there was no portables,
Speaker 3: you know, you had a baker tree stand or a
Speaker 3: giant climber or you built, wouldn't stands.
Speaker 4: I remember him just like just.
Speaker 3: Climb up there, just like here, step on my my
Speaker 3: mind and lift me up into this tree stand that
Speaker 3: don't know if it's safe for anything.
Speaker 4: He goes, I'll be back later, and.
Speaker 3: I was like later, like what, I'm like eight ten
Speaker 3: feet from the ground. So I remember sitting in these
Speaker 3: spots all day and my dad worked shipworks. He probably
Speaker 3: went somewhere and fell asleep right waking up and come
Speaker 3: back and go see things Like No, I was like afraid.
Speaker 2: To get down.
Speaker 4: You should have got down. I'm like eight feet off
Speaker 4: the ground, like I got my bet, no haul line,
Speaker 4: like no, nothing. But it's like times have changed, you know.
Speaker 3: Like my dad with a put a, he'll put like
Speaker 3: a climber up in the tree with limbs, just used
Speaker 3: the limbs to go up. He had this one tree
Speaker 3: called the sitting tree. It was just limbs all the
Speaker 3: way up and you just sat on the limb. Always
Speaker 3: see deer there, but you couldn't shoot out with a
Speaker 3: belle because it's too many damn limbs.
Speaker 4: So you climb up there, You're like you'll see there,
Speaker 4: and you're like, well, I can't I'm doing it. It's
Speaker 4: a gun tree, you know. Yeah, basically I was like, yeah, it'
Speaker 4: thirty come by shoot one pound shooting this, but I'll
Speaker 4: fall into my death, you know.
Speaker 3: But it's like it's times have changed significantly with that,
Speaker 3: and it's like I tell people you've been around, like
Speaker 3: the Baker tree stands.
Speaker 4: That's my first climber at death Trap, that that one makers. Yeah. God,
Speaker 4: I remember climbing up and just going I'm good and
Speaker 4: just gone all the way down. You're like all on
Speaker 4: the trade and you're like, what's just happened? You don't
Speaker 4: even know. It's dark, it's noisy. But it's like what
Speaker 4: we have now is like it's definitely a lot better. Dude.
Speaker 2: We people if you if you're just starting out now,
Speaker 2: you have no idea. I mean, we did all that shit.
Speaker 2: The widow Maker freaking wooden tree stands have been up
Speaker 2: since the forties, like those those original uh climbing stands.
Speaker 2: You know, we used to tie. I can remember like
Speaker 2: one of the first times I used one of them,
Speaker 2: you know, you tie. We tied a rope between the
Speaker 2: top and the bottom, like hey, you can't fall, but
Speaker 2: I had tied like a six foot rope between them,
Speaker 2: and I was like fifteen, you know. So you get
Speaker 2: up there and it's not you know, now, if you
Speaker 2: use a climber, which not very many people do, but
Speaker 2: there's a there's a strap on each side, so a
Speaker 2: falls level, you haul that some bitch back up to
Speaker 2: your feet. But back then you're like, Okay, now it's
Speaker 2: all cock eyed, hanging crooked, and it's six feet below me,
Speaker 2: and you're like just dumb, you know, like I mean,
Speaker 2: we got we got really lucky, you know what i mean.
Speaker 2: Obviously you probably just weren't hearing about a lot of
Speaker 2: the falls and stuff back then. But the stuff that
Speaker 2: we have now is just you know, if you're not
Speaker 2: using if your saddle hunting is different, like you said,
Speaker 2: because that's that whole system is just safe. Like it's
Speaker 2: just if you if you know how to use it
Speaker 2: and you're comfortable with it, man, it's it's great. But
Speaker 2: you also have the six point safety harnesses now, and
Speaker 2: you know, people will say, like I can remember for
Speaker 2: a long time, people are like, oh, it's going to
Speaker 2: get in the way of my bowshot, or I don't
Speaker 2: like a big bulky vest, and I'm like man, you
Speaker 2: can get these things that are like two pounds, you know,
Speaker 2: under a jacket whatever, you got the lineman's belt. And
Speaker 2: you know you've said this several times and it's it's
Speaker 2: worth repeating. If you use one of those, the proper
Speaker 2: way to use it if you're not comfortable with it, like,
Speaker 2: is to lean back, so that point of contact there
Speaker 2: is that is the tension with you leaning back and
Speaker 2: using it like you would on a saddle. And once
Speaker 2: you get comfortable with that, like your hands free, it's
Speaker 2: a it's a game changer. But if you're not comfortable
Speaker 2: with it, like people are too confident, like you were,
Speaker 2: getting in trouble. People who aren't confident enough, they can
Speaker 2: get into trouble. And then you've got the lifeline situation.
Speaker 2: And man, I you know, you get pretty conditioned. My
Speaker 2: daughters are older than yours, you know, but you get
Speaker 2: pretty conditioned to the entire process, like you're hooked up,
Speaker 2: start to finish anybody going with you. And that's that's
Speaker 2: one thing. When you take camera guys with you who
Speaker 2: have no dude, no experience climbing trees, never been in
Speaker 2: a white tail stand, you start thinking through that stuff
Speaker 2: because you're like these guys have fifty pounds of shit
Speaker 2: on their back. They're going up in the dark in
Speaker 2: a place they've never seen.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 2: Sometimes you know, I'm I'm like six too, so I
Speaker 2: I tend to default and put my my sticks pretty
Speaker 2: far apart, and you have to think, like you can't
Speaker 2: do that. You know, you're not setting up for you anymore.
Speaker 2: But it really kind of is a crash course when
Speaker 2: you set up for somebody else and you're like, I
Speaker 2: don't want that person to fall. Kind of just teaches you,
Speaker 2: like here's the process. Like you don't get to say,
Speaker 2: like I'm pretty comfortable and I do this or I
Speaker 2: do that, Like it's like I gotta.
Speaker 4: Want go ahead.
Speaker 3: One thing I do like with the full body harness,
Speaker 3: because we see it at work. People put it on incorrectly.
Speaker 3: It's so loose that like I see it in the woods,
Speaker 3: I see it work, and I'm like, you guys have
Speaker 3: no idea, like from a guy that falls, like I
Speaker 3: had not the ground stopped me. But I've I've been
Speaker 3: you know, I've tested harnesses. I've jumped off tenors just
Speaker 3: see how it feels. I'm like, if those cross straps
Speaker 3: aren't tight, like if you're your balls, isn't pushing through
Speaker 3: the center of that, Like you're gonna run.
Speaker 4: In some problems with that.
Speaker 3: And I see it all you see magazine pictures or
Speaker 3: like YouTube videos whatever. It's like half people have it
Speaker 3: all wrong, and like I krins, it's like you're you're
Speaker 3: probably doing more harm than good, Like you actually might
Speaker 3: be better hitting the ground because that, you know, you
Speaker 3: get those.
Speaker 4: Things pinched off.
Speaker 3: If you pinch off your your another reasons, they're like
Speaker 3: you can die from that, you know, like bluff float.
Speaker 3: Like so just because you're wearing safety equipment doesn't necessarily
Speaker 3: mean you're safe if it's not installed correctly, right, Like
Speaker 3: like your your lifelines. I see them all the time,
Speaker 3: the same dude to hunt this ladder Stami with the lifeline.
Speaker 3: It's been out there for forty years and never leaves.
Speaker 3: You're like, dude, it's not saving you. That's just going
Speaker 3: to bring you know, like it's three months, buy new
Speaker 3: one every year. If you can't buy new one every year,
Speaker 3: take it with you at the end of season, you know,
Speaker 3: like like I don't know, you can't leave.
Speaker 4: Them up your round.
Speaker 2: Well that's that's what I was going to say, when
Speaker 2: you were saying that the other fella I tried to
Speaker 2: get on for this, you know he did had the
Speaker 2: classic left his tree stand up, stepped on the and
Speaker 2: the platform gave out trapped door open. And that's that's
Speaker 2: something you I still hear people say this all the time, like, oh,
Speaker 2: I changed my ratchet straps. It's like that's great, you know,
Speaker 2: like that's great. But you you can tell a ratchet
Speaker 2: strap when it's wearing out right and you look at
Speaker 2: it and people, oh, you squirrels two on it. I'm like,
Speaker 2: I've never seen that. I'm sure it happens, but I've
Speaker 2: never seen either, right, never, But you know, I mean
Speaker 2: a tree gets real tight whatever. Yeah, that's it's a
Speaker 2: it's a thing that you should pay attention to. But
Speaker 2: what we saw for a long time that you know,
Speaker 2: some of the tree stand companies that used to be
Speaker 2: really popular don't exist anymore, or they've been reinvented to
Speaker 2: new you know, bought out new companies whatever, is because
Speaker 2: there were failure points like with the cables between the
Speaker 2: seat stem and the platform, where if you left them
Speaker 2: up longer than a season and that water got in there,
Speaker 2: you might rust out some metal component in there that
Speaker 2: you have. You're not You're never going to do a
Speaker 2: visual inspection and be like there's the failure point. But
Speaker 2: you put two hundred pounds on there and all of
Speaker 2: a sudden you find it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and it's a fifty dollars stand. People like, oh,
Speaker 4: I got ten hangos.
Speaker 3: They're forty dollars stands, And it's like I have a
Speaker 3: few of them, but I wouldn't hunt out of them
Speaker 3: all the time, right, No way, you know, like I
Speaker 3: can afford hundred dollars at least one hundred dollars stand
Speaker 3: you know, like just spend the extra. You're gonna get
Speaker 3: some better material and don't leave it out and get around. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I mean it's like I can't.
Speaker 4: I mean because Jersey there's a stands ladders.
Speaker 3: It's who are like Della burn They make you take
Speaker 3: your stands out for the most part, you know, and
Speaker 3: uh so it's it's kind of nice states that make
Speaker 3: you remove stands the end of the season.
Speaker 4: New Jersey it's free for all. Yeah, you know, it's
Speaker 4: just stands everywhere.
Speaker 3: And you're like, and you see the old ones with
Speaker 3: their chains, you know, like my body he hunts all
Speaker 3: his permanent sets have chains and the season pull loosen
Speaker 3: them up, let the stand hang there, and then they'll
Speaker 3: reset them for the season. And because he don't like straps,
Speaker 3: you know, and he's on a rotation every two years,
Speaker 3: day comes down and put new gables on that he.
Speaker 4: Goes for a whole process.
Speaker 3: But he kills some good deer, but it's more of
Speaker 3: like a safety thing for him, right, peace of mind, right,
Speaker 3: which is most people don't.
Speaker 2: Well no, and I mean there's a there's a big
Speaker 2: misconception out there with a lot of people. And you
Speaker 2: see this in the gun in the in the gun
Speaker 2: hunting world, a lot is I'm going to use a
Speaker 2: ladder stand, so I don't need a lifeline. I'll just
Speaker 2: clip in when I get up there. It's like, if
Speaker 2: you look at the statistics man, the ladder stands are
Speaker 2: freaking dangerous. And it's because the ankle license. I'm a
Speaker 2: broken ankle from the ladder stand. Well, the thing that
Speaker 2: happens a lot, well not a lot, but it's it's
Speaker 2: a component of tree stand fatalities and bad injuries. Is
Speaker 2: you know, like day two a rifle season, you know,
Speaker 2: so you go to deer camp day one, playing poker,
Speaker 2: drinking whiskey whatever ever. You know, the uncles are all there.
Speaker 2: Day two, everybody's tired, a little hungover, and you fall
Speaker 2: asleep in that ladder stand and pitch out head first
Speaker 2: because it's real comfortable, and you know, like you don't
Speaker 2: think about that or like a lot of people don't
Speaker 2: think about that stuff. But if you're not connected, like
Speaker 2: gravity doesn't care.
Speaker 4: Man, No, undefeated, No.
Speaker 2: I mean, so much of this is it's just like
Speaker 2: in our head, like what we think is going to
Speaker 2: be okay, right, Like you think like, oh, I don't
Speaker 2: need to put my seat belt on, I'm just driving
Speaker 2: down the road to the gas station. Well you might
Speaker 2: be going sixty miles an hour in one section of that,
Speaker 2: you know, or thirty twenty whatever. But I mean, I'll
Speaker 2: tell you a little story before we wrap this up here.
Speaker 2: I went down to Nebraska with a buddy of mine,
Speaker 2: I think it was twenty fourteen, and we went in
Speaker 2: rut hunt people everywhere went up on this ridge. I
Speaker 2: killed a giant the first morning. He shot an eight pointer,
Speaker 2: and so we were like it's day one and we
Speaker 2: had small game takes. So we're like we're going to
Speaker 2: stick around hunt rabbits whatever, just like enjoy our time
Speaker 2: down there. After we get these deer butchered. So you know,
Speaker 2: I have this great big ten pointer hanging in camp
Speaker 2: and butchering it. Of course people see it, right because
Speaker 2: there's people coming and going like crazy. And this guy
Speaker 2: came in started talking to us, who was bull hunting
Speaker 2: the same property. You know, it's public, and you know,
Speaker 2: we kind of budied up with him, like you do
Speaker 2: because you're camping there, and you know, kind of make plans.
Speaker 2: All right, he's going back here, we won't go mass
Speaker 2: with him.
Speaker 4: Whatever.
Speaker 2: Well, start talking to this guy and I see he
Speaker 2: doesn't have a safety harness on, and he's he's walking
Speaker 2: that property. We were hunting as a section so you
Speaker 2: can get a mile away essentially.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and.
Speaker 2: Where he's telling me he's hunting, I know this area,
Speaker 2: and I you know, especially back then, I'm like, you
Speaker 2: don't have cell phone reception back there because you're way
Speaker 2: in the bottom of this valley. So I started talking
Speaker 2: to him about it. I was like, man, you know,
Speaker 2: are you not using a harness?
Speaker 4: Is it in your pack?
Speaker 2: And he goes, ah, you know, I don't. I don't
Speaker 2: wear those, you know, like he's like, man, and I
Speaker 2: fell out one time too. He said, I just went
Speaker 2: from being, you know, sitting in my tree stand to
Speaker 2: waking up cleaning the dirt and the leaves out of
Speaker 2: my mouth just hit the ground and we were so
Speaker 2: we were done deer hunting, and you know, I was
Speaker 2: working for Bowhunter magazine then, and I was like, I
Speaker 2: was like, listen, dude, I'll give you my harness. I'll
Speaker 2: give you you know, the tether, the whole thing. I
Speaker 2: was like, if you'll use it, i'll leave it with
Speaker 2: you and you can have it, like I have lots
Speaker 2: of them, because he's a nice guy. Whatever, So I
Speaker 2: left it or I gave it to him. He's like,
Speaker 2: oh man, this is awesome. And so we had hunted
Speaker 2: rabbits for a few days. Whatever, We're going home, and
Speaker 2: so we break down camp and his truck was parked
Speaker 2: in the parking area and I whatever, I don't remember
Speaker 2: what I was doing, go throw away a bag of
Speaker 2: garbage in the campground or something. But I looked in
Speaker 2: his truck in the cab and that safety harness was
Speaker 2: just sitting on the seat and he was out hunting,
Speaker 2: and I was like, dude.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, I got that's scarce.
Speaker 3: Like, you know, my my dad's friend he worked with
Speaker 3: he felt out staying and and I was a kid,
Speaker 3: I was probably ten or twelve. His son found him,
Speaker 3: I think or whatever. So you're like, that's just I
Speaker 3: was always aware of that, Like my dad put it
Speaker 3: in my head. And then I killed this guy right
Speaker 3: here in the mountains and we're drying them down. My
Speaker 3: dad killed down my buddy cum the buck. I think, yeah,
Speaker 3: so we're we're talking the rains. That comes in asked
Speaker 3: what we're doing, see our license and everything, and he's
Speaker 3: like you guys wearing their horns up there, like yeah,
Speaker 3: we're good to guys because they found somebody that was
Speaker 3: up there for like a year and they found like
Speaker 3: a half like a skeleton dude in the woods.
Speaker 4: Said and call like was a whole like did he
Speaker 4: fall out?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 4: So he gives us the whole.
Speaker 3: Story, and I'm like, because it's remote, you know, fifty
Speaker 3: thousand acres so it's like you're.
Speaker 4: Not in near a Hikings frond. Nobody's going to go
Speaker 4: into this little spot. Where got the dude hanging from
Speaker 4: a stand.
Speaker 3: So it's like his foot got caught in and I
Speaker 3: guess was weren't harnessed and got caught in the cable
Speaker 3: and he's just hung upside down, probably screaming until you
Speaker 3: passed out. And I'm like, that's just crazy because it's
Speaker 3: still twenty I mean, it was just twenty eighteen or
Speaker 3: nineteen whatever it was. I'm like, then people still didn't
Speaker 3: I mean, the literature is there. If you're hunting, you
Speaker 3: see it, you know what it's like, people still don't
Speaker 3: use it. And I'm like, man, that's just nuts. And
Speaker 3: I just really like I'm a victim of it. So
Speaker 3: I hear about that, and like you're telling me the
Speaker 3: sort of like in the back of my mind, I'm like,
Speaker 3: he's an idiot because.
Speaker 4: No cell phone service.
Speaker 3: Like you're going to die out there right because you
Speaker 3: didn't want to be comfortable or like you didn't want
Speaker 3: to wear it.
Speaker 4: Like that's just kid's wife, kids, the old family job business.
Speaker 4: You know, it's just it's not worn't.
Speaker 2: At all well. And not to mention the fact that
Speaker 2: if you do fall, I mean, it's not like you're
Speaker 2: going to die right away falling seventeen feet like it's
Speaker 2: gonna be a you're gonna you're gonna have a lot
Speaker 2: of time to think about it and the mistakes you made.
Speaker 2: What let's let's just wrap this thing up with I
Speaker 2: just want to ask you one that question about about
Speaker 2: your injuries, like do you still deal with repercussions from
Speaker 2: that fallout? Like do you still deal with the injuries
Speaker 2: at some level today? For sure?
Speaker 3: Every day I'm in pain, but you just deal with
Speaker 3: it like no one Yeah, yeah, like no like ailment
Speaker 3: seel Like I still run.
Speaker 4: I mean I still you know, it's not going to
Speaker 4: stop me. I'm not going to stop living my life.
Speaker 3: But like my wife will say, like I don't complain
Speaker 3: about the pain because we were.
Speaker 4: Talking, no one cares.
Speaker 3: And then when I do get to the point like
Speaker 3: I'll snap sometimes because like I just need like I
Speaker 3: can't be bothered with anything right now because I.
Speaker 4: Do industrial maintenance. So it's like I beat my body
Speaker 4: up at work, you know, And then it's like I
Speaker 4: do stuff.
Speaker 3: If you get right from hunting season, It's like my
Speaker 3: body don't necessarily get a break sometimes and I'll do
Speaker 3: be something, doing something around the house, like kneeling, and
Speaker 3: it just gets to the point where it's like I
Speaker 3: was just irritable and then.
Speaker 4: Still say something and I'll just snap at her and
Speaker 4: I feel bad.
Speaker 3: But I was like, if I'm snapping, it's like there's
Speaker 3: that I have a high personal pain. But like I'm here,
Speaker 3: like I went from like a like a ten to twenty.
Speaker 3: It's just I don't need you to stay. That was
Speaker 3: not very nice.
Speaker 4: So it's like it's like I just need a little
Speaker 4: space to let me and and move on.
Speaker 3: But there's never a day and I'm not in pain, right,
Speaker 3: you know, you just you just learn to if I
Speaker 3: complain about it every day.
Speaker 4: No one likes winer. No one likes a complainer. Like
Speaker 4: my daughter, she don't care about pain. I gotta pick
Speaker 4: her up, you know. Even with this, it's like I'm like.
Speaker 3: The pick me up daddy, all right, no matter how
Speaker 3: hard I'm in pain, I gotta do what my dad's
Speaker 3: got to do.
Speaker 4: Or work my knees. We're crawling on that, you know,
Speaker 4: pulling and belt. My knees hurt.
Speaker 3: That belt needs to get in and the belt's gonna
Speaker 3: be running by far I leave, So you just fuck
Speaker 3: them down and do it, you know, And then just
Speaker 3: I'm being paid for a day or two, and then
Speaker 3: it subsized a little bit and let's go about my
Speaker 3: merry way, right.
Speaker 2: I mean that that's a great way to end this
Speaker 2: because you actually had I mean not it's not like
Speaker 2: a favorable outcome, right, but it could have been a
Speaker 2: hell of a lot worse.
Speaker 3: Was Yeah, my my surgeon was well he did was
Speaker 3: a miracle basically because because I see the x er
Speaker 3: as before and what he did and what I'm able
Speaker 3: to do, you know, and it's like that dude deserves
Speaker 3: an award because he didn't run have anything to work with.
Speaker 4: My miniscus was flip upside down, you know. The A
Speaker 4: c L was the stress. You unbelieved pc L, you know,
Speaker 4: and it's like both ministers just destroyed.
Speaker 3: They got KR how he did KR and bolts and
Speaker 3: everything went through and it's like you know, fan a
Speaker 3: while now and it's like I don't get swelling or anything,
Speaker 3: you know, it just hurts.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 4: So whatever he did was, Yeah. I wish I knew
Speaker 4: where he was because he closed up where he's not
Speaker 4: at the hospital or wherever he is, like whoever wherever
Speaker 4: he went. Thanks, there's all right.
Speaker 2: There's probably a is it. There's probably just like a
Speaker 2: some constant level of inflammation in there.
Speaker 4: Huh No, it's not not too bad.
Speaker 2: But where's the what's the pain coming from?
Speaker 3: It's like aches, like it'll just ache, like when if
Speaker 3: we had that real extreme pressure change, like high pressure,
Speaker 3: blowing pressure dropped so fast, like I'll be like, hey,
Speaker 3: the rain's coming, my wife, it's coming, trust me.
Speaker 4: Because both my knee and wait but the left one
Speaker 4: and be like yeah, it's definitely coming. And I can
Speaker 4: look at you, like brother underground or something.
Speaker 3: You see that that bever much of pressure rising down
Speaker 3: and I'm like, oh, there it is. I was like,
Speaker 3: and my pain started at noon and love the rise
Speaker 3: and starting to go up like sharply.
Speaker 2: It's like, dude, you're like the wise old guy sitting
Speaker 2: in his backyard like drinking iced tea, like yep, rain's coming, mama,
Speaker 2: Yeah we'll be we'll be.
Speaker 3: At work for that work at the airport, and some
Speaker 3: of the guys will be doing somethings like I like
Speaker 3: probably range jackets. Today was like that rain's coming faster
Speaker 3: than they get out of here. Turn off poor and
Speaker 3: it was like told you you know, it's like the
Speaker 3: joys of falling out of a tree.
Speaker 2: I guess, dude, you got like a little a little
Speaker 2: superhero trait there for deer hunting though. Yeah, yeah, so
Speaker 2: probably not worth it.
Speaker 4: Yeah get in the woods, Yeah.
Speaker 2: Probably not worth it, but yeah maybe there's a silver
Speaker 2: line in there. Uh dude, It's always so much fun
Speaker 2: to chat with you and hear your stories. This one
Speaker 2: is a very very uh cautionary tale. People need to
Speaker 2: pay attention to be safe out there, everybody. Greg, thanks
Speaker 2: so much for coming on Man and the Problem.
Speaker 4: I thanks.
Speaker 2: That's it for this week, folks. Make sure to tune
Speaker 2: in every week for some more whitetail goodness. I'm your
Speaker 2: guest host, Tony Peterson and this has been the Wired
Speaker 2: to Hunt podcast, which is brought to you by First Light.
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