Archery, writing and other stuff
Dad and I have been meaning to take a look at my archery equipment while he's here and, as he leaves tonight, yesterday was our last chance so we spent an hour after work playing.
After all, if I'm going to start shooting again I want to make sure that everything is OK. In fact, the only thing that I need to do is source a new stringer because mine isn't long enough and I have always had trouble with it. Dad was kind of horrified by my stringer and its ridiculous short length. The stringer is the device that is used to help an archer bend their bow for stringing - much safer than the "prop against a foot, bend and hope" method that can lead to damaged limbs (on the bow and you) :-D
We did make a couple of surprise discoveries. I shoot a 66" length bow, which isn't a very long bow (my father's is 68") but is the right length for my frame. I'd assumed that I had pretty standard equipment and I had been told that my limbs were 24lb unwound and 26lb wound up.
Um.
Turns out, I have a short riser (23" length - the riser is the metal/fiberglass bit that sometimes gets called the handle and is what the limbs, arrow rest etc lock into) and medium length limbs. When you check the labels on my limbs, they're 26lb with a 23" riser. And I wound them up around six months before I left England so they're probably closer to 28lb.
I was pulling a heavier bow than I thought :-D Impressively, I was able to pull my bow safely last night so my strength has built up more than I'd expected.
Heh.
Dad suggested some improvements that I can make to the bow. The tillage is a bit off so I need to have a play with my limbs to change that. We checked my bracing height (the distance between the string and the riser), which Dad thought was low at 8.25". However, I've been doing some googling and that seems to be within the right range for a 23" riser in the brand that I have. Heh. Score for me!
One thing I do need to do is get a friend to check my draw length. That's usually marked as the distance between the string and the front of the riser when the bow is at full draw and its what you need to know when buying new arrows. My arrows are fine at the moment and I've got plenty, but I'll need to know that if I'm ordering new ones down the line.
We think my draw length is standard at 28". That's longish for a person my height, but my arms are very long so it sounds right. Dad walked me through checking, though, so I'll get a friend to do it for me at some stage.
Lastly, we checked my string which seems OK. I'm trying to remember how long I'd been shooting with it before I left England but we think it's got a few months left in it. The nocking point on the string is a tiny bit low so when I need to set up a new string (Dad has a tutorial for me, yay Dad) I'll probably put the markers a couple of mm higher so that my arrows aren't brushing the shelf of the riser so much.
In other words, my equipment all looks good and I'm fine to shoot with it when I get in contact with the club :-D And he's given me some new toys to continue working on my strength with. Now I just need to get a better/longer stringer so that I can set up/string my bow and *use* the toys!
I got the first major editing pass on CH4 of my Marvel Big Bang finished yesterday. There is one scene in that chapter that is more or less the thing that germinated the fic and it's a key scene for several characters. And it terrified me when I was writing it so I chickened out on it *sigh* The lovely Fahre pointed me in the right direction, assured me that it needed punching up rather than toning down and I feel much happier with how it looks now.
My plan is to print CH3 and CH4 out tonight for their second read-through and making of edit notes so that I can make final tweaks and send them back to Fahre for the line-edit treatment while I worked on the remaining chapters. As CH4 was the one that needed the most work, I'm feeling pretty confident about getting the remaining chapters to Fahre by the end of the Thanksgiving weekend.
Hopefully I'll be ready for final submission on October 26th. Eeep! I've had a sneak peak at some of the art and it's awesome :-D
I love Big Bangs. I know that they send me slightly nutty towards the end, but I do love seeing the art that people do for them.
Now I just need to kick the other two WIPs into shape for posting as well. Gah, editing sucks sometimes.
Tomorrow I have to go shopping for new trousers for work and some new tops. It's time to admit that a lot of what I own doesn't fit me and there's a limit to how much they can be tailored down to my smaller size. So that means new stuff. Ugh.
Hopefully my plan to persuade Mum to get dinner at the mall will work. There's a half-decent Italian place next door and I want some pasta and meatballs :-D
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