Mr. Terry's Neighborhood: Gang Orange vs Mr. Terry / Are You Kidding Me?

The Gang Orange membership will soon take to the woods.

Thousands from hunting camps, or parked along state game-land roads, waiting for dawn. It’s the annual pilgrimage in the year of our Lord, Monday, December 2, 2013.

For many, it's the first time in the woods since, well, since last opening day, and the one before that, and before that. All suited up at an estimated $750, including gun, scope, outfit, pocket warmers, boots, gloves, battery socks, snacks, hat, etc., etc. Seriously -- broken down -- deer meat at $89 a pound.

Most of the membership doesn’t know an oak from a maple and trudge through the dark woods like a blind man searching for a golf ball in his basement. Then, just before daybreak, they’ll sit on a stump or against a tree, rifle across the legs.

Thirty minutes later, cold sets in. They shift to the left, to the right, hoping the cold disappears. Then an ear scratch. The butt hurts from the stones and sticks not cleared before slumping down, exhausted by the 20 yard walk from the warm car.

They pick their noses, cut some cheese – if you don’t know what that is, ask a 4^th grader – shift some more, yawn, blow their noses without hankies – if you don’t know what that's like, watch an NFL game and pay close attention to the sidelines.

Those who smoke light up every 20 minutes on the hour. Damn, this is huntin' in the wild.

More picking, scratching, coughing, cheese cutting -- move to another spot 20 yards away, trying to get warm. About 9 its lunch time: out come the Saran wrapped sandwiches, chips, Red Dog, bag of peanuts, etc., etc, followed by another short walk to tinkle – now I know you know what that is.

It goes on and on. Pick, scratch, jiggle, rub, eat, tinkle, move again, smoke, eat, tinkle, and before long it’s dark-thirty. They trudge back to the car and home or back to camp, and what's next?

After 45 minutes on the chamber pot, the complaints rain down like hail in a Georgia thunderstorm.

"Ain't no deer out there. Didn’t see one all day, and I was quieter than mouse crap. They moan and groan about the Pennsylvania Game Commission and how its mismanaging the deer herd. "They should all be fired."

Sound familiar?

Let’s face it. The reason deer are killed on opening day is that Gang Orange takes to the woods en masse and push deer from one member to another.

But not Mr. Terry.

Mr. Terry moves in silence. He doesn’t scratch or pick, and he surely doesn’t tinkle. Not when he is shooting through the lens. He moves about the Pennsylvania forest like a drone seeking Ayman al-Zawahiri.

Out there alone, not en masse, the deer and the bear and the fox know him. Like the grey fox below. How many of the Gang Orange membership have seen a gray fox in between their Lance crackers and Reeses' peanut butter cups? You got that right!

I rest my case.