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| Saggitarius Means Archery One of the best places on the net to obtain a great education on archery in general is the Sagittarius board. This message board runs on software written by some enthusiasts from the Netherlands, and the server is in a University there. Unfortunately, during the evening/night of November 19, 2002, there was a fire in the building housing the servers for the Sagi board. As a result, Simon Oosthoek, the webmaster and founder of the board tells me that the board is down. At first he though it would be down for the foreseeable future - weeks rather than days. A recent email from Simon tells me that he hopes it will be back up in just a few days. Hopefully he will be able to find a way to get his board going again quickly. In the meantime, you may want to bookmark the AA's website message board. And if you want to contact Simon, click here. |
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| Archival Archery Message Board The Archival Archery message board started out as a JOAD discussion group and it continues to serve a great number of people with questions and answers about the goings' on in the JOAD community. Several JOAD leaders from around the country continue to help answer questions and insure the information provided is beneficial. It has also grown to provide a place for anyone wishing to sell archery equipment and for companies to advertise their services, and for people to post calendar events for upcoming archery get-togethers and tourneys. General discussion areas for archery have also been added, and there are lively discussions going on concerning a variety of NArchival Archery and Archival Archery archery topics. You do NOT have to join the board in order to post, but feel free to register if you wish. You can browse past messages, which are stored indefinitely by topic, regardless. A number of NArchival Archery judges frequent the board, so it has become a good place to reach them and ask specific questions. While the Sagittarius Board is temporarily down, we extend an invitation to all Sagittarians to continue their conversations on the AA's board till Simon can get his board onto a new server. Archival Archery Message Board |
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| Pests In The Bowcase What's new? Pests. Surprisingly enough, pests are new. Archers are a cantankerous, independent lot and I'm certain that many of you will be upset to find out that your computer is loaded with pests that are "Big Brothering" you. Ratting you out! Or, have you said this recently?: "My computer is really slow," "It always crashes," and "I can't get on the Internet anymore." ?? Since the web is a primary tool for acquiring information on archery, anything that gets in your way of surfing to the Sagittarius Board or the Archival Archery message board, for example, is a *BAD* thing. So let's talk about these vermin for a minute. What do they do, why do they do it, and most importantly, how do you stop them?Many programs, including Microsoft Internet Explorer, install small programs that monitor what you do on your computer and report, no, BETRAY you to the company that caused the pest. Information is money, and these companies are all about money. So they gather your information and use it to target you with ads, for one. But they are also about your loss of privacy and freedom. These pests can record and report every site you visit, what you type in such as your credit card information, your home address, literally anything on your computer! Some will nuke your computer, on purpose. But the worst pests will silently open the back doors on your computer so that hackers can invisibly gain access to steal information and commandeer part of your computer for bad purposes, such as DDOS attacks. If you want to read about all the different kinds of pests and what a DDOS is, click on this link to view a page full of them including a threat matrix. RATS deserve a special look - if you find you have SubSEVEN or BackOrifice, for example, you've got a RAT! The first time I ran PestPatrol, I found a pc in my house that had SubSEVEN, despite all my security efforts! No one is safe from pests unless you are using the right tool.You can check your computer to learn what pests are in your own "house". There are a number of tools to removes pests, but I'm going to focus on the one I use: Pest Patrol. It has a free version that will identify the pests on your PC, and provide links to inform you about the level of risk as well as instructions on removing the pest manually. Their website has good educational information as well. If you pay a $30 charge, you can download a version that will not only ID the vermin but allow you to painlessly REMOVE them. The tool will also monitor your computer and memory to prevent future infestations. In the past I have recommended strongly that you get, keep current, and use an "Antivirus" software such as Norton's or McAffee, at a cost of between 10 and 50 bucks per year, depending on how well you shop for bargains. The second tool I have suggested is a free one, ZoneAlarm, that will help keep your computer INVISIBLE to hackers. Add to it now a copy of Pest Patrol, at $30, and you will reduce your risks of downtime and increase your surfing safety in a substantial way. Think about it this way. If right now you were 10 minutes away from having to spend the next two days rebuilding your computer - formatting your hard drive, reinstalling your operating system(windows), then finding and reinstalling your favorite programs, and THEN updating them to the latest versions, and then restoring your documents and data (uh, you DO have backups, right?). How much are those two days worth to you? |
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| The Ancient Practice of CLOUT SHOOTING by Cliff Huntington "The term clout shooting is derived from the act of shooting at a clout. The clout itself is nothing more than any mark, historically white and in its most simple form, a small white rag. This is accomplished at long ranges, customarily between 9 score and 12 score yards. The event dates back to the first Elizabeth and has been practiced in varying form for many years and is an "old English form of competitive archery at a single mark." This is the beginning of an article on yet another great website - Stickbow.com. This site started out primarily to serve the traditional (ie, barebow/selfbow/longbow) style of archery, but has evolved into almost an encyclopedic site for bowhunting and bowyer archery. It does focus more on hunting rather than FITA target archery and is rife with advertisements. It has good info on making your own bows - a return to the rustic rather than a promotion of the high tech (but there are lots of compound topics as well). I was going to write about it in the last issue, but it had gone down. It's back up now so the problem was probably with the ISP or server - if you find it's not "there" when you click on the link just wait and give it a try later. Oh yes, and for the rest of the very entertaining and informative article by Cliff Huntington, CLICK HERE. It's a good read. And when you click on that link, take note of the list of historical articles on the right-hand side of that page - I bet you'll find some information on archery that you didn't know. |
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| Unwritten Indoor Etiquette - Something To Consider By Rick Stonebraker This has never been formally written down to my knowledge but I would like to do so. Over the years, the indoor season has evolved to where the local shooters competed in the less desirable shooting times to accommodate the out-of-towers and this has always been appreciated but never mentioned. For those of you who do not know what I mean, let me explain: Although the Sunday morning shooting line is the best line to shoot in, for a local to compete at this time may cost travelers a lot of time. They may sign up unconsciously and not even think about the ramifications. Example: a local shoots on Sunday morning and is probably finished by noon and in front of the TV watching football by early afternoon, while the out of towner is still down at the range. By the time the afternoon line is finished, it is 4 pm or so and a 2-5 hour drive awaits them and in the wintertime, they will be driving in the dark. So, when signing up for a tournament in your hometown, try to be a little considerate and pick a shooting time that is less desirable for an out-of-town person. UT and A&M host a lot of indoor events over the years and the coaches encourage this pattern and has worked well over the years and has been extremely appreciated, but for some, it is not inherently apparent. Just something to think about if you host an indoor event in your hometown or if you compete in an indoor event in your hometown. |
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| Online Registrations For Upcoming Events Online registrations are available at the top of the main Archival Archery website page for this weekend's Longhorn Indoor Event (no, it's not too late to get in on this event, and there are several shooting times that are not full up!). Forms for online registration for the A State Indoor(Fort Worth) and the A State JOAD Indoor(Bay City) are also available. On each registration form you will find a link to the currently registered archers page, where you can see who is shooting at what time. In all of these forms, when you have filled out all of the fields, you need to click the SUBMIT button at the bottom of the page, and then double-check the information that is displayed, and then print that summary page at least once, to mail in with your registration fee. Print TWO copies if you want to keep one for your own files. The Archival Archery will hold your check till after the registration deadline, so if your schedule changes and you can no longer attend, you won't pay any penalty - we just shred your check! Check the links to the registrations here. |
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| 4-H Indoor Archery Season Continues The District 11 4-H Indoor Archery Tournament season is STILL in full swing and they held another meet this last weekend in Calhoun County (Port Lavaca). Results have been posted. While these archers adhere to the 4-H guidelines and standards, they also recognize the NAA's JOAD guidelines. They've certainly established a level of excellence in BOTH organizations. Right now the 4H'ers in South A are holding a tournament each weekend in a different town, moving around to allow the kids to have an opportunity to shoot as many as 6 times before Christmas. This gives them a chance to have some great fun and garner some experience in tournament. More than 90 kids shot the first tournament in Goliad and that number again in Lavaca County a week later. Then in Bay City there were 115 archers! This last weekend in Port Lavaca there were 125 archers. Notice a trend? Compound, Recurve, and even barebow archers are having a blast and shooting great scores! Guest youth archers are welcome at these events. Check the This upcoming weekend will have a tournament in Victoria, which coincides with the University of A' Longhorn Indoor in Austin, so attendance will likely be less than last weekends. |
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| World Indoor Archery Team Trials Information (WIATT) The WIATT is going to be hosted by James Madison University, a long-time bastion of collegiate archery. The NArchival Archery has provided us with information on the WIATT, to be held in January of 2003. Use this link to view that information. |
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| Challenging Oneself: Compos Sui Tom Barker has written an article revealing what I feel is a very special aspect of 4-H archery. It's not something that I had previously known or understood, but it is one of those things that when you hear it, you say to yourself: "That makes sense! I wonder why everyone doesn't do this?". He also explains the division classifications of 4-H archery. Archery can help youth to become masters of themselves, aka Compos Sui, and 4-H District 11 is doing a lot in this regard. While we often hear the phrase "no discrimination on the basis of ....gender", how many sports do you know where the contestants are free to happily compete against each other regardless of sex? Now I am wondering whether it isn't something that JOAD should be seriously considering. Hmmm. Anyway, read for yourself! The full document is on the Archival Archery website's 4-H section, at this link. |
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| RECALL NOTICES Bear Archery LLC has recalled about 2,250 compound bows. The limbs of these bows can break during use, causing impact injuries to consumers. Bear Archery has received about 200 reports of these bows breaking during use with reports of seven minor injuries, such as cuts and bruises to the face and chest. These are junior-sized compound Bear Archery bows sold under the model names Warrior and Buckmaster/Warrior. Check here for more information and Bear Website Information on Recall. API Outdoors, a division of Outland Sports Inc., has recalled about 9,000 Treestands used by hunters. A cable that secures the treestand to the tree can break, posing the risk of falls and serious injuries to hunters. If you use a treestand, check this link. |
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