I Had An Incredible Weekend Hunting With Sydnie Wells And Chief, But Now I Have An Insatiable Appetite To Kill A Deer

I have never hunted anything in my life, unless you count the standard 43 year old divorced cougar with 2 kids I tend to gravitate towards at the Hangge Uppe at 3am most weakends.

Ha ha

I just didn't think I had it in my to kill an animal. Being from the western suburbs, I was never remotely exposed to the hobby/sport. None of my friends hunted. None of my friends parents hunted, or at least not that I'm aware of. Nobody in my family hunts. It's just not something I've never really been exposed to even if I wanted to take part in it.

But then Sydnie Wells got hired by Barstool. Her videos are awesome. Here's her merking a bunch of feral hogs with some bad ass gun I try to kill people with in Verdansk from a helicopter:

I saw this video over the summer and it piqued my interest. I thought maybe, just maybe, I could shoot a deer or at the very least shoot waterfowl. That's when Sydnie and I linked up at a Sox game over summer and I told her I wanted to give hunting a shot. At the very least, I knew it'd be really good content as I've only handled a gun a time or two in my life.

Then deer season started and Sydnie decided to move to Chicagoland and come in the office more often. We locked down the hunting date at her family's place down in Canton IL. As the date approached, I became REALLY nervous. I figured I'd make myself look like an idiot because it's something I've never done before, but I'm used to looking like an idiot on the internet so that was the easy part. The nerves came because I knew I was inching closer to killing my first animal. I've never came CLOSE to killing an animal. I've had dogs my whole life and the few times we had to put down old dogs I made my mom do it. Couldn't stomach it. 

That all changed when I got my hands on a .20 gauge for the first time. I swear to god, I was Chris Kyle with that thing. I've shot trap once in my life and took MAYBE 5 shots and that was years ago. This time it was a controlled setting and I couldn't miss if I tried. I'm guessing I hit about 15 of 20, and that's after missing the first 2-3 shots. Once I got used to it, I could have been blindfolded and still obliterated those clay pigeons to nothing.

Chief? He couldn't hit the broad side of a barn. Literally the worst fastball command these eyes have ever seen. I wanted to DFA him on the spot and make him cry like Wilmer Flores he was so bad with a shotgun. It was embarrassing, to say the least. 

Fast forward to the tree stand. We separated into two camps. Chief went with Sydnie, I went with her brother. Day 1 was uneventful; we saw one buck and then right as hunting hours were waning, we saw two does off in the distance. Since we had until 5:09 on the dot to pull a trigger, her brother and I were sprinting through a cornfield after the two does. They were about 100 yards out and obviously, they got away.

Day 2 was different. Same camps, different spots. About 30 mins into the stand, I see a doe to my 9 o'clock about 60 yards out. I waited... and waited... and waited... to get a clean shot on it, as branches from the trees were in my sights. That's when she walked to a part of the field that gave me about a 5 inch window to shoot. 

I had a .20 gauge that was about 40 years old (literally) that I was using. The reason I was using that gun is because Chief was so bad at trap shooting that he needed the gun with the scope attached. That's fine; like I said I was Chris Kyle with a gun so I don't need no pussy ass scope. 

My entire body was cranked 90 degrees to my left because of where the deer was. I had this thing down sight for a solid minute stretch and was aiming directly at her heart. I'm not kidding when I say this, but my heart was beating 1 million miles per hour. The adrenaline rush was unmatched. Finally I said "fuck it" and pulled the trigger.

I fucking missed. The deer flinched but as soon as the echos from the gun quieted, she kept grazing away. I still had a chance at her. The only problem was we only had ONE FUCKING SLUG ON US. We thought we had at least 3, but nope. Just one. Sydnie's bother had a bow on him and I demanded he give it to me so I could kill this fucking deer. The shot was impossible through tree branches that far out, so after drawing the bow and realizing that I had no chance, we said fuck it and got out of the stand. 

Tough luck. I couldn't stop thinking about the miss and cannot wait to do it again. We didn't even kill anything and still had the time of our lives. We're going back down in 2 weeks and I promise you I will kill a deer. Murder it in cold blood. I have an insatiable blood lust for deer that would make Son of Sam proud. I'm 100% getting into this sport moving forward in my life. Once I get all legalized I plan on having a weapon's arsenal of hunting guns in my shitty 800 square ft Chicago apartment.

Oh, and you guys are all assholes.