Twenty-twenty has been wild. Covid, lockdowns, protests, riots, elections, and all other sorts of craziness. Regardless, the year has come and gone. As such, I’m going to take a gander back at what that’s meant for this blog and my hobbies.
Hunting
Hunting played a large role in 2020 for me. I went on two hunting trips, none of which yielded a harvest. However, one of the hunts exposed me to hunting with night vision and that’s likely something that I’m going to work on getting into in 2021.
I spent a good deal of time this year thinking about and evolving my deer hunting load out. I also reviewed a good number of items that I include in it. I suspect it will be an active work in progress over the next few seasons, but I’m happy to have spent a few weekends in the field figuring out what works and what doesn’t.
Competition
I had high hopes of getting a lot of matches in this year. Unfortunately, the lockdowns followed by ammo scarcity and rising prices put a big damper on that plan. As such, I only participated in three competitions. All of which occurred in the first quarter of the year.
I don’t suspect 2021 will be much different in this regard, but I’ll do some goal settings and see if I can’t increase my level of participation a bit next year.
Self Defense
This is one area where I was able to hit my goals this year. I achieved my goal of receiving 40 hours of instruction. This started with attending Tom Givens’ Combative Pistol course, followed by attending KR Training’s Red Dot Essentials course, and ending with attending Gabe White’s Pistol Shooting Solutions course.
Skill maintenance this year was mostly made up of dry fire – a topic which I had intended to write more blog posts. I suspect 2021 will provide ample opportunity to blog more on this subject.
Firearms
I got a chance to review several different firearms this year and some of their accessories as well. Here list of them just in case some long time readers missed them and for newer readers to peruse:
- Daniel Defense DD5 V1 Mil Spec +
- Daniel Defense DDM4 V11
- Smith & Wesson 329PD
- Kimber America Hunter Pro
- Ruger LCRx (22 LR)
- Smith & Wesson Model S&W500
- Heckler & Koch VP9 with Trijicon RMR
- Heckler & Koch VP9
Readership
I’m having a hard time putting into words just how amazing this year has been in terms of readership growth. Readership grew by over 1,500% this year. On top of that I’ve had the privilege of connecting with a bunch of y’all via social media. This growth resulted in advertising and affiliate revenue that is helping to cover some of the costs associated with running this blog and the two giveaways that took place in 2020. The growth has also opened up the opportunity to work with a couple of manufactures who have sent me gear to review. While I have no ambition of reaching internet celebrity status and I am nowhere near that, the growth is way more than I had previously imagined.
A sincere thank you to each and every single one of you who have been a part of this journey. I can’t wait to see what 2021 brings in this respect. I promise to keep on writing and sharing my honest thoughts as long as you all continue to read them.