photo of the year

As most of my readers are already well aware, when Joe Huffman is not working for the Evil Empire Microsoft, he spends some of his time figuring out how to make little boxes of cardboard explode in interesting and exciting ways, and then let other people share in the fun. The “sharing in the fun” event (more commonly described as “Boomershoot“) is typically sold out nearly a year in advance (though some slots are still available for this year’s event, due to cancellations), and has been positively featured in numerous news sources across the country, including, most recently, an article in Motorcyclist Magazine.

However, if you happen to be really lucky (and living in/near Washington/Idaho does not hurt, nor does working at M$, nor does knowing Mr. Huffman personally), Mr. Huffman will throw you a “private party”, consisting of very few people, enough reactive targets (“Boomers”, to use the parlance) to go around, and enough hardware to reach out and nudge them into detonating. One such party was recently held for coworker Ian, and from the pictures of that event, I give you the picture of the year:

Why the lofty title of “picture of the year”, even when the composition is somewhat odd, the lighting could do with some help (it must have been crazy-bright that day), and either the image was really blown up, or the camera taking it was not of impressive quality (no insult intended, just pointing out the artifacts in the image)? Simple.

That picture documents, first-hand, a victim of an oppressive government learning how much fun freedom really is.

What greater thing can there be?

For a few short hours, Ian got to learn what it is like to live as a (mostly) free human being, able to indulge in whatever peaceful, responsible, and safe pasttimes as he might desire. As Mr. Huffman said, “Some forms of therapy are not covered under Obamacare,” and it would seem to me that recoil- and concussive-therapy being used to spread the cause of liberty is something that should definitely be covered, if anything is.

(Despite all of the fun and entertainment that can be had at Boomershoot, though, it is important to remember why Mr. Huffman started it every once in a while, especially in relation to introducing victims of oppressive governments to the idea.)