Andy’s Ring (Fort Cobb)

Approximately an hour southwest of Oklahoma City lies Fort Cobb Lake, a 4,000 acre lake with another 2,000 acres of park area surrounding it. It’s a really quiet place, great for getting away and relaxing a weekend at a time. My buddy Andy and his family just put a brand new mobile home a lake lot down by the lake. His brother-in-law and I joined Andy on this weekend’s mission: his farewell to a piece of jewelry.

That’s Andy. During the week, Andy is a firefighter in Mustang, OK. He is also, after ten years of marriage, now single. Without going into too many details, Andy took the “nice guy” approach (because he is one) throughout the divorce and it bit him in the ass. His name was drug through the mud both in and out of court, and things began to get nasty. Throughout it all Andy took the high road, because he’s just that kind of guy. Besides, this weekend, I think he had the last laugh.

Andy is very talented with woodworking, although this particular piece of work might not show it. This is a small piece of wood with holes drilled in it, designed to hold golf tees.

Here are several practice golf balls Andy brought along on the adventure. Andy is also a certified scuba diver, and retreived these balls from a pond near a local golf course.

This one, however, is the most important one. That’s Andy’s wedding ring, attached to the side of it. The whole ring was covered in epoxy. Ain’t no way that thing’s coming off. Ever.

Andy’s brother-in-law Kenny videotaped the event as it unfolded.

Here’s Andy, on the edge of the Fort Cobb dock, explaining to Kenny and I what he is about to do.

Andy tees up one of the practice golf balls …

… begins to swing …

… CRACK! That baby’s out of there!

Andy prepares another practice swing.

This shot was snapped seconds before I began running for my life. Andy whacked this ball hard. REALLY hard. Unfortunately, the ball hit the metal railing and shot back at us, whizzing right past Kenny and I and both of our cameras. We decided we might want to seek higher ground before anyone got injured.

I’m not saying Andy has any pent up aggression over the divorce, but here Andy points to the chunks of wood he’s taken out so far.

After relocating to the boat loading dock, Andy re-set up his tee holding contraption.

POW. Andy lets another one fly.

Here, Kenny interviews Andy before the final shot. Andy explained to us that he had thought about pawning or selling the ring, but felt that it might be cursed and he didn’t want to hurt anyone else with it.

Andy also explained that he didn’t donate it to anyone because he didn’t want any good to come of it either. It had to be destroyed. Andy even used the worst, oldest, nastiest golf ball he could find to attach the ring to.

Unfortunately, all of Andy’s practice shots had also launched all the golf tees out into the lake as well! There’s no tee for the final shot!

Kenny and Andy search for a tee, using the light from Kenny’s camcorder.

Andy, always thinking, decides the ring itself will also work as a tee. The ball with the ring attached is placed on the board, ring down.

This is the last known shot of Andy’s wedding ring. If you would like to see it again, it’s about 200 yards out in the middle of Lake Fort Cobb.

After the impressive drive, Andy is interviewed by Kenny.

“I’ll drink to that!” says Andy.

Andy and I celebrate with Mr. Bud Lite on the Fort Cobb dock.

Andy and his brother-in-law, Kenny.

The rest of the night was filled with tons of festivites. Here, Andy tells me about the one that got away (yeah, right). A few minutes later, some old man wandered by and asked us if we had caught any fish. I told him I had caught a marlin but threw it back. He didn’t believe us.

Here Kenny shows what a wimp he is by not baiting his own hook.

Here, Andy baits both Kenny and my hooks. Hey, I never said I wasn’t a wimp too.

This was pretty much the fishing technique used all night. Leaning the poles up against the railing left both hands available for beer drinking.

Me, self-portrait.

Andy proudly displays the only fish caught that night. Amazingly, he caught it with no bait on his hook.

Woo, that’s a keeper baby.

Close inspection shows that somehow, Andy managed to hook the fish IN THE EYE. Andy threw the one-eyed swimmer back to the lake.

After a couple of hours of fishing, Kenny drove Andy and I (riding on the tailgate) back to the cabin.

On the way back we stopped by the Crow’s Roost. It was closed.

Firefighters are really strong. That’s what I always tell Andy when there are heavy things around to lift, like beer coolers.

Inside the cabin, Andy breaks out two of his favorite snacks. Pepperonis, and marshmellows. Mmmmm!

My eyes were really sticky after this picture.

Kenny thought he would take advantage of two drunks by getting us to play poker with him. $20 buy in, winner takes all. You might want to look closely, because this is the last known shot of Kenny’s money. To see it today, you’ll have to look in MY WALLET! Boo ya!

Andy decides that mashmellows go better with beer than lime. After the game had ended (did I mention I took everyone’s money?) we decided to watch a movie around four in the morning. Andy was snoring during the opening credits and my eyelids were drooping as well, so we called it a night.

Here are a few pictures I took on the drive back home Sunday morning, just to give you an idea of how far out there Fort Cobb really is.

Yeah, it looks like this for about an hour.

Out one window …

…and out the other.

Mission Accomplished.