karen wrote:
Dismissive, arrogant and detached from reality???? :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: Now that is funny! Your post and comments just show how much you actually know.
I would be quite happy to answer any constructive criticism but unfortunately I have never heard anything but malicious unpleasantness from you both in person, by email and on this thread.
Karen
Karen! I don't know who you are! I have never met you. How could I email you if I don't know you. You keep alluding that I am mean and nasty but cannot offer any details! You say that you would reply to any constructive criticism, but you don't! I have given you pagefulls of constructive criticism and all you could offer was that I don't know anything!
Well, let me add more details. On the first of the two instances when I found the reception "closed for lunch" no one was answering the door, so I went round to the Stats shed and asked for help. A young girl had keys and she took me round the back through the staff entrance. We found two females having lunch and a natter, but they would not answer the door! I knew my competitor's number and I found my match cards myself. The two having lunch never lifted their backsides off the chairs and whatever I said made no impression on them. As I walked round the front of the building, I saw more people banging on the door!!!
Have you ever shot competitively? I came not to "have a bang and see where they go", but to shoot to win! Do you have the slightest idea of the concentration required to fire from a standing, unsupported position and hit the X ring at 50 metres. You have to be perfectly calm and even the slightest confrontation prior to the match ruins everything. That incident completely ruined my day - waste of entry fee; waste of petrol and waste of time.
On the second occasion there was a hand written notice on the front door: "Closed for lunch! Collect competition cards from range office"! When I called at the range office, John Gardener told me that the reception was closed for lunch and that he did not know anything about competition cards. More banging on the door and more agro!
I have nothing to add to the point about non-delivery of target faces as ordered, except to confirm that the HBSA Mid-range Open was delayed in September this year, because the targets supplied had wrong faces.
Let us leave the inadequate parking, dirty toilets, attrocious roads and bed bugs for another thread! This one started with a question about the life membership, when you hijacked it to attack some person that you think is me!!! Well! Let me tell you that if you were in a position to do anything about the matters that I mentioned, I would have known you!
Back to the thread now. I conclude that Life Membership is indeed unfair to those that live some distance away. It is also doubtful whether the NRA gets real benefit from the scheme bearing in mind that the funds are regularly lost in their entirety. I also think that if the way the Bisley ranges are run is not improved substantially and soon we are in real danger that even the ordinary members will see little point in continuing.
Although this is my personal opinion, I should mention that I am an active member of 3 clubs and 2 associations over 3 counties and, consequently, whether I like it or not, my opinion is tempered by the opinions of many others, but I have no mandate to speak on their behalf.
We need to take stock of the whole complex issue and it will not be easy. Life Membership, calculated as a multiple of Annual Membership becomes meaningless as the value of ordinary, annual membership diminishes. It would be nice if we could restore the respect, love and affection and support for NRA that probably existed years ago (not sure of that), but that is a long haul project and time is not on our side. We need something positive to show tomorrow! A good starting point is to go through the benefits at put financial value against each. If you cannot then the members certainly will not!
My apology to the moderators for veering off the thread to slug it out with Karen. I hope that something worthwhile can be picked out of that.