Hey...Buckaroo.

Don’t ask me where Ryan gets his acting skills. Far be it from me to dabble in such silliness.

But put the kid in a costume and he becomes the character.

What you see here, my friends, is the strong, silent type—broad in the shoulders, narrow in the hips. Heck on wheels with a gun. He’s not lookin’ for trouble, but if trouble comes lookin’ for him he’s not gonna shy away from it.

Straight out of a dog-eared Louis L’Amour.

Not that I read that stuff. After all, I’m a very serious reader as you can see by my no-nonsense Recommended Reads. Heck, I wouldn’t even know the names of any real Louis L’Amours. I’d have to make ‘em up—like, High Lonesome, or Dark Canyon.

Ha! This is easy! I can just flip a switch and put my mind on western dimestore-novel random.

Maybe North to the Rails or The First Fast Draw. Yeah! Those sound like romanticized cowboy titles that Louis L’Amour might write.

You wouldn’t ever catch me putting down my serious historical analysis of The Bounty for a guilty peek at how Ruble Noon, the mysterious tall gunslinger, kills Ben Janish in some ridiculous novel Louis L’Amour might creatively title The Man Called Noon.

No, you don’t see lists of such absurd fare on this blog.

And you wouldn’t catch me dressin’ up like a cowpoke on a pioneer trek a few years ago. Lookin’ just a little like The Man from Snowy River in my outback hat that I drove all the way to Salt Lake for because I was hopin' I'd be mistaken for Jim Craig.

No, I wouldn’t like the way the sun is settin’ behind me as I fiddle with my Nikon—lookin’ like some wannabe, weather-beaten, cow-punchin’ photographer.

No siree little feller.

Shootfire.

I don’t know where Ryan gets it.