I like to shoot guns, and I'm fairly decent at it. As is one of my daughters. I don't do it a lot anymore, my successor, Henry, my son, was a Army paratrooper, and used a long gun in Iraq and Afghanistan.
So there is this other side of me. I protest, yeah, and I'll be out with you there on the streets, with the signs, etc in the next few years. But I'm really not a non-violent guy, in terms that are classically used. A pacifist. Not that, not my nature. . I'm not violent, mind you. As my kids and friends can verify, if you're my friend or kin. Or a patient, got to put that one in. But turning the other cheek don't come naturally.
I spent two years, nearly, in a hot, humid, unfriendly land, SE Asia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and a venture into Burma the South Border of a country we won't mention now, but our new con man president has some ties to.
I was a medic, a corpsman. I got identified early, through circumstances not ones I want to relate, as someone who could fire a rifle. And pistol.
My kin were at fault, my dad, his brothers and cousins had me shooting before I was 5.
Geez, come to think of it, one of the girls can say she shot a rifle around that same age.
Anyway, I have this target .22, that's fun to take out and bang around with here. And by here, I mean I can go target practice less than 2 miles from my house, in the woods.
A Colt Woodsman
I don't expect many comments from this, just thought I'd tell you what I did on my days 'off'.' I haven't trotted out this little gem in a couple years. It's old, but still seems to work. I took a magazine to shoot at various bottles and can, then set up three targets, 25 yards away. 'bout 75 feet.
Here's my targets, around 25 yards, three in succession:
\
Have to say, I'm not usually that good, referring to the last target. As the youngest will attest. That's more her average than mine.
Anyway, I'm still the same guy who wrote the last post, a nice guy. Just don't do what someone who at the university in Seattle threatened, or demean my kid. Not much can piss off a boomer-age guy than some neo nazi harassing his daughter. Don't recommend, it, kid.
No snow here, day after Thanksgiving, warmer than I can remember.
Cheers to you all.
Mike
Ammo is expensive; looks like you don't need to spend any more money practicing.
ReplyDeleteIt has become more expensive, but I have, because I shoot so little, boxes and boxes from the past 20 years. I'm set.
DeleteWow, you are a good shot!
ReplyDeleteAverage, my youngest is better.
DeleteImpressive grouping, Mike. I've always thought the Roosevelt dime would be cooler if they kept Mercury's winged helmet and transferred it onto his head --but it looks like he dodges pretty good without it.
ReplyDeleteHah! I do have a couple winged merc's around, from I think the twenties. Well, I always put FDR down there for the photo, and keep him out of harm's way.
DeleteAn amazing and complicated person, he was. Imagine trying to do a contrast and compare with him and the current elected 'president'.
Cheers
Mike
Oh, doing ok? Need to use rescue meds often?
Present %SpO2, 97 --doing fine.
DeleteMike, many liberals see guns as a tool and not a political statement, as does my husband. Many liberals like to hunt. I am glad that liberals are so broad in their interests. Even Gabby and her husband still have guns.
ReplyDeleteyep. agree
DeleteSomething else we have in common. I shot competitively in my teens and got quite good, but only competed regionally in small bore. The NRA was an entirely different entity back then. Politically I am as left as you if not more so. Maybe it's not such a strange combination. I just don't know.
ReplyDeleteI think with some groups, the right wing, guns are a source of worship rather than simple use.
DeleteThat's a nice grouping and cluster. Well placed! We have some competition range shooters in this area. I was fortunate while working to have training from Bravo 4 Certified Army Snipers, ATF Agents and FBI advanced Fire Arms training, including a couple of sessions in the FAT's unit. It is a skill I admire.
ReplyDeleteCheers
My uncles started me shooting when I was maybe 5. I always just had a knack for the open sights, scope I was fine, but with some guns I was almost unconscious with the open sights, the post in front.
DeleteI'm a liberal and a pacifist, but I own a gun (a Colt 360). I don't think most liberals are opposed to any and all guns. In spite of the NRA paranoia. No sane person should object to reasonable gun control.
ReplyDeleteAgree all points. I am curious how you came by and why the Colt. Perhaps an email......
DeleteYep, I have guns, too, but detest the NRA... Come to think of it, I think I need to take them out of the gun safe and oil them up as it has been a few years...
ReplyDeleteThere is much to detest about the NRA, and they've changed much in their life span.
DeleteMy dad and grand-dad were hunters and I, as a young lad, went along to beat the bushes. But when I was a teen, I went out with my dad and found that I was a great snap shot at prairie chickens (grouse). Later I went out by myself during pheasant hunting season and they scared the hell out of me, rising as they do from right beneath your feet. Haven't fired a gun since.
ReplyDeleteOne of those 5 pound cock pheasant's booming out in front of you can cause heart arrhythmia....same with wood ducks, coming at you at 70 miles an hour.
DeleteI have good memories of my uncle taking us cousins out to the woods to practice shooting at tin cans. I come from a family of hunters. The meat filled the freezer-it wasn't hobby hunting. I don't hunt but I did like the shooting practice. I'm not against guns. I'm against crazy people having guns. And, i have to say, I don't understand why anyone needs to have a machine gun. I am usually good at seeing the other side but this is a case, I guess, of not knowing what I don't know, because I just don't get it.
ReplyDeleteI think it's the difference between seeing a gun as a tool, to do a certain thing, and as an object of worship. The nuts stroke their guns lovingly at night. I keep them in a closet, no safe, kids don't live here.
ReplyDeleteTo them they are venerated. To me, they are pieces of metal and wood. They are no more or less important than my snow shovel......well, actually less today.