Being a shooting coach:

It seems like a natural progression to have become involved in the shooting sports industry.  I was born and raised around guns.  My dad was a gunsmith as well as a competitive shooter which means that my gun safety education started early.  At any given time, my dad would have some kind of a project on the bench.  This afforded me many learning opportunities that have stuck with me for a lifetime.

Many years later, I was recruited by some friends to join their outstanding team of professionals in the luxury entertainment shooting industry!  Talk about a dream job!  Supposedly it was my personality that caused them to zero in on me.  Here I was thinking it was my model like good looks that landed me the position.  Apparently they already chose a face for the company.  (Can't be prettier than me, but whatever.  It's their company.)

So, I told you that to get to this.   One might think that a guy from my hunting and shooting background would go out and marry an outdoors woman.  The type of gal that would drop everything in order to take an evening off to either go to the range for some trigger time or an afternoon hunt.

Nope.  Not me.  I go and marry a hippy.  I kind of knew what I was getting into and I was honest with her from the get go.  If I'm not mistaken, on our first or second date I told her that "September and October are mine.  I might be hard to keep around the house come hunting season."  I kind of thought that she would be on board since we were eating a steak at the time.

Months later, we move in together.  I bring my T.V in first.  Some miscellaneous furniture followed and then I started to bring in the guns.  I had 4 at the time and I could tell by the look on her face that I was going to have some "splaining" to do.  I mean, you'd have thought that I dragged in a burlap sack of dead cats and silicon sex toys.

"What is that?", she asked.  "It's a shotgun, baby."  "What do you need that for?" she asked.  "It's for hunting birds and rabbits, honey."  She just looked at the floor like I just stole something from her.  I looked at her as I walked out to bring in another gun.

"What is that?" she asked again.  "It's a rifle, baby."  "What do you need that for?" she asked.  "It's for hunting antelope, deer, elk, moose or almost any big game animal, honey."  Again, she looked at the floor.  As I walked back out to grab the hand guns, she took a seat on the couch and asked, "Are there more?"  "Oh yeah!" I answered and thought, "What a silly question that was."

I take a good look at her as I hit the door to bring in the last 2 guns.  I think she started to recite ancient Buddhist text or some John Lennon or Grateful Dead lyrics.  I come waltzing through the door with 2 pistol cases and an ammunition box.  Before she could ask I said, "It's 2 hang guns and an ammunition case, Baby.  I use them for just shooting for the hell of it or for protection if needed, Honey".

"What kind of shit are you getting into that you need guns for protection?" she asked.  And, knowing me as good as she did at the time, I felt that was a completely reasonable question.  She was plenty aware of my general attitude and she watched me scare the ever loving shit out of a guy for taping a "no parking'' sign on my brand new truck.

I replied, "I'd rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it."  That wasn't good enough.  I could see that she was very uneasy, so I began what I felt was a meaningful dialog regarding the subject.  "Are you anti-gun?" I asked.  She said, "Well, kind of."  I said, "Remember us discussing the fact that I hunt in September and October, Baby?"  She nodded.  "How do you think I hunt, Honey?  I can't just smite a limit of pheasant or a deer or an elk.  I have to go shoot them, Honey."

"Yeah, but hand guns aren't for hunting" she said.  "Well, that's not entirely true, Honey.  One of these 2 hang guns is often used for hunting."  I went on to mention a mutual friend that we shared that hunted with his .44 magnum.  She was still in disbelief.  So I asked her, "Why are you afraid of guns?"  Then she told me, "My dad was cleaning his gun once and blew up the TV."

That made sense to me.  You're sitting around watching Hee Haw or some shit and the TV gets blow up, its liable to scare the shit out of you!  So, I started to tell her a litany of things that went wrong at the time the TV blew up, like trying to clean a loaded gun.  Nothing I said put her at ease, but she managed to hang around for a couple of decades despite the mighty arsenal I had in the safe and the pistol I carried nearly everywhere I went.

Years later, we were looking for something to do.  We didn't have time to go camping.  She isn't interested in fishing and I wasn't into hiking unless we were going to be going fishing.  Out of the blue she says, "I think I would like to learn how to shoot."  We tried that before.  After a brief safety tutorial, I handed her a .22 and you would have thought I handed her a basket of asps.  She was just too uncomfortable and I could not put her at ease.  This time looked a bit different.

"Okay" I said.  "We can go shooting.  What do you want to shoot?"  "I want to shoot one of those rifle things and that 9mm thing" she said.  I grabbed the guns, the ammo, hearing protection and the keys and down the road we went.  The whole ride in, we discussed gun safety and safe gun handling.  This time, she seemed genuinely interested.  And I thought to myself, "She'll be fine with that .22 but as soon as she shoots the 9mm, she'll head for the truck and that will be all she wrote."

So, we got to where we were headed.  It was an old gravel pit in the middle of nowhere.  We rehashed all of the safety stuff we had gone over earlier and began to set up some targets.  I asked her if she was scared.  "No, not so much" she replied.  We got back to the truck and I got the rifle and the pistol out.  I opened the rifle case and let her hold the rifle.  Again, we went through all of the safety aspects.  Finger off trigger until ready to shoot.  Barrel pointed in a safe direction.  How to obtain sight alignment and she was right with the program.  I loaded the magazine and had her load it into the magazine well, while naming each of the components.

"Magazine" she says as she holds it in her left hand.  "It goes in the magazine well which is located right here on the bottom of the action."  I nod in approval.  "This is how you charge the rifle" and she worked the action.  "This gun is now in condition 1 and that means the rifle is charged and ready to go."  She got in her stance with a bit of coaching, shouldered the rifle, obtained her target, slid her finger in the trigger guard and let one fly.  She hit the target.

"Was that right?" she asked.  "Yeah, Honey.  That was the objective.  I appreciate you keeping your finger out of the trigger guard and the muzzle safely down range as we discussed during the safety briefing.  Now, do it again."  Pew...hit.  "Again."  Pew...hit.  She manged to go 9 for 10 at a target as big as the bottom of a coke can at 25 yards.  She had a grin from ear to ear.  "Is that good?" she asked excitedly.  "Yeah Baby.  That what its all about."

I thought it was a fluke or just dumb luck.  I loaded her up another magazine and asked her to load the rifle.  Again, she said what step she was doing, explained why and when the rifle was in condition 1 she said, "Ready to fire."  She shouldered the rifle, obtained her target and then managed to dump 8 of 10 into the target that was already riddled with holes.

She smiles and says, "I want to do it again" as she hands me the empty magazine.  I gladly loaded another magazine.  She loaded the gun, charged the gun, obtained her target and sent another 9 of 10 into the target.  She had a smile on her face that I couldn't knock off.  I didn't realize it yet, but I was creating a monster.

"I'm done shooting this thing.  I want to shoot the pretty one" she says.  We go through another safety briefing much like the previous one, except this one was regarding a pistol rather than a long gun.  We worked on a proper stance for a couple of minutes and then she just kind of nodded.  I said, "What was that?' and she said, "Load it, dude!"

As well as she had been shooting, I figured I'd better do it and do it now.  I explain to her that the magazine was bigger and that meant that the gun held more rounds.  She said "Okay" and started jumping up and down and clapping.  I'd never seen her act like this.

I tell her, "Loading this pistol is almost the exact same thing as loading the rifle.  Magazine goes into the magazine well, pull the slide back and let it fly forward and chamber a round and then you are ready to get to work.  Are you ready?"  She squares up to her target, takes the gun, racks a round into the chamber and gets to work, just like I thought she would.  She went 12 for 16 on her first magazine.  She hands me the gun, hops around, claps and says "Again, again, again!"

This shit goes on for about and hour and half.  No matter how far away from the target she is, she is drilling it at least 75% of the time.  And by this point she is letting me know if she is shooting high or low.  Now she is pushing me out of the way and loading her own magazine while hopping around and singing some song she just made up about shooting.  It was like I was shooting with a big toddler!  "Is this right?  Is this good?"  Bang, bang, bang.... giggle, giggle, giggle.

She didn't need me.  In fact, I felt left out at this point.  "Honey, do you mind if I shoot?" I asked.  "In a second.  Can you grab me more bullets, please?" she says.  I thought I would be the boss out here and I was wrong.  "Dirty Harriet" is blowing shit away and barking orders like a gunnery sergeant.  "More ammo, Dudley!  I ain't got all day!  Load that magazine and do it now!"

I told her, "Honey, my finger hurts from loading all of the magazines.  Can I please shoot for a minute."  Gunny Dudley replies, "Well holy shit!  Little Bricey's finger hurts!  Let's just stop the war while Bricey goes in search of some TLC!  What in the hell do you think this is!!!  Ammo!  Now!  Go, go, go!"

Now, I didn't serve in the military and I know damned well she didn't either.  She may have missed her calling.  "The action is clear, the range is cold!  Move those targets!"  This went on until we ran out of ammo and then I got my ass chewed for that!  "No ammunition?  What in the hell is going on here?!?!  How are we to defend ourselves without ammunition?"  I was at a loss for words.

She managed to calm herself only to the point of jumping around and clapping again.  "Were doing this again, right?"

Never in a million years did I think that she would enjoy this that much.  As it turns out, every new shooter I have had the pleasure of working with feels about the same way!  (Minus barking orders and chewing my ass about ammo shortages.)

Hope you guys enjoyed the story.  Little Schwarzkopf ordered me to get on with some KP and doing something about acquiring more ammunition.  I'd better get my ass on that, now that she knows how to shoot!

Fighting a boxer

Many years ago, I had the horrible misfortune of being in a bit of a scrape with a boxer.  I'm not talking about the kind of guy who joins a boxing aerobics class and thinks he is learning to box, nor am I talking about the type of guy who pays an athletic trainer to make him think he is training like a boxer.

No.  What I am talking about is much different specimen.  I'm talking about the type of guy who wants to learn how to box.  This guy goes to a boxing gym, filled with other boxers and does this of his own free will.  This guy spends hours on end trying to master his craft.  He spars with other boxers.  He works on his footwork, his stamina and his agility.  He works on slipping punches and works on throwing effective counter punches.  He also works on defense, something you would never learn about in an aerobics class.

Now, I'm not a tough guy.  I have not been in too many fights.  In fact, I am not a big fan of me being in fights.  As it turns out, that shit hurts.  I guess I am old enough to realize that now.  When you encounter a regular guy who wants to fight, most lack the essential skills to stick around long.  Most don't know how to throw a proper punch.  Testament to that thought is, I've managed to keep my teeth in my mouth, in their original position.  More importantly, these people typically don't look like they know what they are doing.  They just start swinging for the fences and one of a few things will happen.  They will gas out after flailing around for 20 seconds, they will get lucky and connect once or twice, or they will get throttled with a straight punch right up the middle.  None of that silly shit is going to happen when you fight a boxer.  Nope.  Not a bit of it.

I can't remember what exactly started the fight.  I think my boxer friend tactfully removed that from my memory while moving both of my eyebrows around on my forehead.  Knowing me in my younger years, I'd suggest that I was running my gums about something, he objected then I said one last thing that got under his skin.

What I do remember is this.  He squared up with me, real quick... as if Micheal Buffer was just done announcing our names to everybody in the arena and the referee was going to give us fight instructions.  There was no Michael Buffer, no arena and frankly no referee.  His chin went down, his hands came up and just by the way he did that alerted me to the fact that I was going to have my hands full.

I admit, he caught me off guard.  He didn't look like he knew what he was doing.  Man, was I wrong about that and I'd learn that lesson in about 9 seconds.  He bobbed 2-3 times as if I were already throwing punches and then it happened.  Left, right, left.  It was a left jab, straight right and a left hook even before I could get my hands up!  Right eyebrow, busted!  Left eyebrow, busted!  Left hook to the chin and out went the lights.....

So, when a professional ass whipping is administered in this fashion, nothing hurts.  You don't feel a thing but you do oddly remember the look on the guys face and each punch right before it ricochets off of your face.  Uhm, he looked serious, by the way.  Kind of like he knew what he was doing.

I could only tell that the beat down was over because my head was no longer bouncing around on my shoulders, and as the lights began to come back on, I found myself in a compromised position.  I was on my hands and knees, a fair amount of blood coming mostly from my right eyebrow and I had the spins.  I could hear people talking and I could feel someone trying to stand me up.  The fog began to clear a bit more.  It dawned on me that I had been issued an official, professional ass whoop and someone had come to my rescue.

I remember thinking, "who is this person, gracious enough to put an end to the savage beating I just took?"  I wiped some more blood from my eye and at the same time hoped the guy who beat me up got run over by the space shuttle or some shit.  Who was standing in front of me?  The guy who just beat my ass...  "You're gonna be all right," he said, "but you're going to want to get that eyebrow looked at."  He turned me around, somehow pointed me in the direction of my truck and said, "Have a nice night, okay?"

I stepped off the curb and stuffed my finger tip into the hole in my eyebrow.  I thought, "not only did this guy beat me senseless, he also knows when a fellow needs about 8 stitches."  I took his advice and headed towards the hospital.  The first thing they asked was, "what happened?"  The next thing they asked was, "Have you been drinking?"  I hadn't but I wish I had a cold one right about then.  I told them I got beat up but "my opponent was good natured and well mannered enough to pick me up, dust me off, give me some medical advice and pointed me in the right direction to get it."

8 stitches in one eyebrow, 3 stitches in the other and two ice bags later, I was sent home to nurse my wounds.  I sat there and kept going over the course of events.  "How could this have gone so wrong?'' It took playing the loop over in my mind about 10 times, but I figured it out.  My mouth sent an invitation to a party that I had no business throwing.

Since then, I have caught myself randomly asking people if they are professional boxers before I go and say something stupid.  I think I owe that to myself.  Call me a hard learner, but I now know what the professor looks like at the school of hard knocks.