Firearms

My friend Jen's parents live out in the country-ish east of Memphis. There, among other things, they have a pond and a back forty where they have build their grandson a go-kart track.

And that's where James and I took the boys shooting.

I had forgotten how much fun a .22 is to shoot. I had mine from when I was a kid, and James' father in-law has two - an old single-shot and a fancy new Ruger with a 25-round magazine. Fun! We killed many, many cans.

John can't quite aim, yet, but he can put the bullets pretty much where he wants them to go. I sort of guided the point of the rifle while he pulled the trigger as fast as he could.

Then we shot a 20 guage. I had brought a bunch of cans in a big plastic bin for us to shoot.

"James," I said, "I think that plastic box is talking kind of smart to me."

"You better teach it a lesson, then," he told me.

So we blew that motherfucker up. The shotgun has a very, very satisfying roar. Later, we examined all the targets, perforated with birdshot.

"It would suck to get with that," James said.

"Oh, the shotgun..." James said to Jen back at the house.

"Is it a boomstick?" she asked.

"That it is."