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ginbarn has always had an aversion to guns, but she did learn to shoot after being assaulted a long time ago. So she took a really big step with me yesterday when we both headed to a shooting range just outside of Dallas.
Her first time on the range in 30 years was with a .357 Ruger revolver. She felt comfortable with the gun's weight and action, and she had no problem with the kick, even though she used the "heavy" loads. She went through an entire box of ammo, and the more practice she got with the revolver, the more comfortable she felt with operating it. She even got five hits in the red zone.
Just when I thought she was done for the day, though, she stepped back out on the range with a Bushmaster .223 rifle. My eyes popped out of my sockets because I didn't think she wanted to try any firearm popularly known as an "assault weapon," and I had just finished up a very satisfying session punching holes in a silhouette target with a Bulgarian MAK-90. But there was ginbarn, Bushmaster in hand, unleashing a deadly torrent of lead on a very dangerous ceiling. It was very cool. Very wrong, but very cool.
She did manage to hit the silhouette target once with the Bushmaster, though - and it counted something fierce. ginbarn scored a direct hit on the crotch. I think this brought her deep psychological satisfaction. But the Bushmaster's sights were very awkward to use, and ginbarn thinks she probably had on the wrong glasses for a rifle range. Plus, the rifle had a fairly strong tendency to jam on her. She left the range muttering about "that plastic piece of shit," which made me wonder if she would have been more comfortable with the MAK-90.
Anyway, that's our trip to the range. ginbarn wanted me to let you know that before we started busting off steel, we donated $70 worth of basic needs to the local bird rehabilitation shelter, where we visited a little pigeon that ruptured its chest by flying into a plate glass window in what was probably the worst case of blunt force trauma I've ever seen on a bird. It's sewn up, and it requires a feeding tube to eat due to its damaged throat, but it should recover eventually.
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