the gun stories. there was a time, well a few times in my life where I've been concerned enough about my personal safety that I'd carry a gun everywhere, and especially have one handy when answering my door. once I answered my doorbell at 2am and found a chickcop that wanted to ask me if I owned a black dog. she seemed utterly unconcerned that I had a gun in my hand. maybe she didn't notice. seems like an odd thing for a cop not to notice... anyway, she asked because she apparently had one in her car that she found roaming the street, and I said "yes, but my dog is in the back yard." (I knew this because the dog was barking like crazy at the back gate.) as I exited the door to show the cop to the back gate to prove my dog was where she was supposed to be, I casually tossed the gun onto the couch beside the door. again, she didn't notice. The cop then left after asking if I knew anyone else with a black dog nearby, which I didn't... the sidewalk painter was the real test of whether I would actually practice what I preached. I answered the door to find a college-fratboy looking guy with a knapsack cradled in his arms and a big smile on his face. "Well, I guess you're next!" says he. he reaches into his knapsack and I reach behind my back and snap the AMT Hardballer .45 auto out of it's Bianchi "pistol pocket" holster at about the same time. I say "Is that so?" as I casually bring forth the cocked pistol and snick off the safety. (not pointing directly at him, finger along the slide, not on the trigger- you know, real casual.) at this point my attention was focused completely on the hand that was still in the knapsack. I wanted that hand to come out empty and do things that made me feel friendly again. I never saw the expression on frat-boy's face, or if I did, i ignored it- in fact, I have no clear memory of what did happen except that I know he went away rather quickly and apparently his hands did non-threatening things because I did not shoot him, and soon I was back inside with the safety on and the holster snapped shut. wow. what a fucking rush. I say that now because nothing did happen. He was just a sidewalk painter (as i found out from my neighbour later), and he wanted nothing more than to charge me $8 to stencil my house number on the curb. I prolly scared him so bad he'd have to toss his jockeys in the trash. well, he didn't get hurt, and next time (if he's brave enough to knock on random doors again), he'd be wise enough not to use such an incredibly misinterpretable sales pitch... Oh, one other time... I had a roommate named Jay. one saturday we'd gone shooting in the desert, and of course we'd taken all the rifles and pistols I owned and generally blew the shit out of a lot of tin cans and clay pigeons, got sunburned, and came home exhausted and satisfied. After tossing out the trash from the bed of the pickup and hauling all the dirty guns and empty ammo boxes and belts and canteens inside, we settled down and watched TV. after a few hours I decided to start cleaning the guns, so I grabbed the kit, spread a cut-open cardboard box on the carpet in the living room and got to work. at about 11pm, I was cleaning the last gun and the doorbell rang. Jay answered. "Hey, can we borrow your phone?" two rocker-looking guys start pushing their way in and Jay (looking confused- trying to decide wether to be polite or be aggressive, I suppose), trying to stand in their way. "..our car broke down and we need to...to.." I'm sitting on the couch with a Smith & Wesson Model 66 target revolver in .357 magnum, which I'm holding upside-down, cylinder open and a cleaning brush down the barrel. I look up to see the blonde guy with wide eyes mouth an "O" that he seems to be unable to get past his lips. without another word, they about-face and as far as I could see from the couch, stumbled away through the bush in front of the walkway. Now, get this: are there people so dumb that they think a seated person could pull a cleaning brush out of a revolver, load a cylinder with cartridges (assuming some were handy, which was not the case anyway), shut the cylinder and fire before they could stop me? Apparently there are. Jay said that one of the guys had a hunting knife behind his back in a belt-holster. They didn't have the guts to try a rush I guess. If they had, I'm sure I would have had my throat cut and I'd have died with a goofy look on my face and a brush sticking out of an empty revolver... I've been shot at before, and actually got hit once with a bullet fragment- a piece of a copper-jacket hit me in the stomach hard enough to raise a welt and draw a little blood. BUT.. I've never taken a shot at someone. never have squeezed the trigger with a human in the sights. (I've not even taken up those few pounds of pressure with an animal larger than a rabbit in my sights- so much for Big White Hunter.) Save the sidewalk-painter incident, I've never deliberately flashed a gun at anyone. Damn it, though; I have a reputation like a cross between Rambo and the Unibomber among those I know. I don't get their docile, un-self-aware attitudes about personal safety and they don't get my attitude either- regardless of the news they read and the statistics showing how likely that it is someone really dangerous is gonna someday take an invasive interest in obtaining a value from you personally and violently. I have a few other gun stories, one involving the drugged-out guy who climbed up the next door neighbors roof, and one where I shot a hole in my washroom wall because of a dysfunctional safety on a new gun. a few others. I'll write them down someday when I remember them. Fuck it. I'm gonna stay up all night. the alarm will tell me when it's time to go to school, then I'll have to go to work- I'll prolly be really tired by then but I've been writing a column in my head for 2 hours now, perfect transient words and phrases and I have to get them on paper (well, disk, anyway) before I can think of sleeping, so I won't sleep. *sigh* I've already lost most of what I wrote in my head. it'll never see paper at all. I remember the great story about all of my friends, the carl story, and the story about my job, but those perfect words won't come again, so I'll go to whatever topic happens right now *snap!* liquor. great.. now watch me pull the standard artfag "my life with liquor, unsatisfying sex and petty larceny" stories out of my ass. not many people write the truth about how they feel about guns, but you all have stories of beer, sex and "the time I ripped off some Company Fuck and got away with it". so do i. this is mostly because I saw other, cooler-than-me people doing these things, so I had to try too. Usually several years later than you tried it, because I was a pompously self-righteous christian boy. Beer. I don't like beer. never have.. tastes like piss to me. Thanks for offering, but please drink it yourself, you'll waste it if you insist on popping one for me. Cheapest thing I like is grape wine. like that kosher shit. tasty like memories of over-sugared kool-aid that's been in the sun for a day. I also like some hard drinks. Tequila, some rums, 100-proof cinnamon schnapps and Triplesec (yeah, I drink it straight.) I like a few mixed drinks. usually any one of these I try I like and get a fetish for a short while about. I still like Black Russians, Sam's Marguaritas, and bottled Piña Colada wine coolers. they're all easy to make... I get drunk and I write, late at night.. as I am doing right now. I'm not really a very good drunk. when I drink, I am drunk for about 4 hours and I fall asleep. nothing really antisocial. I'm still pretty new at the drunk thing, so don't expect Bukowski to spring from my tortured heart. I never get drunk during the day. I don't get hangovers (at least not splitting-headachy unable-to-function kind) so school and work are not affected by this.