douche douche douche

I've never been a hunter. Growing up in Pennsylvania, I had a few friends who would go hunting with their dads. They'd rub themselves down with fake deer pee to mask the fact that they smell...well...human, and trudge through the woods in the fall and, if successful, would come home with antlers and a bunch of meat you had to doctor fifty ways from Sunday to convince people they should try, and that it was actually good. It took a lot of convincing. I tried it many times (because someone always had a new "maranade" and this one "really made it taste good", and you couldn't hurt anyone's feelings) and wasn't ever ready for seconds. Apparently I'm not alone. I never see venison on the menu at any of my favorite restaurants. My dad, however, wasn't big on guns or hunting, so he never took me out to shoot bambi, or doves, or turkeys, or anything else. Therefore I never inherited the hunting gene and never owned a gun. Some people really enjoy it though. They must. You don't smell like deer pee and come home with venison just for the meat. You have to like what you're doing, and good for them if that's their thing.

Yes, the story has a point. I am going somewhere. Guns have never been my thing. If someone else wants them, I'm OK with that. My biggest gun experience was in the Navy where I had to qualify with a pistol in order to potentially fly with nuclear weapons. A friend who was real good with guns qualified in the lane next to me, and put a few shots in my target to make sure I succeeded. I just never really wanted a gun, and my knowledge of all things firearm related is far below the norm. So I was a little surprised when the youngster got some money for Christmas and, when we discussed what he wanted, he came back with "an air soft gun." I didn't even know what it was, so I figured I'd look into it some before the veto came slamming down on his head. OK, so it's a modern day BB gun, with plastic BB's. Memories of the Christmas Story and Red Ryder came flooding back and, "you'll shoot your eye out kid" actually came out of my mouth. But it was hard to argue the negative side. One of his friends gone one two years ago, and has a pellet gun now. One of the car pool kids, a year younger than him, has a shotgun. Several kids in his class have paintball or air soft guns. So, I did my best with the gun responsibility speech, coming from someone who doesn't spend much time with them, and we went off in the morning, the Friday before Christmas, to Sports Authority, armed with a $15 coupon I found in the paper, and the promise it would go in a closet until Christmas morning. We got the gun he wanted (which looked amazingly like the pistol I qualified with in the Navy) and a bazillion plastic BB's, and I squirreled it away when we got home.

Christmas morning came, and he pulled it out before anything else. The PSP and other stuff I was all proud of myself for supplying to the morning were pushed aside. In his jammies he loaded the gun and headed for the backyard, and shot toward the woods and..nothing. The plastic BB came rolling out of the gun in what could have been a perfect "does this happen to you?" Viagra commercial. He tried again, and again. Same result. So we tried a novel idea...read the book. Apparently the gun needs something called a CO2 cartridge to make the BB go really fast. Who knew? Certainly not me. Not the youngster either.

So he spent the rest of the morning playing with his other stuff. Occasionally he'd grab the gun, head back outside and pretend to shoot it. The noise he made when he'd pretend to fire the gun made me laugh though. It wasn't BAM BAM BAM, or BOOM BOOM BOOM or even POW POW POW, or anything like that. It was DOUCHE DOUCHE DOUCHE! The kid had me rolling.

Day after Christmas, we hit Walmart and got a box of the required CO2 cartridges . Gun works great. He's happy hitting targets by the pond behind the house where there are no nearby homes. In the meantime, though, the PSP did get rave reviews.

One of the more interesting things I got was from my dad-in-law and his wife. It is called Bubba's Stink Purty Manly Cologne. It got the laugh it expected, but when we went up to Georgia yesterday to visit them, I felt obliged to apply some of the stuff to my body. After all, they gave it to me. I shaved yesterday morning, and winced as I sprayed it in my general direction. I half expected the smell of deer pee, but was pleasantly surprised. Actually not bad.

I went to the golf course the day before yesterday, riding in a cart and drowning balls. What I did other than that could hardly be called golf. I don't drink when I golf...well, not alcohol. I stick to the gatorade, powerade, anything with the syllable "ade" in it, because my game is usually in need of lots of "ade". Tuesday though, could have made me rethink that drinking policy, but since it didn't, I suppose nothing will. It was the worst round I shot all year (well, longer than that actually, but I don't care to find out how far back I'd have to go), which was surprising and frustrating, 'cuz I rocked at the driving range just before Christmas. Oh well, so it goes. If at first you don't succeed, drown another dozen balls.

So go the holidays. Hope yours are at least as much fun as I'm having.