Cold Steel & Hot Lead

*written about five months ago

Well it finally came. My Schofield is here and it is beautiful! I went to pick it up the day after I got back from my last session and I was amazed. This is the first real gun I have ever owned and I must admit that the feeling is a little weird. It came in an unremarkable cardboard box and was wrapped in an, oil soaked, plastic bag. I was astounded at how heavy it was. The thing is a hand-cannon. When I got it home I realized that I needed to not only get a case for it (so I wouldn’t have to keep it wrapped in a rag), but also a trigger lock and an actual gun safe. So, I headed back out to a local hunting store to get all this. It all cost me less than I thought (the remains of my per diem from last session) and I had it all installed before LJ got home.

I bought some ammo as well. Now, this is no peashooter, the thing is a .45 colt; the second largest caliber to be had for any normal hand gun (the shells themselves are actually bigger than any 50 caliber like the Desert Eagle) and it aint cheap. A pack of 50 cost me thirty bucks. Have I gone out and fired it? No, not as yet. Why? Well, let me be honest. I haven’t fired a real gun in years. The last one I did fire was somewhat smaller than this one and I was at a range when I did. Not to mention the gun and the ammo are both expensive as hell. So maybe I’m a little gun shy, not really a pun in this case. I will fire it though, but before I do I want to get eye, and ear protection. Again this is a very big gun and it is going to make a very loud bang, so I just want to be ready.

I did purchase snap-caps. Snap-caps are little mockup bullets that allow you to repeatedly dry fire your gun without damaging it. I got these for the purpose of getting the feel for thumbing and fanning the trigger for practice. However, this particular gun is a “top-break” which means that the barrel and revolver lever forward if a latch is pulled from the top. The latch unfortunately is released by the same motion as fanning your hand back and over the hammer. This could lead to ejecting all your rounds and looking like a complete dumb-ass in front of all the other cowboys. So, I’ve decided that fanning will either take way more control than I currently possess or it is just not the way this gun can be operated. Not that it really matters right now though; as I will be treating the thing like a rattlesnake with another head on it’s ass.

I haven’t, as yet, come up with a good name for it, but I am working on one. I think a gun and a cowboy have to have some history first before a name can come forth. You can’t just slap any old name on your trusty sidearm. It has to be sentimental, hence the whole cowboy romanticism thing. I think LJ would probably resent me using her name and my dog Zeus’ name is just too ostentatious. Maybe I could use my grandmother’s name. She’s tough as nails and I’m sure she packs a hell of a punch. I dunno. It’s still a work in progress.

Further, I don’t need any tired old, clichéd, movie reference jokes about shooting my eye out. I’m not one to be superstitious, and it was cute when I had a BB gun, but the thought of a ricocheting .45 slug hitting me in the eye is an idea I want far from my consciousness. If anything tell me I’ll get hamburgers thrown at me or I’ll sit on a tack. You know something unpleasant, yet non-lethal. Plus, I’ll be incredibly careful with it, so try not to worry.

On a completely different note, LJ wants me to grow a beard. Is that out of the blue or what? So I am currently twelve days into “Beard Growth ‘07”. I’ll see where this leads, but so far it is pretty unremarkable.

Epilogue:

I have fired it now, a few times. The fist time I fired it a piece of gun metal dislodged from somewhere and hit me in the cheek (this hasn’t happened since). What you have to realize about guns like this is that they are very open. Automatics, like the kind you see on TV where the magazine is slammed into the grip, are very closed. This is because they use all extra gas and force to chamber the next round. My gun is an exact replica of the ones used almost 140 years ago. The technology was much more rudimentary. So, you have to expect some debris when fired. Anyway, I pulled the metal shard out when I got home with some tweezers and an exacto-knife. Results? I am a piss poor shot, but to quote Hell Boy, “I’m not a very good shot, but this gun uses really big bullets.” Also, my parents got me a training gun that is a .22 colt replica, so I’ll be able to practice more often at way less the cost.