I had a similar experience when a cop friend took me shooting, Suzi. Almost all of the handguns were so heavy and so REAL, they were kind of overwhelming. The only one that didn't bother me was the .22 rifle.

And I also agree with earlier assessments of Hil's landlord.

The most fun I ever had around guns was going to a Black Powder shoot. You want loud? You want clouds of black powder smoke wafting around? You want geeks talking about powder, balls, and wadding? It sounds miserable, right? But you see this guy pick up this hogs leg of a fricken long-barreled pistol and point it at the target, pull the trigger and "ssst-pause-BOOOOM!"

And muskets are the best. Shoot once, peer at the target, pour in the powder, ram the patch and ball down the barrel, do that end-for-end swing thing Daniel Day Lewis did in Mohicans, sight down the mile-long barrel, pull the trigger and "ssst-pause-BOOOM!"

Black smoke everywhere. It's a wonder the west was won, I tell you what, with all the pouring and patching and "sssst-pause-BOOOM!"

ETA: None of which addresses your post, Suzi. Because yes, modern pistols are more chilly intimidating than fun.

Remember when I said I was scheduled to talk with the HR rep of a vendor about one of their guys being inappropriate? I got an email today from the owner of the company telling me that the guy in question would no longer be involved in work at my place of employment or with our staff (which is what I had asked for) and that all full time employees of his company will be going through cultural and gender sensitivity training. So hey, that's positive!

And just to keep things in balance, I realized today that I failed to renew my license plates. It would be an easy fix if I didn't have to get an emissions test before renewing. I doubt I'll be able to get that done before Saturday. I may have to drive to work the next two days to reduce the chances of being ticketed in the meantime.

CJ wants me to like guns as much as he does. I'm glad we went and I may go again, but I didn't get a rush from it. Yes, i got an adrenaline surge but in a bad tummy kind of way.

Crowley can't fit under my bed with his collar on, so he can't chase Noodle under there. Instead he pokes his head under one side, yips, runs to the other side, yips, jumps up on the bed, and repeat over and over again. This has been going on for the last week. I finally laid down to see what Noodle does during this frenzy of activity. Basically, she ignores him. If he pokes his head under and is too close to her, she will hiss. That is about it. Silly animals.

CJ wants me to like guns as much as he does.

Yeah, I don't want anybody to like guns. I'm against handling a tool whose primary purpose is to kill other humans.

I've come to the not popular opinion that "responsible gun owners' is a bullshit thing which propagates and allows gun culture, and is the open-gate that allows massacres.

You know where they don't have responsible gun owners? Australia. Because they took the fucking guns away.

Do you know where they say a precipitous decline in gun massacres? Again, Australia.

This is causal, not a correlation.

I completely understand why it's a rush to have such power in your hand.

But the enjoyment/false security you get from that play is what allows the other shit.

I'm sure it would be a huge rush to use a flamethrower, or own a loaded tank. But we don't let people do that for reasons.

I am that asshole that would take all the guns away. And I am very confident that my gross executive fiat would be beneficial to the USA. Very simply, things would be better if lethal power was not doled out to so many idiots and crazy people.

And, of course, many perfectly reasonable people are free to disagree with you.

And, of course, many perfectly reasonable people are free to disagree with you.

1. The legal door you walk through to play with a weapon of lethal force is the same door that Paddock walked through to kill and wound the people in Las Vegas. To participate in gun culture is to validate and endorse it.

2. Gun culture is racist. And I"ll break that down into two parts. First, it's a grotesque expression of white privilege that is not allowed to other races. A black man who picks up a toy gun in a department store will (and has been) shot and killed. A black man who is legally licensed to own a gun in an open carry state will (and has been) shot and killed in his car. Second, stoking racist fears is the chief marketing strategy of manufacturers. In fact, it's pretty clear that the chief tool of white supremacists to enforce their terror is guns.

3. Guns are the primary tool of violence against women. How do women get murdered? In their own home, usually by their husband. Or their ex-husband. Or their boyfriend or ex-boyfriend. By a vast multiplicative factor, women are killed by men that they know. At home. By a gun. And that doesn't even begin to talk about living under the threat of a gun-owning partner.

4. Massacres are highly profitable. There is nothing false or misleading in the following statement: When you buy ammunition you fund the industry that profited from the murder of children at Sandy Hook. Gun sales go UP after massacres. There is not only NO incentive to stop massacres, the gun industry actively opposes limiting gun access to people with mental illness.

5. When you buy ammunition, guns, go to gun shows, join gun clubs - you are supporting the NRA. You don't have to be a member of the NRA to fund it. The NRA gets plenty of lobby support from the industry.

6. Gun culture and gun ownership are anti-democratic. The NRA has stoked the racist fears of its base so there's a highly militarized, authoritarian gun ownership culture eager to suppress black votership, oppose federally elected powers, take it to the streets if Trump is impeached.

You cannot own a gun, go shooting at a range, keep it in your home without supporting these things. And I mean that in the literal sense that you are funding them.

I get all of that and I personally won't own a gun. That said I also was brought up in a hunting environment. I don't eat meat myself, but many of my family and friends hunt for food. My niece barely goes to a grocery store between her gardening and hunting efforts.

My big thing is the hunters have to get a license, but don't have to demonstrate the ability to hit a target, or know the safety rules or even how to clean their weapons. Common sense says you can't drive a car without showing you can stay in a lane. I can't see why you can own a gun without demonstrating competency.

I can also see, but don't endorse, the need for personal safety. But again, the owner should have to demonstrate competency so they don't shoot their neighbor.

I agree Laura, that people don't have to show competency in terms of skills or knowledge of gun safety seems madness to me. It seems like such a basic and reasonable ask in a country that has enshrined the right to own guns. But ALL the gun owners in my family, every single last one of them, would disagree with me on that one, and they live that belief by not keeping their guns and ammo in a locked safe, instead they keep loaded guns in various insecure places like by their nightstand and in their cars or on a rack by the door, etc.

That is really horrifying, Burrell.

I remember well my dad always cleaning his rifles outside, and we never had a clue where he hid the ammo. There was one time when he was alone at our Otter Lake house on a hunting trip and he cleaned his rifle inside because the weather was awful. He ended up putting a shot through the wall and bed headboard. We mocked him about it for years because he was always so diligent about safety.