Stress Relief...go shooting

On Tuesday, Ken gathered most of our pistols and a buttload of ammo and we headed to the gun club so that Dad could try shooting pistols.  Dad has never fired any pistol other than a .22 before - in.his.life!  That is so foreign to me, and I could never wrap my head around it, but it's true nonetheless.  I know that getting a permit to touch and then purchase a handgun is difficult in New York, but I just couldn't believe that Dad had never gone through the process.


Well, Ken went out of his way to make this fun for Dad.  He worked with George, the Pistol Chairman, and got access to the storage room where all of the steel targets are located.  When we arrived, I had the fun job of laying everything out while Ken set up the targets.  Dad spent the time not believing that he was actually going to do this, and even more surprised by everything that was needed in order to shoot.


Ken had a couple guys from the Quail Forever group meet up with him, and he talked to them for a while.  During this time, I got started with Dad - went over gun safety, how the revolver worked, how to load it, etc.  He stepped out and took his first shots.  

Dad's first shot with a handgun ever

From there, he was hooked!!!  I had started Dad on Ken's 686 which is a 4" frame.  After a while, I let him shoot my 686 which is a 6" frame and magnaported.  Dad lost his mind!  He loved the revolver and enjoyed the single action accuracy as opposed to the double action.

Ken returned to us, and watched Dad do his shooting.  He was a good shot and had some great groupings despite not ever doing this before.  While Dad was shooting, I would take my 686 back and let off some shots.  I loved the cowboy reactive targets and spend the day trying to get 4 for 4.  Most of the time, one of the stupid cowboys wouldn't stay down, so I would pull the string, get them lined up and do it again.  Took me about half an hour, and then I achieved success!

As Jordan would say, "Yay Me!"

Dad had gotten very comfortable with the revolvers, so I moved him on to the automatics.  Ken wanted to start Dad on his .40, but I intervened and had start with my 9mm.  It's a 4" barrel and completely awesome.  Dad was uneasy at first, and very nervous, but after the first double action shot, he totally got into it with the single action.  Plus, he was happy that there wasn't a lot of recoil.  

Please note that even with my little camera, I caught a picture with the brass flying!  Awesome!!!

Ken was finally able to give Dad his .40 to try.  Dad was again nervous, but he handled it as well as all of the other pistols after a while.  He was hitting the steel targets, knocking them down, and he was able to get 2 - 3" groupings.  

I'm not sure who loved this more, Ken or Dad, but each of them were "male bonding" and Ken was thrilled being able to do this for his dad.  Getting set up was fun and watching Ken teach his father and coach gave me a giggle.

Ken was totally stoked to bring out the Ruger .44 that he had borrowed from our friend, Grant.  Ken wanted to make sure that Dad had the full and total experience, and Ken loved being able to shoot it.  Dad kept warning me not to take pictures of him because he was afraid he would lose the grip on the pistols and drop them and then I would have "evidence" of such, but again, Dad was a natural and did really well.

Ken showing his dad how "it's done"

We all had a great time at the range.  Dad was getting tired and my stupid blood sugar dipped, so we cleaned up and headed to lunch.  Ken and Dad went back in the evening to shoot some more after they had rested while I stayed home with the girls.  Apparently, the male bonding without the woman was really cool for them.