The Threadless Nut

Declan recently wrote a Halloween story for a local homeschooler group. They decided not to publish his story on their site because it referenced weapons (no restrictions were stated up front), so I’m publishing it here:

THE MAN IN BLACK HIS MACHINE GUN WAS STRONGER THAN ARMOR, NOTHING COULD BEAT HIS MACHINE GUN, NOT EVEN ANOTHER MACHINE GUN, HE WAS IMPOSSIBLE TO BEAT UNTIL A GUY WANTED TO STOP HIM AND THEN HE GOT ALL HIS FRIENDS TO HELP HIM AND THEN THEY STILL COULDN’T BEAT THEM AND THEN THEY GOT THEIR MOMS
AND DADS AND THEY STILL COULDN’T BEAT THEM
by Declan Chase-Salerno, age 7

A guy in black with another guy gave the man in black some dynamite in a bush, but he didn’t blow anything up with it yet, and then one of the good guys said, We have to take the man in black to the statue factory, (“His name isn’t important!”).  None of the other guys knew what that would do.  When you move, he disappears.  Then we stood still, and he shot wooden carts with weapons at us, and my mom grabbed on to me and jumped over all the carts.  And then we dodged the carts, which led us to our barn, and then we hid in there for a while.  And then we found the guys that gave the man in black some dynamite, and we asked if it was fake dynamite, and he said no, and we said why did you give him real dynamite, and the man in black hypnotized him to do it, because he owns a dynamite factory.  Then, he wanted to help us get the man in black, but we still couldn’t catch him, we didn’t have enough guys, And then we got our dog, Casey, to help us find him.  She barks a lot when she sees someone.  And then we found him, but he disappeared when we even moved a step.  So we went to upstairs in my house, and we got some guns to get him to surrender, but they still didn’t work.  He had a machine gun.  And then they got the police to help them, and the police got the sheriff’s department, the army, and that still wasn’t enough, until the army invented a new weapon, the disintegrator, but that still didn’t work, because his armor was stronger than anything.  Then we got him to a statue factory, but that didn’t stop him because he broke out of the steel case.  Because he was so strong, he broke out, and he also had fists made of pointy steel.  Then the army got the military that invented a new gun called the Hypnotizer but he had hypnotizing-proof glasses, that still didn’t stop him, so they had to set off the dynamite while he was still holding it, like in cartoons.  Until a good ghost came to help us and called all of his ghost friends, and they wanted to help, and the military called a weapons specialist, Agent G, and he invented a gadget that could read people’s minds and we could know his plan and stop it, and we would know where his base is.  And the ghosts called a ninja force, and they helped them, until they met the Super Penguin.  Which could peck people’s heads off.  But he had an indestructible helmet that the Super Penguin couldn’t peck.  Until they chased him to Canada and his armor fell off while he was running, all his armor, it turned out he was very skinny and weak, and they destroyed his base, and then they had a campfire and roasted weenies.
The End.

Quinny also wrote one, but hers was deemed OK:

Last Night There Was 3 Girls And 2 Puppies Who Woke Up
by Quinn Chase-Salerno, age 4

Last night, three little girls woke up, and then the serious one said, “What happened?”  And then the three little puppies woke up, and one barked at someone, and then they saw a little spooky thing, then they turned into spies, then killed him, and then they all went in the dark and brought a flashlight and then the 3 little girls weren’t scared except the serious girl wasn’t scared, and the 2 little puppies weren’t scared either, then they saw something that was creeping slow and had a shell on top and it was a turtle.  And then they put their flashlight in their pocket then it was daytime then they weren’t scared again.  Then they went back home and saw a little black thing it was their brother.  And then there was a kitty that went back.  And the kitty wasn’t scared either.
The End.

Great stories Guys!

Well, I’ve been meaning to write this AAR up, but one of the other participants beat me to it. He did a fine job, even including a couple of pictures of me, so I’ll just refer to his post:

AAR~ MDTS CP 3&4 New Paltz Rod & Gun Club – Oct 16, 2010 – AR15.COM

Excellent course that really pushed some new skills, I enjoyed learning the weapon retention techniques, and the one handed manipulation block was eye opening. I learned that a closed front cover garment makes it very difficult to do anything with only the support hand. The charging target block really introduced some stress, showing how skills degrade.

I’ll echo the endorsement of Chris Fry and MDTS. His courses consistently deliver well thought out material that is constantly evolving and well tailored for the armed citizen. Thanks also to Joel for helping run a safe range, except for the part when he yelled at me for automatically doing a reload when my gun went dry during the qual. Sorry Joel, I’ve been indoctrinated by Chris (and others) already. Looking forward to hosting Chris in New Paltz again.

There are a bunch of different versions of the basic firearm rules out there. Some have 3, some have 10, but the most common are the 4 rules that Jeff Cooper is credited with:

1. All guns are always loaded.
2. Never let the muzzle cover anything you are not willing to destroy.
3. Keep your finger off the trigger until your sights are on the target.
4. Identify your target, and what is behind it.

There’s always been a bit of controversy around rule #1, since it’s fundamentally a lie, but it is a good mindset to have. There’s some interesting discussions going around the blogs around this subject, I like this post in particular:

SnarkyBytes » The Rules

Interesting how he boils it down to 2 rules in a methodical way. I’m not 100% sure I’m on board with it, but I like simplification in general, and it does seem to preserve all of the safety aspects of the original 4. Going to have to read through it a couple of more times.