A History of Brockman Pellet Gun Stories
4/5/1

There are five significant events in the Brockman side of the family when it comes to pellet guns. Two of the stories are mine, and were actually BB guns. The other three stories are divided between my mother and father, and I think they were using BBs too, but they refer to the gun as the pellet gun.

Story 1: I shoot myself in the eye

Dang it, you know it�s never going to happen to you since it�s such a clich�. But sure enough...

We lived at 10123 Versailles at the time and I was in the backyard with my lever action BB pistol. I was around 12 feet away from the maple tree at the north end of the yard and I shot at the tree. The BB hit the tree, and bounced back, tracing it�s path back to my eye, which was next to the site. I saw it coming and closed my eye. Pop, it hit me. Ouch. But there was no damage. I don�t think Mom and Dad know about this.

Story 2: I shoot the glass in the top of the patio table

I wasn�t shooting at the glass, per se. I was shooting at either a plastic army man or a small similar object. I almost remember that it was an army man. I wasn�t using my BB pistol as I had borrowed my friend Matt�s pump action pellet rife. I had pumped it up around 20 times and I took aim. Peyow! Hit it dead center. However, the BB must have hit the table at some point. It made one of those little cones, which had fallen to the ground leaving a cone shaped hole. My dad noticed a few days later when the crack got bigger. I was told that I�d have to pay for it. I think it came to $34 dollars. [Old Mark Comment: �And them was 1979 dollars!�] Before the replacement glass arrived, the glass fell through to the ground one night. What a mess.

Story 3: Mom hates woodpeckers

And I can understand completely. Some irritating woodpecker was pecking at all hours on the side of the house when Mom and Dad lived at 745 Bluewood. I was off at college, which was actually just across town, but I didn�t live there anymore. It was a yearlong struggle for Mom and obviously she finally got her aim right. It makes for a good story, but I unfortunately don�t remember many details.

Story 4: Mom and the Stumpy the Goose

I�ll say this is fiction and add a fictional element so that I�m not lying and so the Fish and Wildlife department doesn�t send my mom to Limestone Correctional Facility. At this point, Mom and Dad live in Guntersville on the water. The name of the street is Signal Point, but I never bothered to learn the house number. Geese would come into their yard and eat the grass and poop everywhere. Mom, with her trusty pellet gun, shoots out at the geese to scare them. One goose develops an instant limp. Other geese tend to leave but this one can�t get off the ground. Then a giant gundam lands and gives the injured goose sitar lessons.

That was fiction.

Story 5: Dad the Mouse Slayer

This one is new to me and I know the details pretty well. While they lived at Signal Point, there was a mouse who kept getting into the pantry. Mom had to throw away everything which wasn�t in Tupperware and then bought Tupperware to store everything in. They couldn�t get this mouse. I don�t know if they tired poison or what, but nothing had worked. So Dad decided that he�d sneak up on it and shoot it with the pellet gun. Ha, you laugh, but he did it. I think he told of two times where he didn�t get it. I�m sure he grazed the saltines or the lasagna noodles, but no mouse. When he finally did get the mouse, he says that the mouse was only four inches from the end of the pellet gun when he fired and that it was a horrible sight.

I commented on Saturday when I heard the story, �If you were that close, you could have just picked him up by his tail. Then you could hold him up to the gun�s barrel and shoot him.�