Second Amendment Blog
New Shooter Report w/ Video
Posted by: Sebastian on 
Jan 6th, 2007 | 
Filed under: New Shooters, Personal
This is the inaugural post of this blog, because I think that one of the greatest things we shooters can do for ourselves is to introduce new people to our community. My friend Loretta, who came to visit over the holidays, did not have any existing prejudice towards guns, but I have taken people shooting for the first time who have. There’s nothing that quite opens people’s minds like seeing firearms as the tools that they are, and shooters for the ordinary people that they are, than a trip to the range.
Loretta wasn’t a complete noob, as she has some experience with shooting .22s and BB guns previously, but this was her first experience with anything with a reasonable amount of powder behind it.
We started off indoor shooting with pistols, which I didn’t get any photos of, because the indoor range I belong to doesn’t allow photography. After that, we headed up into Lehigh County to the PGC public outdoor range there. I had given her the safety lecture, and introduced her to the operating systems of the various rifles and pistols the night before. After a brief explanation of the range rules, we were ready to shoot:
Here she is loading up the magazine with three 5.56×45mm rounds.
Taking aim downrange with my AR-15. Click on the picture to see video.
We need to work on stance a bit, but it was rather difficult to shoot standing, since it had rained heavily the night before, and the range was a puddle of mud.
Time to switch to the Kalashnikov. I decided to take the AK-47 rather than the AK-74. The recoil impulse on the 47 is harsher, and has been too much for other female shooters I’ve taken to the range, so the 74 would have been my first choice, but I only have surplus ammo in 5.45×39mm, and it has corrosive primers, so I would have had to spend an hour or so when we got back cleaning the rifle out to avoid rust problems. Loretta handled the recoil of the 47 just fine though.
Taking a shot downrange. We’re shooting at the 50 yard target. I like to use the Birchwood-Casey Shoot-N-See targets. It makes them easy to see, even without the spotting scope showing in the picture. Click on the picture for video.
And so we add one more person who can pick up both our standard military service rifle, and the world’s most prevalent small arm, and know what to do with them.
January 6th, 2007 at 9:58 pm
[...] I’m pimping commenter Sebastian’s new blog, Snowflakes in Hell. You guys should check it out. Between here and SayUncle’s place, I’ve noticed he’s had very insightful comments, especially on gun rights issues. I get the feeling there will be quite a bit of great content. Oh yeah, and he’s starting off by bragging about taking chicks to the range. That’s a good start to any blog. [...]
January 9th, 2007 at 8:52 am
[...] Reader Sebastian (no not this one, the other one) now has a blog called Snowflakes in Hell. Well, more importantly a blog that’s not on live journal, which means it’s readable now. For his inaugural post, he takes a girl shooting evil black rifles. With video. [...]
January 9th, 2007 at 3:08 pm
Outstanding! By coincidence I recently took my teenage daughter shooting, and after the .22’s ran out she tried my AR-15 and a Romanian AK. She did well with both, but preferred the AK. Her reason: she couldn’t stand the spring noise from the stock of the AR-15 as it cycled.
January 9th, 2007 at 3:20 pm
I guess I’m not the only one who hates the spring sound :) I don’t tend to notice it on the Bushmaster though. The Armalite, which has a fixed rather than telescoping stock, has a pretty loud srping sound. The AK featured is a Romanian as well, but I replaced the furniture on it with fresh unfinished stock made by an outfit in California called Ironwood Designs, and stained and finished it myself. The Romanian AKs are coming with decent furniture these days, but in 2000 they were coming with shit. You can also polish up the bolt carrier on those so that they have the chrome look the original AKs had.
January 9th, 2007 at 3:24 pm
Very nice thing to do. Thank you.
She is not large– the AR buttstock could have been shortened a click or two.
January 16th, 2007 at 9:10 pm
You know, I had already given her the gun safety speech…although when I gave her the speech I was driving a pickup, and two of my early-teenaged cousins were in the back shooting at cow patties with .22s. But they definitely demonstrated “what not to do,” including shooting at fish in a pond. Also, if you’re reading this, chica…that shirt and pose make you look like you’re in some South American militia ;).
February 18th, 2007 at 1:21 am
That last pic is a real winner…
June 11th, 2007 at 8:02 am
[...] of Today, it has been six months since I inaugurated this blog with my very first post of taking my friend Loretta shooting. It would seem odd that I started this blog to impress Bitter, but my first post was taking [...]
August 19th, 2007 at 8:02 am
I started my girlfriend (now wife) who was an anti gun liberal with a pellet rifle. I stressed safety and showed her the delight and satisfaction of hitting bullseyes. I set it up at 30 feet with safe back drops and she did well. Then I took her to an outdoor range just to observe the discipline and safety and to be aware of the gunfire reports. We eventually returned with 22’s and she again did well. Now shes an NRA member, with a 10 hour safety course under her belt and is comfortable with any 223/30 caliber rifle. She owns a GP100, loves shooting 9mm autos and hates liberal gun grabbing politics. All it took was truth and patience. Any time you have an opportunity to bring someone new into the fold, do it slow, do it right, and they will end up loving it.
September 10th, 2007 at 9:32 am
[...] subject of my very first post, Loretta, was a recent convert to the idea of eating squirrel. She had been converted to it by my [...]
January 6th, 2008 at 12:19 pm
[...] really be blogging”, which got me started on this whole thing. Ironically the first post was about taking another girl shooting. A lot has happened since I posted about that. Wow. We’re at 2288 Posts, 8468 comments, [...]
February 23rd, 2008 at 11:33 am
Found your page while looking through Google Images. I have a gun rights talk show called Pink Rifle, I just added Pink Rifle TV. Its good seeing this pictures. I love going to the range and I own this gun (in a few days). Pink Rifle.com or find me and other gun rights podcasts on the web and on iTunes.
January 6th, 2009 at 1:07 am
[...] 6th, 2007 is when I penned my inaugural post: This is the inaugural post of this blog, because I think that one of the greatest things we [...]
Add A Comment