An Interesting Change
Hey! See that burn there? That’s a bullet wound.
Okay, technically it’s a jacket wound, acquired at the shooting range. Because when you fire guns, the casings are ejected out of the gun, flying at high enough velocities to do damage to your eye, red-hot from having just thrust a bullet out of the muzzle. And if you’re unlucky, then that burning brass jacket will arc up, hit the edge of your safety glasses just right, and tumble underneath to be lodged next to your sizzling skin.
Did I mention you’re holding a loaded gun when this happens?
Fortunately, I was calm enough not to wave the gun around while it was burning a small row of blisters against my eyebrow; for all of my neuroses, I’m good in actual crises. I laid the gun down, barrel pointing down-range, and extracted the jacket, which had cooled enough to only hurt my fingers a little.
Still, it’s a little weird to carry a wound from gun shooting around.
I do like shooting, and am sad I won’t get to do it for a few weeks – last week, I learned that I shoot better if I don’t just hold my breath, but exhale and shoot with empty lungs. Grouped quite nicely that time around. And of course, I’ve always wanted to own a gun, but as a depressive this is probably a Very Bad Idea.
Yet all of this shooting gave me an interesting switch earlier today. I wrote a Tweet that said, “I’m sure someone thinks the spree of shootings is a conspiracy by Obama to ban guns, but I don’t want to look.” (As it turns out, that “someone” is the lead singer of Megadeth, proving that everyone involved with Metallica is now batshit crazy.)
But the original Tweet? “I’m sure someone thinks the spree of shootings is a conspiracy by Obama to ban our guns.”
Hrm. Little mental shift there.
Sorry for the burn. You said you were wearing safety glasses, as oppossed to regular glasses, so it’s especially unfortunate that it landed “just right.”
Just a point of correction: It’s not a “brass jacket,” it’s a brass “cartridge case” or just “case.”
The jacket is the metal coating (usually brass, but can also be steel) that surrounds the actual lead core of the bullet. That’s where the term “Full metal jacket” comes from. There are also partially jacketed bullets. These have a lead core with a brass jacket with exposed lead at the tip. They are commonly called “soft points.” And, of course, there are also jacketed hollowpoints which have a lead core with a brass jacket and a hollow tip to facilitate expansion.
In all examples, the jacket is part of the projectile, not the cartridge case. Just wanted to point out the correct terminology because “words matter.”
Rob (Trebor1415 from LJ)
Btw, next time you are near the Detroit area, shoot me an e-mail first and I can take you guys to my local club as my guest for some shooting.