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sabotabbyAs previously mentioned, UofT plans to close the 88-year-old shooting range in the basement of Hart House. Someone from the gun club was kind enough to show me and S. around yesterday and teach us how to shoot pistols.
Anyway, it was terrific fun. I once fired off .22 rifles at camp when I was a kid, but I've never so much as held a pistol before, let alone shot one (or three). If for no other reason than accurately depicting firearms in my writing, I've always thought that it was a good thing to know how to do.
The Hart House range is particularly cool for a few reasons. They keep guns there—locked up, of course—which means that you can be a club member and not actually own a gun. They also have instructors on-site, so you don't need a license to shoot, which makes it quite good for beginners and cash-strapped students.
This is with a .22.
Here's the 9mm.
And here's a .45.
As you can see, I'm not a very good shot, though not beyond hope. It's much harder than it looks, particularly when one has the beginnings of astigmatism and kind of shaky hands.
I suppose the most interesting thing was how cathartic it was. Not in the "I'm blowing off steam and envisioning the faces of my enemies" sort of way, but in a "nothing exists except for the sights and the target" way. It was surprisingly meditative.
Anyway, it will be a pity if they do close it. As far as I can tell, the university thinks that it "looks bad." But the university seems to have no problem getting funding from the military. Which kind of makes you wonder.
P.S. Sorry folks, they don't allow photography in the range. So no pictures of me shooting things.
P.P.S. The basement of Hart House is a bit scary. They have giant cockroaches. I didn't know cockroaches got that big in Canada. The one we saw was so big that at first I thought it was a mouse.
Anyway, it was terrific fun. I once fired off .22 rifles at camp when I was a kid, but I've never so much as held a pistol before, let alone shot one (or three). If for no other reason than accurately depicting firearms in my writing, I've always thought that it was a good thing to know how to do.
The Hart House range is particularly cool for a few reasons. They keep guns there—locked up, of course—which means that you can be a club member and not actually own a gun. They also have instructors on-site, so you don't need a license to shoot, which makes it quite good for beginners and cash-strapped students.
This is with a .22.
Here's the 9mm.
And here's a .45.
As you can see, I'm not a very good shot, though not beyond hope. It's much harder than it looks, particularly when one has the beginnings of astigmatism and kind of shaky hands.
I suppose the most interesting thing was how cathartic it was. Not in the "I'm blowing off steam and envisioning the faces of my enemies" sort of way, but in a "nothing exists except for the sights and the target" way. It was surprisingly meditative.
Anyway, it will be a pity if they do close it. As far as I can tell, the university thinks that it "looks bad." But the university seems to have no problem getting funding from the military. Which kind of makes you wonder.
P.S. Sorry folks, they don't allow photography in the range. So no pictures of me shooting things.
P.P.S. The basement of Hart House is a bit scary. They have giant cockroaches. I didn't know cockroaches got that big in Canada. The one we saw was so big that at first I thought it was a mouse.
