Sunday morning, Oakwood tube station, 11am (thoughtfully re-arranged by Andrew from 10am, lest the clocks' shift forward was too much for feeble systems). A motley collection of archers with varying amounts of clay shooting experience. Shooting with guns as opposed to bows does have the fringe benefit of not having to lug kilos of gear along; naturally old habits die hard and at least half the group had large enough rucksacks for a fully fledged safari - instantly giving a complex to those of us clutching an Ipod and a tenner for ammunition.

Ladies and men were split up; ladies having different ammunition. Consensus was that presumably this meant ladies' guns were less powerful, leading to the hopeful thought that the likelihood of getting one's shoulder knocked out by recoil was somewhat smaller. And of course, having ladies separately conveys the instant benefit of separating the "let's kill anything that moves" tendency from the "oh my god that's a terrible noise" tendency. The exception to the latter in our group being Jill Rennie, who promptly got seven out of eight clays on her first attempt, and remarked that she "hadn't been aiming at anything."

Getting used to the concept of shooting something virtually the instant it moves, rather than spending ten minutes agonising over whether one's shoulder/back/arm is aligned in the right position was interesting. And quite pleasant for those of us who follow the "oh christ my back's collapsing the gold is vaguely in sight what the hell" school of thought. On the other hand, after a few rounds (rounds??? ends???) the unmistakeable result of having something explode on your shoulder began to be felt, quite an impressive collection of bruises.

Thanks to Andrew Rosenstein who organised this, excellent day out.

Nic Waters

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