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@^*&$##* kids

skidmark

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It's been extra warm & sunny the past 2 days. Kids are out playing & otherwise being themselves. Me - I've got trash that needs to go to the communal dumpster and I'm not waiting till after the evening news to get rid of it.

Being as I'm old and banged up, and the dumpster is 300+ yards from me, I bag everything up & put it in the back of the truck for a quick ride. As I round the corner onto the public road, I see some:cuss: child pointing a long-slide automatic across the street. He's not 5 yards in front of me! Deciding I cannot stop before I'm even with him., I decide to punch the accelerator and bust past where he's standing. I'm reaching for my side and looking at him as I floor it. He whips it back behind him and starts to ease away backwards towards the row of aparrtment townhouses he seemed to come from (opposite side of the U-shaped court from where I reside).

I check my 6 and reverse well past my starting point to get distance and some cover from the corner of the townhouses. Seeing him still standing around, with his hand behind him and being very shifty, I call 911 and report a possible youth with a gun. I informed 911 dispatch I was armed & gave a description of me & my vehicle, and kept a running description while waiting for the county PD units to arrive.

Just as the units pull up the kid spins in my direction with the :cuss::cuss:pistol straight out and pointing towards me. (Units are arriving at 90* to all this - kid at one end of a line about 40 yards long, and me at the other end.) I'm starting to pull and reverse again when they pull in between me & the kid. They bail & do the crouch behind the door thing with guns drawn while yelling for the kid to drop the weapon.

It turned out to be a squirt gun with the orange end chopped off by the kid because he "wanted to make it look real."

Half of me wants to over to his apartment later tonight and move his backside to within an inch of his tonsils. Half of me wants to do that to his parent(s). And the third half of me wants to adjust the attitude of the kid and parent(s) simultaneously.

At least the first responding officer did come over to thank me, and to give me the basic details. He sounded as upset as I still am.

I might just take the comfy camp chair out on the front step and run a mop down the bore of the SxS just to see if there is any idea of "getting even" for calling the cops on this wonderful example of today's youth.

Thank you for allowing me to vent.

stay safe.

skidmark
 

67GT390FB

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Skidmark,

glad everything worked out ok for you as well as the idiot kid. I will admit that growing up i too removed the orange tips from my cap guns(those that even had them as this was at the start of the nanny state). the difference being i had sense(due to good parenting) enough not to point it at someone other than my friends who knew it was fake and we were playingsoldier at the time. you're right the parents need as much reeducatiing as the kid does if not more.

joe
 

vmathis12019

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This is why I have ALWAYS been against toy guns. Children shouldn't be taught that guns are toys. The non-realistic looking squirt guns are acceptable I suppose, but kids shouldn't be playing with realistic looking replicas.
 

stryth

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skidmark wrote:
He whips it back behind him and starts to ease away backwards towards the row of aparrtment townhouses he seemed to come from
That's all kinds of suck.

I read this several minutes ago, and was doing other things when it hit me - he's obviously got no exposure to firearms outside of hollywood, and is curious about them but probably also ashamed... He probably hid it to make it seem like nothing was going on, but of course that rouses concealment fears among adults - if he's hiding something he must have something to hide. He probably just didn't want to get yelled at.

Anyway, What hit me was this: Maybe the best thing to do would be, if possible, to take him/get him to a range. Don't know if it's at all possible, but would probably leave a better impression on him, and definitely an opportuniy to show him why what he did was bad and a better way to deal with it.

Yes, very dumb of him and he should know better or be taught better. I'm a big believer in teaching those who can learn.
 

sjhipple

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stryth wrote:
Anyway, What hit me was this: Maybe the best thing to do would be, if possible, to take him/get him to a range. Don't know if it's at all possible, but would probably leave a better impression on him, and definitely an opportuniy to show him why what he did was bad and a better way to deal with it.

Yes, very dumb of him and he should know better or be taught better. I'm a big believer in teaching those who can learn.

+1

People who aren't familiar with firearms are the most dangerous.
 

vmathis12019

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hlh wrote:
They just gotta outlaw kids and squirt guns!! :cuss::celebrate
No, they need to teach parents that realistic looking toy guns are dangerous, as there are adults in this world who REALLY do not having a gun pointed at them. In this situation, the parents are at fault. I don't think anything should be "outlawed," but I do believe that responsible parents shouldn't be buying their kids toy guns that look real.
 

jack

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When I was 4-5 years old, these cops would drive by every afternoon. If I was wearing my twin Perl handled (plastic) six shooters, my long ranger hat and mask we would have a shoot out. I would drawl both and open up on them. They would shoot back with their " finger guns " and laugh.

Life sure has changed .
 

acrimsontide

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vmathis12019 wrote:
No, they need to teach parents that realistic looking toy guns are dangerous, as there are adults in this world who REALLY do not having a gun pointed at them. In this situation, the parents are at fault. I don't think anything should be "outlawed," but I do believe that responsible parents shouldn't be buying their kids toy guns that look real.
+1
 

hsmith

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jack wrote:
When I was 4-5 years old, these cops would drive by every afternoon. If I was wearing my twin Perl handled (plastic) six shooters, my long ranger hat and mask we would have a shoot out. I would drawl both and open up on them. They would shoot back with their " finger guns " and laugh.

Life sure has changed .
I was thinking this as I read, even 20 years ago when I was a kid no one would have thought different.

But, now a day, I can't fault skidmark. It is a different world...
 

nova

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Another reason I don't like kiddies playing "airsoft" because it gets kids in the habbit that guns are toys that don't hurt anyone when you point and pull the trigger.

Airsoft guns in particular, because they're MADE to be replicas of real firearms with the exception of the orange tip (which most people remove anyways, even me, for a film I made with some friends and didn't want to use my real handguns for obvious reasons).
They're restricted to 18+ to buy but parents get them for their kids anyhow.
 

skidmark

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I'm much calmer now. Also down a few more porters, but they can be replaced tomorrow.

First of all, the kid was in the indeterminant 12 - 14 - 16 year old range. Heck, at my age they are either babies, grade-school sized. middle/high school sized, young punk sized, or big enough to be holding down ajob and why aren't they at work doing that sized. The rest of the worldafter that is older than me, and I'm starting to feel like I need to be getting both respect and my discount without having to ask for either one.

All of you who focused in on the kid whipping the thing behind his back - you are right - that's what got my attention. Furtive movement is almost as loud a warning as an obvious movement. If he had not tried to hide it I would have had a longer look at it, the kid and the other kids he was with, and might have figured out all by myself it was a squirtgun. If I had, I probably would have gone about my business without another thought about it.

Given my actions, and now taking the time to think about it, I remain very surprized the kid did not high-tail it into the apartment and get rid of the darned thing. When the cops rolled up I think they saw what I was seeing - a kid with what looked like a gun stuck straight out shoulder high.

I'll give the kid credit - it was not turned "gangsta style".

I'm not sure I want to take this kid under my wing and teach him about guns. Think I'll wait and see if he or parent(s) try to talk with/to me about what happened. But I'm not holding my breath on that either.

At least I walk away knowing 2 very important things -

1 - some kid got a chance to grow up, and

2 - you do fight like you train.

stay safe.

skidmark
 

Neplusultra

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jack wrote:
I was wearing my twin Perl handled (plastic) six shooters, my long ranger hat and mask we would have a shoot out. .

Therein lies the difference. Plain and simple. The key is the appearance of fantasy verses a realistic gun that the kid wants to or does believe is real.
 
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