Recently I managed to
prise my lazy
posterior out of bed relatively early one Saturday morning. Some friends and I piled into
SUVs and headed north to partake of the sport of clays; that is,
trap shooting and
skeet shooting.
There was only one trap field open at the club, so we all hung about while waiting our turn. The six of us were, on average, thirty to forty years younger than all the other shooters in attendence; I was definitely far more ethnic, and we had with us the only woman visible.
Not that we stood out or anything.
In any case, while we were waiting for our round on the left-hand field, we noticed movement on the right-hand field, out near the brush at the end where the pigeons buried themselves in heaps of crumbly black ceramic and day-glo paint. Two shapes. Deer. A mother and child, as far as we could tell...and the continued BLAM sounds of shotguns firing to our left didn't seem to faze them at all. Small white tails flicking, they moved about the edges of the trap field, munching on twigs.
There was a general sigh; I turned to see that the crew of regulars had piled out of the blockhouse to stare at the deer. Many comments along the lines of "oh man, why didn't I bring the .30-.30," could be heard, as well as ribbing:
Why aren't they running?
'Cause they've seen you shoot, Bob. (laughter)
They stayed for the whole round, vanishing silently and suddenly into the brush when the shooting stopped. Days later, I can feel their sarcasm.
During our skeet round, a V of geese flew overhead five times (five!) before wheeling around and heading out, but that's gotta be a coincidence.
I don't think the deer had cell phones.