How it really is

Bryn Parry is wordsmith as well as artist in his new book SHOOTING TOP TIPS A Rough Guide to Smooth Shooting and he does both hilariously well. There will be few readers who will not nod knowingly at the following...

You wake at eight; you are late. You disabled rather than enabled the alarm on the mobile phone. You scrabble around looking for a matching pair of socks; your head throbbing with pain from the last glass of port. Breakfast is two Ibuprofen washed down with a warm, full fat Coke, as you try to remember where you have hidden the fore-end this time, find enough cartridges and steal some live batteries from your daughter’s camera for your ear defenders.

The car starts, thank goodness, but you get stuck behind the Yummy Mummies doing the school run in their shiny 4x4s. You rely on the sat-nav to avoid a marital, but only realise that you have put the wrong village name in when you find yourself on the outskirts of Bracknell. You shout ‘stay calm!’ at your wife as she stares out of the window at the rain and thinks longingly of the very painful methods with which she will murder you.

You arrive at the shoot. Your host has left the RV but his fuming father is there to direct you to the first drive. He sits silently beside you as your car slides across the mud on its road tyres, his knuckles white and his jaw locked with fury.

Your host is charm personified, ‘no problem at all, we were just worried that you might have had an accident. Here’s your peg; it was the Kaiser’s favourite; bit of a hot spot, so have fun!’

Your dog starts to sing and then, as you frown at it, to howl. Your wife stands silently behind you, her arms folded, her mouth pursed and her feet already wet in her leaking wellies. This will be positively the last time she is seen out shooting and that is final.

You take the gun out of its sleeve and check the barrels, loading from your pocket. Neighbouring Guns nod in your direction and you smile back grimly, only too aware that the morning has been delayed on your behalf.

A movement above draws your eye; a pheasant flickers through the trees, your gun goes up, bang, bang and the bird flies on. Your neighbour calls out ‘Yours’ as a good bird sails over your head, your gun empty. You stuff two cartridges in and slam the gun up into your shoulder, instinctively firing at a low bird and blowing it apart with the choke barrel, blood misting in the still air and the feathers floating as testament to your lack of judgement. You curse, your wife sniggers and your dog races off into the woods to chase some runners.

By the time the whistle goes you are dripping with sweat and surrounded by empty cartridges. Your left hand is blistered by the barrels and your right has an egg-sized bruise on your middle finger. Your wife has wandered off to chat to the young, rich, handsome, good Shot next door and you have absolutely no idea where the dog has gone.

The picker-up comes up to you and asks, sneeringly, if you have any more birds to pick; the mashed, headless corpse of your low bird held by its tattered wing, his dog trying to spit feathers from its mouth. You say you think you might have a couple of pricked birds down in the wood, but he walks off in a different direction, knowing you have not.

You walk back towards the cars shrouded in a black cloud of misery, knowing that you have seven more drives to go and things can only get worse. www.brynparrystudios.com

 
 
 

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