Paint-balling...not a topic i'd thought i would ever blog about...

The arsenal... primed and ready to go!

 So... a few months ago, my good friends Laura and Alvar ran an idea past a bunch of our friends... did we want to participate in a Wagjag deal to go paintballing in February??  At the time, i remember vaguely thinking that hey, that can't be too bad, can it?  It's cheap and people seem to have fun right?  So i hit "pay" and went on my merry way in life...kinda sorta forgetting all about it (or repressing the memory, not sure which one!) 
As time wore on and October merged into November and December... the memory still lay fairly dormant.  Once the snows of January were on the ground, plans had to be made for the big outing and now serious thoughts began to be entertained in my poor brain - "Hey, this is going to hurt!" and "i'm not a violent person, can i even shoot someone?  I'm supposed to be all caring and nice as a nurse... my role is to help people, not hurt them!"  and various other ideas began to crowd into my daily thought processes.  The weeks wore on and unfortunately the paintball place hadn't burnt down mysteriously or i hadn't broken my arm, leaving me hale and hearty for this adventure.  I wasn't even sure what to wear - i had been advised that layers were a good thing - to cut down on how hard the paint balls would hit!  That bit of advice was indeed good! 
Inevitably, Saturday followed Friday and we were now lining up at the counter at the paintballing place, receiving our armour and instructions on how to play the game.  The girls looked a might more scared than the boys... i for one was too busy worrying about whether i would know if the safety were on or off and would i accidentally hit someone point blank with a paint ball in the "safe" zone and be carried off to jail for assault with a non-deadly weapon. 
Fortunately, "red is dead" stuck with me and there were no accidents with the safety or trigger.  We were geared up and (sorta) ready to go.  Karen and I had a master plan - hide in the corner and pretend we were rocks.  Unfortunately, this wasn't a great plan since when i looked up paintballing tips on the internet in a last ditch attempt to acquire some knowledge about this little-publicized sport, they highly recommended moving - that a stationary target was an easy pick. 
First game, somehow my mind was blank... not only did i only manage to probably fire five paintballs, probably hitting the ceiling or the floor with great accuracy, i managed to get shot in the first two minutes.  It was quite a shock to be shot in the back by a warrior who snuck up on unsuspecting females - how valiant and brave to shoot quivering masses of femininity!  All's fair in love and war i suppose eh? 
The next game i was determined to do better and i did.. made it three minutes this time before someone got me square between the eyes on my mask... since i couldn't see anything anymore, i feebly found my way out of the action zone and wiped up the evidence.
The third and fourth games were a bit more fun since we were allowed three "lives" and so the play continued a little longer.  I still "died" fairly quickly but at least i moved a bit further up the playing field and didn't hide in my corner.  The fourth game, i did my best to empty my gun but alas, i am no Rambo or Terminator so i emerged from the fray still carrying ammo... i probably needed to remember to pull the trigger a bit more.
But at the end, we could say we survived... none too worse for the wear - i got a couple of war "wounds" but they were nothing to write home about - the one on my back is nicely turning black and blue now from the initial fiery red... but thankfully it doesn't hurt much and i didn't manage to get too many more!  I think i didn't manage to shoot anyone in the whole course of the game, usually only daring to poke my gun out and spray a few shots here and there but never aimed properly, or none that anyone owned up to anyways... but it was (grudgingly admitted) fun and i wouldn't even mind to go again.... words i never thought would ever have come out of this mouth! 

The warriors before... unfortunately there was no "after" picture