As I passed through the security checks at both Doncaster Airport in the UK and Faro Airport in Portugal, on my recent holiday, the alarms went off. Obviously my worldly positions, phone, watch, belt, coinage and anything else remotely metallic were already sat neatly in a plastic tray so the security staff, with more good humour in the Algarve than in South Yorkshire, it has to be said, methodically checked over my boots, shirt and jeans. They tousled my hair, either in a touching display of fondness or perhaps to see if it contained a weapon of some kind, I prefer to think the former, and then shrugged and sent me on my way.
Now I could have explained that it may have been the piece of metal embedded in my right leg, the result of a shooting incident, that caused the machines to react, but that could have labelled me as a possible undesirable and delayed me getting to duty free.
This foreign body in my right calf is there because some years ago my wife was doing some work in Skipton, a pretty little market town in North Yorkshire that advertises itself as "The Gateway to the Dales"; we in our household now refer to it as "The Badlands". It was a Friday shortly before Christmas and Spicer's wife had ordered him some state of the art DVD player from a store in the afore said town and asked us if we would mind collecting it as we were going there anyway. My wife went into the store to sort out the paperwork and I went to collect our car from its parking place. As I walked past a public house called The Cross Keys' I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my lower right leg. Now strangely, as it had never happened to me before, I knew immediately that I had been shot and screamed this fact out to an old couple who were walking by. I assume that she fainted not through my language but the sight of my blood. Having ascertained that there was no more lead flying in my direction I took out my mobile, propped my self against a wall and called the police. "Right Sir you say that you have been shot" said a very polite voice on the other end of the line. "Yes officer" I replied equally politely, just as my mother had brought me up. "Right could you bob round to the station and report it" says he, "No officer I suggest you come to me!" says I, this time perhaps a tad less polite. "Right Sir good idea. We'll have someone there shortly" he concluded And bless them they did.
It was obvious that the shot had come from the public house and the police soon established that the landlord's teenage son was the culprit with a powerful air rifle. He had damaged half a dozen cars, various road signs and me.
I rang D, hobbled to the car, drove to the electrical shop, loaded Spicer's bloody hi fi and set off to Airedale Hospital where we spent the next six hours. The pellet was too deep in the muscle to remove, so the doctor suggested leaving it in there and see what happened. What did happen was that it is still in there.
After a quick phone call, Spicer's wife arranged to collect the girls from school for us and being a Friday, Spicer organised a substitute to play for me at tennis that afternoon. Apparently they were well into the second set before Biddercome asked Spicer why I wasn't playing. "Oh he's been shot" the latter stated as though it were an everyday occurrence. "Is he dead?" asked Simcock "No" said Spicer and they then carried on and went to the pub afterwards without giving it a second thought. Bless them.
So as you can see the incident itself was the result of a schoolboy prank but the consequences have ever since been quite interesting. If people only know that you have been shot, and not the actual shooting circumstances, then your life takes on a whole new persona. For instance a few weeks later, against my wife's better judgement, and whilst I still had a pronounced limp, I played in a Law Society golf day as a guest of a solicitor friend of mine. As no one knows much what I do for a living anyway, then an air of mystery surrounds me normally. Mark, who at that time was mostly overseeing house conveyances, introduced me to his lawyer associates as a client who had recently been shot, and suddenly his esteem took a boost in their eyes as they assumed that he must be representing some gangland overlord. We both spent the afternoon being fawned over and wined and dined, one guy even carried my golf bag for me.
On a similar tack Canute, my business partner, and I were recently experiencing a difficult business meeting with a prospective client who was really haggling about our costs. I then received a text; I should actually have turned my phone off but had forgotten to do so. It was only from my teacher friend Simcock, who I had been winding up earlier in the day, he wrote that if I didn't behave that he would get his chemistry students to melt my car. The prospective client asked me if the text was important, I explained that it was from someone threatening to torch my car and surprisingly the meeting was then quickly concluded with us obtaining exactly what we had asked for. I said to Canute that next time we could tell him that I had been shot and we could up the bill by another twenty percent.
On a serious note though, I do realise that many tragedies have befallen families due to gun incidents, even involving air rifles, I really sympathise with people not so lucky as I was and do appreciate that I was fortunate that my encounter was not more serious.
Now I could have explained that it may have been the piece of metal embedded in my right leg, the result of a shooting incident, that caused the machines to react, but that could have labelled me as a possible undesirable and delayed me getting to duty free.
This foreign body in my right calf is there because some years ago my wife was doing some work in Skipton, a pretty little market town in North Yorkshire that advertises itself as "The Gateway to the Dales"; we in our household now refer to it as "The Badlands". It was a Friday shortly before Christmas and Spicer's wife had ordered him some state of the art DVD player from a store in the afore said town and asked us if we would mind collecting it as we were going there anyway. My wife went into the store to sort out the paperwork and I went to collect our car from its parking place. As I walked past a public house called The Cross Keys' I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my lower right leg. Now strangely, as it had never happened to me before, I knew immediately that I had been shot and screamed this fact out to an old couple who were walking by. I assume that she fainted not through my language but the sight of my blood. Having ascertained that there was no more lead flying in my direction I took out my mobile, propped my self against a wall and called the police. "Right Sir you say that you have been shot" said a very polite voice on the other end of the line. "Yes officer" I replied equally politely, just as my mother had brought me up. "Right could you bob round to the station and report it" says he, "No officer I suggest you come to me!" says I, this time perhaps a tad less polite. "Right Sir good idea. We'll have someone there shortly" he concluded And bless them they did.
It was obvious that the shot had come from the public house and the police soon established that the landlord's teenage son was the culprit with a powerful air rifle. He had damaged half a dozen cars, various road signs and me.
I rang D, hobbled to the car, drove to the electrical shop, loaded Spicer's bloody hi fi and set off to Airedale Hospital where we spent the next six hours. The pellet was too deep in the muscle to remove, so the doctor suggested leaving it in there and see what happened. What did happen was that it is still in there.
After a quick phone call, Spicer's wife arranged to collect the girls from school for us and being a Friday, Spicer organised a substitute to play for me at tennis that afternoon. Apparently they were well into the second set before Biddercome asked Spicer why I wasn't playing. "Oh he's been shot" the latter stated as though it were an everyday occurrence. "Is he dead?" asked Simcock "No" said Spicer and they then carried on and went to the pub afterwards without giving it a second thought. Bless them.
So as you can see the incident itself was the result of a schoolboy prank but the consequences have ever since been quite interesting. If people only know that you have been shot, and not the actual shooting circumstances, then your life takes on a whole new persona. For instance a few weeks later, against my wife's better judgement, and whilst I still had a pronounced limp, I played in a Law Society golf day as a guest of a solicitor friend of mine. As no one knows much what I do for a living anyway, then an air of mystery surrounds me normally. Mark, who at that time was mostly overseeing house conveyances, introduced me to his lawyer associates as a client who had recently been shot, and suddenly his esteem took a boost in their eyes as they assumed that he must be representing some gangland overlord. We both spent the afternoon being fawned over and wined and dined, one guy even carried my golf bag for me.
On a similar tack Canute, my business partner, and I were recently experiencing a difficult business meeting with a prospective client who was really haggling about our costs. I then received a text; I should actually have turned my phone off but had forgotten to do so. It was only from my teacher friend Simcock, who I had been winding up earlier in the day, he wrote that if I didn't behave that he would get his chemistry students to melt my car. The prospective client asked me if the text was important, I explained that it was from someone threatening to torch my car and surprisingly the meeting was then quickly concluded with us obtaining exactly what we had asked for. I said to Canute that next time we could tell him that I had been shot and we could up the bill by another twenty percent.
On a serious note though, I do realise that many tragedies have befallen families due to gun incidents, even involving air rifles, I really sympathise with people not so lucky as I was and do appreciate that I was fortunate that my encounter was not more serious.
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