I found an old story...

[Wordbender]

...I did for Sporting Shooter magazine. Here's a true tale from the dim and distant days of my youth.

 

STRETCHING A POINT

 

When I was a kid, if I didn't have a gun in my hand it meant that I'd run out of pellets or .410 cartridges. At such times the catapult took over as my sporting implement of choice and the hunting would continue with hardly a blip in the action.

 

Modesty aside, I'm pleased to report that my prowess with a catapult gained me many a respectful nod from the village elders, often backed by comments along the lines of 'See 'ee? That boy kin shoot a cattypowt better'n most kin shoot a gun. 'At 'ee kin.' As unassuming then as I am now, I naturally refused to let such idolisation go to my head, and remained my natural, non-arrogant self. Or possibly not.

 

Thus it was that, when approached for catapult-shooting lessons by Ernie, the roadsweeper, I did all I could to help. Now, Ernie wasn't over-sharp in the mental gymnastics department. At 40-something, his CV would have read 'I'm not very clever but I can lift heavy fings.' Rumour had it that Ernie had to be re-trained after every lunch break. Anyway, I was carrying home a freshly-brained rabbit one day, when Ernie intercepted me at the roadside and asked me to show him how to shoot a catapult. So, I did just that. Except, and I can only blame the devil for this…I told him he should use his thumb as a sight.

 

In Ernie's calloused paw, my junior catty all but disappeared. I could just see the top of the prongs, with each length of elastic held in its split by a criss-crossed, red rubber band from a screw-in bottle top. At the other end of the elastic, an elongated leather oval held a large steel nut that I'd filched from the 'bits' box in my father's shed.

When fired from the catty, these nuts whistled in a most pleasing fashion and I'd save them for special shots at rabbits or pigeons, rather than waste them on sparrows or rats. Ernie's lesson definitely qualified as 'special', I thought.

 

With his fingers wrapped securely around the handle of the catapult, Ernie's thumb was cocked high and proud between the prongs as, tongue protruding from corner of mouth, he drew back the quarter-inch square elastic. Back, back it came, until the nut-bearing pouch was brushing Ernie's sun-scabbed ear. He paused for just a split-second while he aligned his sighting thumb with a small puddle, then released the shot.

 

'Ssssnockk!!' is the closest I can get to the sound of a large, imperial nut impacting a live thumb at extreme speed. Ernie's immediate reaction is far easier to relate. "Whaaaaaaaaaa!", he roared as the nut slammed into the joint of his thumb. Then he began cursing in an unbroken stream, before clamping the already throbbing digit between his thighs and doing mini jumping-jacks, to the eventual accompaniment of "Ow! Ow! Ow! Owww! Ernie's first comprehensible phrase was a full two minutes in the forming, as he wailed a repeated, "I bin 'a broke me fum! I bin a broke me fum!"

 

He had, too. Ernie was off roadsweeping duties for a full month, during which I kept my head well and truly down. Upon Ernie's return and our first meeting, I hid my catapult and waited for him to make the first move. After exchanging 'Ow do?' greetings, I asked Ernie how his thumb was. "Never be right, they reckons", he said, flexing his single-use catty sight and grimacing. "Yor the cattypowt expert. What'd'yer fink I done wrong, then?"

 

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Edited July 5, 2007 by Elton

[Elton]

Tel - send me the original, as some of the characters are a bit skew-whiff. I'll sort it.

 

{I think I may have sorted it}

[Wordbender]

Tel - send me the original, as some of the characters are a bit skew-whiff. I'll sort it.

 

{I think I may have sorted it}

 

Seems OK now, mate.

 

You know what a 'puter genius I am.

[medwaygreen]

Wonderful.

 

[Newt]

ROF - good stuff as usual Terry.

[Clifftop]

Great story WB, i started laughing at the end of the 3rd paragraph and didnt stop until the end.

[DavyR]

Wonderful.

 

 

MG - Haven't you learned *anything* from reading that cautionary tale? Never stick your thumbs up - it makes them far too vulnerable.

[Steve Burke]

Nice one, Terry!

 

Whoops, perhaps I shouldn't have added that thumbs up!

[Vagabond]

Hilarious

especially the bit about retraining after every lunch break.

 

Catties for beginners......

[Chris Goddard]

An absolute classic!! Well worth repeating and thanks for that!! Did Made oy larf!!