The collected writings of Bob Giddings

A Bone Headed Stunt

21 May 2005

Near Post, TX

As is my custom, I am burning up the miles to get out of Texas. Or, more properly, to get out of the heat. Smiley, the inconsequential TV weatherman, says that it's going to get into the triple digits this weekend, down here in the flats. I finally pulled over into a picnic area south of Post because my eyes kept closing. Not good, with 7000 pounds of trailer pushing you along.

At 11 pm, it's still 72 degrees in the trailer, though a bit cooler outside. It takes a long time to shed the latent heat of the day. I told Mr. Edgar, my postman, that I was headed out for any place where I could freeze my butt off. He laughed, but I was perfectly serious.

There's a fan in the bedroom, but you wouldn't know it. Waaay too hot to close the windows. Too hot to even lower the blinds. I got undressed in the dark, and sweated for a while on top of the sheets. The trucks on 84 made an unmitigated roaring racket. I went foraging by feel in the drawer by the bed, trying to find my earplugs.

Unexpectedly, my hand encountered cool steel.

Dang. Dang. I forgot to take the guns into the house before I left. Double dang. There's a 12 gauge under the bed. And double dang dog it. I'm going up to and through Canada, where the Law takes a dim view of personal firearms.

Well. That sure was a bone headed stunt.

Oh, I've got tons of excuses. I was reeel bizzy before I left. And I live full time in this trailer. Just like at your house, there's a ton of stuff I put away and forget about until I need it. And like most people, I seldom really need a gun.

Make that never, so far. Not really.

Oh, the irony. I habitually give both the gun fondlers and the gun phobiacs grief. So much hysteria over a common tool. But one thing you'll have to grant, no one in either group would be likely to simply forget the presence of a couple of firearms sitting right next to the bed they're sleeping in, for months on end. And certainly not until they are 250 miles from home.

No doubt about it, I could probably come up with lots of excuses. But the primary problem seems to be that I have my head up my ass. Do they make a special tool for this situation?

This is going to end up a real exercise in ingenuity. I might even get by with the shotgun, with the appropriate application of 50 bucks for a license. But there's no way I'm gonna sneak a .45 by the border guards. Into Canada. Into the US at Skagway. Back into Canada. Into the US on the road to Tok. Back into Canada on my return. Back into Washington at last.

Nope. Ain't gonna happen.

I've got a couple of weeks to think of something legal. You know, it ought not to be this hard. And it wasn't, yesterday. I suppose I could throw the dang things away. Ouch. Beats prison.

Sell them? Store them?

What a royal pain in the arse. Which, in my case, makes for a blinding headache.

Bob

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