"Mr. Gunwrench"

A friend tore a story out of the local paper and gave it to me, and of course Phil over at Perils of Caffeine in the Evening beat me to posting it.

This article will satisfy neither camp in the culture wars. While it seems to indicate that Darwin is losing influence (the guy lived), it also resoundingly refutes the concept of Intelligent Design. From today’s P-I:

SOUTHWORTH — A man trying to loosen a stubborn lug nut blasted the wheel with a 12-gauge shotgun, injuring himself badly in both legs, Kitsap County sheriff’s deputies said.

The 66-year-old man had been repairing the car for two weeks at his home northwest of Southworth and east of Port Orchard and had gotten all but one lug nut off the right rear wheel before getting frustrated Saturday, Deputy Scott Wilson said.

From about arm’s length the man fired the shotgun at the wheel and was “peppered” in both legs with 00 buckshot and other debris.

Wilson described the injuries as “severe but not life-threatening.”

Now, the big mistake here was using buckshot in the Gunwrench. He might've thought his gun was loaded with a slug, which, from the proper distance and angle (point-blank, 90 degrees to side), would’ve worked on your standard Lincoln Continental frozen lug nut by fracturing the top off so you could then drill out the threads. Skating on thin Darwinian ice? Sure, but buckshot guarantees disaster from any angle. And wouldn't work. Of course, by relating this bit of trivia, I realize what it discloses about my socioeconomic and geographic origins...in the Land o' Gun Racks.

At my high school, the principal came on the loudspeaker one morning during deer season and told us boys we were to never, ever, ever leave our rifles and shotguns in our cars; as someone might be tempted to steal them, to do so was irresponsible and unsafe. We were henceforth only allowed to store them in our lockers while at school.