Thought I got shot at today

[rox]

I have never been up close to a gun going off, only hear them in the distance from the hunters. Today i am outside pruning the olive trees and there is this huge BOOM right on top of me. Then i could smell sulfur. Wow, somebody is shooting at me I thought.

I look around and i see the neighbor boy running away. I watch him run up the hillside headed home. I was looking for a gun, but he didn'thave a long gun so I figured he msut have a pistol. Since he ran away I wasn't in any imediate danger so I called the neighbor and said that the son of your tennants jsut tried to shoot me. I mean it was a real loud BOOM. My husband was at the store so i figued to wait for him to come home and we would go visit that family. While waiting for him to come home i found the shell, it was about 5 or 6 feet from where I was standing. But something was funny about it, it was a paper shell but had gunpowder in it. Well perhaps it is some kind of an air gun or something i thought. i know nothing about guns but i was sure happy to find that exploded shell. i now had proof that I was attacked.

When my husband came home we went to see the neighbors tenants. turns out it wasn't their son, turns out it was the son of the neighbor behind us. i was really shocked. I know that boy Luca, pretty well, I had even done a home made paper making activity with him shortly after we moved in. He is a very nice boy about 11 perhaps now 12 years old.

So we go see Luca and his parents and it wasn't a gun at all but some kind of a big firework. I ahve heard fireworks before and now think it was something like an M80. i may have the name M80 wrong but that is what we used to call them. They make jsut a very loud loud bang. Luca got in trouble his dad smacked him upside the head and i don't think Luca gets physically punished much, they are not those kinds of parents. I made him say "I'm sorry" and we also told him he is welcome to come back and play any time jsut don't bring any weapons or fireworks. He and the neighbor girl were playing on ur property earlier in the morning. we didn't care, they weren't doing anything but running around.

I was very happy that he didn't have a gun, and put it down to stupidity that he would throw a firecracker at me, like I said it was only 5 ft away. geeze kids, what goes through their mnds sometimes?

 

[JoeR]

Rox, did he throw the M80 at you? Or was it a mistake, and he didn't know you were there? Pretty scary to have an M80 go off within 5 feet of you. I would have had to change my underwear after that.

At least the parents addressed the problem, unlike some parents who would deny the children did anything wrong, and then tell you not to go near their kids or talk to them.

Joe

 

[rox]

No he threw it at me for sure. No way was it a mistake. i was working up on a terrace, and he was down on the driveway so he msut have snuck up on me and he had to throw it up and over to get next to me. Plus he had to light a match to light the darned thing. His dad had given him the fireworks and yelled at him and told him that he knows he only has one spot he is allowed to throw them in. Thankfully it is not the dry season or that think for sure will start a fire. Fire is our worst fear.

I think he was playing some sort of game, like palying army and stalking me. I don't think he meant to hurt me just scare me. He's not been a problem neighbor kid at all. He wasn't very good at it either becasue he had to run through open areas to get away and for sure i would see him, so he wasn't that smart about it. Kid's don[t think through the cnsequences and they do dumb things. I do hope the father never gets him a gun though ...

 

[thcri]

Rox,

I am sure when it went off it scared the daylights out of you, it would have me if I did not know it was coming. And we are all glad your ok as that thing could have done some minor damage if close enough.

Hope you sleep well tonight.

murph

 

[Dusty]

I think that the fireworks might have scared him as much as you, or he might not have run away, just stayed and hid. Kids will be kids, and we just have to push them in the right direction once in a while. We all make mistakes, and that is how we learn. The good news is that no one was hurt.
Dusty

 

[tawilson]

Gee, a parent that gives an 11 year old M80's to play with. I like to wait till their 13 or 14 at least.

 

[vmarc]

Gee, a parent that gives an 11 year old M80's to play with. I like to wait till their 13 or 14 at least.

That says it all.

 

[shvl73]

If he hadn't let go in time you might have found parts of his fingers as well.

 

[Thomas]

Dang,that was to close for comfort.
Glad to read both side agree not to let this slide...by the sounds the little guy has more respect for you now.

 

[SPIKER]

ROX: good to see you posting again. How are the Olive trees coming along?

sounds like it was what we americans call a fire cracker, an M80 is VERY big bang and if it had gone off 4~5 feet from you you wouldn't be hearing much for an hr or two. Firecrackers are pretty loud and leave a bunch of paper fragments about. there are some cheap fireworks that are a hollow tube about size of the small finger and about as long to the first knuckle. I'm not sure what they call those anymore since my firecrackers are much bigger now (boys & their toys ya know) the older we get the bigger & more expensive our toys get.

anyhow how was the growing season this you over there?

markM

 

[rox]

Spiker,

You are right. t was a fire cracker that was a hollow tube about as big around as a finger and length about to the first knuckle, perhaps a tad linger. Now that i think about it, it could not have been an M80 it wan't that loud. stiLl it was pretty doll garned loud.

we had a very good ahrvest this year, 4,000 liters it took us a month to harvest. The weather is so nice 51 to 52 F and sunny that for the last 2 days we have started pruning our trees. we ahve about 700 of them to prune. These trees are way way too tall, I am taking of 6' & 8' form the tops. My hsuband is so sweet, I ahve all the power tools and he has all the manula tools. I have a stihl Pole saw, which is basically a small chain saw and also an electric secature. A secature is basically an extreemly pwoerful electic pruning shears. You wear a battery pack to power it, it will cut through branches an in and a half across in one pull of the trigger. So I ahve all the good stuff and my husbans uses a small hand arborist saw, a big lopers and a hand pruning shears.

i really like that tishl chainsaw on a pole, it is from thier combi sysem line. I like to be away from the area that the limb is going to fall and with that long pole saw i am able to stay out of the fall area. it is not that big a deal really because the branches always get hung up so there is very little risk in hurting yourself. the main risk is getting sawdust in your eyes from looking up at the cutting ara. I ahve started wearing safety glases after about the 10 speck of sawdust in my eyes.

Our trees look great very hardy and healthy, no diseases or pests. Anyone we have evry ahd over who commercially grows olive tress is completely amazed with our trees. My hsuband and I keep working on them to keep them that way. We msut have ideal climate and soil becasue these olive trees literally grow 2 feet a year, both up and wide. it is crazy jsut trying to keep up with keeping them pruned. I take it back we do have one sick one which I am going to massivley ahve to prune back in order to get some new vigerous re-growth. after watching these trees grow i am not shy about cutting them really short. Ones i cut last year are already to tall. to tall meaning they are higher than the harvesting equipment. you don't want to have tree growth where you cna't get upt here and pick. This year I am really gutsy and cutting them shorter that i did last year, becaue now i have to go around and re-cut those ones i did last eyar becaue they are too tall.

I hope the weather holds nice. lst year we got a good 2 weeks the first weeks of january that we warm and sunny I hope this year it is the same.

 

[SPIKER]

ROX:

glad to hear you had a great year: my fruit trees been in the ground 2~5 years and I FINALLY got 2 pears this year and they weren't fit to eat due to bugs anyhow good to have you back posting.

markM

 

[jinman]

Rox, kids do crazy things for no reason at all. I know, because I did some very crazy things with fireworks as a kid.

As I remember, the three "biggies" of fireworks were the M80s, Cherry Bombs, and Baby Giants. The M80s were silver gray and had a fuse coming out the side. Cherry Bombs were a favorite because they were cheaper to buy and sounded much like a shotgun going off. Also, the fuse would burn in water, so you could "fish" with them. We lived in the country beside a railroad track that was down in a deep trench. That trench was the sight of many war games using fireworks as bombs.

My dad rented a shop building to a fellow with a used car lot. He had several close friends who used the shop and one fellow in particular was a real cut-up kind of guy who was always joking and pulling pranks on people. One day my brother and I saw him working on a car with his head below the hood. (I think I was about 12 and my brother 15.) We had a cherry bomb and walked toward where he was. When we got near, we lit the cherry bomb and threw it down by the railroad track. The fuse burned slowly, so we had time to walk up and call him by name before the thing went off. BOOM!

The poor guy hit the ground. He just immediately dropped down and completely flat and it shocked both my brother and me. Then, he got up and he was shaking all over. We apologized right away and told him we didn't mean to scare him that badly, just play a joke. He mumbled something and then closed the hood, got into the car, and drove away. We looked at each other and realized we had done something really wrong.

When my dad got home, he took us aside and had a really firm talk with us. He said our joking friend had been in the war and had suffered from shell-shock. Any other joke would have been fine, but the firecracker had triggered a panic response. If we felt bad before, we now felt really bad. The next day we went to see that fellow and told him how sorry we were. It was a lesson I will never forget and the end to my dad allowing us to have fireworks.

Your little friend is a kid. He would do the same thing with friends his own age. What he did was very wrong, but I don't think he meant to hurt you. In his mind he was probably just playing a prank and would probably not have done it if you had been a stranger. By seeing your response, he too immediately learned how flawed his judgement was. Or, that's my guess.

I'm sure glad you are okay.