Growing Up Hunting in the U.P., eh? Michigan

When my father took me hunting for the first time and let me carry a gun, here are some of the rules he went by. I started hunting at 10 years old and was never allowed to have or use a BB gun, because my Dad said all kids would do with them is kill small birds or shoot somebody's eye out. We only hunted animals that we could put on the table for food. Rule # 1: Don't point a gun at someone unless you are going to kill them! When I first heard him say that I was shocked trying to imagine: Why would he say that? Then it dawned on me. Rule # 2: Understand that a gun is always loaded even if it is not! Rule # 3: Always know the target you are shooting at! No sound shots! If you hear a sound, don't take a shot and hope some animal or bird will be found dead. You might be in for an unwanted surprise. Since we grew up poorer than poor, we never took practice shots or a shot at a partridge, deer or whatever, unless we had a real good chance of making a kill. Hunting for our family was more for the food and being out in the wilderness, but it was sport,too. If I came home with shots fired and no bird or animal I was yelled at! Made me learn to be a careful and accurate hunter. When I was twelve my father bought me my first gun, a 22, for my birthday. That small game hunting season (we could hunt from our backyard) he told me to go up in the hills to see if I could get a rabbit or grouse. I was on an old dirt road and the local Iron Mountain police were in a patrol car (don't know why they were way up there) stopped me and took my gun away! I told them I was hunting, but they didn't believe me. When I got home and told my Dad about it, he grabbed my hand and we headed for the police station. Don't remember his words, but my father was mad as hell when he confronted the chief of police (Rayhoy). He explained what happened and how the patrol officer more or less called me a liar and took my gun. The chief agreed with my father, apologized to me and gave the gun back. The reason I remember the chief's name was because he had done such nice things for all us kids when I was growing up. On Friday nights, he would invite us to watch movies at the hall and serve us spaghetti dinner. Other times all us kids would make model airplanes and so forth. We admired the police. I'm sure you are all sick of the Dick Cheney jokes, but I do have some questions on his hunting. He was using a 28-gauge (the smallest next to a 410) and I don't understand how he could put over a hundred pellets in a person at 30 yards when I doubt if you could even kill a quail at that distance. Doesn't gel with me. Of course, most folks wonder whey he took five days to tell Fox News what happened. Why was it just Fox News and not all the networks? Was he afraid he might be asked the wrong questions or does he have something to hide? Don't blame the news media for something you did. Questions are supposed to be asked of you when you're Vice President of the United States! More and more stories are coming out about his hunting excursions. In Wyoming, when hunting with his friends, they would have bets on who would kill the first antelope (he really needed the meat) and one time he took a long out-of-range shot, ended up wounding the animal and the hunting party followed it most of the day. Another time they (whoever he was hunting with) had a contest to see who could get the most pheasants (this was on private land in North Dakota) Dick Cheney won by killing 75! How many of those did he eat? I knew a guy that went hunting with Dick Cheney and all he ended up with at the end of the day was a bloody t-shirt with BB holes in it! (Joke) Again....let's make getting a hunting license (I guess Dick didn't have one) for a Vice President as hard as it is for older folks to get medicare. Good Night and Good Hunting, Joe