Tam distills all the rules of gun behavior down to one: Assume you’re an idiot. <\/p>\n
This works for me, because it’s something I already do. <\/p>\n
Today I climbed on top of a machine about thirty feet tall. If I had been thirty feet up a rock cliff, (Which I have done, in my skinnier days) I would have been scared shitless; the fact was I wore safety equipment against falling and though I was in some precarious positions i was never in any real danger. <\/p>\n
The inherent danger of firearms makes it important that you follow safe handling rules, and frankly, I strive to be ever more anal retentive about safery- but I have to say, I like Tam’s rule. <\/p>\n
I tend to apply it to almost everything I do, because I do a lot of other things that are inherently dangerous. Bluing guns is basically playing with five gallons of boiling lye. All woodworking tools are potentially lethal- if you got your hand in a Lauderdale chop saw, for instance, you would bleed out before it let go of you. Metalworking machinery- don’t get me started. Welding, cutting steel, forging… Just about everything I do offers me an assortment of amusing and varied ways of snuffing it, or at least causing myself serious bodily harm. <\/p>\n
So I assume the next move I make is the one that’s gonna get me killed. As often as not, even being careful, I need to be able to get the hell out of the way quickly. And all this is amplified by the fact that I have SEEN the injuries of which I speak; there are a number of friends who I’ve buried or visited in hospital after having been harmed by industrial machinery. And if you want to see gruesome injury, go to a farm. <\/p>\n