Last Saturday

I should have said: last Saturday was an odd one. Very early in the morning I sprayed about a gallon of petrol over the side of my car, thanks to a non-functional nozzle cut-off, and proceeded to have a fairly significant argument with the garage about precisely why they have buckets of sand on the forecourt. And signs reading ‘Report all spillages, however small.’ And ‘out of service’ hoods for pumps.

Not in the best of moods, I next sat on the M6 for rather longer than I’d hoped, thanks to mad traffic in the vicinity of Manchester. Then I got slightly lost somewhere West of Chester.

Next, I got out of the car, and seconds later somebody I’d never met before put a shotgun in my hands and shouted ‘Pull!’ Repeat sixteen more times. After which, I turned around to bid my fellow clay pigeon shooters a cheery good morrow, only to find them stony-faced because I’d just nailed seventeen out of seventeen in about ninety seconds.

Last year was, it seems, neither a fluke nor beginner’s luck. Tragically, I dropped two on the last stand, making my tally of 23 out of 25 merely level-pegging with host Daniel. But still, I am – evidently – a crack shot. My dad tells me that his father was a crack shot in the Home Guard, to the extent that in competitions they handicapped him by making him shoot left-handed. Only, his left eye was better than his right so he still won. Whatever the gene for ‘marksmanship’ is, it seems I have it. Hmm. Still not sure how I feel about that.

<div class=”Alistair Cook”>Goodnight.</div>

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