Paintball
Though I'm now back to the drudgery of London after a long trip home on Sunday night, there is so little of note to write about here that I'm going to go back to Saturday and write about going paintballing...
I have never been paintballing before. It always sounded pretty cool, but I was a little wary of the fact that I was sure it would be full of people who would take it far too seriously. Then I would get annoyed because I had paid for the privilege. But I needn't worry about that, because this time it was all being paid for by my brother's football team (well, my football team technically, given that I jointly run it). Of course, they needed some adult supervision (any excuse) and so I joined the fun.
All in all, it was a very good day. As expected, there were a number of people taking it too seriously, coming already dressed in combats, and preparing their attacks with military precision. But the trick - always make sure you're on the side of the crazy obsessos. I did, and victory in every event soon followed. That way, you will probably play for longer (I was a bit disappointed that you go out after one hit) and, of course, will win more often than not. There was the usual capture the flag goodness, and then having to defend a certain location from enemy attack, and then having to rescue hostages. It was a lot of fun, but being hit by a paintball hurt a lot more than I thought it would. Fortunately, I got away quite lightly, but a lot of the kids went away covered in bruises. It didn't look good...
The whole day lasted about five hours, going from event to event and stopping for lunch inbetween. My favourite part was when I took someone down with a glorious headshot. I have no idea who I was shooting - since everyone looks virtually the same in the overalls they give you, and I just knew I was shooting an enemy by the blue armband they had. I was firing at someone who was sitting behind a board for defense, and they would look through a square hole in it to see who to shoot at. I thought I'd have a crack, but the wind was picking up and was taking all the bullets in a ludicrous direction. But just as I was about to give up and shoot at someone else, my final shot - fired to the left - was caught perfectly by the wind, bent to the right in a glorious loop, went through the hole in the board and hit the target smack in the face. Technically, head shots aren't allowed, so the person probably didn't go out, but it was still great to see. They probably got paint all over their face, as it gets through the gaps in the paintball mask. I'm hoping that it was one of the other silly group that were with us, a crowd of 16 year olds who were really thick. Made our group look like saints though, so it wasn't all bad...
That was my Saturday. A fun day, but it would have been better, I think, if all of our group were just battling each other. We did get split in half onto the opposing teams, but we were also joined by lots of others from the other groups there. But it's a team sport, and it's rather difficult to communicate with people who you don't know. We had about 12 others on our team who we didn't know, and they just went off and did their thing while we did ours. We probably achieved little as part of all of our victories, but at least we still had fun.
Overall... I'm not sure I'd do it again. It's a little awkward playing with people you don't know, especially if they're quite a closed group already. I suppose for someone with the ultimate social network they could put together enough friends to rent the whole facility for the day. That would be awesome. It's still not easy to tell who you're shooting at, which is both good and bad I suppose. Means you can't pick on certain people you don't like...
The sad thing was that the paintball, which did generate a good team spirit, didn't help the football team to win on Sunday. We should have done much better, but lost 3-1 with just the usual bad defending. We're still waiting for our first win...
Anyway - it's now Monday, I've decided to stay off today, and there's a lot of stuff I need to get sorted, including the still broken washing machine. So I'd better get on with it...
I have never been paintballing before. It always sounded pretty cool, but I was a little wary of the fact that I was sure it would be full of people who would take it far too seriously. Then I would get annoyed because I had paid for the privilege. But I needn't worry about that, because this time it was all being paid for by my brother's football team (well, my football team technically, given that I jointly run it). Of course, they needed some adult supervision (any excuse) and so I joined the fun.
All in all, it was a very good day. As expected, there were a number of people taking it too seriously, coming already dressed in combats, and preparing their attacks with military precision. But the trick - always make sure you're on the side of the crazy obsessos. I did, and victory in every event soon followed. That way, you will probably play for longer (I was a bit disappointed that you go out after one hit) and, of course, will win more often than not. There was the usual capture the flag goodness, and then having to defend a certain location from enemy attack, and then having to rescue hostages. It was a lot of fun, but being hit by a paintball hurt a lot more than I thought it would. Fortunately, I got away quite lightly, but a lot of the kids went away covered in bruises. It didn't look good...
The whole day lasted about five hours, going from event to event and stopping for lunch inbetween. My favourite part was when I took someone down with a glorious headshot. I have no idea who I was shooting - since everyone looks virtually the same in the overalls they give you, and I just knew I was shooting an enemy by the blue armband they had. I was firing at someone who was sitting behind a board for defense, and they would look through a square hole in it to see who to shoot at. I thought I'd have a crack, but the wind was picking up and was taking all the bullets in a ludicrous direction. But just as I was about to give up and shoot at someone else, my final shot - fired to the left - was caught perfectly by the wind, bent to the right in a glorious loop, went through the hole in the board and hit the target smack in the face. Technically, head shots aren't allowed, so the person probably didn't go out, but it was still great to see. They probably got paint all over their face, as it gets through the gaps in the paintball mask. I'm hoping that it was one of the other silly group that were with us, a crowd of 16 year olds who were really thick. Made our group look like saints though, so it wasn't all bad...
That was my Saturday. A fun day, but it would have been better, I think, if all of our group were just battling each other. We did get split in half onto the opposing teams, but we were also joined by lots of others from the other groups there. But it's a team sport, and it's rather difficult to communicate with people who you don't know. We had about 12 others on our team who we didn't know, and they just went off and did their thing while we did ours. We probably achieved little as part of all of our victories, but at least we still had fun.
Overall... I'm not sure I'd do it again. It's a little awkward playing with people you don't know, especially if they're quite a closed group already. I suppose for someone with the ultimate social network they could put together enough friends to rent the whole facility for the day. That would be awesome. It's still not easy to tell who you're shooting at, which is both good and bad I suppose. Means you can't pick on certain people you don't like...
The sad thing was that the paintball, which did generate a good team spirit, didn't help the football team to win on Sunday. We should have done much better, but lost 3-1 with just the usual bad defending. We're still waiting for our first win...
Anyway - it's now Monday, I've decided to stay off today, and there's a lot of stuff I need to get sorted, including the still broken washing machine. So I'd better get on with it...
posted by Matt at
9:29 am
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