[the possum]

I've used point shooting for a long time, and it came in handy last night.

I surveying some of the tornado damage in our woods and came across a smallish possum. I pulled out my .45 and lined up the sights on his head, since I had the time. Later examination showed the slug entered just at the top of his nose and exited behind his right eye. He tumbled out of the tree and took off running across the ground toward the corn field- I thought I'd somehow missed him at the time. So since he fell down behind a bushy sapling, I had to move around just to get another shot, and started slinging lead.

Now mind you, this is shooting at a small running target, while moving myself- running/stepping over a bunch of downed branches, ducking under and through more branches, shooting one handed in the dark, as my other hand was busy with the flashlight, within one second. I don't know how anyone expects to get a good sight picture under such circumstances. At least, I didn't bother, because point shooting worked just fine. I think it was my third shot that finally landed him, with several more just to make sure. (and the bowie knife.)

There are fundamentally three variants of point-shooting. The first uses body-indexing to "aim" the weapon, the second uses peripheral vision, and the third uses the much-maligned "point AND shoot" method where you pull the trigger with your middle finger and "point" your index finger along the weapon towards the target.

I suppose we'll have to name a fourth then, because I often use yet another version in addition to the peripheral vision one. I know where the bullet will go just by the way the gun feels in my hand. I know where my wrist is pointing. I don't need to "index" it off my body, and I don't need to see it at all. (well, at least back when I was in good practice.) I used to practice by blocking my peripheral vision with my left hand, and just holding the pistol out in all sorts of positions.

7 yard COM shots probably work fine. 7 yard headshots with point shooting . . . I need to be convinced.

Back when I was practicing regularly, I could keep nearly all my shots in a nickel sized group at 7 yards, taking my time, shooting from the hip. Going faster, they were more like soda can sized groups. I could do better with the peripheral vision technique.