PAINtball

Let me preface this post by pointing out that the first four letters in 'Paintball' are P-A-I-N. The first four letters spell PAIN. Keep that in mind as you read through this post.

Friday night my Youth Group had a lock-in. For those that do not know, a lock-in is when we spend the night at the church. There are several lock-ins throughout the year and everyone has a different special activity. Sometimes we go bowling we've done laser tag, and the most common is LAN (Local Area Network), but this one is particularly fun for me because it is something that I don't get to do that often.

*Now it does not take a genius to figure out what the special activity for this lock-in was, so if you happen to be reading this and wondering then I suggest you reread the title*

Anyways, the special event was paintballing, this is the second time I've gone paintballing, the first time was a year ago with this same group.

So to start off we arrived at the church around 7pm Friday evening. I invited Andrea to come, although she doesnt really count as a guest anymore since she is a 'regular' at Youth Group. But we got there and went over to a table with a bunch of guys. Chris was in this group and I knew a couple of the other people at the table because they were all friends with Chris. He had brought quite a number of people which was nice because I got to meet some more of his friends. So we hung out with them and we walked around some talking to the other guys that we knew there.

But notice, I haven't said anything about talking to any girls. And I promise the reason is not that Andrea and I just wanted to flirt with guys all night. (Which would be ridiculous anyways since we are both dating) But, the reason is that Andrea and I were the only girls that came to this lock-in. That was fine for the most part, Andrea and I get along fine with guys, but it was a bit odd at some points it seemed as if we had come to an all-boys event and that we simply did not belong, though they assured us that that was not the case.

Anyways, after everyone had arrived Bob talked to us about God and then we all got ready to go paintballing. Andrea had never gone before, and I had only gone once, so we felt a bit awkward next to the guys that went so often that they owned their own guns. The guys made sure to comfort us by telling us that they wouldn't hit us too many times, but then again also telling us that they would dominate and we were 'going down'.

After a brief explanation of how to work the guns, and an overview of the rules we were split into two teams. We would be going out on the course for 10 minutes each round for as many times as we could before our time was up. When you are hit with a paintball and it explodes you are out and must stand up with your gun over your head saying that you are out while you walk off the course, because if you don't walk off like that there is the definite possibility that people will continue to shoot at you. Now if the paintball just hits and bounces off of you then you are not out of the game, but it does tend to hurt a lot more when they do not break than when they do.

We started out playing simple capture the flag games, nothing too difficult. In these first few rounds Andrea was hit twice on her butt (and probably a few other places that I don't remember). And I was hit 3 times on the arm (none of them exploded *ouch*) and I was also hit once on the butt.

Then for some reason that I will never understand they decided to change the game. They took about 7 of the best guys and sent them onto the course with their guns to hide in places where they could easily shoot us when we came in, they were called snipers. Then when they were hidden the rest of us were allowed on the course and we were allowed to walk over to the opposite side of the course before we began.

There weren't many more of us than there were snipers, which made it hard, and we weren't really sure what the point was. Obviously the snipers had an advantage. So the horn went off and I turned the corner and someone shot me 3 times; I still don't know where they were hiding when they shot me. I put my gun over my head and walked off the course. But not without a bit of groaning.

*This is where the PAIN in PAINtballing comes in*

The first hit had been on my collarbone, it did not break *ouch*. The next two where hit right on my right breast, one exploded and one didn't *ouch, ouch, ouch*. When I got into the waiting room I put down my gun took off my mask and gloves and then went to the bathroom to look in the mirror. Already there was a welt on my collar bone, and although the other spot was killing me as well I refrained from looking. (Later I saw that there was a welt and a bruise there too). I don't think the guys understood that pain lol.

I didn't like that round very much :-P

After that we switched to different games and I only got one more major injury. My ring finger on my right hand got hit. It is still hurts a little now but it's not too terrible.

Now thats enough complaining I suppose ;-)

After Paintballing was over we went back to the church and watched the movie 'The Patriot', it was a pretty good movie I suppose. Then it was late and so they kicked all of the girls out of the guys room...*all two of us* so we went to our own room and stayed up talking until around 6:15. I fell asleep around 7 and then andrea well asleep around 9 and then around 10 we got up for breakfast. After breakfast we just sorta hung out until my mom came to pick us up at about 11:30. Then we took Andrea home and then I went home.

So, yes that was my amazing Lock-in experience, it really was lots of fun. Except now I'm very tired, and yet I know that I have so much homework that I can't go to sleep, and I have to babysit tonight. But Oh well. Now I have to stop this blogging so I can go do that homework that I have been postponing for about an hour while writing this.


Loving Everyone Always Forever