I have never wanted to hurt anybody and I certainly never wanted to shoot someone so I found the idea of paintball a little strange. People go off to the woods at weekends and get shot at with paint balls by people they hardly know and it turned out two guys from my office do this most weekends. I never could understand why grown men would want to run around in the woods playing at being soldiers while they dodged paintballs flying through the air.

There was nothing better I had planned to do at the weekend so I agreed to join them running around the woods getting cold, wet and paintballed. We left town and I was feeling a bit subdued as we headed for the paintballing site since I had no idea what I was in for.

Next day I awoke to get some instruction and borrow some paintball equipment which was all explained to me fairly quickly and I was told the most important rule is never to remove your face mask while in the fighting area. Next I was shown how to operate a simple paintball gun and the we were off to my first paintball fight. No sooner had I arrived in the fighting area I was hit by a bright pink ball of paint. I never even got to see who it was that shot me and I realised I had a lot to learn about paintballing.

I had a lot of fun that weekend. I had a great time shooting a few of the guys and getting shot a lot myself. I expect you are wondering how much it hurts when you get shot with a paintball and I must confess it can hurt but most times the protective clothing takes the sting out of it and to be honest you only notice a bruise after you finish playing.

You might guess I am now a regular paintball player and most weekends you will find me out in the woods with my cheap paintball gun. You can start out with some cheap gear and I bought a cheap paintball gun and some overalls for protective clothing but I am improving my gear as I have the spare cash to do so.