English practice 54

Splat, You’re Out

I’m not sure whose idea it was, but around the end

of ninth grade, a bunch of guys from my playing paintball.

If that game where two teams run around shooting at each other with gas-powered

guns that fire little pellets of brightly colored paint:

[1] The first thing I learned about paintball is that

it’s quite an investment. A decent gun at the time about seventy-five dollars, but that wasn’t the end of it. [2] Pads aren’t necessary, because getting shot in the arm or leg doesn’t hurt much, but you’d be a fool to play without a facemask, throatguard, and another piece of athletic equipment specific to male players.

[3] [4] And of course, paintball means regular bike rides to the sporting-goods store to buy more ammunition and get your gas canister refilled.

[5] A bunch of protective gear is required too.

It was the only location where we could be sure not to hit any homes, cars, or innocent

surely would have brought our paintball days to an abrupt end. We cleared brush to make paths, and dug pits and erected walls to make two opposing forts. This was more yardwork than we would have done even if our parents had paid us, but no hardship

was going to stand between of sneaking up on a friend and shooting him in the butt with exploding pellets of neon goo.

Now and then, the memories of my heroism that

summer still a smile to my face. There was the time I discovered a secret trail up a hillside full of pricker-bushes

and picked off three guys without any idea where I was. Then there was the time I snuck a giant sheet of clear plexiglass into Bobby’s woods, put it up between two trees, and tauntingly danced safely behind it while opponents wasted their ammo.

[1] I guess, one by one, everyone got a girlfriend and stopped coming out to the games. [2] After a year or two, he probably did the same. [3] I ended up selling my gun and all my gear to a kid a couple of grades

younger. [4] I why we stopped playing. [5] And I’d like to believe that, even now, that same equipment is still being used by some ninth

grader discovering the joy of squeezing the trigger on a paintball gun and hearing his shot followed by a loud pop and a swear word from his friend echoing

through the woods.

The following paragraphs may or may not be in the most logical order. Each paragraph is numbered in brackets, and question 45 will ask you to choose where paragraph 3 should most logically be placed.