Sound like California I love the moutains and the ocean out there!! I lived there in the 70s.

As a child of the jungle, the hardest thing about coming to the States for college was getting use to the rules.  I got kicked out of so many trees in parks b/c it was "dangerous" and "immature" to climb them.  My brother and I use to climb up in the University campus oak trees and hang our hammocks and sleep there all night.  Campus security looked upon us feral MK's (missionary kids - there were about 70 of us on average at this university) with tolerance and let us sleep till about 6am before kicking us out b/f any university professors caught us )  lol.

Fortunately in New Mexico you can register for a hand-gun and carry it around the mall in a holster as long as it isn't concealed.  So concealed slings shouldn't be a problem.  My martial arts instructor once got pulled over by a cop for speeding and the cop asked him if he had any weapons in the truck.  My instructor slowly began passing a couple of Chinese swords out the window followed by a pair of nunchuk's, a fighting staff, an assortment of night sticks, rattan eskrima sticks, a butterfly knife, along with many other unspellable (let alone unpronounceable) Asian weapons, and finally a dummy hand gun along with his real hand gun...  After the cop recovered from his shock and discovered that Michael was an instructor he let him go... funny picture to imagine though.   

It does pay to be careful however.  My brother and I were out at our favorite slinging spot which is a 75 foot cliff overlooking the Farmington reservoir.  We were slinging stones out into the lake, and because of the height, altitude, and fairly decent skills, the stones spent a great deal of time in the air before hitting the water several hundred yards out.  On this particular day I made a fantastic fling and as the stone left the cradle, a solitary kayaker came paddling innocently from around the cliff bend.  It's amazing how many prayers you can utter in 10 seconds as we watched the stone descend in it's arc, at the same time try to figure out how we would explain to the police that the dead kayaker in the lake was really hit by a small meteor and that these were really just Peruvian belts wrapped around our waists.   Fortunately God was able to decipher our hastily uttered prayers and the stone landed a good 50 feet off the Kayaker's port bow.  I couldn't see the look on his face, but judging the extreme distance, he must have thought that we were NFL quarter backs practicing our end-zone passes.  We should have just packed it up and gone home, but since God had thoughtfully assigned a couple of guardian angels to keep us out of trouble, we decided it would be rude not give them something to do.    In the spirit of scientific discovery, we next decided to see if we could exceed escape velocity and put the first sling-slung-stone into orbit.  After sending a couple dozen rocks 300 feet straight up into the air, Joel's sling hooked his stone backwards over his head and we watched in slow motion horror as it arced up and then plummeted down, missing the one and only car parked on the lake front by about 10 feet.  Taking that as a sign from God that He was not amused with our keeping His angels occupied, we packed it up and went home...

Anyway, it’s late at night and I felt the urge to reminisce.  No doubt everyone on the forum will be leery of slinging with me should chance ever cross our paths; however I assure you that I have never hit a single soul while slinging (though a strange phenomenon of small meteor showers does seem to follow me which have been known to strike by-standers... But for that I hold mother nature responsible). 

Barak - who loves to hammock in trees and can't wait for summer

Douglas
      You are right about the need to be careful. For years I've carried a sling in my pack and vehical, never worried about being harrased by anybody. That was because few people knew what it was, and less still, how destructive it can be. This is just not the same world I grew up in. Now that there are so many people who use the sling the laws may change. For our part we just need to be carefull, slinging takes room and it is something that is getting to be less and less available. I'm not supprised about the California law; when people live in fear they tend to pass laws that make them FEEL safe. Living in fear drives people to try and make the world foolproof, a major mistake, but one that has not changed since there have been people living in fear. Somehow they never quite get around to admitting what the real problem is.  Fear God and you need fear no man; fear man and you end up fearing everything. Seems to me the best thing that we slingers can do is to sling responsibably, and always to consider that if people are afraid of what we do, then we may be infringing on their need to feel safe. I know that sounds stupid, but in todays world keeping it formost in our minds may, for a while at least, keep slinging out of the banded by society laws.

Not that it will change things, but that's my two cents

WalkingBird

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Right, they'll shoot you on sight for that, and have.

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Speak for yourself... 

JustBarak,


I feel your words!  I have experienced the same things and have felt the same!  I'm certainly not one to blow smoke up one's kilt, but let me say..... that was an engrossing account!  Your writing style is witty and entertaining.  If you are not already, may I suggest having a go professionally?


Peace,

TS

ask them if you can play baseball in the area then ask them  to hit a  5.25 oz baseball at 90 .to 100 miles per hour ask them to hit a target with that and then show them you can hit one at 150 feet with a one oz rock.

A lot of US jurisdictions (state, city, and county) have “dangerous weapons “ clauses that act as a catch-all. Even if it isn’t explicitly banned, you can still be convicted of a crime... but most places also have exemptions for historical relics and re-enactments, so if your sling looks like a historical replica, you might have a defense, but a sling made from paracord is a hard sell if someone really wants to throw the book at you.