One of the most basic rules of gun safety is to treat every firearm you handle as if it’s loaded. That means you keep the muzzle pointed in a safe direction, you don’t point your gun at anything you’re not willing to shoot, and you don’t play around or fondle the hardware. Those are pretty simple rules to follow, but one Oregon man blatantly ignored all of the rules and nearly lost his life as a result of his idiocy when he ended up shooting himself while standing in line at a grocery store Sunday evening.

Investigators said the 29-year-old man was waiting in the checkout line, when he unholstered his Glock 9mm semi-automatic pistol from his waistband “so that he could show it off to a friend.”

As the man put the gun back in the front of his pants, he accidentally pulled the trigger, according to police.

Police said the bullet narrowly missed his femoral artery. Officers immediately provided first aid before medics arrived to take over treatment.

There’s a lot of idiocy to unpack here. Why, if you want to show your firearm to your friend, would you take your gun out in line at a grocery store? I live in rural Virginia, and it’s a very 2A-friendly place, but I guarantee that if I was chatting with a friend at the local market and pulled out my pistol so he could get a better look at it, I’d either be mistaken for an armed robber or presumed to be a moron without a lick of common sense.

Then there’s the fact that Nicholas Ellingford couldn’t keep his finger off the trigger when he put his gun back in his holster. I’m not one who believes that appendix carry is inherently unsafe, but no matter how you carry, you need to practice taking your gun out of the holster as well as putting it back. I can’t help but wonder just how much practice Ellingford had in re-holstering his handgun before he decided to whip it out to show his buddy at the grocery store.

Ellingford is likely going to be in the hospital for a little while, but that’s just the start of his trouble. As it turns out, he doesn’t have a concealed carry license, and police say they’re treating the negligent discharge as a criminal matter, since he “placed several people in danger” with his dumb decisions.

Nicholas Ellingford learned the hard way that the rules of gun safety aren’t optional, and ignoring them doesn’t make you more manly. In fact, Ellingford is lucky that he didn’t emasculate himself by shooting himself in the family jewels when he tried to put his gun back in his pants. I doubt it’s a mistake that he’ll make twice, but it’s one he never should have made in the first place.