Surprise find follows knee x-ray

VETERAN rural councillor Rod McKenzie has ridden shotgun on many issues for many years but even he didn't know he had the pellet to prove it until late last week.
At Wakefield Hospital for a knee reconstruction, Mr McKenzie was astonished to hear a nurse exclaim "you've been shot at" as she held aloft an X-ray of his troublesome right knee.
"I said: 'No, I broke my knee years ago' but she said: 'No, no, you've got a shotgun pellet in your leg'."
The revelation that he had been carrying a bit of lead around with him got Mr McKenzie thinking, and it didn't take long for him to recall a day of hi-jinks back in the 1960s when he had been targeted for some ribbing by mates after an All Black test against the Aussies.
"We had gathered to listen to the test on the radio and for a few drinks.
"One bloke in particular had me on about not bringing any beer and later said to me: 'Go and get your beer'.
"I was walking down a concrete path heading to my car and they apparently thought I was going to his car."
In the stupidity of the moment a shotgun was discharged but the joke backfired when the pellets hit the concrete, sending three into Mr McKenzie's backside ? "just under the skin" ? and sprayed the mate's car, peppering the paintwork.
"I leapt about 50 feet in the air and landed in a rosebush."
Mr McKenzie said he had a bit of home surgery to pick the pellets from his backside but never realised one had lodged in his leg.
It wasn't until the nursing staff picked it up in the X-ray that all was finally revealed.
The Wakefield Hospital staff had thought the find a great joke and Mr McKenzie was teased about his war service.
"They joked about how I must have been injured in the Vietnam War, but one nurse said it was probably the Boer War."
And the future of the wayward pellet?
"It's staying right where it is ? it's not doing any harm."
Picture: Mr McKenzie with the X-ray of his knee, showing the shotgun pellet, circled, as a white dot on the right.