My distan for firing blanks has followed me for years. At the end of my first nco course we had to do a spendex of all the blanks. I had managed to never fire a single shot the entire time. There was a small female soldier there who had to carry the m249. Well she apparently has never had to clean weapons. She thought it was a blast shooting all those drums of blank ammo. So I asked her if she knew that the 249 could shoot from mags as well? She got all excited and said no way! I asked her if she wanted to try. She excitedly said yes. So I handed her all my mags and let her go to town. I probably should have felt bad watching her clean it.. but.. naw.