Wednesday, December 21, 2016
Tuesday, December 20, 2016
Friday, December 16, 2016
Tuesday, December 6, 2016
Friday, December 2, 2016
Remington R51 First Impression
Or, An Infidel and an Odyssey Part 8
About a month ago, The Lovely Bride first expressed an odd desire. She had a craving for a Glock 42. Odd because she already has a Glock 43.
From that time on, every time we'd go to Gooseburg or our favorite LGS she'd have to stop and admire the Glock 42s in the display cases.
As usual, my more sensible inclinations were overwhelmed by a confluence of events. Christmas was just around the corner, I had just paid off the Gander card and I really wanted The Elfen Niece to have a respectable, functional carry gun.
When it happens in three's you might as well just surrender so, one night, while TLB was watching her dad (Alzheimer's) at his place on the river, TEN and I stole away to Goosburg to scope out what was there. I figured I was already in for the G42 so we might as well see if there was anything she liked.
I specifically wanted to try the R51 because I had heard their slides were easier to rack than most similarly sized 9mms and also that they attenuated the recoil better than most 9mms their size. Its based on a Pederson design instead of a Browning (PBUH) design but I'm a big tent kind of guy so I wasn't scared. Besides, I run into more than a few women and elderly folks who can't rack the slide on a traditional 9mm and more than you'd think who feel like the 9mm kicks them too much so I wanted to have some hands on experience with one that I could along to my next class.
We took a number and didn't have to wait long before a middle aged salesman came over to help. We checked out the R51 first. The slide was easy for me to rack
and TEN confirmed that it was easy for her too. My next concern was that the grip would be too big for her but it wasn't. It just looks bigger (back to front) than it really is because the gun has a grip safety that extends the full length of the backstrap. With that depressed, her finger fell right on the trigger. She really liked the idea of a grip safety instead of a switch that she'd have to remember to flip while drawing the gun in a life or death situation too.
I mentioned to the salesman that I was aware of the the problems with the initial run of R51s and that I thought that they'd probably have gotten it all ironed out with the reissue and he said something about Model 700 triggers and that left me wondering. He remarked that he had never had the gun out of the display.
We looked at a S&W but it wasn't as easy to rack and didn't have the grip safety .
Springfield XDs have grip safeties but she didn't like anything else about the guns so on we rolled. A Kimber Bel Air was just too gaudy and she doesn't want to carry cocked and locked. We looked at five to seven promising candidates and the salesman suggested we go to Beckwith's to shoot a few to see what we liked.
On the way back home, TEN offered her opinions of each gun that we had tried and said that she liked three things about the R51 and no more than one thing each about any of the others. Ease of slide-racking, grip safety and the way it fit her hand were all checked off in the R51 column.
Over dinner, she found several recent reviews of the R51 via google that said the problems were solved and it was definitely worth a look-see. I had to buy the G42 anyway so we got back in the car and headed back to Gooseburg.
We waited for the same salesman so he could get his whopping 1% commission and asked him to serve up one R51 and one G42. He was happy to do so and it wasn't long before I had passed the background check and we were leaving the store. Somewhere in the midst of that process, Johnny Bravo-Salesdude from our previous attempt to compare guns meandered down to our end of the counter to try to catch TEN's eye. Her indifference was stunning and he slithered away after three or four tries. Back home, I hid the G42 in the reloading room to wait for Christmas and TEN put the R51 on the desk in her bedroom.
On Thanksgiving, Gooseburg had a sale on Remington 9mm that left it about six bucks a box after a rebate so TLB and I went down and bought four boxes of 9mm. I also suggested we get a box of .380 since we were probably running a little low on that. She has a Sig P230 so she didn't suspect a thing.
The next day, we wound up at Rural King where they had little triangular gun cases on sale for about $2.50 and we bought two of those. TLB assumed the second one was for my Khar and I didn't tell her any different.
We had plenty of factory ammo and getting home early yesterday finally left some time before dark to test drive the R51 so TEN and I headed to my buddy's place on the river.
After letting the neighbor know that we'd be shooting a little and convincing his chickens that we hadn't brought them any food, we moved the little shooting table into position. TEN didn't want a full magazine in case it was uncomfortable to shoot so she just loaded five rounds.
TEN doesn't have a lot of experience with semi-automatics because she really likes the H&R .32 Magnum and mostly shoots that but she took to the R51 like a fish to water. Before I knew it she had the magazine locked in place and a round in the chamber. She fired her five shots and, when the slide locked back, she put the gun on the table to load some more.
What she did next almost made me tear up with pride. In one fluid motion, she inserted the magazine and dropped the slide by releasing the slide release. I mean she did it so fast I'm really wondering if she's been practicing when I'm not around. She fired a few more and pronounced it utterly and irredeemably awesome.
She insisted that I had to fire it so I loaded up a magazine and gave it a whirl. It definitely delivers a different, more comfortable recoil than TLB's G43, SCCY 9mm or even her S&W 6906. Its there but it isn't sharp. The R51 is very comfortable to shoot. All the way home TEN was texting her friends and raving about the R51. She was absolutely beaming and insisted that she would obsess about it for days.
Our little test run wasn't a grueling torture test. All total we only put 26 rounds through it but the little gun delivered in spades on the ease of manipulation and reduced felt recoil.
Finances dictate that I leave the 2,000 round torture test to someone like Ms. Keel but the first impression is that we have held pure awesomeness in our hands.
About a month ago, The Lovely Bride first expressed an odd desire. She had a craving for a Glock 42. Odd because she already has a Glock 43.
From that time on, every time we'd go to Gooseburg or our favorite LGS she'd have to stop and admire the Glock 42s in the display cases.
As usual, my more sensible inclinations were overwhelmed by a confluence of events. Christmas was just around the corner, I had just paid off the Gander card and I really wanted The Elfen Niece to have a respectable, functional carry gun.
When it happens in three's you might as well just surrender so, one night, while TLB was watching her dad (Alzheimer's) at his place on the river, TEN and I stole away to Goosburg to scope out what was there. I figured I was already in for the G42 so we might as well see if there was anything she liked.
I specifically wanted to try the R51 because I had heard their slides were easier to rack than most similarly sized 9mms and also that they attenuated the recoil better than most 9mms their size. Its based on a Pederson design instead of a Browning (PBUH) design but I'm a big tent kind of guy so I wasn't scared. Besides, I run into more than a few women and elderly folks who can't rack the slide on a traditional 9mm and more than you'd think who feel like the 9mm kicks them too much so I wanted to have some hands on experience with one that I could along to my next class.
We took a number and didn't have to wait long before a middle aged salesman came over to help. We checked out the R51 first. The slide was easy for me to rack
and TEN confirmed that it was easy for her too. My next concern was that the grip would be too big for her but it wasn't. It just looks bigger (back to front) than it really is because the gun has a grip safety that extends the full length of the backstrap. With that depressed, her finger fell right on the trigger. She really liked the idea of a grip safety instead of a switch that she'd have to remember to flip while drawing the gun in a life or death situation too.
I mentioned to the salesman that I was aware of the the problems with the initial run of R51s and that I thought that they'd probably have gotten it all ironed out with the reissue and he said something about Model 700 triggers and that left me wondering. He remarked that he had never had the gun out of the display.
We looked at a S&W but it wasn't as easy to rack and didn't have the grip safety .
Springfield XDs have grip safeties but she didn't like anything else about the guns so on we rolled. A Kimber Bel Air was just too gaudy and she doesn't want to carry cocked and locked. We looked at five to seven promising candidates and the salesman suggested we go to Beckwith's to shoot a few to see what we liked.
On the way back home, TEN offered her opinions of each gun that we had tried and said that she liked three things about the R51 and no more than one thing each about any of the others. Ease of slide-racking, grip safety and the way it fit her hand were all checked off in the R51 column.
Over dinner, she found several recent reviews of the R51 via google that said the problems were solved and it was definitely worth a look-see. I had to buy the G42 anyway so we got back in the car and headed back to Gooseburg.
We waited for the same salesman so he could get his whopping 1% commission and asked him to serve up one R51 and one G42. He was happy to do so and it wasn't long before I had passed the background check and we were leaving the store. Somewhere in the midst of that process, Johnny Bravo-Salesdude from our previous attempt to compare guns meandered down to our end of the counter to try to catch TEN's eye. Her indifference was stunning and he slithered away after three or four tries. Back home, I hid the G42 in the reloading room to wait for Christmas and TEN put the R51 on the desk in her bedroom.
On Thanksgiving, Gooseburg had a sale on Remington 9mm that left it about six bucks a box after a rebate so TLB and I went down and bought four boxes of 9mm. I also suggested we get a box of .380 since we were probably running a little low on that. She has a Sig P230 so she didn't suspect a thing.
The next day, we wound up at Rural King where they had little triangular gun cases on sale for about $2.50 and we bought two of those. TLB assumed the second one was for my Khar and I didn't tell her any different.
We had plenty of factory ammo and getting home early yesterday finally left some time before dark to test drive the R51 so TEN and I headed to my buddy's place on the river.
After letting the neighbor know that we'd be shooting a little and convincing his chickens that we hadn't brought them any food, we moved the little shooting table into position. TEN didn't want a full magazine in case it was uncomfortable to shoot so she just loaded five rounds.
TEN doesn't have a lot of experience with semi-automatics because she really likes the H&R .32 Magnum and mostly shoots that but she took to the R51 like a fish to water. Before I knew it she had the magazine locked in place and a round in the chamber. She fired her five shots and, when the slide locked back, she put the gun on the table to load some more.
What she did next almost made me tear up with pride. In one fluid motion, she inserted the magazine and dropped the slide by releasing the slide release. I mean she did it so fast I'm really wondering if she's been practicing when I'm not around. She fired a few more and pronounced it utterly and irredeemably awesome.
She insisted that I had to fire it so I loaded up a magazine and gave it a whirl. It definitely delivers a different, more comfortable recoil than TLB's G43, SCCY 9mm or even her S&W 6906. Its there but it isn't sharp. The R51 is very comfortable to shoot. All the way home TEN was texting her friends and raving about the R51. She was absolutely beaming and insisted that she would obsess about it for days.
Our little test run wasn't a grueling torture test. All total we only put 26 rounds through it but the little gun delivered in spades on the ease of manipulation and reduced felt recoil.
Finances dictate that I leave the 2,000 round torture test to someone like Ms. Keel but the first impression is that we have held pure awesomeness in our hands.
Thursday, December 1, 2016
OOPS!
Sorry Brigid. The book sounded interesting and I planned to buy a copy but it just slipped my mind.
They say that Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings won the Pulitzer for The Yearling because, after she was "discovered" for writing The Yearling, they realized she should have won it for South Moon Under a few years before.
I bumped you up to five just now.
Haven't gotten my niece to read The Book Of Barkley. She doesn't want to read it because he dies. I told her that the dog dies in all dog books. That's why people write them. I'll let her read Small Town Roads when I'm done with it. I suspect she will like it. She more or less raised herself and I think that a dose of your perspective might help balance all the negative influences that she's had over the years too.
Hope you have a Merry Christmas despite the slow start on the new book!
They say that Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings won the Pulitzer for The Yearling because, after she was "discovered" for writing The Yearling, they realized she should have won it for South Moon Under a few years before.
I bumped you up to five just now.
Haven't gotten my niece to read The Book Of Barkley. She doesn't want to read it because he dies. I told her that the dog dies in all dog books. That's why people write them. I'll let her read Small Town Roads when I'm done with it. I suspect she will like it. She more or less raised herself and I think that a dose of your perspective might help balance all the negative influences that she's had over the years too.
Hope you have a Merry Christmas despite the slow start on the new book!
Sunday, November 27, 2016
An Infidel and an Odyssey Part Seven
After the great pig hunt, other family members decided they wanted to go shooting so the next day we wound up at the Hernando Sportsman's Club.
The Elfen Niece's mother ("TENm") wanted to try out different guns so we brought a modest assortment. As usual, she liked the SCCY 9mm just fine until she fired the Glock 43. The ergonomics on the Glock are so much better that she didn't like the SCCY any more. We'll never get to sell that gun if The Lovely Bride doesn't learn to stop letting people shoot her Glock after they've shot the SCCY. It just don't work when you do that.
Airweight S&Ws were beyond TENm's recoil threshold and we quickly ran out of the guns that we had brought so we really needed to get her to a place with a bigger selection. To add insult to injury, she had set up next to some douche bag that kept offering her unsolicited advice and opinions as he kept trying to hit on her.
The Lovely Bride (sister to the Elfen Niece's mother) saw me coming to a boil and got between me and the douche bag to politely explain what his opinions were worth to us. She's good like that. I'm sure she's kept me from being thrown out of more than one range due to insufferable jerks. Ranges, grocery stores, Wal Marts...
So we left.
The next day we wound up at Gooseburg looking at various options. Because of our experience with Aunt Clickity, TENm was seriously interested in a Ruger LCR. She tried one and couldn't open the clinder latch. I was sure she must be pushing the button the Smith and Wesson direction so I tried it and I couldn't open it either. The danged thing left a dent in my thumb. Scratch the LCRs.
Our salesdude was an unkempt guy in his late 20s with a scraggley beard and as soon as he saw TEN he went into Johnny Bravo mode.. He'd take a gun that we wanted to see out of the display case and comment on the weight of the trigger and how it just didn't suit his refined taste. The reset would be too far forward for competition and bla bla bla. I reminded him that we had told him we were looking for a carry gun and that a heavy trigger and a longer reset wouldn't be bad for what we just told him we wanted so he shifted tactics.
TENm wanted to rack the slides of various automatics. He'd take an automatic out of the case, drop the magazine, rack the slide three or four times, put the magazine back in and hand it to her. She'd pull the slide back and it would lock. Before she could react, Mr. big, strong man would come to the rescue, take the gun back while accidentally brushing her hand, drop the magazine, rack the slide a few times, put the magazine back in and hand it to her. She'd lock the slide back and he'd do it all over again. At the third time, I told her to drop the magazine. She did and finally got to do what we came there to do.
Everywhere we went we were running into Douche Bags. Thankfully, salesdude never tried any of that directly on TEN. I really didn't want to get banned from going back to Gooseburg. As it was, TENm got tired of it and we left Gooseburg without finishing her test drive. A pattern was emerging.
Somewhere along the way, I had stumbled into a class to get Certified as an NRA Basic Pistol Instructor. About the time that all this was going on, I mentioned that to an old friend and she told me that her whole family wanted to get their carry permits and they'd wait until I got my Certification so they could take the course from me. The class itself is a whole 'nother Infidel episode but the friend's family specifically told me that I should offer a ladies only class because they didn't want to have to take the class with a bunch of guys acting like know-it-alls and hitting on them.
This friend ain't no Feminazi so her family's comments really said a lot. Coupled with the recent experiences at Brooksville and at Gooseburg, they were really telling. I added a section to my lesson plan on tips for women buying guns. TEN is going to be my assistant when I give the next class. She won't just be selling vowels either. She knows a lot more than you'd expect and she ain't shy where safety is concerned.
The Elfen Niece's mother ("TENm") wanted to try out different guns so we brought a modest assortment. As usual, she liked the SCCY 9mm just fine until she fired the Glock 43. The ergonomics on the Glock are so much better that she didn't like the SCCY any more. We'll never get to sell that gun if The Lovely Bride doesn't learn to stop letting people shoot her Glock after they've shot the SCCY. It just don't work when you do that.
Airweight S&Ws were beyond TENm's recoil threshold and we quickly ran out of the guns that we had brought so we really needed to get her to a place with a bigger selection. To add insult to injury, she had set up next to some douche bag that kept offering her unsolicited advice and opinions as he kept trying to hit on her.
The Lovely Bride (sister to the Elfen Niece's mother) saw me coming to a boil and got between me and the douche bag to politely explain what his opinions were worth to us. She's good like that. I'm sure she's kept me from being thrown out of more than one range due to insufferable jerks. Ranges, grocery stores, Wal Marts...
So we left.
The next day we wound up at Gooseburg looking at various options. Because of our experience with Aunt Clickity, TENm was seriously interested in a Ruger LCR. She tried one and couldn't open the clinder latch. I was sure she must be pushing the button the Smith and Wesson direction so I tried it and I couldn't open it either. The danged thing left a dent in my thumb. Scratch the LCRs.
Our salesdude was an unkempt guy in his late 20s with a scraggley beard and as soon as he saw TEN he went into Johnny Bravo mode.. He'd take a gun that we wanted to see out of the display case and comment on the weight of the trigger and how it just didn't suit his refined taste. The reset would be too far forward for competition and bla bla bla. I reminded him that we had told him we were looking for a carry gun and that a heavy trigger and a longer reset wouldn't be bad for what we just told him we wanted so he shifted tactics.
TENm wanted to rack the slides of various automatics. He'd take an automatic out of the case, drop the magazine, rack the slide three or four times, put the magazine back in and hand it to her. She'd pull the slide back and it would lock. Before she could react, Mr. big, strong man would come to the rescue, take the gun back while accidentally brushing her hand, drop the magazine, rack the slide a few times, put the magazine back in and hand it to her. She'd lock the slide back and he'd do it all over again. At the third time, I told her to drop the magazine. She did and finally got to do what we came there to do.
Everywhere we went we were running into Douche Bags. Thankfully, salesdude never tried any of that directly on TEN. I really didn't want to get banned from going back to Gooseburg. As it was, TENm got tired of it and we left Gooseburg without finishing her test drive. A pattern was emerging.
Somewhere along the way, I had stumbled into a class to get Certified as an NRA Basic Pistol Instructor. About the time that all this was going on, I mentioned that to an old friend and she told me that her whole family wanted to get their carry permits and they'd wait until I got my Certification so they could take the course from me. The class itself is a whole 'nother Infidel episode but the friend's family specifically told me that I should offer a ladies only class because they didn't want to have to take the class with a bunch of guys acting like know-it-alls and hitting on them.
This friend ain't no Feminazi so her family's comments really said a lot. Coupled with the recent experiences at Brooksville and at Gooseburg, they were really telling. I added a section to my lesson plan on tips for women buying guns. TEN is going to be my assistant when I give the next class. She won't just be selling vowels either. She knows a lot more than you'd expect and she ain't shy where safety is concerned.
Sunday, November 13, 2016
TARD
Do You Know Someone Suffering From Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder (TARD)? Know the Signs, Spot the Symptoms, Save a Life
Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is a pattern of pathologically dissociative and psychotic behavior, first observed in the late hours of November 8th 2016, and increasing in severity with passing time. Sufferers of Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder often exhibit pronounced cognitive dissonance, sudden bouts of rage, uncontrollable crying, suicidal ideation, and extreme butthurt.
Signs and Symptoms:
People with Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder are characterized by a persistent unwillingness to accept that Donald Trump is going to Make America Great Again. Individual sufferers often display signs of paranoia and delusion; in acute cases psychotic episodes have been observed. Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is different from being upset about the results of the 2016 presidential election; People with TARD are unwilling or unable to accept reality, despite irrefutable evidence.
According to the DSM-V, individuals with TARD exhibit most or all of the following symptoms:
Telling others they are moving to Canada
Fixated on fantasies about the Electoral College
Protesting an election no credible source contests the outcome of
Exclamations that “Someone” should do “Something”
Sudden weight gain
Acute change in demeanor from pompous and arrogant to fearful and combative
Claim that anyone who disagrees with them is some combination of Racist, Sexist, Bigoted, Homophobic, and Actually Hitler
Causes and Mechanisms:
Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder was directly caused by the election of Donald Trump as President of the United States of America. For many, both in America and worldwide, this was a shocking and unexpected outcome; their preferred news sources having failed to inform them that the alternative candidate was a criminal parasite in such ill health she got chucked into the back of a van like a kidnap victim.
Research is ongoing, but TARD appears to correlate closely with the following environmental and behavioral factors:
Membership in the Democratic party
Identifying as a Feminist
Currently enrolled in college, and/or
Possession of a Liberal Arts college degree
Cuckoldry
Living in a densely populated metropolitan area
Massive student debt
Spotty or non-existent work history
Hipsterism
Diagnosis:
Diagnosis of Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is straightforward. Ask the patient if Donald Trump is going to be the Next President of the United States of America. Some patients will become agitated, and may attempt to deflect. It’s critical you press them on the issue, even if they start babbling about ‘muh triggers’. A sufferer of TARD will begin to ramble incoherently, often displaying three or more of the symptoms within a short period of time.
Co- morbidity:
A diagnosis of Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is highly comorbid with Paraphilic Infantilism, Emotional Eating, Bush Derangement Syndrome, and adult bed wetting.
Treatment:
The only known effective treatment is exposure therapy. The patient must be repeatedly exposed to reality, and should wear a Make America Great Again hat as long as they are able to tolerate it. Each exposure should increase in length, after a week the patient should be encouraged to be seen in public wearing the MAGA hat. Coach the patient to refer to Donald Trump as President-Elect Trump.
Patients with TARD are very resistant to treatment, and dangerous in large groups. Any possibility of treatment requires that they be separated from their hive-mind support apparatus; they cannot begin the process of accepting reality in the presence of encouragement towards delusion and irrationality. Separation may require the assistance of law enforcement.
If you have a friend or loved one suffering from TARD, urge them to seek treatment. Together we can beat this scourge, and Make America Great Again!
Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is a pattern of pathologically dissociate and psychotic behavior, first observed in the late hours of November 8th 2016, and increasing in severity with passing time. Sufferers of Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder often exhibit pronounced cognitive dissonance, sudden bouts of rage, uncontrollable crying, suicidal ideation, and extreme butthurt.
From a comment on a friend's Facebook Page
Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is a pattern of pathologically dissociative and psychotic behavior, first observed in the late hours of November 8th 2016, and increasing in severity with passing time. Sufferers of Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder often exhibit pronounced cognitive dissonance, sudden bouts of rage, uncontrollable crying, suicidal ideation, and extreme butthurt.
Signs and Symptoms:
People with Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder are characterized by a persistent unwillingness to accept that Donald Trump is going to Make America Great Again. Individual sufferers often display signs of paranoia and delusion; in acute cases psychotic episodes have been observed. Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is different from being upset about the results of the 2016 presidential election; People with TARD are unwilling or unable to accept reality, despite irrefutable evidence.
According to the DSM-V, individuals with TARD exhibit most or all of the following symptoms:
Telling others they are moving to Canada
Fixated on fantasies about the Electoral College
Protesting an election no credible source contests the outcome of
Exclamations that “Someone” should do “Something”
Sudden weight gain
Acute change in demeanor from pompous and arrogant to fearful and combative
Claim that anyone who disagrees with them is some combination of Racist, Sexist, Bigoted, Homophobic, and Actually Hitler
Causes and Mechanisms:
Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder was directly caused by the election of Donald Trump as President of the United States of America. For many, both in America and worldwide, this was a shocking and unexpected outcome; their preferred news sources having failed to inform them that the alternative candidate was a criminal parasite in such ill health she got chucked into the back of a van like a kidnap victim.
Research is ongoing, but TARD appears to correlate closely with the following environmental and behavioral factors:
Membership in the Democratic party
Identifying as a Feminist
Currently enrolled in college, and/or
Possession of a Liberal Arts college degree
Cuckoldry
Living in a densely populated metropolitan area
Massive student debt
Spotty or non-existent work history
Hipsterism
Diagnosis:
Diagnosis of Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is straightforward. Ask the patient if Donald Trump is going to be the Next President of the United States of America. Some patients will become agitated, and may attempt to deflect. It’s critical you press them on the issue, even if they start babbling about ‘muh triggers’. A sufferer of TARD will begin to ramble incoherently, often displaying three or more of the symptoms within a short period of time.
Co- morbidity:
A diagnosis of Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is highly comorbid with Paraphilic Infantilism, Emotional Eating, Bush Derangement Syndrome, and adult bed wetting.
Treatment:
The only known effective treatment is exposure therapy. The patient must be repeatedly exposed to reality, and should wear a Make America Great Again hat as long as they are able to tolerate it. Each exposure should increase in length, after a week the patient should be encouraged to be seen in public wearing the MAGA hat. Coach the patient to refer to Donald Trump as President-Elect Trump.
Patients with TARD are very resistant to treatment, and dangerous in large groups. Any possibility of treatment requires that they be separated from their hive-mind support apparatus; they cannot begin the process of accepting reality in the presence of encouragement towards delusion and irrationality. Separation may require the assistance of law enforcement.
If you have a friend or loved one suffering from TARD, urge them to seek treatment. Together we can beat this scourge, and Make America Great Again!
Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder is a pattern of pathologically dissociate and psychotic behavior, first observed in the late hours of November 8th 2016, and increasing in severity with passing time. Sufferers of Trump Acceptance Resistance Disorder often exhibit pronounced cognitive dissonance, sudden bouts of rage, uncontrollable crying, suicidal ideation, and extreme butthurt.
From a comment on a friend's Facebook Page
Thursday, November 10, 2016
Too Funny
I have a second cousin that's dyed in the wool democrat. I mean she and her ex-husband used to have parties to celebrate the anniversaries of Nixon's resignation. I have actually given thought to posting and deconstructing the memes she posts on Assbook here because they are so illogical and based on lies. I just didn't have the time because there were (and still are) so many of them.
That being said, she posted this and I thought it was just too funny not to put here. I bet she doesn't get that his speech patterns are indicative of a very quick mind.
If you've been to a Trump rally or watched one on the confuser, you know this really is how he talks and its Great!
I can't wait to hear him say it.
Sunday, November 6, 2016
Thursday, October 20, 2016
Wednesday, October 5, 2016
Saturday, September 10, 2016
Saturday Studebaker
1937 Studebaker Coupe Express.
Packard built the Rolls Royce Merlin engines used in the Mustang and Studebaker merged with Packard in the 1950s so they are kind of step-brothers.
A graphic representation of the Studebaker merger with Packard. Looks like the Packard was an Amberlamps.
Friday, September 9, 2016
Just Damn
Way back in the Pleistocene Era, when I was maybe 5 years old, we had just moved into the house that my parents built and were busy learning abut all the new neighbors. Behind us lived a middle aged woman and her husband, the Janitor at our elementary school.
Their grandchildren came to visit one day and there were a couple of kids my age, a girl about my sister's age and a toddler in diapers. I remember wondering how anyone could be smaller than my sister but here she was.
The lady divorced her husband and her grandkids' parents also split up so we didn't see them again for years until the lady and her 4th husband moved into a retirement community and rented the house to her son. As part of the deal, the toddler got to stay in a little apartment on the back of the house. Of course, by then, she was a beautiful seventeen year old girl. This picture posted by Irish a while back bears an amazing resemblance to her back then.
The resemblance is so striking that I almost wrote a comment to his post. She even had a crochet bikini (a red one) and a benefits package every bit as impressive as the girl in the picture.
We became friends and it could have gotten serious (she frequently told me she had a crush on me - wink, wink) but she was always fighting with her various boyfriends. I mean yelling and throwing things at them. I wasn't about to get into something like that so I kept my distance.
Eventually she got married and went her own way and I never heard from her again.
So yesterday I am about to go inspect a house owned by a guy whose last name is the same as her first name. Its a distinctive, fairly unusual name (its a place name out of the Bible, not anything like "Shaquandra") and I got to wondering how she might be getting along after all these years.
Goolge produced an old obituary for her father and listed her, with a new last name, as one of the survivors. Cool! I Googled her with the new last name and got a bunch of hits.
The first one was a mug shot. Ok, so she married a loser and whacked him with a frying pan or something. Can't see how that would be out of character so I clicked on the link and up came a mug shot of what looked like a crack addict. I could not even tell whether it was her.
There were about forty other mug shots and arrest records in three counties so I picked one of the same person from 2009 and, yes, it was her.
Some of the arrests were for shoplifting, one for parole violation and giving a false name to an LEO but most were for possession and distribution of meth.
I still can't believe that the beautiful, sweet, teenage girl that had the crush on me all those years ago turned out that way.
Why in the hell do people try that stuff?
Their grandchildren came to visit one day and there were a couple of kids my age, a girl about my sister's age and a toddler in diapers. I remember wondering how anyone could be smaller than my sister but here she was.
The lady divorced her husband and her grandkids' parents also split up so we didn't see them again for years until the lady and her 4th husband moved into a retirement community and rented the house to her son. As part of the deal, the toddler got to stay in a little apartment on the back of the house. Of course, by then, she was a beautiful seventeen year old girl. This picture posted by Irish a while back bears an amazing resemblance to her back then.
The resemblance is so striking that I almost wrote a comment to his post. She even had a crochet bikini (a red one) and a benefits package every bit as impressive as the girl in the picture.
We became friends and it could have gotten serious (she frequently told me she had a crush on me - wink, wink) but she was always fighting with her various boyfriends. I mean yelling and throwing things at them. I wasn't about to get into something like that so I kept my distance.
Eventually she got married and went her own way and I never heard from her again.
So yesterday I am about to go inspect a house owned by a guy whose last name is the same as her first name. Its a distinctive, fairly unusual name (its a place name out of the Bible, not anything like "Shaquandra") and I got to wondering how she might be getting along after all these years.
Goolge produced an old obituary for her father and listed her, with a new last name, as one of the survivors. Cool! I Googled her with the new last name and got a bunch of hits.
The first one was a mug shot. Ok, so she married a loser and whacked him with a frying pan or something. Can't see how that would be out of character so I clicked on the link and up came a mug shot of what looked like a crack addict. I could not even tell whether it was her.
There were about forty other mug shots and arrest records in three counties so I picked one of the same person from 2009 and, yes, it was her.
Some of the arrests were for shoplifting, one for parole violation and giving a false name to an LEO but most were for possession and distribution of meth.
I still can't believe that the beautiful, sweet, teenage girl that had the crush on me all those years ago turned out that way.
Why in the hell do people try that stuff?
Thursday, September 1, 2016
Saturday, August 27, 2016
An Infidel and an Odyssey Part 6
A buddy at work told me about a guided hog hunt where you pay $100 to shoot a meat hog and they skin it, quarter it and put it in your cooler. It sounded too good to be true but it planted a seed.
I thought about doing a pig hunt as sort of the next step in The Elfen Niece's journey into becoming a shooter and it seemed like a way to maximize the odds of her having a successful first hunt so I made the call.
Turned out to be $150 but the rest of the story was true so I set it up while TEN was off at spring break. I ordered two boxes of 240 grain Nosler soft nose bullets to load for the Ruger 44 Carbine. I selected that rifle for her because it is the old model and looks so much like her 10-22 that I thought it would give her one less thing to learn.
I talked to a buddy who had a son that been skunked a couple of times hunting on their property and they wanted to go too so we set up a party of four. Two shooters and two watchers.
Setting up my CH press and my Lyman powder measure, I eyeballed the drum and set it for what looked like it would throw close to 23 grains of Winchester 296. I threw the first charge and it weighed 23 grains. Well, the first one is sometimes a little off from what its going to throw so I threw another and it was 23 grains. I threw another and it was 23 grains. Holy smoke. I set the measure by eye and hit it right on the nose. I won't live long enough to so that again but it sure looked like a good omen.
TEN came waltzing though the door about supper time (that's dinner time if you are a yankee) and asked what I was doing. I explained that I was loading 44 Magnum ammo because I was going on a guided pig hunt the next weekend. She said "I could do that" and I told her that was good because she was going and she was going to shoot the pig. She was all in.
I loaded up some dummy rounds so she could practice loading the rifle. The first time she picked the rifle up she gave a huge smile and exclaimed "this is awesome!" We did dry fire practice from the kitchen table. I explained that she needed to hold it tighter to her shoulder than she did her 10-22 and why.
We got it dialed in at the range. It will shoot minute of pig out past 100 yards. We were good to go.
The appointed day arrived and The Lovely Bride managed to get The Elfen Niece out of bed a good 5 minutes before we were supposed to leave. She usually doesn't get up for anything until 10 minutes after so that was a good sign.
We drove to a little crossroads community and met up with my buddy and his #1 son. The guy in charge of the hunt showed up a few minutes later and led us to an old farmhouse on the edge of some woods.
We had a little meeting where the hunt boss impressed upon us the dangers of getting out of the stands or doing pretty much anything besides exactly what he told us to do. Mostly he impressed upon us the fact that he was in charge. Marshal Dillon would seem bashful by comparison. When I told him what each shooter was shooting, he took TEN aside for a little lecture. I was talking to the others and didn't pay attention to what he was telling her but later that morning I wished I had.
Walking to the stands, the hunt boss insisted on carrying TEN's rifle. He told me that he wanted first dibbs on buying it if I ever sold it. I said that it was was TEN's rifle, not mine and that we had no reason to want o sell it.
"SHHHHHHHHH! The hogs will hear you. They're all around us right now."
Whatever.
We get to our stand and the hunt boss sends us both up to the top and then he hands us our rifles. We sit back and we are looking at a feeder that isn't twenty feet away. I guess that's about all you can expect out of a $150 guided hog hunt. They guide you to the feeder so you can assassinate a pig while its having breakfast like its someone with the goods on Hillary.
We get our Thermacell cooking, put our electronic hearing protection on and start to load our rifles when
Grunt
Oh crap.
"What was that?"
"Hogs."
Grunt Grunt
And two dozen pigs swarmed the feeder.
"Which one do I shoot?"
They were all black except one that was white with black spots. Saying "shoot the black one" wouldn't tell her which one and would just result in the rest of them looting and burning their woods down so I told her to shoot the white one with the spots. She nudged her rife into position and her pig saw the movement. While I was waiting for the shot, it stared at her for a few seconds and took off. All the other pigs followed.
Well Crap. What did Archibald Rutledge say about being ready the moment you get to your stand?
Well Crap. What did Archibald Rutledge say about being ready the moment you get to your stand?
So the hunt is over and we are under orders to not get out of the stand until the hunt boss comes to get us. I asked why she hesitated to shoot and she told me that the hunt boss told her that she had to shoot the pig in the side behind the shoulder because her bullet would bounce off its head. The pig was looking straight at her so she never had a broadside shot. Thanks hunt boss. The pig weren't that big.
We sat there whispering as if there was any use. We heard the feeder come on behind us. We watched a hawk in the next tree. We heard our feeder come on. We watched spiders and squirrels and birds. We listened to cows in the next pasture and TEN was fascinated by all these sights and sounds that she had never heard before. Mostly we waited for the hunt boss to come give us permission to get out of the stand.
He finally arrived about 8:30 and we told him our story. He asked if we wanted to hunt them up with his dog, Magnum. Of course we did.
Magnum is really still just a puppy and is in training to be a cattle dog but he got on the trail. We followed and pretty soon saw the whole herd moving through the palmettos about a hundred yards off to our right. We heard the dog behind us, saw him jump and a palmetto thicket exploded as a big spotted boar tore through it not thirty feet away. The boar ran to join the herd and TEN and my buddy's son were entranced. Marlin Perkins would have been proud.
NOW we're hunting.
The dog kept the herd moving and the day was getting warmer. There were only two watering holes in the area and the herd kept going from one to the other trying to get a drink but little old Magnum kept them moving. The hunt boss kept Magnum cooled off and hydrated so he could keep the herd moving. After about 30 minutes of that, he called Magnum in and had my buddy and his son set up at one of the watering holes.
Sure enough, it wasn't ten minutes before the herd came to them and they had their pig.
Our turn was next. I was carrying a Savage Model 99 in 303 Savage (big surprise there) and TEN had her 44. I don't know why but the hunt boss told me to leave my rifle in the truck. It was his hunt so I did.
We set up by the watering hole and waited. TEN was propped up against the base of a pine tree listening and I was about two trees in back of her shooting pictures on my cell phone. Pretty soon the herd came up from behind us on our left. They milled around in the brush for a few minutes and then quietly went back the way they had come.
(OK. So that's the stuffed pig at the Bass Pro in Orlando. Its for illustrative purposes. If the History Channel can show footage of German Mk IVs while talking about Tiger Tanks I can use somebody else's dead pig).
I'm too deaf to hear it but they circled around behind us and came up from our right. Before I could get my phone camera set to video, they had spread out around the watering hole.
TEN picked out a nice eatin-sized pig and fired. The pig jumped, spun around several times and then took off after the herd with a gait that looked like it needed new spark plug wires. I yelled to shoot it again and TEN said the gun wouldn't shoot.
I didn't have my rifle because the hunt boss told me to leave it in the truck so the pig got away.
Sure enough, the 44 had misfed from the magazine and it took five minutes to get the thing cleared and reloaded.
TEN made the comment that the gun hadn't kicked nearly as bad as she expected. That was odd so I asked what she meant and she explained that her little talk with the hunt boss consisted of him telling her that the 44 Magnum Carbine would kick so hard that the scope would split her forehead open and she'd have to get stitches. That was right before he told me that he wanted me to sell it to him.
Sabotage.
Only the plan backfired. She hit the pig anyway.
The hunt boss was late for an appointment and kept insisting that we show him where the pig was when she shot it and where the blood was. He wasn't convinced she'd hit it. She kept insisting that she had hit it and we had to find it. We found the spot soon enough. She had definitely connected with some part of that pig. There was blood on the ground and it was red. Hunt boss decided that she'd shot it in the butt because butt-shot hogs spin around in circles. I didn't think so because it wasn't running like its back end was hurt. It was more of a stuttering trot. Either way, we had to find it.
After a cursory search, the hunt boss left us in the hands of the assistant hunt boss. He cleaned my buddy's pig and then called a friend to come help hunt down the wounded one.
We split up to search the woods again. The assistant hunt boss said to shoot the last pig in the herd because that's where the wounded one would be. We were a couple of hundred yards away when he found the herd. Trouble was, there were three pigs hanging back, not just one. Then he noticed that one was limping and he shot that pig.
We moved toward the sound of the shot and found everyone examining the pig. Before I got up to it I asked to see where the first bullet had hit.
It was the off-side front foot.
She was so rattled by the hunt boss telling her she'd get her forehead split open by that incredibly powerful 44 Magnum carbine that the he wanted me to sell him that she flinched and shot it in the foot at all of twenty yards away.
She has never fired a gun without me being there and I have never seen her flinch, even with that rifle, but she flinched that day and the only reason was she was told she would get hurt and need stitches when she pulled the trigger. I was actually proud of her for shooting with that stupid story planted in her mind. She was going to do this stitches or not and she did.
The assistant hunt boss cleaned our pig and put it in the cooler. I paid him a little extra because he was so helpful.
This is fresh meat:
So far we have had pig steaks and pig sausage gravy biscuits. It will go down in history as the most expensive pig I ever bought but over lunch TEN told me the she was sorry that the hunt boss got upset but that it really worked out better because we actually got to hunt instead of just shooting a pig at a feeder. Worked out pretty well.
I took the 44 to the range the next day and fired 30 rounds trying to make it miss or jam and it did neither. I think the jam might be due to the scare job the hunt boss put on her too. If you can limp-wrist a Glock maybe you can limp shoulder a rifle. I don't know. I just know I can't make it jam.
This week she informed me that we need to find someone who will let us hunt deer on their land.
This is what its all about.
I made that call today. The food plot is going in next weekend. She will be shooting a custom Mark X Mauser in 25-06 with a muzzle brake on it. With Accubombs its as accurate as a drill press and kicks about like a 22 Hornet.
The venison might as well just throw itself in the pan right now.
He finally arrived about 8:30 and we told him our story. He asked if we wanted to hunt them up with his dog, Magnum. Of course we did.
Magnum is really still just a puppy and is in training to be a cattle dog but he got on the trail. We followed and pretty soon saw the whole herd moving through the palmettos about a hundred yards off to our right. We heard the dog behind us, saw him jump and a palmetto thicket exploded as a big spotted boar tore through it not thirty feet away. The boar ran to join the herd and TEN and my buddy's son were entranced. Marlin Perkins would have been proud.
NOW we're hunting.
The dog kept the herd moving and the day was getting warmer. There were only two watering holes in the area and the herd kept going from one to the other trying to get a drink but little old Magnum kept them moving. The hunt boss kept Magnum cooled off and hydrated so he could keep the herd moving. After about 30 minutes of that, he called Magnum in and had my buddy and his son set up at one of the watering holes.
Sure enough, it wasn't ten minutes before the herd came to them and they had their pig.
Our turn was next. I was carrying a Savage Model 99 in 303 Savage (big surprise there) and TEN had her 44. I don't know why but the hunt boss told me to leave my rifle in the truck. It was his hunt so I did.
We set up by the watering hole and waited. TEN was propped up against the base of a pine tree listening and I was about two trees in back of her shooting pictures on my cell phone. Pretty soon the herd came up from behind us on our left. They milled around in the brush for a few minutes and then quietly went back the way they had come.
I'm too deaf to hear it but they circled around behind us and came up from our right. Before I could get my phone camera set to video, they had spread out around the watering hole.
TEN picked out a nice eatin-sized pig and fired. The pig jumped, spun around several times and then took off after the herd with a gait that looked like it needed new spark plug wires. I yelled to shoot it again and TEN said the gun wouldn't shoot.
I didn't have my rifle because the hunt boss told me to leave it in the truck so the pig got away.
Sure enough, the 44 had misfed from the magazine and it took five minutes to get the thing cleared and reloaded.
TEN made the comment that the gun hadn't kicked nearly as bad as she expected. That was odd so I asked what she meant and she explained that her little talk with the hunt boss consisted of him telling her that the 44 Magnum Carbine would kick so hard that the scope would split her forehead open and she'd have to get stitches. That was right before he told me that he wanted me to sell it to him.
Sabotage.
Only the plan backfired. She hit the pig anyway.
The hunt boss was late for an appointment and kept insisting that we show him where the pig was when she shot it and where the blood was. He wasn't convinced she'd hit it. She kept insisting that she had hit it and we had to find it. We found the spot soon enough. She had definitely connected with some part of that pig. There was blood on the ground and it was red. Hunt boss decided that she'd shot it in the butt because butt-shot hogs spin around in circles. I didn't think so because it wasn't running like its back end was hurt. It was more of a stuttering trot. Either way, we had to find it.
After a cursory search, the hunt boss left us in the hands of the assistant hunt boss. He cleaned my buddy's pig and then called a friend to come help hunt down the wounded one.
We split up to search the woods again. The assistant hunt boss said to shoot the last pig in the herd because that's where the wounded one would be. We were a couple of hundred yards away when he found the herd. Trouble was, there were three pigs hanging back, not just one. Then he noticed that one was limping and he shot that pig.
We moved toward the sound of the shot and found everyone examining the pig. Before I got up to it I asked to see where the first bullet had hit.
It was the off-side front foot.
She was so rattled by the hunt boss telling her she'd get her forehead split open by that incredibly powerful 44 Magnum carbine that the he wanted me to sell him that she flinched and shot it in the foot at all of twenty yards away.
She has never fired a gun without me being there and I have never seen her flinch, even with that rifle, but she flinched that day and the only reason was she was told she would get hurt and need stitches when she pulled the trigger. I was actually proud of her for shooting with that stupid story planted in her mind. She was going to do this stitches or not and she did.
The assistant hunt boss cleaned our pig and put it in the cooler. I paid him a little extra because he was so helpful.
This is fresh meat:
So far we have had pig steaks and pig sausage gravy biscuits. It will go down in history as the most expensive pig I ever bought but over lunch TEN told me the she was sorry that the hunt boss got upset but that it really worked out better because we actually got to hunt instead of just shooting a pig at a feeder. Worked out pretty well.
I took the 44 to the range the next day and fired 30 rounds trying to make it miss or jam and it did neither. I think the jam might be due to the scare job the hunt boss put on her too. If you can limp-wrist a Glock maybe you can limp shoulder a rifle. I don't know. I just know I can't make it jam.
This week she informed me that we need to find someone who will let us hunt deer on their land.
This is what its all about.
I made that call today. The food plot is going in next weekend. She will be shooting a custom Mark X Mauser in 25-06 with a muzzle brake on it. With Accubombs its as accurate as a drill press and kicks about like a 22 Hornet.
The venison might as well just throw itself in the pan right now.
Sunday, August 21, 2016
Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Saturday, July 16, 2016
An Infidel and an Odyssey Part 5
After helping get a few batches of new shooters going, it seemed like I wound up being the group's designated range safety guy every time we went shooting. I got to thinking about that and decided to take the NRA Range Safety Officer course.
Everybody on the road knows everything there is to know about driving safely. I know they do because they will tell you so right after they run into the back of your car at a stop light. My thinking was something along the lines of "what if I'm really as stupid as half the drivers on the road and I'm teaching these people wrong.?" I didn't think I was but I thought it couldn't hurt to take the class just in case. Since Aunt Clickity, The Elfen Niece and the rest of the bunch were looking to me for instruction, it just seemed that I owed it to them to be officially recognized as having a clue.
The good people at Harry Beckwith's had the RSO class on their schedule so that's where I went. It was a small group - maybe ten or so students. Only two of us were guys.
The class was good. I can't say that I learned anything new about safely handling firearms but I did learn a lot about range operating procedures.
We always have a little range safety briefing before we shoot and the class says you should do that so that made me feel good. The class covered it in a lot more detail than I have ever done so that's an area where I definitely learned something.
The biggest thing that I learned was more of an attitude than a technique. I came away from the class with a much stronger focus on safety. Its not just, "Oh, I always keep the muzzle pointed in a safe direction." Now its "I AM keeping the muzzle pointed in a safe direction and I know it because I am focused on keeping it pointed in a safe direction." Some people would say "Its all just common sense" and there may be some truth to that but its also about being aware and USING that "common sense." The using it part is where most people mess up.
The one thing that seemed odd about the class was that it was so different from the internet. They said we were supposed to make sure everyone was safe and that we should try to help make shooting fun. There wasn't a single page in the manual about policing the internet, making believe you are so stupid that you see a picture of a girl with a gun and think the picture was posted to demonstrate gun safety or even making believe you are too stupid to understand sarcasm. Seriously. I say it was odd but it was odd in a really nice way.
You can despise the NRA if you want but I'd recommend the RSO class to any shooter.
In order to avoid always having to RSO for the group and never getting to do any shooting of my own, I joined the local range a few weeks after taking the class. I'm not doing any RSO-ing there but, once I get some hands-on experience, I would work that into my schedule if they need me.
The local range has a mandatory safety briefing for all new members and it was kind of a combination of the NRA Basic Pistol and the NRA Range Safety Officer courses. I had to sit through six hours of that "briefing" and then demonstrate that I had paid attention and that I can hit the target before they would give me my membership card. I didn't mind. I can go shooting by myself and actually get to shoot now.
After the briefing, I was able to sight in The Elfen Niece's Ruger 44 Carbine for part 6 or 7 of this little saga. (If Archibald Rutledge can call a girl "Elfen" without it being weird, I can too).
She is a shooter and is becoming a hunter (ress?).
This odyssey keeps getting better and better.
And before anybody goes off on ol' Barn, how do you know the muzzle isn't pointed down range? Maybe he just turned to his right and is keeping the muzzle pointed in a safe direction.
Sunday, June 12, 2016
Was it One Week Ago...
or was it two weeks ago that I was reading about Isis calling for terrorist attacks in the USA right about now?
Saturday, June 11, 2016
Friday, June 10, 2016
As Wirecutter Would Say...
Gotta Be California:
A successful rancher died and left everything to his devoted wife.
She was a very good-looking woman and determined to keep the ranch, but knew very little about ranching, so she decided to place an ad in the newspaper for a ranch hand...
Two cowboys applied for the job. One was gay and the other a drunk.
She thought long and hard about it, and when no one
else applied she decided to hire the gay guy, figuring it would be safer to have him around the house than the drunk.
He proved to be a hard worker who put in long hours
every day and knew a lot about ranching..
For weeks, the two of them worked, and the ranch was
doing very well.
Then one day, the rancher's widow said to the hired hand, "You have done a really good job, and the ranch looks great.
You should go into town and kick up your heels." The
hired hand readily agreed and went into town one Saturday night.
One o'clock came, however, and he didn't return.
Two o'clock and no hired hand.
Finally he returned around two-thirty, and upon entering the room, he found the rancher's widow sitting by the fireplace with a glass of wine, waiting for him.
She quietly called him over to her..
"Unbutton my blouse and take it off," she said.
Trembling, he did as she directed. "Now take off my boots."
He did as she asked, ever so slowly.. "Now take off my socks."
He removed each gently and placed them neatly by her boots.
"Now take off my skirt."
He slowly unbuttoned it, constantly watching her eyes in the fire light.
"Now take off my bra.." Again, with trembling hands, he did as he was told and dropped it to the floor.
Then she looked at him and said
"If you ever wear my clothes into town again, you're fired."
(P.S. - I didn't see it coming, either )
Sunday, June 5, 2016
Sunday, May 22, 2016
Sentimental Old Softie
Back when I was tinkering with the .30 Carbine, I stumbled onto a place called KeepShooting.com.. They have a mix of surplus and new stuff, their prices seem good, shipping is cheap and the quality of the M1 Carbine magazines that I ordered was top notch.
They send an email full of their specials every few days and I've been sorely tempted on a few occasions but I guess its been a while since I actually ordered anything because their most recent email said that they've missed me.
That is so sweet. The last person that said they missed me is certifiably insane so, other than my dog, a GSP so also certifiably insane, nobody that I want missing me has missed me in a long time.
It was touching.
Even more touching was the discount code for 20% off my next order. So I shopped a little.
The Lovely Bride's ancestry goes back to Yugoslavia but I don't think we need a Yugoslavian Army mess kit.
Don't need an Italian Army wine bottle or a set of Romanian military pajamas either but I finally stumbled onto their Glock accessories.
They had magazines for the Glock 21/41 and the 43 for $24.95. Either runs about $49.95 at the local Gooseburg. Maybe ten bucks less at the LGS.
So I bought a big one for me and a little one for TLB. With the discount code, I have a few pennies over $22 in each magazine including the $4.00 shipping. (Not $14.00. Four Dollars total shipping). They are actual Glock magazines too.
Sweet.
Now I'm trying to figure out what use I might someday have for a driver's periscope from a Leopard 2. For $29.95 I think I'll be able to find one.
They send an email full of their specials every few days and I've been sorely tempted on a few occasions but I guess its been a while since I actually ordered anything because their most recent email said that they've missed me.
That is so sweet. The last person that said they missed me is certifiably insane so, other than my dog, a GSP so also certifiably insane, nobody that I want missing me has missed me in a long time.
It was touching.
Even more touching was the discount code for 20% off my next order. So I shopped a little.
The Lovely Bride's ancestry goes back to Yugoslavia but I don't think we need a Yugoslavian Army mess kit.
Don't need an Italian Army wine bottle or a set of Romanian military pajamas either but I finally stumbled onto their Glock accessories.
They had magazines for the Glock 21/41 and the 43 for $24.95. Either runs about $49.95 at the local Gooseburg. Maybe ten bucks less at the LGS.
So I bought a big one for me and a little one for TLB. With the discount code, I have a few pennies over $22 in each magazine including the $4.00 shipping. (Not $14.00. Four Dollars total shipping). They are actual Glock magazines too.
Sweet.
Now I'm trying to figure out what use I might someday have for a driver's periscope from a Leopard 2. For $29.95 I think I'll be able to find one.
Tuesday, May 17, 2016
An Infidel and an Odyssey Part 4
After Aunt Clickity got her passing grade in the permit class by proving to the instructor that she is capable of using her gun without hurting anybody she doesn't intend to hurt, I stuck around to sight in a hog rifle. In the ensuing conversation, the instructor mentioned that he did classes off the schedule for groups of ten or more. A seed was planted.
When I got home, The Lovely Bride agreed that we probably had enough friends, family, family of friends and friends of family to cobble together at least ten intrepid souls to form a class.
TLB's day off is Monday and, when she got to work Tuesday Morning, the groundwork was already in place. Aunt Clickity had spent all day Monday proselytizing for the cause of concealed carry and several people wanted to get in on the next class.
I sent a few assbook messages and the first two netted us three students. This was gonna be easy! Aunt Clickity had four lined up. Our niece was on board as was a brother in law and we had two more probables depending on whether my coworker would get around to asking one of his friends.
If everything went right we had our Ten and it just took 2 days.
Then the brother in law dropped out.
Then two of Aunt Clickity's didn't have the money. Then the other two weren't sure because one was eighteen and was intimidated.
Suddenly I'm herding cats.
Then the instructor called. I was afraid that he was going to ask me about the head count. Nope. He called to tell me that someone else had called him to get in on the class. I had given the lady one of his cards a couple of weeks before and she wanted in.
Over the course of the next week we had all but three back in the corral. The brother in law was out and two of Aunt Clickity's still didn't have the money. Communicating through Aunt Clickity, through TLB, through me to the instructor, they wanted to know if he took credit cards. He did but had never used the swipey gizmo that he had so he wasn't really interested in trying it out just yet. Sarcastically, I suggested that they might try paypal. After doing so, I thought it wouldn't hurt to ask the instructor if he did take it and danged if he doesn't!
By that time, another week had passed and TLB was at work when she heard someone whispering "Hallelujah" over and over again behind her. She turned around and there was Aunt Clickity whispering "Hallelujah, Hallelujah, Halleujah" over and over again, making little silent clapping motions with her hands.
"What?"
"Hallelujah"
"What?"
"Oh Hallelujah!"
"Oh Hallelujah WHAT?"
"They have Paypal."
"HALLELUJAH!!"
Her other two friends had already paid by Paypal. That made eleven.
The appointed day arrived and the class went great. One person even brought her husband so we had twelve.
We had no lesbians this time but the diversity police would have still been pleased because we had a mixed race couple and TLB's friend from work came with her daughter and they are African American. I know it dissapoints liberals to no end but we just ain't as good at being bigots as they are at calling us bigots.
The indoor part went smoothly. The best questions came from the 18 year old.
Once we hit the firing line, we split the pack into groups of five. The instructor took the left and his
Sister in law had her husband's 9mm and had trouble loading the magazine. The whole push down and then slide in thing wasn't happening for her. We did get her five rounds loaded and she hit blue paper when the instructor gave permission to fire one round.
The Adjectiveless Niece (I'm tempted to call her something like "The Elfen Niece" but I'm not sure that doesn't carry a connotation that I don't want to imply - the class was in Ft. McCoy but I don't live there) was next to her. Both took their blue paper assailants out of the gene pool.
The next group included the 18 year old and her Mother. Since the Mother was TLB's friend from work, they were assigned to me. The girl borrowed the .32 H&R from TAN (TEN?) and loved it.
The little gun has a bull barrel and a round butt. Its easy to hold and its easy to hold steady. We were shooting .32 S&W Longs with cast lead bullets and my own home made bullet lube.
Back during the heady days of Bill Clinton Presidency, Buckshot and I did some experimenting along the lines of "where would we get ___________ if it were suddenly banned?" Among the ensuing projects, we cooked up our own bullet lube from unconventional ingredients. This stuff had a good proportion of commode flange ring in it. It works well enough as a bullet lube in the .32 and it makes a tiny puff of smoke when its fired. Kids and new shooters love it. They can see that they've shot something.
The 18 year old went through the drill and gradually got her shots pretty well centered. All the while she kept telling me "I can't believe I can do this!" When her group was finished, she asked if she could keep a spent casing as a souvenir.
Whoo-Hoo. That's what its all about!
The last group was just two folks. My Buddy Ray and his girlfriend. Her Mother had died a few days before but she had said she would attend and she kept her word. Both shot well. I believe Ray did better than anyone.
The class adjourned to the local Bubba Ques for lunch. Appropriately, this particular Bubba Ques has sulfur in its water.
In the aftermath, I sold the Hapgood shotgun to a friend for a wall hanger, TLB joined The Well-Armed Woman and TAN learned how to cast her own bullets for the .32. Seriously, my 19 year old niece that hadn't touched a gun until 18 months ago is casting her own bullets for the .32.
I don't know how it could have gone better.