Shifting Attitudes

Does this mean that the bitter-clingers are now the hoplophobe gun banner types, now, since self defense is now mainstream and people contradicting that notion are the ones behind the curve?

Tam Stole

Tam stole the Xmas gift idea I had for my nephews and nieces.  Well, the older ones.  I intend to give the blighters a small lil pocket knife (one that has a decent chance of not giving folks the vapors), a small lil flashlight, and a matchsafe for basic survival 'dump em in the jacket pocket or glove compartment' kit.  All can be clipped together.

What else should go along with such a basic set up?  Things like paracord, a spork, a cup, a water bottle, and a poncho.  Maybe a crowbar.  You know, for the zombies.

Gun Shop Employees

Me:  "I want to buy a new carbine on the market made by JR Carbines."

Emplyees:  "What do you want me to do about it."

Me:  "Ok..." Looks around and Ted, the owner, isn't in.

Not the first time I've had this kind of conversation.  Left out of the conversation because of the abrupt end:  "...  and I'm willing to put a deposit down on it, and I'm gonna need gunsmith services on it, and on services to fit a new threaded barrel in my 1911, and I'm gonna need advice on which of these fine suppressors you have in this display case that will fit on both and work the best."  So that's a $700 gun, a $700 suppressor, and work for the gunsmith over there munching on a whopper and bs'ing with another employee, both of whom also too distracted to help me right then. 

Why don't gunstores like to sell people stuff and provide a service that they essentially have a monopoly on?  Oh, right, that 'monopoly' word.  Well, this isn't the only gunstore in Maryland that can sell me a suppressor.  I know they'd rather sell me an item they have in stock right then, but still.  Money is money.  I thought everyone liked money.  That's why they call it "money."

Tomorrowland

HT: RobertaX

What wonders our future holds.

What are you, a girl?!

I thought I was onto some blogfodder.  A workgroup I associate with at my office has a dozen people.  3 of them are women.  I found out one has a Beretta 92, the other has a Mossberg 930, and was checking with the 3rd.  If she had possessed a firearm (she would have no qualms over her personal ownership, likes the Sig P238, but her roommate is anti-gun, so...) that would make 100% of the females, but less than 50% of the males.  Then the initial reaction is the rib the males over, "Sheesh, the WOMEN have guns but YOU can't, fellas?  Whaswrongwitchu?"

But that is ALL wrong, and I am ashamed to admit this first impulse.  Owning or desiring to possess, or carrying, or knowing how to use a firearm is a not exclusivity manly trait.  It's not a demonstration of masculinity. 

That sort of thinking leads to the weiner jokes that gun-banner love to deploy.  It's simpleton thinking.  And I need to alter my thought process.

Firearms are an equalizer tool that facilitate effective individual defense for most anyone.  Self Defense is a human right, not relegated to a specific gender.  When I am advocating for shooter's rights I should never hinge it on any masculinity argument.

Excessive Hoarding

Shame on you Holder

Oh my goodness the transcript from Representative Hoy I saw at the bottom of this article is satisfying.

I should add, Rep. Hoy is a fictional character.  Sadly.

"Hundreds are dead as a direct result of actions undertaken by your subordinates and you wish to shame Congress?

Mr. Attorney General, if you had any integrity. If you had any honor, you would fire those most responsible for this travesty and then resign yourself.

The only person in this committee room who should be feeling shame is you and what you allowed—either by design or by neglect—to happen in Operation Fast and Furious."

Satisfying, and the sentiment is dead on correct.

Place Holder Title, gone all wrong!

[sorry about the title, but lets just go with it]

You know, I have pined for a single stack .40 for a CCW.  Something smaller than a 1911 Commander (hence the .40) but  used like the Sig P229.  It's the vaporware in my head.  The closest thing to it is a Kahr K40 


But if trends continue and the pocket 9s become pocket 40s, giving me a plethora of choices, I better check myself before plunking down the plastic.  I need to try the pistol first.  Lightweight pistols are not my preference, for shooting-comfort reasons.  If the pocket 40s come, most all will be polymer guns.  I bet they'll hurt.  Kick like mules.  I don't even like the Bersa .380!  All metal guns, I am sweet on them.  I need to find a rental case with the Kahr in it to test.



Another reason to stick to the tried and true and surprisingly slim and concealable Commander.

My Alma Mater

Virginia Tech.  Another shooter, now.

"VaTech is on lockdown," wrote one poster on Twitter. "Hoping we don't have repeat of the past. What part of no guns at school is apparently hard to get."

Sigh.  What part of "criminals and crazies don't follow the rules" is so hard for YOU to get.  Also:  Now you know where my horrible grammar and sentence structure comes from. 

I hope the people shot aren't seriously injured and the shooter is brought to justice.

"Police says the suspect is carrying a pistol or a 'long gun.'"

Well that narrows it down....

[2PM update:  Reports that the police officer shot was killed.  Well damn.  I was hoping for no fatalities.  Thoughts and prayers for the officer and his/her family.]

[2:14:  Now 2 are reported dead.]

[5:40 Looks like a murder suicide, now, and all over.]

The Further Adventures...

Of The Beard.

So, the week waiting period is up today and yesterday he asked if I had a trigger lock for his M&P .45.  Yeah, in Maryland you are not supposed to leave the store unless you have an approved trigger lock.  Or if the gun has an onboard locking system, like what for that little zit on the newer S&W revolvers that RUINED THEM.

I have lots of locks.  I bet there is a long cable lock that comes with the M&P.  NONE of them will work for him because my state requires a chamber lock.  And I didn't get one with my .45s.

For those in free-er states than Maryland (or Cali) what it is is a little cartridge size doohickey in the same caliber as your pistol.  You chamber it.  Then you stick a wrench down the muzzle and it expands the part, locking it in the chamber.  They can even grab hold of the extractor, making it impossible to pull back the slide.  VERY safe, if by safe you mean, "make the pistol near impossible to function."  No one is going to take a pair of bolt cutters and get that bad boy out.  Or even swap barrels.  

The lock is only required on new guns.  Springfield 1911s have that little key to turn that locks the mainspring down in the mainspring housing and you can swap out with a standard ping or new mainspring housing assembly.  Some auto's have a keyway on the slide somewhere.  Well, the police don't trust those locks and won't have them on their guns, so the M&P has no lock, hence the quandry for The Beard today.  He'll end up having to buy one from the gun shop.

I have a lock I used to get my P229 .40 home.  Someone forgot to sell me one on the Colt Commander.  That's happened for some people, the gunshop says "Don't forget to bring your State approved locking mechanism when you pick this up in 8 days!" then forget to check it when you come back.  

The only reason to keep a lock like this is if you have kids and never intend to use the pistol to defend your house and have no safe to secure the pistol in.  A really angry DA might prosecute you if your 6 year old manages to crack your safe and shoots off your gun in some tragedy because you didn't have the lock in place anywhere that wasn't inside a shooting range.  Sorta defeats the purpose of a home defense weapon.  Even Gunny Ermey uses a pistol safe with a Glock that sounds like he stores is at Condition 3

Glowball Warmening

You know, you can do the same thing with Catastrophic Anthropogenic Greenhouse Warmening

1)  Conclude we need to institute worldwide socialism with us smart politician calling the shots...
2)  Hunt around for a dire reason to institute it...  I know!  Enviromental apocalypse!  The sheep will eat that up.  They LOVE fuzzy-cute macro-fauna.  We'll say global warming or an ice age or the ozone hole.  Pick one.  They all require top down economic direction.

I have a feeling that is not the sentiment the cartoonist wanted me to come away with...

Pearl Harbor Day, at 70

My crotchety neighbor, Archie, got to Pearl Harbor for the first time in early 1945.  There were still cleaning up after the 1941 attack, then.  Remember the price of complacency.

When he got to Leyte, months after the battle, he went up on deck (his station was below the waterline) and asked why there were all those trees growing up out of the ocean.  It wasn't trees he saw.  It was ship's mast from sunken vessels.

His ship went to Bikini Atoll for a scientific test called Crossroads in 1946, with the Demon Core, but he managed to finagle his way out of making that trip, avoiding health worries from that later in life.

Map

You know there is a lot local to that new range at the Peacemaker Training Center of interest to a gunnie with a taste for history.

At A the range, B is the Antietam Civil War battlefield, and at C  is Harper's Ferry with it's armory.  All about half an hour drive through scenic roads.  The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal is along the Maryland side of the river and a splendid area for hiking and camping.  I hiked the entire length of it, over time, as a Boy Scout.  North to South, of course, as that is downhill.

Camp Corpse Crawler

A reader from Oregon gave me the heads usp to this place.  Zombie Survival Camp.  You know, for the Kids!  Won't anyone think of the children?  Children are our future!  Teach them well and let them lead the way.  Show them all the beauty zombies possess inside.  Their heads.  When you crack open the undead noggin like a walnut. 

 

Kids are also useful spotters for us older farts.  Their eyes are generally better.  Kids will be great for daytime perimeter watches, just give em a varmint rifle and bribe them with a bounty per zed.

 

Would that the rest of the nation take after the Pacific Northwest in this critical emergency preparation training.

 

Blogshoot

Let's get the preliminaries out of the way  Attending the event at the Peacemaker Range was our host Lagniappe, OldNFO, MBtGE, and Tempestuous Sea.  Plus some new bloggers I hadn't met before.  AnotherDayAnother and Proud Hillbilly.  Plus some frequent Commenters like A, and Stretch and Bubblehead Les.

Great fun was had by all.

There was discussion on what to call this.  First annual Mid-Atlantic Blogshoot?  Great Eastern Panhandle Shoot? 

First off, this range is brand new.  Opened in September.  And it had the best view of any range I'd ever been to.  West Virginian hollers and ridgelines and open sky.  I'm used to dense wooded areas or the back end of the County Dump when I shoot long guns.  So that was pretty nice.  The point of this place is to make a goto training facility where 3 gun competitions can be held.  It has a fully electronicified (it's a perfectly cromulent word.... electronicified) 1000 yard range.  You shoot, and a camera connected to the internet is looking at your target and displays your results.  So you and the rest of the world can see that 10 ring shot you just made.

The long range is restricted to members at this point.  $500 initially, $400 to renew.

And it's only an hour and a half from MBtGE's house.

Their intention is to host as many training evolution there as possible.  

Open to us, and the public is a pistol range pit, a shotgun area for skeet, and a rifle area.  The primary berm is 100 yards out with decent concrete and shaded shooting benches.  But they also have a 250 yard berm and are planning a 400 yard berm. So, finally a place to do relatively serious rifle work available to the DC area general public.

At the 250 berm there was a steel gong target and this was the only item to shoot at.  It was the big hit of the party.

OldNFO had one of his sniper setups that he let me try.  He had zeroed it for the gong, so when I got my chance the thing was practically set on Easy-Button.  Put the cross hairs on the steel, barely touch his trigger, and wait for the the sound of the 'ding' to get back to your ears.  It was 100%.

Then the fun began.  My M1A with iron sights rings the bell more often than not, but it's a well set up and made rifle.  MBtGE was shooting 100% with THAT.  My first shot hit the support post, low, so I adjusted my point of aim from the 'chest' to the 'neck' on the plate and started hitting.

MBtGE had his Beretta CX4 storm that shoots .40 cal pistol ammo.  After using OldNFO's spotting scope to help MBtGE walk in a shot to learn the point of aim on his EOTech optic, he gave me a try.  I dinged it on my second attempt after a simple point of aim adjustment was called.  MBtGE later was using his 10/22 to ring the gong with iffy ammo.  The immediate feedback of a steel plate was one of the most satisfying shooting experiences I have had, ever.  I was just pleased my M1A was set up where I wanted it and the proof was in the gong-y pudding.

Effective range for a pistol caliber carbine is now 250 yards, too.  Sweet.

Also had fun trying out the new Ruger mags in my 10/22, but this was more a function test of those mags than marksmanship.  They worked great, and my shooting wasn't that bad, either.  Bubblehead Les was good to his word to trade me a M1 Carbine type sling to attach to it, too.  Thanks Les!  I have it adjusted for length to be a hasty sling, now.  

At the pistol area, I shot Proud Hillbilly's FN1922 (serendipity from Tam's post) and her airweight j-frame.  That FN has odd grips, narrow in the front-to-back orientation.  My trigger finger has to curl way back toward me to get to the bang switch.  Euro types must have teeny hands 90 years ago.  And the super lightweight revolver was a handful even with regular .38 special.  I like getting the chance every now and then to shoot these lightweights as it reinforces my decision to get the all steel versions.  It's just not a pleasant gun to shoot.  I'd rather it be pleasant to shoot for .0001% of the time than light to carry 99%+ of the time for this type of weapon.  Size, not weight, is my bugaboo. I'm a BIG fan of the j-frames.  And I LOATHE the airweights.

There was Arisaka rifles present that Lagniappe reloads .30-06 down to and he has a Ruger .44 rifle with a integral suppressor that was also a hoot to listen to.

An entirely enjoyable day of shooting.  And JT's (I like the initials...) had really good prime rib sammiches.  Eat there, but don't trust your GPS.  The GPS lead us to a strip joint called Vixens.

Below is a couple of Dirty Bird targets.  My last, as I prefer the sticky and yellow of the Shoot N See.  The left is 50 yards, right is 100 yard.  Looks like I may need another notch or two of windage for the .22.  You can see 2 .308 in there, too.  My .308 may need a notch or two of elevation.  But that's a solo range trip to work on that, not a fun range trip like a blogshoot.  I want to be a little higher on 100 yards.  Ugh, the only trigger worse than my 10/22 is the CX4 carbine.  Still, not too much to complain about for a journeyman effort.

I know the feeling

 The soul of 100 year old manufactured goods.   Nice.

It applies, for me, to light-alloy revolvers too.  Plastic gun can certainly be the bees knees in function, but there is that certain somthing that is missing.

I apply this to other areas of my life.  I LIKE the Singer sewing machine that is treadle powered.  I LIKE the Disston handsaw made 130 years ago and works better than a modern handsaw (double tapered blade, you know).  I LIKE the 1942 typerwriter built like a Sherman tank.

Sure, buying shirts at Target is easier and cheaper, Cutting plywood to width with the Ryobi circular saw is faster and hurts my muscles less, and the computer I am typing on gets to publishing lickety split and the keys 'punch' fast and easy, but there is something about those things that lasts in my marrow.  I don't know why it appeals.  Am I a nostalgic, is that what causes it?  Why am I looking backward?  Why did I choose History when college Engineering Calculus kicked my ass?  I like the way things work, and the stories from the past, I guess.

Of course the same applies to guns.  The Colt Pocket Hammerless is heavier and bigger than an LCP.  Costs USED twice as much, and if they made it new it would cost 4-5 times as much with all that nice machining, I'm betting.  But if they made it to the same standard I'd give up getting a free LCP for a 2011 Colt Pocket Hammerless.  Wouldn't even have to think about it.   $2400, and it's not even custom.

Hey if I'd pay that for a beYOOtiful retro .380 why haven't I bought a custom 1911?  Hmmm, better save my pennies, maybe?  Or am I blowing smoke on the $2400 .380 and would just be happy living in a world where such a thing is still made?  I admit, knowing there is a guy in Japan that makes samurai swords the way his forefathers made 700 years ago, appeals.  And I'm not shopping for swords.

No time to chat

Shooting.

Hopefully I am right now on my way to a WVa blogshoot.  Will report back later...

Yikes

I almost forgot to renew my range membership.  Yeesh, that would have been expensive.  Renewal is much less than an initial membership.

Oh and The Beard, guy at work, put his paper work in for his 2nd gun in his 3 month odyssey of acquisition.  One gun a month, ya know.  He got the Mossberg shottie last month, this time it's the S&W .45, next month the LCP.  So proud...

Just hoping his multi-purchase doesn't alert the bad guys.  It shouldn't.

Oh, Mitt...

 "Romney visits former President George H.W. Bush"

Bless Bush the Elder.  He meant well, was competent, and a patriot, but he was a bit Patrician, que?  Plus, he lost one.

Probably not the way to buffer your chances at winning, Mitt.  You are running second to a series of Not-Mitts because you are not Tea Party-ish and the GOP is right now more Tea Party-ish.  They don't want a seasoned gov't technocrat to fix what's wrong with government.  They want someone that will reduce the impact of government on their lives.  Less reglation, less taxes, less TSA probulating, less Patriot Act snooping.  Less less less.  They don't want to hear about the Federal anything for a while.  And they want to not hear because they don't NEED to hear.  If the big bureaucracy was less damaging they could take their eyes off of it and trust that when they glance back that way there won't be a reason to panic at the out of control mess it made.


You'd win easily if you could capture the, "Elect me cause I know how to get the Feds from sniffing around you and yours and get back to post roads and minting coins.  Elect me because the Tea Party has the right idea and I can implement those principles better than anyone and repair all this damage and turn back the tide of gov't intrusion." 

Now That's What I'm Talking About...

The carbine designed for me.

New ARish patterned .45ACP Carbine that takes 1911 mags.  Only out a month.  It's not perfect, but it may be close enough.  It can even be converted to throw brass to the left for me.  

I'm weak, WEAK I say!