Ahhhh, a day off...

So, it was early in the AM and I was taking in my morning caffeine infusion on the porch, re-reading Helliconia Spring by Brian W. Aldiss (not recommended if it's a little chilly in your favorite reading spot) under leaden, cloudy skies, when a sudden glare of light tore my eyes up from the page. I sat there blinking for a second, then stampeded inside for a camera. Sorry the shot didn't turn out better, but the lighting effect only lasted a moment or two and this was the best shot of the bunch.

Here's this morning's actual View From The Porch:


That's the cool thing about living on the lake here; five or six times a week, Mother Nature does something that makes you want to stick a dollar in her garter belt. :)

Boomsticks: *snicker*

Admit it, you laughed too.

Politics: Casa Tam needed redecorating, anyway...

...so I may as well go shopping at House of Copenhagen.


Where did this urge spring from? Well, to trace it to its roots, it seems a lot of Islamic fundamentalists got all wrapped around the axle about a Danish cartoonist portraying their religion as a pack of bloodthirsty bomb-toting terrorists, and so they naturally reacted to this biased portrayal by, well... threatening to bomb the cartoonist, the newspaper, the country he lived in, the continent he was located on, and anybody who might in any way be remotely connected with that continent.

Oh, and they're not going to buy anything from Denmark, either, so Erik Jørgensen furniture, Havarti cheese, and several yummy pastries are Right Out for the Sons of the Prophet. (Presumably Copenhagen-brand Danish Ham production is unaffected, thank Wotan.)

Sandmonkey is leading the countercharge to take up the slack in the Danish export market and the blogosphere seems to be rallying around the flagpole in a haze of Tuborg and FRÏS fumes.

Oddly enough, despite the rather prominent Pastafarian link on my blog, I have yet to have an Episcopalian turn up on my front porch with his Sansabelt pockets full of grenades. Maybe this is why I tend to take Episcopalians more seriously than I do people who respond to caricature with C4 Underoos.

On that note, I'll leave you with this: A cartoon of Mohammed with a bomb in his 'do.

















(H/T to TFS Magnum, who shoved me down this rabbit hole.)

Boomsticks: The Weekly Check on the Bias...

...is up over at Alphecca.

This week, Jeff brings us a special Chicks With Guns version of the Weekly Check.

Speaking as one, I heartily approve of this part.

No, really, this actually happened...

I was there when Tiff got off the phone after talking to this guy. She had this freshly-tasered look on her face, as if to say "Nobody could really be that dumb. This was a joke, right?"

Boomsticks: The importance of the customer service department at Better Killing, Inc.

Oleg has a great post up on why the free market and civilian availability is a swell thing for gun designs, the same way it is for anything else...


UPDATE: Marko over at the Munchkin Wrangler offers a good riff on Oleg's post here.

Watched Gladiator again last night...

...so here's a totally gratuitous Russell Crowe picture.


That man makes my elbows sweat.


...


Anyhow, where were we? Oh, yeah, the daily writing of the stuff for the blog...

Being a huge history buff, as well as a big fan of Ridley Scott, I've been meaning to grab a DVD copy of the straight-to-video flop Gladiator 2... er, Kingdom of Heaven. There's been a lot of 'net chatter over why this movie was such a box office dog, especially given the fact that it made use of plenty of the same swordfights-in-snowy-northern-forests and skies-full-of-fiery-catapult-projectiles footage that was such a hit for Ridley in Gladiator. Given the overt similarities between the two costume dramas, the second should have been as much of a slam-dunk success as the first, yet it bombed miserably.

I'm going to take a differing view from those who've stated it had something to do with the sociopolitical commentary on the Crusades, and instead suggest that it was due to putting Orlando Bloom in the alpha male lead role. I'm sure Orlando's a swell guy and all, and he did a great job as the slightly-androgynous Legolas in LOTR, but after seeing him on the small screen, you want to take him home and feed him milk and cookies. After watching the legate Maximus, on the other hand, you need to disassemble your monitor and wipe off the testosterone that's been smeared all over the inside of the screen. That's the difference between the two films in a nutshell.

Boomsticks: Another Trojan horse...

Wadcutter would like to remind you that the "American Hunters & Shooters Association" Trojan horse is hollow, and full of gun-banning weenies.

The Postal Service is an equal opportunity employer...

...of nutjobs, apparently.

In a twist on the usual script, the disgruntled ex-postal employee who showed up at work and aired out some grievances (and some former co-workers) was a woman. Odd, as we usually prefer to assassinate someone's character, rather than the actual someone, but California is a thoroughly modern state, after all. When reading the story, I had my predictable, visceral first reaction of "Why didn't somebody just shoot her?" followed by my equally predictable second reaction of "Oh yeah, it was a Post Office. In California. No guns allowed. Except for psychos."

Anyhow, after getting all empowered, she apparently Did The Right Thing in the end and saved the state the cost of a trial, via a self-inflicted gunshot wound. (Note to potential emulators: If you want to kill yourself, please just nip off into the woods quietly and smoke that gun barrel alone. Don't drag all these other people into the scenario with you, okay? And do it in the woods to save us the inevitable carpet cleaning bills. Thanks.)

There's a poll up at the story on AOL, asking if you've "ever feared a co-worker would commit workplace violence". Despite working someplace where everybody packs heat and there are machine guns hanging on the walls, I had to answer "no" to that one. Maybe I'd have had to answer differently if I was a unionized government employee working in a victim disarmament zone...

Thanks to the magic of SiteMeter...

When I was little, I'd always cheer for the cheetahs on Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom, because I love watching my fellow carnivores at work.

Blog Stuff: I lurve my car CD changer...

Now playing at the Beemer Ampitheater:

Disc 1: Front 242, 00:00:02:42
Disc 2: Robert Plant, Now and Zen
Disc 3: Van Halen, Best Of Volume I
Disc 4: Urge Overkill, Exit the Dragon
Disc 5: New Order, Republic
Disc 6: Moby, I Like To Score


A good mix thus far. It's not hard to find something to help me get my Game Face on on the ride to work, depressurize on the drive home, or provide good driving music on my day off.

Boomsticks: A game of 'Telephone' on the Errornet.

Strategypage.com makes a muzzy post on the current Joint Combat Pistol program, including the claim that it is slated to replace the Beretta M9 for the DoD, and the odd statement that it will need to "have a rail up top".

Enthusiastically riffing off this bad info, respected gun nut Kim du Toit opines that they need to pick the 1911, ignoring the DA/SA requirement in the spec sheet. He even goes on at length about the "rail on top" requirement (which doesn't exist anywhere outside the Strategypage blurb.) Hell In A Handbasket and SayUncle, both stand-up guys and rabid gun enthusiasts, also take the "Replacing the Beretta" ball and run with it.

The pistol will replace the M9, but only for SOCOM. My money is currently with the USP45, whose dimensions, as it has been pointed out, are suspiciously similar to the max dimensions given in the RFP. With the company having spent a wad on a plant in Georgia, only to flush a ton of money down the failed OICW and XM8 programs, they are due to be thrown a bone by the DoD. (Throw in the G11 flop and the less-than-succesful SA-80 revamp, and HK is turning into a lederhosen-wearing version of Colt: A company with a positive gift for bad luck.)

Incidentally, the size of the proposed contract, at 645,000 pistols, should give a good idea of just how really amazingly bloatedly huge SOCOM has grown in the post-Transformation military. Heck, I think our local Cub Scout troop is attached to SOCOM. Kinda takes the "Special" right outta "Special Operations Command".

I hate to be so image-intensive...

...but I just had to do one more. :)

Inspirational Thought for the Day:

Now I'm ready to face The Public. ;)

You, too, can find motivation here.


(Mad Props to GeekWithA.45.)

Blog Stuff: There's a lot of Wally World chatter...

...swirling around on the blogs I visit regularly. Glenn Reynolds' little quip sums up my own feelings perfectly: I'm no big fan, but the squalling of WalMart's foes sounds like advertising to my contrarian heart.

Those wanting the mega-retailer to dry up and blow away might as well wish for a new pony for Christmas while they're at it; there're just some things that a giant retail conglomerate can offer better than any Mom & Pop. Those bemoaning the destruction of Mom & Pop are missing the fact that when Wally World comes to town, it only crushes little businesses foolish enough to try and compete head-to-head with it, when there are plenty of niches that the Blue Collar Nirvana leaves open to exploit, the three main ones being Specialty Items, Snob Customers, and Convenience Addicts.

Wal Mart isn't and can't be everything to everybody. If you need a bottle of Arrogant Bastard Ale, a box of Buffalo Bore .41 Magnum ammunition, or an odd piece of software for your Mac, well, Wal Mart just can't inventory those things. Similarly, if your yearnings run towards a scary-looking Eeevil Black Rifle, or the controversial raunch-rock album with its naughty lyrics intact, well, Wal Mart won't inventory those. Somebody's gotta sell 'em, though.

This kind of intersects with Snob Customers; I know, because I am one. Some people are willing to spend more to get a better degree of service. If there was a grocery store that charged double the usual prices, but had an obsequeious toady following me around the store to fetch items I pointed at off the shelves, I'd be there with bells on. I'll always spend a couple bucks more to avoid being treated like cattle.

Lastly comes convenience; which may sound ironic, but is one of the main reasons you won't see me at Wally World much. It is just too damned inconvenient to navigate the asphalt prairie, dodge pick-'em-ups with "#3" stickers in the back window, schlep across a store the size of Rhode Island, and wait in a hundred-person-long checkout line just to save a dollar on a six-pack of beer, two tee shirts, and some TV dinners. I'd rather be hit between the eyes with a ball peen hammer. Repeatedly.

Blending some elements of all three of these profiles, I'm obviously not the Wal Mart Shopper, and my retail dollars are largely safe with Mom & Pop. But I am in the Super Store a couple of times a year anyway.

Nobody does bulk bags of socks like Wally World.

Boomsticks: That thunder you hear...

...is a very special Carnival of Cordite. Number Forty-Five, to be specific.

Lots of good gun forty-five caliber stuff from all the usual suspects; go check it out!

Blog Stuff: Gladys Kravitz gets wired...

...and she doesn't like your dog.

Boomsticks: The Once and Future Pistol.

In the annals of the sidearm, there are many famous handguns. Maybe four have reached the status of Icon; immediately grasped and understood by anyone with even a modicum of exposure to Pop Culture, whether they grok which end the bullet comes out of or not: The Colt Model 1873 (aka "The Peacemaker"); the German P-08, known popularly as the "Luger"; the Glock, of rap lyric and Tommy Lee Jones one-liner fame; and the M1911 pistol, generically termed "The .45".

For a nonagenarian, this is a gun that sure gets around alot. It's the preferred sidearm of quite a few of the more well-known teams of trigger-pullers and door-kickers. Most action pistol disciplines have special classes for non-1911-pattern guns, to allow for an interesting fight for second place. It's still amazingly popular among both casual target shooters and CCW permit holders, and it completely dominates the centerfire stages of bullseye competition. It's still made by Colt, and currently cloned by: Kimber, SIGarms, Springfield Armory, Rock River Arms, Rock Island, Charles Daly, Dan Wesson, Smith & Wesson, Taurus, Para Ordnance, and more. Entire boutique houses, such as Wilson Combat, Les Baer, Ed Brown, STI, and Nighthawk Custom have sprung up around the business of offering handmade deluxe 1911's. Custom parts makers like Nowlin, Kart, Chip McCormick, and Greider Precision would probably dry up and blow away were it not for incessant demand for parts to improve on, specialize, or personalize this old military sidearm.

One of the most sought-after 1911 models on the market right now is Springfield Armory's Professional model. Originally designed to meet the needs of FBI SWAT and their Hostage Rescue Team, this is a no-BS fighting pistol that emerged on top after a thoroughgoing selection procedure that left many pistols from big-name custom houses sucking wind by the side of the road. The Professionals are hand-built in Springfield's custom shop, which is run under the watchful eye of Dave Williams, and lend their aura to lesser, mass-produced guns like the TRP and Loaded 1911 models that come off of Springfield's Geneseo, IL production line. Springfield may not be getting rich off such labor-intensive guns, but the halo effect cast over the rest of the product line by the Hostage Rescue Team pistol more than makes up for that in publicity alone.

Eschewing such competition-oriented touches as a full-length guide rod (a feature which provides no measurable accuracy benefit, may be a detriment to reliability, and complicates takedown) and forward cocking serrations (useless outside certain range-safety procedures during some types of competition), the Pro instead emphasizes ruggedness and reliability, while still offering match-grade accuracy. As an essentially hand-built gun (although not truly bespoke, since you can have any color you want as long as it's Black-T, and the guns are built to the FBI's specs, not yours,) the Pro is expensive but worth every penny, as one of the fastest-shooting, most accurate, hardest-hitting CCW-able pistols on the market. All-in-all, the Professional Model is very nearly the current pinnacle of evolution for the 1911-pattern fighting pistol.

Now, of course, with an expensive pistol like this, one would never dare risk exposing it to anything so crass as holster wear.


Further, it must be understood that such a tightly-fitted and highly-accurate pistol mustn't be exposed to dirt, lest it impede the gun's functioning (and resale value.)


Remember, too, that this finicky match-grade machine requires careful cleaning after firing, to ensure proper functioning.


Of course, that was all a joke: What really needs to be remembered is that here is a pistol that served American soldiers for seventy years in every hellhole on earth, from the mud of the Meuse-Argonne to the snows of Bastogne; from the dry cold of Chosin to the dank swamps of the Mekong Delta. The Pro is simply a current iteration of those guns; a weapon made of tool steel and now coated with teflon, to boot. This may be why the USMC just placed an emergency order for a bunch of them: What worked then works now, and while we wait for the anti-grav device to come along to obsolete the wheel, we can also limp along with these things until the boys at Sandia perfect the Death Ray. Until that day, this'll make for a pretty fair stand-in.

Sorry...

I would have written something before going to work, but thanks to bryanp I've been reading Queen of Wands, from the beginning, since 6:15 this morning.

Blatant Capitalism: Sometimes my job is like Christmas...

Opening the boxes to see what has shown up off of various back orders is like checking to see what showed up under the tree.

Today, f'rinstance, we finally got in the .45 ACP Springfield XD's we've been expecting, and they're every bit as slim as the hype promised. Groovy.

We also received our long-awaited shipment of 9mm hammers, buffers, and mag blocks from Rock River, along with another whole bunch of stripped lowers.

I need another lower like I need a hole in my head, but they're so cheap that it's hard to resist not having one or two lying around, just waiting to be built...

Boomsticks: Gratuitous Gun Pr0n No. 19

A S&W Model 640 in .38 Special that's been sent off to the Performance Center for the Carry Comp package. The stocks are cocobolo from Ahrend's, and the knife is a Benchmade Terzuolo Park Avenue.

I don't have this one any more, having swapped it for an actual PC640 in a complex three-way trade, but hopefully its new owner finds it useful.

Blog Stuff: Thanks, y'all!

Thanks for the birthday wishes, everybody. It was a good 'un. :)





I started off with a morning trip to the book store that left my wallet a lump of smoldering wreckage, followed by a yummy lunch at The Chop House,

(Waiter: "...and to eat?"

Tam: "The 16-ounce prime rib, please."

Waiter: "How would you like that cooked?"

Tam: "I wouldn't, but if the health board makes you do it anyway, I want to look at that steak and feel confident that a good vet could resuscitate it."

Waiter: "And for your side item?"

Tam: "A loaded baked potato."

Waiter: "Salad dressing?"

Tam: "Skip the salad; I don't want to take up any valuable steak room with stuff that food eats."

Waiter: "Hold off on the bread too, then?"

Tam: "Yeah, I think so."

Waiter: "Probably a good idea, that's a big cut of prime rib.")

...and then home for a nap.

Later in the evening, a good friend came by and took me out to dinner, which made for a nice ending to the day. As birthdays go, t'weren't bad at all. :)

It's Tuesday, and that means it's Bias Time!

Jeff has the usual roundup of inanity, ignorance, and disinformation outright lies about firearms and self-defense law culled from media around the globe. Click here for the Weekly Check on the Bias.


There's some interesting chatter on the Alaskan "Stand Your Ground" law, which apparently includes legal protections for good guys who have to spark a goblin. A little bit of hand-wringing is associated with the immunity from lawsuits portion of the bill, but a tightly-written law should nip that in the bud. Tennessee's own pioneering Good Samaritan law specifically prevents the criminal (if he survives stopping a bullet) or his kinfolk (if he doesn't) from suing the poor schmuck who had to cap him, but only if said goblin was engaged in one or several strictly enumerated activities at the time he got popped. (How many euphemisms for "shot" did I manage to work in there, anyway?)

Also, according to The Independent,

"Record levels of gun crime are being blamed on the fact that more people than ever are carrying firearms as fashion accessories."

which shows that fashion and a sense of style isn't dead in Jolly Olde. Myself, I prefer more utilitarian pieces during the week, but make a point of carrying my polished blue Colt .38 Super for Sunday-Go-To-Meetin'. Gotta dress nice at least one day a week, after all...
...Oh, wait, they're saying that like it's a bad thing, aren't they? Sorry...

Birthday horror...

I was just scanning down the page looking for new comments, when I came across the "Sober Redneck" post, which references Jimmy Carter.

That's when it struck me: The Carter presidency is as far in the past now as the FDR years were when Carter was in office. Yikes.

To put it another way, Pretty Hate Machine is as old now as Led Zeppelin's first album was when I was in high school.

I think I need a lie-down.

Blog Stuff: Happy Birthday to Me!

Twenty-nine again, for the ninth time.

I think I'll play hooky from work. :)

Blog Stuff: Enigmatic Blog Title of the Day.

We know of BlackFive. We know of Food Court Team 6. But then there's...

Tomato7.

Compelling in its eccentricity. What does it mean?

Politics: ...to the shores of Tripoli...

...or Mogadishu, as the case may be.

If the flashing blue lights don't work, a couple of five inch shells across the bow should get 'em to pull over.

Tom Jefferson would be proud; he didn't seem to like pirates very much.

Go Navy! :)

Boomsticks: "Mounted Exercise With The Pistol."

One of the neater items in my collection is an old copy of "FM 23-35, Basic Field Manual, Automatic Pistol Caliber .45 M1911 And M1911A1." Mine was originally the property of one Ensign Dellert, of Naval Construction Battalion No. 104.

The coolest part of the book? That would be Chapter 4: "Marksmanship, Known-Distance Targets, Mounted." Where else is one to learn that 'mounted men should never under any circumstances use both hands on the reins when the pistol is drawn?'

I have so far been unsuccessful in convincing the neighbors to let me make use of the hayburners in their pasture to practice these drills...


(Incidentally, on 2/15/45, Ensign Dellert was given a letter from the skipper of LST 571 authorizing him to own "this Japanese rifle", which is kind of a cool artifact to go with my Type 99 Arisaka. Sadly, his descendents fighting in the current unpleasantness will never be granted a similar letter authorizing possession of trophies from their vanquished foes.)

Blog Stuff: Born To Lose.

Countertop has the first round of polling for the 2006 Gunnies up.

I even got nominated for a category: Best Gun Pr0n.

Now, I'm fairly proud of the gun pictures on my blog. I try hard to eschew the standard, blurry, flash-illuminated 2D stuff normally associated with gun pics on blogs; I work to the best of my limited abilities and tools at composition, lighting, focus and backdrop. Every gun picture on my blog was selected from five to ten shots of the same layout. I even use a camera formerly owned by Oleg Volk.

Unfortunately for my chances, Oleg's up as a nominee in the same category.

Go vote for him; I did. :)

Politics: Lost Liberty is old news.

The "Lost Liberty Hotel" is now officially Old News: It's on AOL's front page.




(I still think it's a swell idea, though. :) )

Boomsticks: I seem to have a one-track mind...

Yet more nattering about .300 Whisper.

(If you're not a terminal ballistics geek, this post will probably be as dull as watching paint dry. I won't feel bad if you skip it, but if you've read this far and are of a masochistic bent and wish to read further, I'll try and supply definitions as I go.)


On further reflection, the 220gr loading should make a pretty fair House Gun round. Here's my reasoning:

1) Sure, the bullet is a weak sister compared to rifle cartridges, but think about it: 220 grains, 1040 feet per second, 500+ foot-pounds of energy. Nobody ever accuses the 10mm Auto or .45 Super of anemia, and these numbers would be right at home with either loading.

2) Those 220 grains are in a .308" bullet. That's a lot of sectional density. (Sectional density is mass relative to cross-section.) Sectional density is what makes for penetration in bad guys.

3) The 220gr projectile is of a long-ogive, VLD (Very Low Drag) configuration. This means that it has a long, pointy nose and a center of mass that is well aft. These are the things that cause a bullet to have an early yaw cycle ("tumble", in layman's terminology) on impact. (Basically, this means that the big, long bullet will, almost immediately on impact, yaw through 180°, shedding energy as it does so, and continue on, base-forward, for quite some distance.)

4) Muzzle blast (both noise and flash) out of a 16" carbine, even unsuppressed, is dramatically less for the Whisper than it is for any of the common 5.56 defense loads. This can be important in an enclosed, darkened room.


Discuss amongst yourselves...

Blog Stuff: Tabula rasa.

I've been waterboarding my muse for the last two hours, but she still won't talk.

It looks like I'll be forced to resort to Sodium Pentathol...

Politics: The horror!

"Sell the chalet, Muffy; that Rice woman is transferring us to Kazakhstan."

It must suck to be dozing in a snug sinecure on one day, and suddenly have to work for a living in some godforsaken corner of the earth on the next.

They can probably even save some money by using unpaid student interns to man posts in places like Brussels and Paris:

"Dear Diary,

Third week here in the City of Lights. The Frogs still think we suck. More later."



(H/T to James J. Na)

Heh. That's cute...

Found this here.


Safe. Semi. SHTF.

Clever. :)

Boomsticks: It's that time again.

"This here's a 44th Carnival of Cordite, the most powerful Carnival on the Web, and it could blow your head clean off..."

Blog Stuff: ...and to bed.

Work comes early in the AM. I have to rise and shine, get some breakfast from the Slow 'n' Surly, and open the Armory up at the usual time.

In the meantime, I leave you with a delightful little blog I stumbled across: Suppose the love child of Erma Bombeck and Sam Kinnison had been raised in the wild by a pack of Dennis Learys; the result would be I am Norman.

I want to be as funny as she is when I grow up. :)

Bikes: Back in a bit.

"Hey! Up there on the porch! You! You don't have to go to work today! It's nice and waaarm ouut!

Hey! It'll be raining tomorrow!

Hey! It's gonna be dark soon!

Hey! I'm getting lonely down here!"




Back in a bit, y'all; my bike is lonely. :)

Boomsticks: My, what big bullets you have, Grandma...

220 grains of Justice!

Yeah, I'm getting pretty spun up about the .300 Whisper upper idea. Does it show?

Blog Stuff: Things you didn't know you didn't want to know...

...about me:

Ten Top Trivia Tips about Tam!

1. Finding Tam on Christmas morning is believed to bring good luck.
2. Ostriches stick their heads in Tam not to hide but to look for water.
3. In Vermont, the ratio of cows to Tam is 10:1.
4. The porpoise is second to Tam as the most intelligent animal on the planet.
5. Tam can eat up to four kilograms of insects in a single night.
6. It takes forty minutes to hard-boil Tam.
7. Tam can be very poisonous if injected intravenously!
8. Baby swans are called Tam.
9. Only fifty-five percent of men wash their hands after using Tam!
10. Lightning strikes Tam over seven times every hour.

I am interested in - do tell me aboutherhimitthem

(H/T to BusyMom.)

Politics: Count Chocula made me do it.

Via SayUncle, we learn that there are still people who think being an ignoramous should be a salaried occupation.

I must have missed where teams of black-clad SWAT goons from Kellog's are forcing Ms. Sherri-with-an-"i" Carlson, at gunpoint, to buy Super Sugar Blasts for her little future cake-eaters.

Look, when someone admits, in a sworn affidavit, that they have absolutely no control over themselves, their children, or their spending habits, don't know how to operate the Off / On / Volume knob on their television set, and can be forced to act against their will by a thirty-second teevee spot featuring a talking cartoon tiger, we shouldn't give them a million dollars; we should throw them in the Soylent Green vats.

Boomsticks: Choosing my religion.

"There is no god but Browning, and Cooper is His Prophet."

Wadcutter notes that some folks can get serious about their choice of sidearms.




WWJMBD? ;)

Blog Stuff: All is still Vanity...

Back in November, I got all excited at my 10,000th hit; wrote a gloating post about it, and everything.

At the risk of looking like a floccinaucinihilipilificatrix, I completely spaced doing the obligatory sack dance over #25k, which happened two days ago. My apologies.

Thanks for reading my yawping, y'all! :)


(Plus, I got to use "floccinaucinihilipilificatrix" in a sentence. Yay, me!)

Books: Quote Of The Day.

Another night of raging insomnia had me re-reading Heinlein's The Number Of The Beast. I'd forgotten this little gem:

"At least once every human should have to run for his life, to teach him that milk does not come from supermarkets, that safety does not come from policemen, that "news" is not something that happens to other people. He might learn how his ancestors lived and that he himself is no different - in the crunch his life depends on his agility, alertness, and personal resourcefulness."

Good stuff...

Politics: Props to Google.

Any time someone tells the .gov to mind its own business, it gives me a warm and squishy feeling inside. It was, therefore, a pretty squishy moment when I read that Google had told the Feds to go piss up a rope.

Anybody with two functioning neurons to rub together knows that strange things gets typed into search engine text boxes all the time. Check your own computer if you have 'auto complete' turned on in your browser; the cascade of bizarre words you've typed into search engines in just the last week or so will probably surprise even you. I mean, who hasn't typed "Osama's Mama" or "Nekkid midgets yelling 'Verboten!'" into the Google box, just to see what turns up? (Really? Just me? Anyway...)

So now some pencil-pusher at the DOJ thinks that Google's search records are a valuable investigative tool for... for... well, something, I guess. Mostly I think that the records'll show that people type weird stuff when they mix Jack Daniels and a keyboard at three in the morning.

Blog Stuff: A seeming contradiction...

Folks who know me in meatspace (ie: outside of my charming 'net persona,) may wonder how come someone who gets so googly-eyed over cute babies can be such a committed misanthrope otherwise. It's simple, really...

When Quinn gets brought to visit Crazy Gun Store Lady, I find his gurgling, yelling of random nonsense, total self-absorption, and uncoordinated lunges for my ponytail to be cute. Because he's eleven months old.

When the same actions are coming from a forty-six year-old accountant at a local watering hole, on the other hand, I find myself having to suppress an atavistic urge to dot him right between the running lights...

I actually enjoy the company of adult human beings, on those very rare occasions when I meet any in this sea-to-shining-sea Romper Room.

Politics: The sober redneck.

P.J. O'Rourke once described Jimmy Carter as that rarest of things: A sober redneck. He then offered the Reagan landslide as proof that America preferred its rednecks drunk, and never wanted to see a sober one again.

Recent evidence calls the "sober" part of the description into question, however...



(H/T to TFS Magnum.)

It has come to our attention...

...that there will soon be even more cute baby pictures on the web. :)

Books: Reeding maykes yoo briter.

An unintended side-effect of reading a whole bunch is that one soon gains, not only an ear for how words should be arranged, but an eye for how they should look. A typographical error or incorrectly spelled word will interrupt the flow of one's eyes across the page in much the same way that a six-inch deep axle-eating pothole will interrupt the flow of one's car down the road.

In this modern day and age, when everybody and their grandmother has access to a keyboard and the urge to share their thoughts with the universe, one gets constant reminders of the sad state of literacy in America. Pundits have been droning for years that the new popularity of (email / the dialup BBS / internet fora / blogs: pick one) is triggering a renaissance in literacy. They'll compare it to the days of the late 19th Century, when the predominance of dime novels, written journals, letters, newspapers, and telegrams pretty much forced folks to be able to read in order to keep themselves amused in a world devoid of recorded music, talking movies, and broadcast speech & pictures.

Said pundits must not have access to an internet connection.

Fifty-eleven times a day I find myself beating my forehead bloody against the keyboard, yelling "Who let these illiterate morons out without adult supervision?"

Mauser*Girl is more eloquent on the same topic.

Blog Stuff: Best Gunblogs.

The 2006 Bloggies rolled around, and despite having categories for Best Food Blog, Best Entertainment Blog, Best Craft Blog, Best Teen Blog, Best Tech Blog, Best Blog Blog, and Best Frog Blog, there was (yet again) no category for Best Gun Blog, what with guns being so terribly politically incorrect and all. (If they're so unpopular, why are they all over the Blogosphere?)

Countertop has single-handedly undertaken the herculean task of correcting this omission with the 2006 Gunnies (and the funniest disclaimer I've read in years.)

Here's your chance to hand out mad props to Jeff for tirelessly tracking the bias, Zendo Deb for her heartwarming tales of bad guys getting their just desserts, Xavier for his gun safety education efforts, Gullyborg for ringmastering the Carnival of Cordite, and Oleg for his 1337 photography ski11z. Go vote.

(BTW: It may be just me, but I think he should have called the awards "The Snubbies". ;) )

Boomsticks: News Flash! MSM still displaying anti-gun bias!

Jeff has this week's dirt up over at Alphecca.

Clicky.

Blog Stuff: Token cute critter picture.

I may have mentioned that I have cats. Here's my favorite picture of Mittens, snapped by Oleg Volk on one of his visits. He's so good with portraits. For instance, notice how eloquently he captured just how exhausted a hard day of power-napping can leave one...

Someone's running MS DOG on my Macincat.

Mittens is the world's most affectionate feline. Having been raised by a Golden Retriever, we're not certain she realizes she's a cat. Every day when I get home, she comes trotting to meet me at the door, wagging her tail. (Hence her nickname: "CatDog".) Even though you haven't met her, she loves you, too. Not that you should get all excited about that: Mittens loves everybody.

Boomsticks: So I've got this freshly-completed AR lower...

...just lying around.

...and a couple of boxes of .300 Whisper ammo sitting on my desk.

...and I'm starting to get some really Dr. Strangegun-esque ideas forming in my head.

Blog Stuff: Cutest. Picture. Ever.

...and it just screams for a caption contest.

Boomsticks: I Have Made Fire!

I've done plenty of piddling around with AR's before; little stuff like front sight posts, handguards, mag catches, pistol grips, et cetera, but I'd never actually, you know, built one.

I am therefore just absolutely tickled pink to announce that I have turned a Superior Arms stripped lower reciever and a pile of DPMS internal bits into a complete, functioning lower reciever. Yay, me! I wandered around the store yesterday dragging that thing with me like a Raggedy Ann doll, showing pretty much everybody I talked to that "Look! The safety works! It fires! It disconnects! Look! I made this!"

Those of you shaking your heads have to grasp how completely ten-thumbed I am at matters mechanical in order to understand my elation...

Blog Stuff: Another SiteMeter find.

Thanks to the magic of SiteMeter, I got to read The Unread Bits.

Now that the bits are no longer unread, go check out his review of the Kahr TP9. Also included is Calvinist Humor; something I was rather pleasantly surprised to find out isn't an oxymoron.

Blog Stuff: Yes, we're open...

About once a month, I start getting calls at work asking "Are y'all gonna be open tomorrow?" I usually answer with a baffled "Uh, yes," and remain confused until I notice that the bank is closed on my drive to work the next day.

Now, granted, I live in a town full of federal employees, university students & faculty and, apparently, bankers, so the need to explain this is kind of understandable: Folks, I work in a retail establishment. We sell you things. If you are off of work, and we are not open, we cannot sell you anything. This would be bad. For that reason, over the last year, we were closed Christmas Day, Thanksgiving, and, (only after much soul-searching) New Year's Day, Easter Sunday, and the Fourth of July.

We are open on President's Day (aka Washington's Birthday), Veteran's Day (aka Armistice Day), Labor Day, Columbus Day, MLK's Birthday, probably Memorial Day, Halloween, Groundhog Day, April Fool's Day, Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day, Grandparent's Day, Secretaries' Day, and National Car Care Month. Basically, all those times that banks are closed, we're open. I'd type more, but I have to get to work.

Wow.

I have a new goal: When I grow up, I want to be as cool as her.


(Hat Tip to Mr. Completely.)

Boomsticks: Note to self...

An allen wrench is not a punch, and a 20-oz. Estwing is not a nylon hammer...

Kitchen table assembly of an AR lower with dick-all for tools, not to mention no kitchen table (nor even a kitchen, for that matter) is harder than it looks. A patient gun nut would wait 'til tomorrow morning, where a fully-equipped shop awaits...

*sigh*



Postscript: So, I give it up, pack a couple of my tools away, get distracted by the computer, and...

...when I look back down at the floor, one of my cats has surreptitiously made off with the screw-on cap to the storage compartment in the handle of my multi-bit screwdriver.

So now I'm applying techniques I learned from reading the memoirs of survivors of North Korean prison camps, but the furry little beasties remain stoically uncooperative:

"Huh? Cap? What cap? Did you see a cap?"

"Little black thing, about yea big, and threaded? Kinda tasty, and rolled around nicely when batted? Nope. Never saw it."

Oy vey. I'd use a blowtorch to try and extract the information, but the stubborn critters still wouldn't tell me anything, and burned cat hair smells awful. Plus, the Washington Post would say that W made me do it...

Politics: Et tu, Oz?

Why even call it a uniform?

I guess it'll make assimilation after the eventual Indonesian invasion easier, or something.

Boomsticks: The Carnival's in town again!

Carnival of Cordite Number XLIII.

"All about the Zombie Apocalypse."

Blog Stuff: Pseudo LiveJournal post...

WTB: One Social Life. Lightly used okay. Must not be work-related. Nothing clingy. And stop touching me.


[mood| Overcome with ennui.]
[music| KMFDM, Secret Skin]




(Is it true that KMFDM stands for "Kill M_____F___ing Depeche Mode"? If it isn't, it should be. I mean, who hasn't wanted to roll over that bunch of maudlin shoe-gazers with an Abrams at least once?)

Boomsticks: ...and someone blurts out the obvious.

Zendo Deb found someone accidentally letting the truth leak into reporting: For self defense, nothing beats a gun.

This is a college town, and every Fall we get inundated with the usual foot-stomping, lemon-juice-squirting, key-scratching, kiai-shouting advice that's supposed to equalize a 97-pound sorority sister with a 260-lb serial rapist.

Every day at work I see someone come in looking for pepper spray or "stun guns" because they're afraid of an attacker, but they don't want to actually hurt them.

All this stuff has a place as a defense if you are surprised or can't get to a sidearm, and some of it is useful as a point on a continuum of force, but ultimately it all requires getting into touching distance of your attacker, who is then, by definition, within touching distance of you. Listen to the advice of the guy in the article with the five black belts: Nothing beats a gun for self defense.

Unless, like the students mentioned above, you spend your days and nights in an area where you're forced by law to resort to yelling, car keys, and lemon juice; in that case, look into pepper spray and a good pair of Nikes...

Boomsticks: Token controversial post.

One annoying comment occasionally stumbled across on Errornet gun boards: "I like my Glock 'cause it's simple. I hate fussy, complicated guns like 1911's."

All this tells me is that the person who typed it has never actually detail-stripped both guns. Don't get me wrong; the Glock is a breeze to detail strip and is fairly simple mechanically. A 1911, however, is barely more internally complex than a stone axe, and is refreshingly free of "toaster parts" (a local gunsmith's term for little sheet-metal levers and teeny coil springs.) I mean, I am about as non-mechanically-inclined as it is possible to be and still operate a light switch, and even I understand how the four parts that make a 1911 go *bang!* interact.

Bikes: The Rejuvenator.

I've been pretty un-fun company for the last week or so. Long hours at work, various fiscal traumas, and the complete and utter lack of a social life have made me one cranky chick.

So, it was good to see yesterday that HappyHappyFunBike's restorative powers still work. A simple ride down curvy side roads to work, with the helmet visor up and the wind in my face, let me bebop into the shop with a spring in my step and a smile on my mug. It's hard to be stressed out or get too mad about anything when you're wearing a big, goofy grin and have spent the last twenty minutes waving at excited kids in the backs of minivans. Man, kids just go nuts when you wave at 'em from a bike; their eyes light up like they just found a real, live pony under the Christmas tree. :)

Blog Stuff: A Gunblog Gathering...

Mr. Completely is calling for a Gunblogger Rendezvous in Reno this November. Go check out the plans. (Maybe I should ask for time off now, and then start putting out feelers for roadtrip partners. Those auditioning should be able to withstand long periods in cramped Nazi rollerskatemobiles piloted by someone who talks too much. ;) )

Blog Stuff: ...and Bikes.

Well, I had lots of stuff I wanted to type about, but it's rapidly warming into a sunny day out there.

I think I'll hop on the Zephyr and take the long way to work. Typing can wait 'til tonight. :)

Boomsticks: AR-15s with skinny mags. The new hotness?

Cowboy Blob has one. SayUncle's building one. Alston wants one. Rock River builds a metal one. Bushmaster builds a plastic one. OlyArms builds one that eats out of Glock mags.


I wonder why the sudden flurry of interest?


Possibly the cold, wet background in the photo above is a clue: I'm gonna go shoot my rifle today. In the warm, dry, climate-controlled Great Indoors. :)

Boomsticks: This is just wrong.

Josh at South Park Pundit offers photographic proof that he has waaaayy too much time on his hands. Behold: Gun pr0n.

Groan.

Politics: Oy, vey! It's the Alitothon...

...in which all our media will be clogged with minutiae as moral paragons like Ted Kennedy and Constitutional authorities like Dianne Feinstein grill Alito, inquiring into his ethics and seeing if he stayed awake in American Government 111 back in the eleventh grade.

It's enough to make one a tiny bit cynical.

Oh, well, it could always be worse. According to a blurb from a Washington Post article posted over at SayUncle, he doesn't seem to think the phrase "Klaatu Verata Nikt..." er, "Commerce Clause" is a magical incantation that Congress can use to summon eldritch powers without offering up at least a feeble attempt at a rational explanation.

Also, this time around, no American parent has had to explain to their child, during the dinner hour, what a pubic hair is, and why a Coke can is an unlikely place to find one. Yet.

Boomsticks: The Weekly Check is up...

...over at Alphecca. Jeff includes lots of ink on NYC's mayor making a national ass of himself.

Hey, Mikey, I know it's hard for you provincial island-dwellers in the frozen North to understand, but Manhattan is not the center of the known universe. Most of the rest of the country doesn't care what you say, or how you feel about the way we run our lives. Shut up and go tend to garbage collection, or some other legitimate municipal service, and quit pretending you're the Mayor of America, you self-righteous jerk.

Go read more...

Politics: "Drat that Constitution! Foiled again!"

Via SayUncle, we get a juicy Feinstein quote generated by the Alito brouhaha:

Feinstein said she is concerned that that opinion “demonstrates a willingness to strike down laws with which you personally may disagree by employing a narrow reading of Congress’ constitutional authority to enact legislation.”

Narrow readings of Congressional authority have got to be chafing, especially when you've sleazed your way to the top of the heap by promising to vote for every one of your constituents to get a gold house and a rocket car.

Boomsticks: 9mm AR guts...

Cowboy Blob had some 9mm AR questions and, slacker that I am, it took me a couple of days to remember to drag out the gun and the camera at the same time.

(Apologies for the photo: I had to hold the camera with one hand, the mag with my other hand, and use one foot to keep a cat from scaling Mount AR.)
(Yeah, it's about 250 rounds since the gun was last cleaned. It's a torture test, or something...)

The gun is trouble-free so far, but all I've run it with were Colt 32-rounders. I have an RRA-modified Uzi mag as well, but have yet to try it. The main visible difference between the mag catch holes on both is that the Colt mags have square holes (like mags 1 and 3 in CB's picture), while the modified Uzi mag has a rounded leading edge (like mags 2, 4 and 5).

One noticeable difference: My mag block doesn't stick up anywhere near as far out of the lower...

Blog Stuff: Don't whine to me, Argentina...

...the truth is I don't give a crap.

Anyhow, it's apparently now a big no-no to "annoy" people anonymously via a blog, First Amendment protections notwithstanding. (And we all know that the Bill of Rights hasn't been used by Congress for anything but dingleberry removal for years...)

I'm doing this blog thing for the same reason that the deranged guy on the street corner you pass every morning screams epithets at passing cars, and about as anonymously as him, too. If I'm annoying somebody out there, well, at least you know who's doing it.

Oh, and you probably deserve it, too.

Politics: This one's for you...

...Mr. Murtha, you pusillanimous vote-sucker, you.

Clicky.

Bikes: Knoxville motorcyclists, you owe me!

I scoped out weather.com this morning, and it was breathing dire omens about hard rain by noon. I left the Zephyr in the driveway and took the Beemer instead, thereby causing the rain to stay away.

If you rode today in the unusually pleasant weather, well... You're welcome. ;)

A jog around the blog.

The Munchkin Wrangler parks his old ride.
GrampaPinhead waves us good-bye.
Alphecca notes that gunblogs got snubbed.
Countertop says we'll just start our own club.

Books: Callahan's again.

Just wrapped up Callahan's Key, in which our favorite band of barflies move to Key West, get joined by Bob Heinlein's cat and an obscene parrot, stow a toddler away on the space shuttle, buy an ex-nudist colony, get telepathic, and help Nikola Tesla save, not just the world this time, but the whole universe.

Like I said before, a Callahan's book is like going to the zoo; either you're happy to see the giraffes again, or you're not. And I like giraffes. :)

Droool...

Oh, dear gawd, that made me hungry.

Where's the takeout menu?

I love happy endings.

Zendo Deb, as always, serves up delicious smoked goblin.

Boomsticks: Gratuitous Gun Pr0n No. 18

A very Texian revolver...


The above is a S&W Model 544, better known as the The Texas Wagon Train Commemorative. 4,782 were made in 1986 in honor of the Texas Sesquicentennial. (The knife is a Marzitelli Airstream.)


It's a blue steel, square-butt N-frame with a five inch tube and adjustable sights. It shipped in a basswood presentation case, had special markings, and was the only .44-40 revolver from S&W made since 1940. For those of you with Type 03 FFL's, it's on the C&R list.

I took mine with me on my vacation to Terlingua back in the Summer of '03, where it was used to bust rocks at 100 yards (a relaxing pastime.) Factory ammo in .44-40 is still loaded by Winchester, although it's spendy. Georgia Arms offers a more reasonably-priced loading, but it's probably only available by mail order if you live outside the Southeast.

Politics: A plane ticket and a pistola.

According to Jeff at Alphecca, the Mexican government has its knickers in a twist about the fact that its criminals sneak into the US, steal guns from innocent Americans, and then return south to shoot up the disarmed citizens of Mexico.

Hey, Vicente, here's an idea: Keep your criminals from coming up here and burgling the houses of our citizens, and you won't have that problem. As an incentive, we'll start giving every Mexican criminal we catch here in the 'States a .38 snubbie and a plane ticket to Mexico City. Have fun!

Boomsticks: What do you get when you multiply six by nine?

Carnival of Cordite Number 42.

Boomsticks: Blind man with a gun.

No Quarters blogs about the blind guy in North Dakota with a CCW permit (not the blind guy in Knoxville with a CCW permit, although we have one, too.) Note that when I say "blind" here, I don't mean "can't read so well without his glasses"; I mean dog-and-cane blind.

Interestingly, Mr. McWilliams was drawn into the brouhaha created when ND considered dropping the marksmanship test from their CCW requirements. I'm sure he was justifiably proud of having passed the shooting portion of the test (although, if it's anything like Tennessee's, if you can stand flat-footed, shoot at the ground, and hit it, you'll pass) but it would probably surprise him to know that many states don't have a marksmanship test, many don't have a written test, and some have no permit requirements at all (ie "Vermont/Alaska-style carry".) All his fears of some non-marksmanship-test-passing yahoo putting a stray bullet through his house are pretty much groundless: Witness the state to our south, Georgia, which is brim-lippin' full of folks who needed nothing but $50 and a clean record to get a toter's permit. No written test. No cheesy video to watch. No arbitrary shooting test. Just some cash, a pulse, and proof that you've made it at least twenty-one years without getting seriously cross-threaded with society. And you know what the secret is? That method works.

For all the hand-wringing about various requirements, states like Georgia and Indiana prove every day that the fact that one has made it 21, 31, or 51 years without showing up on a police blotter is ample proof that one is very unlikely to decide to shoot up the mall tomorrow (and that if one is likely to decide to shoot up the mall, one is unlikely to wait and get a toter's permit before doing so.) Heck, studies in multiple states, such as South Carolina and Texas, have proven that CCW permit-holders have a lower crime rate than other normally-trusted demograhics, such as oh, say, sworn and bonded Law Enforcement Officers. Consider that the next time someone asks you to wring your hands...

Blog Stuff: A Blonde Joke.

As a blonde, I find this joke offensive. (But still funny.)

A Good Quote:

"Reality is what doesn't go away when you stop believing in it..." -Philip K. Dick

Random Cool Blogs I Stumbled Across Today:

The Meatriarchy: If God Didn’t Want Me To Eat Animals, Why Did He Make Them Out Of Meat?

Among other random discoveries: It's probably sad that I know that the nastiest insult one can use in Klingon translates into English as "willing slave", whereas the US English insult "Your Mother wore army boots" translates out as "Your maternal parent wore the footgear of a soldier" and is a compliment.

So much for me ever getting a date again...

Fun Science Fact of the Day:

It is a little-known fact that electric space heaters can also be used as cat magnets. If you're not sure where your feline companion is, turn on a heater and within fifteen minutes every cat in the house will be sprawled in front of it like sunning iguanas.

Boomsticks: A revolver chambered for what?

Les is musing on the idea of a revolver chambered for an autopistol caliber. While he seems to be settling on the .45ACP-caliber Model 625, he also pondered the possibilities of one chambered in .40 S&W or 10mm Auto.


Above is the S&W Model 646, one of a limited run of 900 .40-caliber revolvers done in 2003 to use up their remaining stock of no-lock frames. It's a 4" round-butt L-frame with a 6-shot titanium cylinder. The titanium is required to squeeze six .40-cal holes into an L-frame's cylinder: it's slightly more elastic than steel, and therefore less likely to fracture at the thin spots. I replaced the rubber Hogue Bantam grip that came on the gun with a Monogrip in Pau Ferro, and the gun handles and points like... well, like a round-butt 4" medium-frame Smith usually does: Superbly.

Obviously the only way to find one would be to scare one up used, but if Les goes with the .45 ACP 625, I don't think he'll be disappointed.


(That's a 625-4 next to the Kimber Custom Classic Stainless LE...)

Blog Stuff: A one-man bad PR machine...

Pat Robertson offers Ariel Sharon's stroke as proof of God's existance.

From where I'm sitting, the fact that Pat is still upright and breathing would seem to argue the opposite point. (Or that if there is a God, he's a lot more lenient than Pat makes him out to be...)


(Hat tip to Les Jones.)

Miscellaneous Rambling...

The tactical world has stolen a page from the upscale women's clothing world...

On the back of a package of Blackhawk brand "tactical gloves" is a handy-dandy glove sizing template. It runs from "Medium" to "XXL". Apparently, the Blackhawk kind of guy doesn't have small hands.

Or if he does, he calls them "Medium".

Bikes: A midnight ride...

I was sitting up reading last night, and realized I needed something from the inconvenience store before it closed. I went inside to get my car keys and...

...grabbed my helmet and gloves instead.

It wasn't exactly "balmy", but middle-high 40s is about as good as it gets at night around this time of year, and dry pavement isn't a thing one takes for granted in the months of leaden skies. Besides, I hadn't been on the bike in a month, and I needed to... um... charge the battery up some, yeah, that's it: I needed to charge the battery.

So, a long-way-'round jaunt to the convenience store to charge the battery up real good, plus a chance to blow the cobwebs out of the Yosh pipe. (Apologies to anyone I woke.) Cool wind in my face. The unique smells of a cold winter night in the woods. The river doing its riverish stuff. This is why I ride...

...and why I sleep late and blog lightly today.

Politics: The New Barbarians.

In the days when trolls haunted the forests of Northern Europe and people were sacrificed to appease capricious deities, weapons were often ceremonially "killed" and thrown into bogs or meres. Nobody's really sure why this was done, as the Bronze Age folk left no written records, but theories abound. Even well into the Middle Ages, a murder weapon might be "executed" just like the murderer was.

Then came the Enlightenment, and with the dawn of the Age of Reason, such nonsense disappeared. Rational people understood the difference between criminals and inanimate objects; that it was the demons in a man's mind, not in his tools, that drove him to violence and murder.

With the children of the Age of Aquarius running the show now, however, the light has apparently gone out of the Enlightenment. Once again we can ease the troubled mutterings of our demon-haunted minds by killing the tool, and letting the killer go free in ten to fifteen with time off for good behavior.

Maybe Ms. DeCambra can find a good bog in which to toss the chunks of that Ruger.

(Hat Tip to Countertop.)

Politics: It's a new year, but...

...Jeff at Alphecca would like to remind us that there's a surplus of old bias left over from last year, and more being generated all the time. Go check out the Check on the Bias.

Blog Stuff: Oh, dear! I got meme all over my new jeans.

Gee, thanks, Marko...

Four jobs you’ve had in your life: Photographer's assistant, automobile repo person, waitress, retail saleschick.

Four movies you could watch over and over: Black Hawk Down, Way Of The Gun, Blade Runner, The Matrix.

Four places you’ve lived: Chicago, IL; Atlanta, GA; Cumming, GA; Knoxville, TN.

Four fiction books you can't live without: The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, by Robert Heinlein; Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand; The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkein; and Neuromancer, by William Gibson.

Four non-fiction books you consider essential: Holidays In Hell, by P.J. O'Rourke; With Charity Toward None: A Fond Look Back at Misanthropy, by Florence King; Lost Rights, by James Bovard; The Standard Catalog of Smith & Wesson, by Jim Supica and Richard Nahas.

Four TV shows you love to watch: I don't even own a functioning TV at the moment.

Four places you’ve been on vacation: Terlingua, TX; Edinburgh, Scotland; St. Simon's Island, GA; Oslo, Norway.

Four websites you visit daily: The Firing Line, SayUncle, Kiss Me, I'm Peevish, and Weather.com (what with the motorcycle and the convertible...)

Four of your favorite foods: A barely-dead filet of beef, Memphis dry rub ribs, French onion soup, and a properly-done Reuben.

Four places you’d rather be: Work (when I'm at home), Home (when I'm at work), out riding (when I'm either place), and someplace where I can shoot (er, which would be "Work".)

Four albums you can’t live without: Gosh, this is a tough one, as it's so mood-dependent... uh... Pretty Hate Machine by Nine Inch Nails, Achtung Baby by U2, Signals by Rush, and... oh, jeez... I'm looking for inspiration through the stacks of jewel boxes on the floor and the rows on my CD rack and just noticed that I've somehow ended up with two copies of Aerosmith's Pump. How the hell did that happen?

Four people to pass it on to: Everybody I'd tag has already been tagged, so if you haven't responded, consider yourself double secret tagged!

Boomsticks: Gratuitous Gun Pr0n No. 17

Just for Uncle, a gun that isn't round in the middle:

HK P7M8 and Ken Onion custom. Photo by Oleg Volk.

I've since sold both the pistol and the pocket knife, but I just love the photo. It makes such nice wallpaper for one's inner conspicuous consumer. :)

Blog Stuff: The "Got Guns?" meme.

Well, since Jeff accused me of instigating it, it's only polite to respond.

2005 was a pretty good year; maybe the best I've had since '01. When all the comings and goings get tallied, the collection comes up some fifteen to twenty guns larger than it was this time last year. I've already listed most of the highlights, but I should probably also mention the 432PD, and the '03A3; then there was the 696 and the Encore. And some other stuff I'm sure I'm forgetting.

Anyhow, now you know why I drive a paid-for car and have no life outside of work... :)

Politics: Aim way high.

David Codrea reports on the FAA's latest delusions of jurisdictional grandeur.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and suggest that the orbit of Pluto is probably in "international waters", so to speak...

Happy New Year everybody!

You know the New Year's bonfire is about to get going good when somebody pipes up with "Heck, yeah, I've got lots of Pyrodex up at the house!"

Blog Stuff: Just got back from the gun show...

The first one I've attended in a year or so.

Conclusion? If you go to gun shows to look for deals on new-production guns, they still suck.


If you're like me, on the other hand...

Flintlocks and Flop-tops
And Number Three Russians
Black-powder Mausers
From jackbooted Prussians,
Shiny Smith PC's from limited runs
These are a few of my favorite guns.

Socketed bay'nets
On Zulu War rifles,
Engraved, iv'ried Lugers
That make quite an eyefull
Mosin tomato stakes sold by the ton
These are a few of my favorite guns.

Rusty top-breaks!
Smallbore Schuetzens!
And all of Browning's spawn
I just keep on browsing my favorite guns
Until all my money's gone.

...well, I almost always find stuff that interests me. :)


This time around, I snagged a bayonet for my Garand, picked up some bulk .32 H&R Mag from Georgia Arms and inquired into their range ammo and dealer programs (always on the clock, I am), and got a bag of 50 handloaded .22 Remington Jet rounds for my Model 53 from a gentleman I'd done business with before. This, to me, is what gun shows are about; if I just want a new gun or some everyday shootin' ammo, I'll get it at work. Sadly, they were out of Blazin' Cajun Ends 'n' Pieces at the Crockett Creek stand, however. Can't have everything, I suppose...

I had an enjoyable time strolling the floor with my pal Marko, and was tickled pink to see the dozens of black CCA hats sprinkled through the crowd.

Some folks like to whine about gun shows, but then some folks would complain if you hung 'em with a new rope.

Politics: A reminder to not forget.

Xavier reminds us of one of the biggest news stories of '05.

Let's not forget it.