Just when I think we've hit Peak Dumb...

"Hit maker Mark Ronson has walked back his comments about identifying as sapiosexual.

"I do not consider myself part of any marginalized community, and I apologize if anybody misunderstood or took offense to it," Ronson told Rolling Stone.

A sapiosexual is someone who is attracted to intelligence and the human mind above other traits, including physical appearance and gender."

So...wait...you mean to tell me that there are people out there who actually identify as "sapiosexuals" to put themselves somewhere in the victimhood stack, and they heard this guy's remarks, and they got all assmad about it?

And now he's getting publicly dragged and feels compelled to walk back his remarks?

Stop the world, I want off. It's stuff like this that makes me want to start smoking again, just to hasten my exit from this nuttery.
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Relaxation...

I hadn’t played D&D in...well, a long time. It’s been probably close to fifteen years, actually.

A real, live tabletop session with friends was so enjoyable.

This time around I let the DM just pre-roll me a character. “Dealer’s choice,” I said, and as a result had a great time playing a halfling bard instead of my usual elven ranger or human fighter.

It was my first exposure to 5th Edition, and I wasn’t as lost as I thought I’d be. There was definitely less math, and I didn’t miss the days of THAC0 at all.
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A great success!

I am still managing to vacation from the news of current events, although the temptation to check CNN or the Beeb is a strong one...
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This Page Intentionally Left Blank

I'm basically ignoring the news for a week. I don't have any real expectations of the world being any less dumb when I get back to paying attention to it on Sunday, but I just really needed a stupidity detox.
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Jinxed.

I have two cars, both fairly sporty models with manual transmissions, so one would be correct in assuming I enjoy driving with a little bit of verve.

Thing is, I also live in a city that is generally flat as a pancake in a place where the roads are generally ruler-straight and intersect at tidy right angles. It's not an environment conducive to pulling g's in corners.

There are a few stretches of road near the house that actually have some curves and elevation changes, like Westfield just north of Broad Ripple village or Spring Mill between Kessler and Holliday Park, both due to the terrain along the White River.

Naturally, I incorporate these stretches into my errands if at all possible, like the other day when I was transporting a trunkload of books to Half-Price Books in the Mustang. Instead of shooting straight up Meridian to 86th, I jogged west on Kessler to take Spring Mill instead.

This, of course, was fate's signal to have me preceded through the s-curves on Spring Mill by a septuagenarian in a car of similar vintage to mine, but instead of a Mustang GT, it was a blue-green Buick Regal sedan in the same cosmetic state it was when it rolled off the lot in the mid-Nineties. And its owner was determined to keep it that way by not exceeding twenty miles per hour in those curves.

Of course, on the way back, I was following a trailer full of lawnmowers downhill through those same curves at the same velocity I'd come up. The traffic gods did not smile upon me that day.

Another One Rides the Bus

I took the IndyGo Red Line down to pick up the film from my first trip on the IndyGo Red Line, which feels incredibly recursive.

It was a roll of Ilford XP2 I'd burned up in the Canon EOS Elan II. XP2 is neat because it uses the C41 color process for developing, so if you have one of the few 1-hour or overnight labs near you, they can do this film. (Roberts Camera will do regular B&W, but it's done by an employee in his home darkroom and so turnaround time is longer than for color film.)

Bang for the Buck

I contributed some thoughts on the best value in a 9mm pistol over at the Ammoman blog today. Go check it out!
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Automotif CL...

I spotted quite a sight in the Meijer parking lot today; this was definitely not your ordinary grocery-getter. I was glad I had the Fuji X-E1 and Zeiss 32mm f/1.8 along, because this deserved better than a quick cell phone snap.

It's a 1955 Ford Thunderbird, the first year of production, when they were fairly close-coupled two-seaters intended as a counter for GM's Corvette. As if to underscore the intended target, Ford shortened the wheelbase on their standard chassis to the same 102" as the Chevrolet 2-seater.

The '53 and '54 Corvettes had only come equipped with the "Blue Flame" inline-six, and so the T-bird's 292cid, 193* bhp V8 was intended to give it a leg up, but 1955 saw Chevy drop their own 265 cubic inch V8 in the 'Vette, where it put out a claimed 195* bhp. From the beginning, the Thunderbird was more of a tourer than the sportier Corvette, and it was only a two seater for the first few model years.

This "Thunderbird Blue" example, with a "Turquoise & White" interior, appeared to be unrestored.

In the late '70s my dad briefly had an immaculate, low-mileage, unrestored black '55 T-Bird. When he wasn't fiddling with it, it was stored in the garage with the hardtop removed†, covered in blankets to keep the dust off.

Other than one or maybe two rides around the neighborhood, I mostly remember the cockpit as the absolute best place in Hide & Go Seek, because none of my siblings or cousins expected anyone to hide in the DON'T YOU DARE TOUCH DAD'S T-BIRD.

Here's something that caught me off guard today when I was thrown into a reverie by the sight of this classic: When I was watching dad work on that oh-so-old Fifties vintage auto, with its quirky old six-volt electrical system and all, it was only twenty-three years old or so.

It wouldn't have qualified for Indiana vintage plates yet, unlike the Ford I took out for a spin to take in the sunset today...

*This was "SAE gross horsepower", which was measured in a climate-controlled dynamometer chamber with the engine out of the car, all power-draining accessories removed, and probably the air cleaner and exhaust manifolds replaced with velocity stacks and straight pipes. And then the numbers would be further massaged by marketing. It's not super-science, but you won't go far wrong by assuming that the actual SAE net bhp is somewhere between 60 and 75 percent of that number. In other words, don't drag race a Prius in your stock '55 T-Bird.

† The 1955 Thunderbird came standard with a lift-off fiberglass hardtop. A convertible top was an option, one that neither the pictured car nor my dad's had.

Game Theory

This column does make some interesting arguments about the Electoral College, namely the way it works in the age of statistical analysis. Gaming the EC has had the same sorts of results on presidential campaigning that the statistical min-maxing of the Moneyball/Sabermetrics era has had on baseball.

"As it stands now most of the country, both rural and urban, goes ignored during presidential campaigns as candidates compete for victory in the Electoral College. FairVote, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to electoral reforms, tracked public campaigning in the 2016 election and found that apart from private fundraisers or studio appearances, the major parties focused solely on those states that were deemed as competitive.

For instance, after the two major party conventions concluded, 94% of all public campaigning took place in 12 states, and 70% took place in just six states. No major party candidate held a rally, gave a speech or held a public event in any state with only three electoral votes.

The same is true for many of the most highly populated states. FairVote's analysis found that Donald Trump and Mike Pence failed to campaign in more than half of the 50 states, while Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine failed to campaign in nearly three-quarters of the states in the union."

For all that it may be statistically valid, I can't help but read that article's headline, "The road to abolish the Electoral College may just run through Texas", as "The road to Sarajevo may just run through Texas".
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Late Adopter.

I didn't get a CD player until the early/mid Nineties. I think the first one I had in a car was the one I installed in my 280ZX when I was working at the pawn shop/gun store in 1994.

I never used Napster, and continued to use the CD changer in the Zed Drei until it finally gave up the ghost a few years ago. I need to replace the head unit in that car so I can listen to music while driving again, but, you know...one of these days. The radio still works and picks up NPR fine, so I keep putting it off.

Anyway, here's a neat animated chart showing the percentage of market share of various music formats, from 1973-2019. Watch the fall of 8 Track! The death and rebirth of vinyl! It's pretty neat.


(h/t to The Online Photographer.)

Gratuitous Gun Pr0n #177...

Ammo shortage resistant Gen4 Glock 35 with SSVI Tyr trigger, Ameriglo I-Dot Pro sights, and additional barrels in .357SIG and 9x19mm...
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Tab Clearing...

• This is how the Elder Gods enter the world.


• Funky Mercedes concept car...well, more of an art project, actually.


• Understanding and Combating Russian and Chinese Influence Operations

"Beeeeeeeto Jenkins!"

Beto was on Meet the Press this morning, and claimed to have been approached by gun owners at a gun show in Arkansas and a sporting goods store in Texas who were said something along the lines of "Gosh, I realized I don't need my AR15 for hunting or home defense, and I'd be happy to turn it in!" (The transcript of the show isn't up yet, else I'd have copied it verbatim.)

"Good Gun Owners"

One interesting feature of op eds or stumping political candidates these days when they bring up the idea of AWB v2.0 is that they all cite some "Good Gun Owner" who had an epiphany after a mass shooting and decided that they didn't need an EEBIL AR47 to hunt ducks or defend themselves from burglars, and voluntarily renounced the "assault weapon" lifestyle and turned the bad guns in.

Which, in light of actual compliance rates in recent ban states, is purely whistling past the graveyard.
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...but only because of the unconstitutional NFA.

ZCQOTD: "I mean, a good long burst of live warshots from the only transferrable Mk.19 would pretty much be the ultimate flex at Knob Creek."

— Tamara K. (@TamSlick) September 14, 2019

When the Hughes Amendment went down, goes the lore, a few smart SACO employees got a handful of Mk 19s "on paper". The exact total is uncertain, it might be as many as three or four. They're rare enough that I've never seen two on the market at the same time, let alone two in the same place.

When they come up for sale, they bring stupid money; one brought half a million bucks a dozen years or so ago. And then each live 40mm grenade is another $200 tax stamp...
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At least he's honest?

Thanks, Beto! It was right decent of you to motivate the gun owner vote. I was worried they might be a little complacent, but with you reminding them what the game plan is, that'll get folks to the polls.
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Yesterday (well, day before yesterday), Part Three

I had a pair of full-frame bodies with me at the zoo: A Nikon D700 and a Canon 5D Mark II. It wasn't really a comparison, because they were wearing very different sorts of lenses. The Nikon had a 24-120mm "travel zoom" lens, a focal length range good for a wide variety of shooting.

The Canon, on the other hand, was fitted with the 70-200mm f/2.8L zoom, a lens I'd been itching to play with at the zoo since the day I got it...

For a pair of cameras that haven't been cutting edge for a decade, they both did pretty well, I think.

All my zoo photography thus far has been with APS-C or smaller sensors, so as it turned out, I often found myself wanting more reach from the 70-200. It was so bright outside that even capturing flying water droplets from the grizzly was doable without having to resort to wide apertures, and I only made use of the full f/2.8 in the desert biome and snake exhibit. In retrospect, I should have brought along my 2X Extender, because the 140-400mm focal length would have perfectly complemented the other camera and having the maximum aperture reduced to f/5.6 would have been no handicap.
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Tab Clearing...

• Camera sales slumping (but still booming relative to the '80s/'90s).


• Are camera sales slumping because it's too much of a pain to share photos to the internet from your DSLR/MILC?


• "You can't stop the signal" doesn't just mean signals you like.

Yesterday, Part Two

The hike to the zoo wasn't terribly far. It's probably somewhere between half and three quarters of a mile between the corner of Washington & Capitol and the zoo gates. Complicating factors were that it was, as mentioned, hot as Hades on Wednesday, and I was also carrying ten pounds of camera gear.

The ten pounds of camera gear, however, were kinda the whole point of the trip...

State of the Gunblogosphere?

I started paying less attention to site numbers 'way back when The Truth Laid Bear and the "blogger ecosystem" finally went away for good, and I pretty much stopped altogether when Sitemeter went the way of the dodo. I couldn't tell you to the nearest five hundred what this blog's daily traffic is in this current year.

But traffic is important for monetization, and any money this blog makes for me is incidental; extra ammo money is great (and so's the occasional windfall for geriatric cat food by the case!) but it's not the end of the world if the faucet slows down.

Greg Ellifritz, on the other hand, has been diligently maintaining his blog. He's been diligently tracking traffic, and conscientiously putting out column-to-article length pieces multiple times a week.

And what Greg's noticed is...well, I'll let him tell you:

"When I first started realizing that I was hemorrhaging pageviews, I decided to write more. In 2019 I’ve been writing a few more articles each month. As compared to the same time period a year ago, my year-to-date writing is up 43,000 words in 2019.

An average novel is usually around 100K words. So I’ve basically written half a novel more free information this year than I have in any comparable time frame in the past years.

In August, I really busted my ass. I wrote 20 articles and my total word count was more than any other month in the history of my site. What did that get me? Fewer readers.

I got my August website stats update from Google. My hard work wasn’t enough. My total pageviews declined by 12.52% in the last month. The number of unique visitors to the site dropped 7% from July."

Greg's a smart dude and turns out a lot of quality content. Following him has taught me a lot, and I recommend his stuff highly.