I'll Give You An Absolute

No person should be in fear for their life in a place they have a right to be.

Most especially they should not fear for their life from the government or its agents in such a place.

It's time to bring back the idea of no warrant, no entry.

Probable cause should be how you get a warrant, not an excuse to why you broke down the door.

The standard for a cop shooting someone should be higher than a citizen.  What's the training for, if not to be able to meet a higher standard?

Unexpected Detail

GURPS has three sets of, conflicting, stats for the Lebel Mle.1886.

I finally figured out why!

The one from Adventure Guns is set in the late 1800's so it's stat'd for Balle M.

The one from Pulp Guns is set in the 20-30's so it's stat'd for Balle D.

The one from High Tech is the WW2 gun, so it's stat'd for Balle N.

I feel so much better now that I noticed this!

It happens again for 7.92x57mm Mauser and the difference between Patrone/88 and S Patrone.

And again with the differences between .303 British Mk.I, Mk.II and Mk.VII.

They're Stupid Tanks

Mecha and Walkers are idiotic tanks.

But I love them so!

Especially in Lego!

The one non-Disney property in this collection is my impression of an Imperial grav-tank from Traveller.

Interestingly to me, the one tank in all of Star Wars that's actually tank-like is the AAT from The Phantom Menace.

Gifts

Willard gave me the nifty crystal glass and the chillin' stones.

I bought the Bulleit Bourbon my own self.  It's definitely NOT Jack Daniels.  That's a good thing.

Stockholder

Watching the Netflix original "Bright"...

The Altamira gang-banger doing the Mac-10 Akimbo appears to be sponsored by some ammo maker...

He's just doing mag-dumps into the ceiling.  Over and over.

It's good to have a sponsor to pay for the ammo!

By the way, if you've played Shadowrun, you're going to love Bright!

It's A Fact!

In Scotland: The fine for wearing underwear under your kilt is two cans of beer.

Quote Of The Random Interval

"Steal all the diesel fuel you can, and just pour it in the ground, when the price goes up later, pump it back out, and make millions!"

--Found on Arfcom in a thread on white farmers returning to Zimbabwe.

Target

I dunno if Marv drinks his own urine, but he does seem to own a lot of Kel Tecs.

IYKWIMAITYD

More Traditional

Aalborg's taffel akvavit is way more traditional than Linie's aquavit.

Aalborg is Danish.  Linie is Norwegian.

It's very tasty!

I'd like to try Aalborg's jubilaeums aquavit now!

The Lawsuits Have Begun

Three cities are suing over the fact that NICS has huge errors in it thanks to States and military failing to report in.

This kind of legal action is what will get attention in Congress to "do something".

It will likely be much like fix-NICS, maybe worse.

It's going to be so grand to get fix-NICS all by itself, huh?

Even better, Congress can't even point to having passed a bill recently that addressed the problem, so they're going to be in a hurry to "do something"...

So, for purity's sake, we're going to get the bad without the good.

The pride y'all must feel now.

Dispel Some Misconceptions

My Oldest Lego

This is Set 611 from 1973.

I replaced the lights and had to replace the tires thanks to dry rot.  I still have that original axle assemblies with bare wheels and the light was a single 1x1 flat in the original solid blue; I have many in my box one of them is sure to be the one that came with the set.

My mom got me this set and I had to account for all of the pieces a set time later for her to buy me more.

I think I did pretty good hanging on to it for... 44 years!

Here's a vid on this kit.

Wait What?

The PIAT might be the worst anti-tank weapon ever devised.

Stewart Blacker, "Hold my pint, be right back."

It's like a crew served PIAT!

h/t Tam

It Is About Race

Representative Sheila Jackson Lee thinks it's about race.

Well, she's correct.

We're humans and she's a congresscreature.  A hominid, to be sure, but hardly human.

RPV Live

Willard dropped off this drone for Marv and me to destroy learn how fly so we can teach his granddaughter how.

Haste

The Apollo program was done very quickly.

September 12, 1962; Kennedy says we should do it.  At this point the Saturn portion of the stack was well under way with two launches already accomplished.

Things accelerate starting in October 1968.

Five manned missions in 10 months each proven another step in the plan, including the completion of the first whole mission.

In essence, zero to the moon in less than 8 years.

How many years have we been dicking around with the shuttle's replacement?

Traditions Are Important

Hark the Ocean Spray Angel sings!
Glory to our Can Shaped King!

The can of cranberry sauce is purely ceremonial and ornamental.  It's not for eating, but Christmas and the following year are ruined without it.

We skipped last year and look what a shit show that was!

It Should Be A Warning

Everyone who wants to mess with, at least, a certain portion of the American population:

We think of Die Hard as a Christmas movie.

Watch the film and think hard on that.

Merry Christmas!

Today is the most secular religious holiday (holy day?) in the entire world.

Observed by Christians for the birth of Christ.

Timed to coincide with Saturnalia.

Celebrated by atheist and Jew alike.

It really is a coming together like no other.

Praise Santa!

M193 v M855

A couple of quibbles... M193 is not 5.56x45mm NATO, it's just 5.56x45mm.

I wish he'd shot a string using the 1:12 upper for the M193 over the chronograph, it would have had just a bit more velocity and is a more apt comparison of the rounds as fielded.

I'm Mocking Your White Christmas

FuzzyGeff sends...

...from Ames.

We had to mow the lawn today.

Yeah, I made the right decision moving here!

Unrelated, this cannot be snow.  I was assured that snow would be a thing of memory.

A Brief Synopsis

I'll try this again in the hopes that certain commenters actually read it...

We're not going to get a pure bill.  The reason for this is our congresscreatures aren't entirely beholden to gun votes to gain and retain their seats.

If we were the only voting bloc that mattered and we named Caesar like the praetorian guard, we'd have everything our way for all time.

We don't and never will.

There's an impression that Chuck Schumer, Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer had things entirely their way and that they made zero compromises to get their anti-gun shit passed.

You might notice that we still have handguns.

You might notice that the assault weapon ban wasn't actually a ban.  It was still legal to possess "banned" items that existed prior to the "ban".

You might notice that the AWB had several carve outs to the FUDD contingent of gun-owners.

You might notice that the AWB sunsetted.

If the anti-gun people didn't have to make compromises, they'd have banned all of that and it'd have taken a literal act of congress to repeal it.

Chuckie, Di and Babs are certainly happy that we refused to compromise and mess with the status quo.  Congratulations.

I remember how happy we were when Dianne made her little "Mr and Mrs America turn them all in," speech!  She let the mask drop.  But that same interview where she expressed her truest desires, she also talked about all the compromises and deals they had to make to get what they got.

It took forever for the FUDDS to finally catch on these guys mean their guns too.  How long before the purists realize that incrementalism is how you get the ball rolling and build momentum?

Didn't You Quit?

I'm a Floridian now.

Previously I was an Iowan.

I quit Iowa for Florida.

You might note that I make scant mention of the politics of my former home?

That's because I left it behind me.

I am quite the exception here in Florida.

I can be up to date on Canada, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Cuba, Puerto Rico and Michigan for the asking.

Why?  Because it would seem that nobody who moves here from those places actually quit their place of origin.

That's not really true.  There's lots of people who've quit those places and are happy Floridians, it's just EASY to find a vocal citizen of those places who happens to reside in Florida.  You can't really avoid them, they're vocal.

If I ever quit Florida, it will be because of the people who didn't think they should assimilate with the locals.

I Reiterate

Commenting here is a privilege, not a right.

You are a guest when you make a comment, not a resident.

If you can't figure that out, you get deleted until you can be polite.

It's not hard to figure out at all.

Because this is my blog, I can be as inflammatory as I want and as rude as I'd like.

Why?

Because it's MY blog.

If you feel I'm being unfair, making a Blogger blog is cheap and easy.  Rebut me to your heart's content on YOUR blog and delete my comments (assuming I notice your scathing posts) all you want.

Again, this is MY soapbox, not yours.

Florida Black Snake

We have at least two black snakes living under our shed.

I'm a bit bummed by this because I liked the eastern rat snake better.  Black snakes are jerks.

Show Me The Successes

Show me the successes from no compromise.

Name the laws.

Come on.

Surely there must be one.

Before you go insulting someone's intelligence, you should be able to show your methodology actually accomplishes something.

Before you panic and shoot down a bill you should actually read it.  Then look around for similar language in other law.  Then see if there's any jurisprudence about that language.

I'm not going ask if you had done that because I can tell that you didn't.

You freaked out because a formerly decent pro-gun group that's under new management from when it earned that respect freaked out because some prominent anti-gun senators were OK with the fix-NICS rider to national reciprocity.

You didn't check the language against other laws and jurisprudence to see how the twisting you think might happen, maybe, possibly... would screw up other laws they also like.  Essentially they can't twist the pro-gun portion without messing up their beloved welfare state.  DID YOU CHECK THAT?

Wait, no, you didn't.

Some of the other twists, suggested only by "our" side that can (maybe, possibly) happen at the state level are court victories for our side waiting to happen.  Just need to build on Heller and MacDonald for that.

Passing CCW Reciprocity would have been a net good for our side.  Fix NICS did not contain any new badness.

Again, name the no compromise, net good to gun rights, bill that passed either chamber of Congress since 1986.  Notice I lowered the bar for you?

Dissuade Yourself Of The Notion

Get it out of your head and heart that you will ever see a bill through Congress that cannot be twisted or misused.

You will never see one.  Ever.

If you can't get that notion out of your head, you're never going to see any advancement to your rights, ever.

Don't like it?  Tough shit.

Don't like me saying it?  Tough shit.

Shit canning every attempt to make things even a little better makes you look like inflexible fanatics.

Inflexible fanatics who only a couple short years ago were demanding compromise in our direction instead of it being all one sided.

We got that, but it wasn't perfect (because it cannot be) and you would not hear of it being passed.

So we get nothing, because it was all or nothing with you and you sure were louder than the more reasonable voices.

All or nothing means NOTHING.  Every time.  Without exception.

So now I know when you say no compromise, you mean, "I'm anti rights and anti-gun!" and I know I can ignore you from now on.  Traitors.

Used With Permission

Wow, that was fast!

Mr. Watt-Evans has said I have permission to use his concepts in my world as long as I give him credit.

That is so completely cool I can't contain the squeeeeeeeeeee!

Oh Look There's A Link

In my spare time I've been playing with a game/fiction world where there's spellcasters set in the roaring '20's.

It originally started by trying to put GURPS points values to Lawrence Watt-Evans' Ethshar mages.

I didn't actually figure out how to do his mages, but I did figure out a workable method for doing it in GURPS, complete with how his Mage's Guild works (the guild was super easy since the rules are boilerplate on this part).

Because gaming leads to creating scenes, I've been thinking of doing a bit of creative writing with my setting and it occurred to me that having stolen the core precepts of how mages work from Mr. Watt-Evans I should seek permission to use his concepts.

He's got a web page, blog and a link to his email address.  Living in the future is neat.

I remember what a pain in the ass it was to send a fan letter to Larry Niven in 1985.  This is so much better.

No Sense Of Tradition

The University of New South Wales says that laser induced hydrogen-boron fusion is just 30-50 years away.

Don't they know that fusion is 20 years away?

They can't of have missed that while learning about physics because I learned that fusion was 20 years away in 1985.

Marv remembers learning that fusion was 20 years away in the mid-70's.

Fusion is 20 years away!

It's not 30.  It's not 50.

TWENTY.

Get with the program, guys.

Update:

"Can't of" is a midwestern double contraction for cannot have which properly should be spelled "can't've" but is said "can't of".  It's the influence of all the somthingsons who permeate the area.

Inevitable Christmas Slump

December has grown to suck for me.

It was always kind of bittersweet because my birthday is within a week of it.

My Mom's birthday was within a few days of mine.

She's passed now and I miss our joint birthday trips to an eatery.  It was silly fun.

Christmas was toys if birthday was clothes... and vice versa.

So I'm in a "meh" funk.

Couple that with the prior three weeks being one of the most challenging I've ever done with The Boy and you can start to see why blog fodder has been slim to none.

I'm STILL waiting on backordered tools to ship from Brownell's so I can resume learning to checker.

Seven Digit

Sometime today I passed a million views.

Wow.

Five Years

Here we are, five years into the third complete cycle of the Mayan calendar...

Isn't it funny that people who can figure out Monday happening every week and January happening every year; freaked out about this?

Quitters

I will not be lectured by people who've abandoned the nation about what's wrong here and how to fix it.

You left.

You can use what's wrong here as your reason for leaving, that's valid.

But you don't get to hurl suggestions about how to fix it because you're not a participant any more!

You don't get to demand that something your new nation has, that you like, be exported to your old nation.

I won't have it.

Thankfully, these people are pretty easy to avoid.

But just in case you hadn't noticed, Fred, of Fred on Everything is a Mexican now.

He bailed.

He's got no stake in the outcome anymore.

The author and artist of Questionable Content headed out for Canada where he routinely lectures us benighted Americans about how great the free health care in Canada is, and how stupid we are for voting for Trump instead of Bernie.

Hey, fuck nut, if you'd stayed, you could have, I dunno, VOTED and helped fashion an outcome more to your liking!  This applies to you too, Fred.

You aren't even trying to fix things.  You're just lecturing on the sidelines... no... from the bleachers; even that's not right.  You're watching the game on your DVR and screaming that the ref should DO something NOW!

Socialists Can't Understand Math

"Sixty-percent of the benefits go to the top one-tenth of 1 percent.” - Bernie Sanders.

Since that top 0.001 actually pays most of the tax burden, a break that affects them is going to be pretty huge.

I have another clue for Bernie, those rich fucks are also the people who own the businesses that employ the rest of us.

If they've more money because the government has less, then I'm far more likely to benefit directly.

Yes, I am selfish.

But this is more benefit to more people than if we filtered the money through the government.

What Does Sea Lion Taste Like

Sea lions terrorize San Francisco.

It's not as if they're even endangered.

Snuff a couple and they will stop biting people, in fact, they will stop approaching people.

But I Just Memorized It!

Every ten years, Florida replaces your physical license plate.

I just managed to memorize the number on The Precious, now I have a new number.

For me, it's a little strange to think that this is only the second license plate the car has ever had on it.

Hydrogen Is Not A Fuel

Hydrogen is a battery.

It's a means to store energy made elsewhere by the consumption of fuel.

The advertising point that it only emits heat and water vapor (A GREENHOUSE GAS!!!!) is bunk.

The energy to extract hydrogen from whatever chemical you're using costs energy.  Costs as in you get less energy out of the hydrogen created than it took to make it.

Well, you get water vapor, heat and smug from your car.

You get whatever pollution is associated with making electricity to crack the hydrogen too.

Before you try to say solar and wind don't make pollution, remember that it takes energy and pollution to MAKE solar and wind generators.  Those two technologies are already energy sinks and net polluters.

Louis Wu And His Motley Crew

Amazon is apparently working on adapting Ringworld.

SQEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

If there was ever a more fertile place to make a sci-fi show now that CGI FX have gotten to the level they've gotten to it's Known Space.

Ringworld is the gateway most people enter Known Space through, so a Ringworld series could readily spawn a number of the other stories as well.

Sometimes You Count Your Blessings

Have you ever signed off on a surgery with a "we might have to amputate" clause?

If you have and then woken up with a full compliment of limbs, count your blessings.

I've signed such a release and it's almost sobering enough to counter anesthesia.

It's Societal Not Racial

It's also not a racist society.

What idiots have defined as "white privilege" is not actually the privilege of being white.

It's the in-built advantage of being a member of the dominant society at large.

Wanna check this?

Go to Zimbabwe and let me know how much privilege you get from being white.

What should we call this "privilege" in Japan?

I am friends with many non-white folks who're more successful than I am.  They joined American culture and it's a rewarding thing to do.

Notice the dichotomy between a reservation Indian and an Indian who lives next door.  I'm not the first to notice this one.

What the "white privilege" people are really bitching about is they're not getting the benefits of membership while they stand apart from the society which generates those benefits.

Refusing to abide by a society's norms has never been a solid plan for success.

Coincidence?

Willard is notably unfond of the AR.

He is also scarred by jumping from a C-123 Provider.

Both are Fairchild products.

Coincidence?

I think not!

Socialist State Project

It suddenly hit me that The Free State Project could work if it had enough people.

What slammed it home was that its polar opposite has already worked its magic on several states!

People who're fleeing the oppression of their former states move to freer states, and immediately begin voting for the things that caused the oppression in the first place.

I know it's having an effect here in Florida.

Generous Donation

A generous reader, who knows well my propensity to lick windows stamps mailed me an ancient tome about gunsmithing.

It includes information about checkering and stock finishing.

I think I have a clue about why I was unable to hold a line with the 75˚ cutter but could get a pattern with the 60˚ spacer.

There's a section that talks about how some woods will take 20 to 24 lpi and some won't even take 16...

This is with proper 90˚ grooves.

My sudden uncontrolled line jumping is probably caused by the wood being too soft to accept the wider cut and the side of the diamond sloughing off.

Harder woods and finer grain structure accept smaller diamonds from more lines per inch!

I have no idea what kind of wood I've made my first attempts with, but it's definitely soft.

Thag lurning!

Thanks Miguel!

Does Your Grenadier Guard Have The Correct Rifle

Mine does!

Actually No

No, Mr Pratt,

You did not and do not detail how Fix-NICS will lead to more false denials.

You say it, but you don't show how this will occur.

You're belaboring the idea that unpaid parking tickets will make someone ineligible after Fix-NICS passes...

Only if you leave the state where the ticket was issued.

Yes, it's a minor offense, not even criminal if you remain in state or pay the fine.  But crossing state lines to avoid prosecution is something that makes you a fugitive from justice.

Look it up!  I did.

Of course, far be it from me to suggest that if you don't want to become a fugitive from justice that you pay your parking tickets.  Just sayin'.

Nothing in Fix-NICS creates new categories of prohibited people.  What it does do, read the text, is require that states report prohibited people... again...  What's actually new is the financial incentives to the states to do so.

This is the mox nixest mox nix I've ever read.

Good On You SGT Johnson!

To the last.

And it was most certainly what he signed up for.

The "and die" of "To fight and die" is always a possibility in combat.

He knew it and signed up anyway.

To say otherwise is to tarnish his memory.

I Like The Cut Of His Jib

Bio on Wiki.

Sacrifice

Sometimes a sacrifice is required.

Oh Gods of stock carving!  Please accept this offering and let The Savage be cleansed of the sin of Fugly Bears!

Let my 20 lines per inch be straight and true.  My diamonds sharp.  My grooves smooth and unfeathery.

We make this offering unto you!

Shockingly Hard To Find

An arched mainspring housing for a 1911, in blue, with a lanyard ring; ribbed, not checkered.

I suspect that since these were removed from lots of guns, there's an ample, but widely dispersed supply in parts bins across the country.

Outsider

I walked away on principle.

I wasn't kicked out.

Nevertheless, I no longer belong.

A bummer, but I made my choice.

Does No Harm

Some judge says there's no evidence that allowing transgender people to serve in the military causes any harm to the services.

Irrelevant!

What the transgender folk have to show is that allowing them to serve is a benefit to the services.

Never mind that this judge seems to be unaware of Bradley Chelsea Manning and all the trouble he she caused.

Never mind that the extended periods of time where transgender folk are undeployable.

I'm sick of these endless debates.

They're based on the near seamless integration of blacks into the military beginning in the 1950's.

One reason that the integration of black men into the military went so swimmingly well is they didn't need separate berthing, separate bathing, separate toilets, new sanitary supplies or extensive surgery and hormones to serve in the existing military.

I didn't get all bent out of shape about homosexuals being allowed to serve because they'd quietly been doing so for decades.  I'll give them extra points for serving while hiding their sexuality because it deeply embodies several core tenants of service.  Not least of which is subsuming your individuality to the needs of the service.

You know serving?

I served.  It broke me physically.  I don't regret my sacrifice.

But it was a sacrifice.

When you join you fucking give!

It's not a take deal.

If you're there to take, you didn't join for the right reasons.

And by the way, people who've never served?  You cannot understand.  Sorry, you just can't, so your opinion is suspect even if it's in accord with ours.

I would also like to remind everyone out there that there is no right to serve.  None whatsoever.

Dunkirk: The Air

FOR FUCK'S SAKE LEAD THE SONOFABITCH AND GIVE A LITTLE GODDAMN RUDDER AND YOU CAN KILL THAT MESSERSCHMITT WITH A NICE SHORT BURST!!!



Sometimes a movie does things too well and the nuances start being jarring.

Plus, the bandit is chasing your wingman!  That's a glorious predictor of his behavior that should not be discounted!

Dialog Like This Deserves An Emmy

Leggy Model: JC, I used your shower and now I'm all sticky.

Jean-Claude Van Damme: It's coconut water.

Leggy Model: Your shower... uses coconut water?

Jean-Claude Van Damme: All of the plumbing uses coconut water.

Leggy Model: I don't understand...

Jean-Claude Van Damme: (Sigh) You never do.

Leggy Model: This is the first time I've been here.

Jean-Claude Van Damme: (Heavy Sigh) Let me help you get dressed.

Leggy Model: (cheerfully) Okay!

If you've Amazon Prime and are a child of the '80's, you're going to enjoy this series.

Completely Accurate History

Spencer & Spencer - Russian Band Stand ~ Novelty 1959

The source of one of my favorite lines!



Too late, Comrade!

The Longer I...

The longer I try to explain myself to someone and have them not only ignore my explanation, but tell me what I really meant incorrectly...

The less I feel like bothering to explain.

Forty Five

Since Gene Cernan lift his foot of the face of the moon.

When I was a child, if you had told me I would outlive the last man to walk on the moon I would have dismissed you as a luddite.

Yet, here we are, 11 months after Gene's death and 45 years since he did it.

Trump says we're going back, but there's bound to be some entitlement that sucks up all the money that will prevent it.

Three letter democrats are the most to blame.  FDR and LBJ...

Not One Inch!

No compromise is a guaranteed loss unless you are undeniably, and overwhelmingly powerful.

The pro-gun side of the debate isn't that powerful.

If we could get anything done without compromise, it'd be done already and we wouldn't be doing so much own-goaling right now.

No compromise forgets that this is a political fight.

The pure vacuum which is the sand-table version of The US Constitution and Bill of Rights does not, and never did actually exist.

There's a universe of difference between "how things ought to be" and "how things really are."

Acting as if "ought to be" is "really is" will lead to you being defeated and outmaneuvered every single time.  Usually while you stand there baffled by how you just lost a "sure win!"

OK, you don't wanna bill that "fixes NICS"...  Fine.

Name the Congresscreature and cite the bill that repeals NICS.  Go on.  I'm waiting...  So are you.

What are you actually doing besides petulantly declaring that you won't work with ANYONE if you don't get your own, and full, way.  Don't forget to stamp your feet and hold your breath until you turn blue.

Should a fucking miracle occur and CCW reciprocity pass The Senate with the same text as what The House passed; don't you fucking DARE carry any place you're banned from carrying now.

You fought against it, you shouldn't benefit from it even a little bit.  Remember, you didn't want it because it's tainted with... more but harder on the government submitting records.

Custom Glassware

Color Me Intrigued

I'm Helping

On a whim I signed up for the GURPS North America Facebook group.

A couple of beginning GM's are asking questions.

It's really odd.  I am sharing, no shit, 40 years of GMing experience with them.

It's nice to see others helping out with experiences that mirror mine.

No Longer Popular

I appear to have lost the French market.

It's a bummer too, since they were about half the clicks here on any given day.

Expectations

There are US Property marked M1911's out there on the commercial market.

The condition of these guns are falsely informing the expectations of the people vying to own one of the guns the CMP is about to distribute.

You have to remember that a gun on the commercial market escaped the military decades before the M9 came along to replace them.

The Remington-Rand my dad gave me, that I foolishly traded on a Glock 21, was a bring-home from Korea.

It was a eight year old gun when the guy my dad bought it from stole it from the Army in 1953.  Because it was made in 1945, it might not have been issued for World War 2.  From 1953 to 1975ish, it was wrapped in an oily t-shirt in this guy's closet.  My dad kept it in his sock drawer for the next 15 years.

It was a 47 year old gun with 3 years of service on it when I, stupidly, sold it in 1992.

The pistol I turned in in 1989... which is the pool the CMP guns will be drawn from...

Mine was a 1944 made Colt frame.  It was probably issued and turned in for WW2.  Guns from my era were the ones issued least in the ensuing 40ish years, but were still subject to at least one arsenal rebuild.

You have to remember that the Army was trying to get new pistols as early as the end of the Korean war, and was getting desperate by the end of Vietnam.  'Nam murdered a lot of M1911A1s with high humidity, poor care and leather holsters.  The pistol competition in the '80's that got us the Beretta M9 was make or break for handguns in the Army.  The 1911's were literally falling apart.

As the M9 started to be issued, the best guns turned in were moved to replace the worst guns in units that still had the old .45's.  The Army only kept the most serviceable guns from what remained when there were finally enough M9's to go around.

There's a lot wrong with a "most serviceable" gun.  All you can really be assured of is they will go bang most of the time and won't spontaneously disassemble.  They were also in serviceable condition at the time of turn in, 25+ years ago.  A lot can go wrong in storage.

I assume that CMP is going to cull the herd of the guns that didn't make it and part them out for what parts are still good.

The odds that a gun in the pool that CMP is drawing from will be in excellent shape is pretty low.  First Sergeants, Sergeant Majors and Officers took home a few that were presented to them, those are always the best gun in the arms room at the time.

The creme de la creme has been skimmed.  The creme de la crumb remains.

Damned Expensive Lottery Ticket

Rereading the CMP's list of hoops to jump through to "purchase" a surplus M1911A1.

The thing I'd missed in the initial reading is that this isn't a purchase of a gun.

It's purchase of a lottery ticket.

You are guaranteed to win if you're lucky enough to be among the first 10,000 entries received!

Win.

Then two drawings occur, not sure of the order.  A person's name will be drawn from the 10,000 entries and a pistol will be pulled from the pile.

Then, sometime later, the winner will discover if their ticket purchase was worth it.

In a world where a pristine WW2 Remington-Rand gun goes for $2,500, getting a similar gun for $1,000 is a deal.  If there are more than a couple that nice in this pile of guns I would be shocked.  Never mind there's credible rumors that the people working at CMP skim the cream for personal enrichment, subverting the intent of the place.

CMP probably reset the basement value for beater parts guns.

Coming soon to a gunshow near you!  Pieced together parts guns for $1,000!  Good luck finding the provenance on that.

I just wish that CMP had seriously done the research on what the market was before setting a price.  They don't need to charge any money for any gun they have.  They're fully funded outside of sales, their form 990 confirms this.  They pulled a value out of their ass that was about 30% too high for what these guns surely are.

While we're here; let's talk about the term "fair market value".  You might notice that it's three words.  That's because it's distinct from the term "market value".

Fair market value is what something should cost when all distortions are removed from the price.  Market value is what someone paid and others could be expected to pay.  Personal value is what you're willing to pay.

Free pistols which would have been worth $750 in an open market being priced at $1,000 is a distortion.  Remember, the supply of $750 pistols is a lot smaller than the surge being dumped on the market by CMP.  A sudden increase in supply of 10,000 of these guns should have a chilling effect on price, not a warming.

I am reminded of tulip mania.  I predict that there's going to be heap big buyer's remorse soon; once people see how messed up these guns are.  I know it's been thirty years since they were packed up and lots of us have forgotten how bad they were.  I remember, and we were thrilled when we got new M9's (and pissed when they got taken away because they needed to be inspected mere weeks before heading to the Czech-German border).  Thrilled to have new guns that none of us really liked.

It Was A Bomb

While I am positive that our truth seeking free press will eventually discover the ATF Form 1 for a destructive device; I feel compelled to mention:

It was a bomb.

It was not a gun.

By definition gun control had either no effect or its desired effect.

No effect if he was going to use a bomb no matter what.

Desired effect if he wanted to use a gun, but was forced to use a bomb for a lack of firearms.

Thus, increased gun control is pointless here so you can stop suggesting it.

Thag, It's A Good Thing You're Pretty...

Because you're sure stupid.

One of Harvey's friend's dad is what you call a master wood worker.

I now have a rather detailed listing of what I probably did wrong...

Beginning with my choice of tools.

To put it in gun terms, I was going (alone) to the range the very first time ever with a full-on IPSC race gun.

He did some looking around and I really do need the Dem Bart or Gunline master set.

Good news!  Gunline is still in business and will be filling their annual order from Brownell's real soon now.

Dem Bart's Walt must have died, nobody knows.

Bad news!  The kit is $138 + s/h.

Once I solve the tool problem, he asked about what I'd hardened the wood with.

"Sandpaper," I replied.

He said to rub in some linseed oil and let it sit a couple days minimum before starting my cuts.

That should make the wood harder and lube the tool a bit.

Anyone wanna hit the paypal link over there and buy some tools?

The Death Of Daniel Shaver

SOMEONE said they saw SOMEONE in that room pointing a gun out the window.

I want to know, did anyone think to call the room?  Ask the people inside to come down to the lobby and have a conversation?

Or did they suit up in the SWAT gear and start screaming to come out from the hall?

The victim is not behaving like someone who's been contacted prior to the screaming from the hall.

The only reason the firing officer wasn't convicted of murder is he adhered to the department's procedures for use of force.  That there should scare you.

The people of Mesa should be looking to replace everyone who had a hand in writing that procedure.

I'm an old fashioned guy.  I believe in self defense.  Ask yourself, "If I shot someone under those circumstances and claimed self defense; could I convince a jury?"  If you don't think so, but the cops can, then they've carved out special rights for themselves they shouldn't have.

Mr Shaver was killed preemptively, because he MIGHT have had a gun hidden on him and MIGHT have been reaching for it because he did not INSTANTLY and PERFECTLY OBEY conflicting and confusing commands.

I'm sober and watching that video and I'm not totally clear on what the cops are trying to have him do.  Raise your hands AND crawl?  It seems that the Mesa PD has created a means to shoot someone whenever they want because they've created a procedure that cannot be complied with.  And as long as they follow the guidelines they've established for themselves, no jail time.

Me, that smacks of conspiracy to commit murder on the part of the department.  Especially since there's established procedures in common use that would have served to ensure everyone's safety.  Procedures that account for the suspect being shit-faced drunk.  Procedures that work even better in a hotel hallway because there's no need to keep the suspect from stumbling into traffic.

NRA silence on this issue?  This isn't in their wheelhouse.

Officer safety above all other considerations is where we got this.  If officer safety trumps all other considerations then it literally is only blue lives matter and that never leads to anything but tyranny.  Maybe not all at once, but in small baby steps, but eventually.  The place where only police lives matter is called a police state, a form of tyrannical government.

Daniel Shaver is dead because the police of Mesa, Arizona created procedures which lead to creating situations where citizens are sure to be shot.  If the guidelines are to "overreact immediately" we will get responses that are grossly inappropriate.

Literally nobody would have died if the police had ignored the witness who claimed to see a person with a gun pointed out the window.  Stew on that.

Update: He was not fired for this.  He was fired over his cute "You're Fucked" dust cover on his AR.  That was found to be violation of departmental policy, and his defense attorney successfully kept it from being admissible in his murder trial.

Whiskey Sour

3 parts Famous Grouse Black.
1 part Rose's Sweetened Lime Juice.

Over ice and stirred.

I'M happy with it.

40 Years

Somewhere about now...

About 40 years ago I bought my first copy of Traveller.

It was the three Little Black Books in a small box.

I had nobody to play with, so I didn't manage to hang on to my original set.

I replaced it at least three times.

I'm an oddity in gaming that I played in the seventies, but didn't start with some form of Dungeons and Dragons.

D&D came later ('82ish) with Standing Bear's world.  That was only loosely based on AD&D.

Fantasy (D&D type games) was never what I wanted to play.

Traveller, Star Frontiers, Gamma World and Boot Hill were my preferred games just because I didn't really want to play swords and sorcery.  There's even some Stormbringer and Top Secret tossed in here, but I'd play anything.

Twilight 2000 and Traveller were my main haunts for near 20 years!

Often I am amazed that I know so much about Traveller, having been immersed in the setting so long and being fortunate enough to correspond with the people who wrote the original game.  I often forget that the actual rules and supplements don't give information that I'm privy to because of my long running talks with Loren K Wiseman (RIP).

It's also wonderful to see how many different interpretations of Traveller I've seen and played over the years.  Some quite contrary to the intent of Marc W Miller... (waves at Erin).

But it's OK to depart from their intent in that regard since they always intended for the GM to make the universe their own.

SKOAL!

Which Carbine Run Bartertown?

In order of introduction...

In GURPS terms, the unreliability of the M1 doesn't occur often enough to show.  Same for the notably finicky XM177E2.

Also note even though the XM177E2 and M4 are shown as LC2, it's because of the short barrels not RoF.  If we were to allow machine guns on this comparison, the XM177E2 should have RoF 15 and cost $32,000; the M4 should be RoF 9/- because of 3-round burst and should be unobtainably expensive.

The 5.56 guns sling lead much farther.  5.56 magazines are by far the cheapest.  5.56 magazines are also the lightest both in total and per round.

The SUB-2000 is lighter and cheaper.  9mm ammo is cheapest.

The M1 Carbine doesn't really win in any category...

The M1 Carbine's 4d+1 pi does 5-25 points of damage with an average of 15 per shot.
The XM177E2's 4d pi does 4-24 points of damage with an average of 14 per shot.
The M4 Carbine's 4d+2 pi does 6-26 points of damage with an average of 16 per shot.
The SUB-2000's 3d-1 pi does 2-17 points of damage with an average of 9 per shot.

The M1 Carbine sends 15-75 points of damage down range (45 average) per turn.
The XM177E2 sends 12-72 points of damage down range (42 average) per turn.
The M4 Carbine sends 18-78 points of damage down range (48 average) per turn.
The SUB-2000 sends 6-51 points of damage down range (28 average) per turn.

The M1 Carbine sends 150-750 points of damage down range (450 average) per magazine.
The XM177E2 sends 120-720 points of damage down range (420 average) per magazine.
The M4 Carbine sends 180-780 points of damage down range (480 average) per magazine.
The SUB-2000 sends 64-544 points of damage down range (304 average) per magazine.

The M4, the heaviest gun, is 13.4 lb. with a basic load of 210 rounds.

Going up to, but not over, 13.4 lb. with whole magazines only...

The M1 Carbine will have 210 rounds (12.9 lb.).
The XM177E2 will have 210 rounds (13.3 lb.).
The SUB-2000 will have 224 rounds (12.7 lb.).

They all get six spare magazines for this weight range.

The M1 Carbine sends 1,050-5,250 points of damage down range (3,150 average) per basic load.
The XM177E2 sends 840-5,040 points of damage down range (2,940 average) per basic load.
The M4 Carbine sends 1,260-5,460 points of damage down range (3,360 average) per basic load.
The SUB-2000 sends 448-3,808 points of damage down range (2,128 average) per basic load.

This is already getting kind of silly.  But should I bother to calculate carrying a 9mm pistol and two spare magazines?  It should end up being about the same because you're not shooting the pistol until your carbine is jammed or out of ammo.  You'd get a few points more damage from using the pistol mags in your SUB-2000 but not enough to shift the preponderance.

I did comparisons of various pistols earlier.

Out Of Business?

At one time there were many companies competing for your dollar to sell you stock checkering tools.

As of today, only Master Carver brand replies to email.

Gunline, Dem Bart and W.E. Brownell appear to have quietly slipped into the darkness.

Which is a pity, since Dem Bart appear to be better for the beginner, like me.

I'm watching a used and poorly maintained Dem Bart master set, MSRP $69, going for $91 and climbing...

Does anyone know if this stuff is seasonal?

Boycott Reminder List

This is to remind me why I'm up on my high horse.  I am sure there's more to add, and this post will occasionally float back up to the top when I do.

Cheaper Than Yellow-Cake Dirt.  For really gouging hard during every panic.  Raising your prices to meet demand is one thing.  Canceling pending orders at the old price so you can sell existing stock at the new price is shitty and dishonest.

Dick's Sporting Goods.  For taking people's money on pre-ordered Troy Defense 5.56 Carbines then canceling those orders.  They did refund the money, but since it was in the wake of Sandy Hook, the money refunded couldn't touch even a crappy AR for months.

HS Precision. For hiring Lon Horiuchi, the actual shooter at Ruby Ridge.

Smith Enterprises.  No, Mr Smith, you cannot "take back" Nazi iconography.  It's too tainted.  You especially cannot "take it back" while there's still Holocaust survivors surviving!

Troy Industries.  For being so tone deaf as to hire Jody Weis (a gun banning politician), even briefly, then not noticing the customers paying attention to such details and hiring Dale Monroe, Lon Horiuchi's shootin' buddy from Ruby Ridge.  Their non-apology response to the outrage cemented the deal.  I can wait until Steve Troy is dead to see what the successor company looks like.  They're so bad at filtering their hires, you kinda want to forgive Dick's.

Remington Outdoor Company.  I won't call it a boycott of them, but I'm very leery of buying from them.  Lots and lots of reports of quality control plummeting since they closed up the original New England locations of the companies they've absorbed.  Plus they've had a couple of disastrous new releases.  Buy with caution.

Bushmaster.  I would be continuing by boycott of Bushmaster for lying to me about product availability, but that company no longer exists, having been bought by the many tentacled monster Cerebus and rolled into Freedom Group Remington Outdoor Company.  I am uncertain if the company formed from the ashes of Remington relocating Bushmaster, Windham Weaponry, is the same idiots in the front office as before.

DPMS. Whom was being boycotted for essentially saying that anyone who wasn't a cop who wanted to buy a shorter than 16" AR barrel was doing so for nefarious purposes.  They too have been absorbed into the Remington Outdoor Collective.

I used to boycott Colt, Ruger and Smith and Wesson.

Colt for rolling on their backs and showing their bellies to the gun banners and de-featuring their AR's long before there was much political need and no legal need.  Their pursuit of smart-gun bullshit is in here too.  Both policies have been dropped.

Ruger because Bill Ruger and his fuddy policies and several gaffs.  He dead.  His company isn't fuddy any more.

S&W because of their deal with the Clintons.  They repudiated that deal when the general boycott of them allowed them to be bought out by sane people.

Power

If you only chose to partake of art, music, and literature created by morally upstanding persons, you’d quickly come to the end of what’s available. Museums would empty out. Concert halls would fall silent. Bookstores would have to be repurposed as yoga studios, and movie theaters as hipster churches. The unfortunate truth is that bad, or at least deeply flawed, people often make the best art. -- Rod Dreher

 While this is true, we didn't used to give their opinions much authority over our lives either.  The art stood on its own merit and we tended to ignore the creators.

Now that we worship these creators, we want them to be worthy of it.

Dammit

I've lost track of whom I'm boycotting and why.

If you can't remember why you're mad, should you stay pissed off?

Utter Failure

Every single text I've located and wasted money on about stock checkering is speaking in a language I don't know.

They all assume I already know things that I don't know.

Somewhere along the decades and decades every boy stopped being exposed to the base skills these books assume everyone has.

I literally don't know what I am supposed to know because the books aren't wasting my time teaching me the non-checkering portion of wood working.

I'm realizing that I'm going to have to have someone teach me, and there's nobody out there.

So that's it.  I'm done.

Anybody want a Master Carver brand set of checkering tools for 20 LPI?

Following In The Hooves Of Erin

Marvyn, also a Brony, has purchased a Kel-Tec SUB-2000 Gen 2.

His is configured to accept M&P 9 magazines.

Being Marv, he's bought about $300 worth of accessories and upgrades... they arrived a week before the gun.

To retain the folding capability, he mounted a short picatinny rail on the MLOK slots on the side, then mounted a 45˚ QD mount to that.  This turned out to be a problem since it wasn't aligned well with the bore and used all of the adjustment of the Vortex Sparc AR and wasn't zeroed.

So the folding was sacrificed to the Gods Of Zero.

First.  Marv is the absolute WORST about getting a gun zeroed.  He will shoot all day and never get his sights to shoot where he's aiming.  Luckily, I'm quite handy with it could get him very close to where he needed to be for a final zero.

Second.  Zeroing at 7 yards is about 4-5" low at 25 yards.  So it's zeroed at 25 yards now, and it's just a bit high at 7.

Third.  Not one malfunction of any kind!  Factory ammo, Marv's reloads, 115 gr, 147 gr, ball or hollowpoint.  It cheerfully ate everything.

Fourth.  Willard shot it like a pistol once.  "Kinda front heavy and ungainly long," is his assessment.

Fifth.  Willard also says that if you've got an M1 Carbine, you're really not in the market for a SUB-2000.  It's the same sort of niche.

Sixth.  The trigger is heavy and unpleasant, but not hard to use consistently.  We were shooting very small groups with ease... with the Sparc AR, because...

Seventh.  The factory "iron" sights are teh suxxor!  They're just crap.

Marv's plan is to replace the factory handguard with one that rotates so that he can use the folding feature.  I think I'd just get a QD mount for the Sparc.

Bonus!  There's a small portion of picatinny rail at the toe of the stock.  PERFECT for mounting a light!  If you're OK with the pistol grip and magazine blocking the beam...

For Chinese AK's

Terra cotta AK PMAG!

As Close As We're Going To Get

Flat Dark Earth is impossible to match with Ritt dye and sand PMAGs.

This is as close as we're going to get, I think, since we can't experiment with the now discontinued color anymore.

I think my formula for the gray that matches USGI magazines cut in half, the sand stone synthetic and a bit of Camel would nail it.  I lack magazines to test with.

But Snowflake

But Snowflake, it's supposed to.

Corporation For The Promotion Of Rifle Practice And Firearms Safety

Otherwise known as The Civilian Marksmanship Program.

Did you know they're nearly 2/3 government funded?

Did you know that 25% of their revenue is from investments?

That's 90% funded without selling a single gun, accessory or round of ammo.

Did you know they say they're selling inventory at a loss?  This does not include any overhead, it's selling the items for less than they paid for them.

Did you know that they employ 158 people?

Did you know that half of their functional expenses go to paying those people?

Did you know that their functional expenses are 3/4 of their revenue?

Did you know that just 3% of their revenue (4% of functional expenses) is spent on something besides keeping the doors open and the lights on?  This is the "promotion of" part of their mandate.

Keep this in mind when you're thinking about how much they should be charging for a Garand or 1911.  We the people already own those guns, and we're paying for the broker who will sell them back to us.  A broker who managed to lose money on the selling guns, ammo and accessories in the biggest sellers market since Francis Bacon started playing with bat shit.

I would like to add that the reason I'm upset about them losing money on inventory is there simple must be a way to give this stuff away like they apparently have been that doesn't cost the taxpayers $13+ million a year.

Law Abiding Criminal

I obey the law, establish a trust to own my NFA items.

I am accused of being a criminal, because only criminals create trusts for NFA items and that's the only reason anyone would create one.

I obey the law and obtain an 03FFL for buying C&R items.

Repeatedly I end up at the local 01FFL because the only reason someone would get a cruffler license is to bypass NICS.  This is because ALL C&R holders are some kind of criminal.

I'm kind of sick of it.

Meanwhile, there's all manner of people who don't obey any laws who're out there unpunished.

Enter the nation illegally?  You have your own lobby in DC!

Drink and drive and lose your license?  Keep driving!

Wreck someone else's car without insurance?  You won't even get a ticket.

Lots of other examples.

Not Feeling It

I might just have come to the end here.

I got the NRA telling me that Florida Carry is lying about what happened when Florida Carry's story matches what I watched happening.

The NRA seems to forget there are other channels to get the information than their emails and magazines.

The NRA is not admitting to not one, not two, but THREE NRA A-Rated republicans from Miami-Dade have nuked open/campus carry every time it's come to committee.

The NRA is baffled that Florida Carry didn't back their "same but harder" brief exposure bill which doesn't fix the judiciary discretion about what is meant by brief or even allow for intent.

We passed that law, it didn't work.  Passing it again was pointless.  Open carry unequivocally fixes the problem.  A problem that wouldn't be a problem without overzealous prosecutors and anti-gun cops.  Nobody talks about fixing that.

I got lots of people who clearly don't read the bills debating the meaning of the words.

How is it that you think you can debate the meaning when you're not bothering to read it?

Pontification from ignorance?  We got it, aisle four.

"The Federal government has no business telling the states what to do!"

Got it.  You took a paragraph explaining why you think that.  I will now demand the return of chattel slavery because, by your reasoning, the 13th Amendment is invalid or only applies to the Federal level.  Maybe you'd better recheck that conclusion.  Before you go there, the 14th Amendment grants the Federal Government the power to apply this to the states.

But you can't read...

All of this, along with persistent inability to make checkering tools work, has really sapped my joie de vivre.

I Can Ruin Your Stock Too!

Something goes catastrophically wrong every time I try to make the 75˚ cuts.

All I am doing is trying to follow the existing line and making the groove a little wider.

I don't know what I am doing wrong, I can't tell how I did the first lines perfect and can't make any more.

I think this experiment is done.

Good news, my amateur gouges sanded out pretty well.

Price Signalling

CMP says $1,000 for a beater frankengun.

Everyone adds $1,000 to their price for a milsurp M1911A1 on Gunbroker!

No shit.  Three auctions I was watching with mint Remington-Rand made guns ended and went from $1,500 buy-it-now to $2,500 with a $2,000 starting bid.

Wow.

Well, every company that makes a 1911, take notice!

Look at the demand for parkerized, arched mainspring, short trigger, small sighted guns with lanyard rings!

Not one of you make one any more.

Fight The Lizard People!

Sounds like someone wasn't getting the 14 essential vitamins and minerals from chemtrails this week.

Plus!  How many times did you read that story before you noticed that it wasn't in Florida?

Too Focused

I think that sometimes the pro-gun people are too focused on gun law to see how verbiage is used in other law.

The speculation around "what if" scenarios which have actually been covered in other laws is not helping.

There's parties freaking out about "what if" so bad it's bordering on paranoia, from the other side of the border.

1/3 Done

This wood is a pleasure to work with!

Night and day.

1/6 Done

With this side...

This is all the lines in the first direction with the 60˚ 20-LPI cutter.

Next is the lines in the other direction with the same cutter.

Then every line gets a 75˚ and a 90˚ pass.

That's MUCH Better!

Marv's M-25 stock is made from much finer grained and harder wood.  The cutter is cutting like I expected it would from what I'd read before my first ever attempt!

This is officially the most lines I've ever cut without a major mistake, so I'm taking a break for a while.  A light touch seems to work better than heavy pressure, but is a lot more tiring.

The tape is supposed to help with the overruns and confine the checkers to the master lines better.  Fingers crossed.

Disaster

I now know what happens when I keep working past total muscle failure on checkering.

The cutter goes sideways and cuts a huge gouge, ruining four hours of work.

Take more breaks, make sure you're really rested!

I've also read that the wood Savage provided with the 110E was uncheckered for a reason.  It's hard and spongy and thus it was actually kind of impressive I did as well as I had.

Fugly Bear stock is now on the burn pile.

We now begin butchering the stock from Marv's broken Sears M-25.  It started fugly, so there's no worries about destroying it.  There's a crudely cut down hunk of 2x4 extending the pull TO youth length from what appears to be a length of pull as short as a modern Cricket.

Gotta Read Them

I'm a guilty as anyone for going off half cocked in a knee-jerk.

But we really have to actually read these damn bills before we go off on what they're going to do, or not do!

The Fix-NICS/CCW for all 57 50 states bill is a great example of panic coming from all directions.

Did you know it requires doctors to report you to the NICS system and provides financial incentive to falsify reports?

Did you know that it mandates accountants to report their clients to NICS?

Did you know that 57 50 state CCW is a disaster for women fleeing abusive spouses?

I have now read the bill and all of that is a surprise to me.  Those things aren't in there.

There are financial inducements to The States to get off their foot-dragging rears and submit fully and completely their records of who's not supposed to own a firearm.  It's the only tool the Feds have to get The States to do anything.  It's part and parcel of The Federal Leviathan and is in so many laws it's beyond the scope of this rant.  It's extra stuff to have The States do what they were supposed to be doing already.

There's a freak out about parking tickets.  Yes, Virginia, if you don't pay your parking tickets you become a fugitive from justice.  This bill does not create that, or change that.  If becoming a prohibited person from your state reporting your fugitive status to The Feds concerns you... maybe you should have paid the fines?

There's a lot of all or nothing absolutism going on too.  Did you know that you almost always get nothing when you take this position?

We could have taken this position for FOPA... The anti-gun side certainly hoped we would with Hughes' little gift.  Most of what came out of FOPA has been for the good, like clearly defining who is actually a prohibited person!

This bill contains no language changing that status quo.  If you were prohibited before, you're still prohibited now.  If you weren't prohibited before, you're not prohibited now.  Manipulations of the regulations putting people who don't belong in one category or another of prohibited person will occur (and already have) regardless of this bill.  That is a different fight.  Don't fight that fight with this bill, it's not germane.

Bite Me Tetotalers

My celebratory drink!

You Know What

I'd need money I don't have for this one.

I want to buy an M1911A1 from gunbroker.

A UNITED STATES PROPERTY marked M1911A1.

Shipped right to my C&R holding doorstep.

Wanna bet that it's a better gun than CMP will have even if it's not cheaper.

I won't even get fixated on a particular maker.  Bog standard Remington-Rand, parked and plastic is just fine.

Lürning

Trying to make it fit a pattern this time.

This is about an hour and a half's worth of checkering.

Things that I have to still learn... how to prevent those overcuts at the end of my lines.  I think some good thick tape!

I've also been thinking of some ideas for some simple tools to make this easier.

While I was hitting myself over the head about how little I seemed to have learned about this...

I realized that I'm miles ahead of anyone who's never even tried.

Every mistake contains a lesson learned.

Every lesson learned improves my skill.

Fuck The CMP

Details about the 1911 sales.

NICS check before they ship.  If you're one of the folks who routinely gets a conditional when you're submitting a NICS because the Government has fucked up your records?  Yeah, fuck you, no gun.

NICS check upon delivery.

No C&R FFL need apply, has to ship to an 01 because... reasons?

NOTARIZED and signed copy of the 01 FFL.

Resubmit every scrap of qualifying BS.

Limit one per year per customer.

For fucks sake, an M1911A1 isn't an NFA item, kids.

They're also the very definition of a Curio and Relic.  These guns only have value because of their provenance.  A key item in defining a gun as a C&R.  That and the newest one is well past the 50 year cut off date.

Yeah, this juice ain't worth the squeeze.

Blackjack!

Twenty-one!

The 21st Amendment is unique.

It is the only amendment to The Constitution that cancels and nullifies another amendment.

What's also interesting is everyone understood that the Volstead Act was void the moment that the 18th Amendment was revoked.

It was a different time then.

Wet Day

84 years ago Utah signed off on the amendment to end prohibition.

Have a drink!

Kudos!

Watched Atomic Blonde, not only is it a massive nostalgia trip because of the setting and music.

They also have someone get shot with a handgun and not die instantly!

Stolen Valor

This liar is not a WWI vet!  Don't be fooled by fake veterans passing themselves off as the real thing!

h/t GunFreeZone

Thorough

How complete are your zombie preps?

All of the important somatic and material components have been completed on this formerly mundane magazine.

Fail

The UpLULA cannot load a Luger magazine.

You have to pay attention when Loading an Astra 600 magazine because the mouth is narrower than the loader's tongue at the rear.

Other than those two exceptions, it's loaded every 9mm to .45 ACP magazine we've thrown at it.

No Rush But...

An important decision:

Because The Bat no longer lives in the benighted land of mist and rain and I don't know a single person in the equally benighted land of cheese and viridian anchorages...

Do I need to renew my Utah toter's permit in three years?

Heck, by that time we might just have national reciprocity.

It's Not Just The People In Florida

Floridapossum Drinks Entire Bottle

I love the lines...

"[S]he definitely wasn’t fully acting normal.”

and

"She sobered up in a few days..."

Let those among us without sin, cast the first stone...

Here's to you Floridapossum!  Live the dream!

With A Loud, Resounding Pop

Pull your head out of your ass CMP.

When did liberals capture this supposed bastion of citizen gun ownership?

You're going to price the surplus M1911A1's starting "around $1,000" to prevent them from falling into the hands of someone who knocks over a liquor store?  To keep them from being tossed into a glove box?

To insure that they're cherished as heirlooms?

I hate to break it to y'all, but it's very likely that only a specific gun will be thought of as an heirloom by a veteran or their families.

Mine is serial number 1164935, by the way.

1164935 should not be a $1,000 gun.  It had a Remington Rand slide and a Colt frame.  The last time I'd turned it in, the front sight had departed for the second time; the unit armorer had no idea how to set a sight.  I was also the last soldier issued that gun, we drew M9's the next day.

My issue gun was one of the nicer ones too. 

Let that sink in.

The nicer guns are going to be the most refurbished and frankensteined.  Mix-masters which are the least valuable guns NOW!

These guns should be sold at market value, not an inflation of it.  An inflation that likely puts them out of reach of the very people who, dare I say, deserve them the most.

It's probably too much to hope that people will refuse to pay $1,000 for one.

I'll bet that they sell out in a day and those same $1,000 guns will be on Gunbroker for $1,500 starting bid the next day; after some entrepreneur buys a wholesale sized lot.

Just like they did to Garands.

There's a solution to all of this.

Limit ONE.

Put a fair market value on them, like $500.  Limit one per customer.  $100 to look for a specific serial number.  Sell with the understanding that if an inquiry for a specific serial comes in on your gun, you will be contacted with an offer to exchange it for a different gun to facilitate a reunion.

Willard Reminds

"They burned the witch on a pile of faggots."

"How did they get them to hold still long enough to burn?"

"They tied the witch to a stake."

"Not the witch, the faggots!"

How old were you when you learned what the original meaning of faggot was?

The past is another country, and it speaks a different language.

Oh Noes!

A Federal law forcing national CCW reciprocity appears to be scaring the shit out of lots of pro-gun people.

"I don't want the Feds in my CCW!"

Because WOOKIE?

The best that I've seen pried out of them for a reason is a worry about what the Feds will do with standards.

We've seen something of this before with the national standards for commercial driver's licenses.

Aside: National CDL's came about from people who'd been banned from driving from multiple violations just getting a license from a different state.  This is not something that can really happen with CCW.  Something that disqualifies you from having a CCW generally also bars you from possessing a firearm too, so it's not like someone could be convicted of a felony in Florida and run out and get a Utah permit.

That could be worrisome.  If the wrong Congress was looking to do something.

The thing is, that wrong Congress isn't going do small moves like that.  They're going to repeal it.

Say what you will about the anti-gunner Congresscreatures, they've large wedding tackle when it comes to submitting bills.

National CCW reciprocity will be much like the freedom of movement provisions of FOPA.  The states that ban guns will simply ignore the Federal law and jail people.

There's no provision in this bill to punish the governments to violate it.

UPDATE: There's weak provisions in this bill to help prevent it from being ignored, but I recognize this language from someplace else.  I need to find it.  IIRC the problem is that the burden of proof will be on the CCW carrier and relief could come years later, and after a conviction for violating some local statute.  No where does it actually punish any person for violating the rights of the carrier.

I'd love to see a Floridaesque statute that puts the burden on the individual officers and legislators who violate the law and make them personally liable, and unable to use public monies for their defense!  All pre-emption laws should have such.

Even if the problem ban-states comply, this isn't a bad thing.  There will be a media and gun-banner pushed spate of them screaming, "there's unqualified people from out of state being allowed to carry GUNS in our state and we can't do anything about it because we're being FORCED by the Federal Government to let them!"  Until, just like every place that suddenly allowed CCW, nothing happens.

Again.

No blood in the streets.  No gunfights over parking places and fender benders.  Again and still.

Aside: Don't you also love how the anti-gun side will embrace Federalism when it comes to an expansion of gun freedom?

At Least As Valid

I wonder if the Vegas shooter might have been hired to shore up the murder numbers.

The Mafia bought a lot of land under sketchy terms.

It's not inconceivable that there's a murder clause in those darkened back room contracts.

"If there are not X murders per year, the Chicago Outfit gets..."

This is at least as valid and sensical as several theories I've read.

Progression

Like most skills like this there's a clear line where you're flailing on one side, and understand on the other.

I have crossed that line!

I've figured it out and now have a low skill level in the skill.

Hurray for me!

Now to get a higher skill level and learn to stay within a pattern.

This is something that must be aesthetically pleasing as well as brutally functional.

Merger

It appears that some skeletal material that could be said to resemble vertebrae have been located in The House of Representatives on the right side of the aisle.

The NICS Fix has been merged with CCW Reciprocity.

Of course there's still The Senate to contend with...

Diamond

If I did not know any better, I'd say those look like checkering!

I am learning a LOT!

This is another instance where focus on form, speed will come later, is the rule.

Slow is fast.

Cliches are trite.

I need to go get a tape measure to sacrifice for an awl guide.

132 Years

December 1st, 1885 – First serving of the soft drink Dr Pepper at a drug store in Waco, Texas.

Willard refers to this as a dark, dark day.

Bowling Pin AAR

The "new" range with pin shooting does it on Thursdays instead of Sundays.

They don't run for time.

It's double elimination.

We had ten shooters.

I ended up on the loser's tree after a horrid round.

I finished second runner up because of a similar round.

I can see what I'm doing wrong, which is a change from way back.

I have to remember to get the line of my bifocals OFF the sights.

I also need to slow down just a little and align the sights.  I get in a hurry and bury half the front sight in one of the rears instead of centering it between them.

My being a good sportsman plunked me on the loser tree!  I had a perfect run, but agreed to reshoot it because the other shooter had a mechanical failure.

My second elimination was close and if I'd gone a little slower I'd have beat him and finished first runner up.  Maybe.

The winner was the person who put me out the second time...

Tangible Progress

I've a long way to go, but I also know how far I've come.

This is actually looking like checkering!

It's also a place I messed up bad with the spacer jumping around and making a section of 40 lines per inch.

This proves to me that I can recover from some mistakes!

I'm also getting the feel of how the tool works.  You have to rock it as you cut (or at least I do).

My tools cut both directions.  I have better fine control pulling.

HAPPY DANCE!

Where The Heck Have I Been?

Or phrased another way, how did I not notice this thing?

I knew about the LULA.

I own a StripLULA.

The UpLULA has been out for at least ten years and only noticed it because Marv is buying a SUB-2000 2nd-Gen and we figured that loading 33 rounds into a long ass magazine would be tedious by hand.

I have to say, the thing works!

So far I've tested on 9mm M&P, .45 1911, .38 Super 1911, .40 S&W Sigma, .357 SIG Sigma, 9mm BHP, 9mm Beretta M9, 9mm Beretta M1951, 9x18 PA-63 and .380 ACP SIG P238.

The dang thing just works!

Marv got first choice of color, I goaded him into the "lemon" color which is really Zombie Green.

I think that Harvey is going to like this as well and will end up with one in purple.