On that day. . .

Very soon I'll finally have a local place to shoot rifles at long range -- out to a mile I hope.  For that purpose I've started down the road towards my next build: a 7mm WSM built on a Savage action, which I'm just getting started on.  There's nothing picture worthy just yet, but maybe soon I'll show the build process.

To celebrate the hope of long range shooting, check out this picture thread of precision rifles.

More mob violence

This dude was beaten almost to death by a group of guys in Alabama.

Owens' sister, Ashley Parker, saw the attack. "It was the scariest thing I have ever witnessed." Parker says 20 people, all African American, attacked her brother on the front porch of his home, using "brass buckles, paint cans and anything they could get their hands on."

And the media did the country no favors for their works in inciting a race war.  Good job.

I'm going out on a limb and suggesting that this sort of behavior is going to get much much worse in the coming months, and when it does it will be everywhere.  This wasn't a savage beating in Chicago or North East DC; it was in frickin Mobile Alabama.  All cities have their rough spots, but the hatred of man is going to start pouring out from every crack and crevice, so be prepared in your daily life.

Ultra high velocity

And how do I get me some of it?

It turns out that tearing through the atmosphere at 20 times the speed of sound is bad for the skin, even if you're a super high-tech aircraft developed by the government's best engineers at its far-out research agency.

DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency, has made public its best guess about what might have caused its unmanned arrowhead-shaped Hypersonic Technology Vehicle (HTV-2) to suddenly lose contact and crash in the Pacific just a few minutes after slicing through the sky at Mach 20 last August: it was going so fast its skin peeled off.

Hmmm. . . .must not have had a J-4 copper jacket.  Thinking about it, most rifle cartridges struggle to break the Mach 3 barrier, and they're saying this classified flying thingy was going almost seven times that fast!  And that's only what DARPA will publically admit to!  Fantastic.  Now, how do we get this technology to Hornady?  I think it would be great to not have to dial in elevation on my scope to blast a doe at 3,698 yards.

"Nothing like that anywhere in the world"

He's very right -- this is from an episode of Epic Drives where they take a ZR1 Corvette to 200 mph on the Autobahn. Nowhere on earth is there a place that I'm aware of where you can casually drive topped out in a high end sports car for miles and miles without a worry in the world. Several years ago I was cruising as a passenger in a BMW M3 with a friend on our way to Zurich, and he kept the car safely pegged at 155 mph for nearly an hour; the only concern we had was keeping an eye out for faster traffic, as 190 mph Porsches are as abundant in Germany as Civics are here, and I saw one Ferrari F40 and several assorted Lamborghinis drive by in downtown Mannheim. And unlike here in America, "regular" traffic stays to the right for the most part, so there's not miles of cars backed up in the passing lane.

"Ohhh. . . . I was almost there!"

In a 630 horse Corvette, I would have been!!


***ETA: I just clicked through some of my Germany pics and found this one of a Testarosa that drove by in Mannheim:



I remember hearing it from far off like a pissed off grizzly bear coming my way, the sound ecoing off the buildings. Also, 4-wheelers are tagged and legal to drive on the street. One morning on the Autobahn outside of Mannheim we were passed by this guy on his quad while he took the exit ramp. . . . we were doing 90 mph in a crappy rental car at the time and he blew right by:




Germany is a way cool place.

Mission impossible

I love these. I used to be the dick that sent the FNGs out to various places to pick up grid squares, six gallons of rotor wash, the keys to the drop zone, squeegee sharpeners, cordless extension cords. . . .you name it. You know who you're clicked with too when the FNG's mission is perpetuated by your buddies who quickly send them over to the S-4 for a bottle of K-9P lubricant, which as we all know you have to fill out a ID-10T form to get.

Flex those muscles!

Countless F-15 Strike Eagles sitting on the flight line looking like they're about to go kick an invading alien army's ass!

Sometimes you've just gotta show the other dweebs in the gym who's boss.

To infinity and beyond your target

This weekend I was able to sneak out at nap time for a little shooting therapy. I did some load development for my mom's Ruger LCP which went well; I tested out my ammunition weatherproofing skills which also went well, and I started to do some weak hand only (WHO) drills because I hadn't done them in a long time, but that part came to a screeching halt due to safety concerns.

I was shooting next to my brother's fiance' (WHOOOOHOOOOO!!!! Congrats, y'all!!!), ringing the Nevco steel target while shooting with my left hand when I noticed someone walking along a path on the top of the hill from my target. All I could see was from his jaw up, and he didn't seem to have any idea that two people were blasting away not 150 yards from him. The hilltop is part of what used to be a massive dairy farm surrounding my parent's property, but has recently in the past few years fallen into the hands of the Historical [Hysterical] Society; they made it into a Civil War historical thingy where there's a pathway a couple of miles long with information plaques every quarter mile or so. You can't do anything with the land that I know of except walk along the path, and that path happens to take you along a 15 degree angle above the place where I've been shooting for 25 years. It's a rare occasion that anyone actually walks it, but this weekend it happened. We packed up and quit shooting for the day because I couldn't tell where the guy went.

Thinking about it, I've had this very thing happen to me on four other occasions over the last 8 years or so:

- Once while shooting on a friend's private property in the middle of 25 wooded acres, a buddy of his jumped on a 4-wheeler with my friend's 6 year old daughter and went trail riding, and the trail brought them directly behind the dirt backstop we were shooting into. They knew we were shooting before they took off, but they didn't know where they were when they were behind the backstop. My friend called a cease fire and we quit for the day.

- Same friend and I were shooting rifles at 300 yards on a gas-line in the middle of a big piece of property in another county. I was in the middle of a string of fire from a .300 Winchester Magnum when some kids on three 4-wheelers drove into the woods about 200 yards behind the target. I was on the scope and couldn't see them, but my friend called a cease fire and we quit for the day because we couldn't verify where they went.

- Again, same friend and I were shooting on a big piece of privately owned property that was going to become a subdivision one day in the near future. We were shooting rifles at a 350 yard target, I was on the scope touching off 308 Winchester rounds when my buddy called a cease fire. Some curious moron with his young son drove his truck onto the property and drove right up to the target to see what was going on. His truck appeared from behind a hill about 100 feet to the left of the target. They sat in the truck for awhile and then drove off. It just about gave me a heart attack.

- Shooting on a power line on a huge piece of property in the middle of nowhere, I was spotting bullet trace for a buddy of mine while he was shooting a 30.06 at a big target at 650 yards. Right before his 3rd shot, I saw a man's face appear at the top of the target in the distance -- it was four men riding on two 4-wheelers, and they were about another 600 yards behind the target. I yelled cease fire right at the shot, which went low and into the dirt in front of the target. The men rode past us a few minutes later, but we still decided to quit for the day.


Keep in mind that these events happened over the course of about 8 years, and represent only a fraction of a percent of times when I've been shooting and nothing happened. One theme all of them have in common is that the backstop we were shooting into was certain, but the people who appeared were in the direction of fire. Rule #4: Beware of your target and what is beyond it -- this rule is really two rules in one; and unless you break it and another safety rule, you won't shoot anyone. It does help to have someone not shooting to be a general lookout so that if there's a safety issue it can be dealt with quickly. It pays to be observant!

Neat article on Infamous Weapons

Half of these I knew about. What I didn't know is that DC's stupid gun laws almost had Jack Ruby's Colt destroyed; the same one he used to smoke Oswald. Weird.

Also from Neatorama: Cheesecake stuffed strawberries! Awesome!

Here's a fun meme!

I see this meme at Excels at Nothing and I remember now that I didn't get around to the last one, so here it goes:

The most scared I've been on the road:

This is an easy but tough one. There's only one clear choice and it surprises me considering that it was low speed and uneventful compared to a past life I had with automobiles. In my youth a was a wee bit troubled and I took my frustrations out every night in sports cars at very high speeds, treating each nightly run like a video game where I had unlimited lives. In my first four years as a young driver I had wrecked so many cars that DMV would send threatening letters every couple of months telling me that I needed a dealer's license if I intended to buy another ride, and I rarely totaled one in the first few tries. Also in that time I had wallpapered two and a half walls of my bedroom floor to ceiling with various "moving" violations, and until I learned legal defenses I was a productive revenue generator for several counties.

More than once I've crawled out of the remnants of a car scattered an eighth of a mile down a dark highway, the wheels sheared off and the frame lying plumb on the pavement, blood on my face and laughing hysterically. All of my dogs may not have been barking, but I was having a good time just the same. During those times I could afford to play the odds because I was the only one playing the game. That all changed when I had kids. . . .

Just over two years ago I was driving home from my sister's house about five miles away from where I lived. I was in my XTerra with my at-the-time two children in the back. It had been raining hard for over a week and everything was soaked; it was early October if I recall and it was in the middle of the day not one mile from my doorstep. Coming up on a mild left-hand curve on a 45 mph road, an oncoming car "missed" the curve and was going to hit me head on. I didn't have or need any time to react as there was only one course of action: steer hard right and hit the ditch. I'm always consciously aware of an escape outlet for times like these, so it was really kind of casual. When I got scared was when I was past the ditch, drifting sideways in the soaked grass and mud trying not to hit the line of trees parallel to the ditch head-on; the branches were tearing down the right side of the truck and I could see in the mirror that my kids were leaning to the left, away from the doors. I'll never forget the sound. I was praying quietly that the glass would hold and that the body of the car wouldn't snag on one of the trees.

All went well and I got control of the car and got it stopped. My kids were screaming in terror and I did my best to calm them down. What floored me the most was when another car stopped to help, and for the first time in my life I couldn't even begin to form a sentence to talk to them. I have a feeling it was just a long clump of cuss words that I spoke. I was shaking, nauseous, pumped chock full of adrenaline, and scared as hell. This is from a guy who used to laugh at the "metallic thud" sound my car made when I hit something solid at speed.

As it turns out it was the oncoming driver's very first week on the road, and I have a suspicion that she was paying attention to her phone and not to curve ahead. She was really torn up about it and bawling her eyes out, but I told her that for her inaugural car accident, when nobody is bleeding and in pain that it's a good day. My brother and brother in law came and transferred my kids to their cars and took them home since there was no "collision" and no need for medical attention. The ditch I hit was substantial, and even with all the replacement parts the girl's insurance company bought for my XTerra it was never the same again, and has since died a slow death over the last two years.

I definitely think the contributing factor to me being scared and shaken up was the fear for my kids. I still don't get shook up at close calls when I'm by myself on the highway, but if you were wondering I drive like an old man these days. My reckless race car days are long gone.

Which one of you made this video?

Own it!

Casting bullets before swineflu

I have successfully come back to the land of the living now that the sickness has released its grasp, so to celebrate I thought I'd show off what I was doing on Saturday, which was during the worst of it. I felt like a pale, clammy, fever-filled fireball casting oh-so-beautiful boooolits in the backyard!

Actually, I was mostly casting lead ingots using my wife's muffin pans:



If you buy wheel weights from the scrapyard, you would be surprised at how you can turn three mostly filled buckets of lead, steel clips, razor blades, and dried up dip balls into lead pucks by melting them all down in a iron pot. Just know that when you melt down what you put in it, don't try to dump any more into the hot melt or molten lead will literally explode all over the place; the melt doesn't like anything cold or wet to touch it.

Afterwords, it's best to not use the muffin tins for food, or even bring them into the house again. Tinseled muffins may look delicious, but it really settles into the bottom of your stomach!

Here's a pic of me warming the shiny new Lyman 9mm mold that I got:



Yes, my gloves are flashing gang signs.

I sorted the bullets last night that I had made on Saturday and only about a third were good. There's a couple of reasons for this, the first being that new molds take some time to "learn;" and second, I was paying more attention to casting ingots. I had a couple of buckets of wheel weights sitting around, and now I have one bucket full of clean lead pucks that fit nicely into my LEE 10lb melter. Being able to grab a handful of lead ingots when making a batch of bullets is way easier than trying to melt individual wheel weights in your casting melter, and makes the mass production of target bullets a snap. Now that I think about it, I'm going to start looking for either a 115 grain or 124 grain semi-wadcutter mold for mass bullet production. I'll save a ton of lead that way (pun intended).

In other news, my Concealed Carry Concepts Shaggy holster came in the mail yesterday:



It has excellent fit and finish, but sadly doesn't have a lick of duct tape. Here you can see the "wedge," which is much better done than the one I did:



I'm thinking he must have a die or something to make the wedge so clean. I really dig the leather backing on the holster; it should make high round count range sessions a lot more comfortable.

I was also able to redeem myself Saturday night by making my brother a serviceable holster for his Walther PPQ. I was embarrassed that he was walking around with the one I had made the other night. I still haven't been out shooting for some time, which is unfortunate because I've got all sorts of things going on that I need to get done. For one, I've started reloading some quality .380 acp ammo for a Ruger LCP for my mom, as promised to her; I've got some more ammunition weather proofing tests to do; I've got a full sized Mosin Nagant to sight in, and I want to nail down a target load for the P30 with my new 147 grain cast bullets. Too many irons in the fire!

FNH MK20 combat sighting

On the US SOF thread at ARCOM, page 47, is a picture of some SOF dude with a MK20 just like I oogled at the Modern Day Marine Convention two years ago. I hope it's doing well as a combat weapon.

The enemy within burns bright

This past Friday I got home from work and all was well, and within a half an hour timespan the sickness crept up on me and took me down like an old sick deer. Saturday and Sunday found me alternating between the chills and burning fever, with super swollen tonsils and eardrums. Having a fever Saturday morning worked out well for me though: I spent the morning outside in the 55ish degree weather in a T-shirt, sweat pouring from my face as I cast 147 grain flat-nose bullets. Even with that, it's been complete agony the past few days, and unless there's a break in the pain, tomorrow isn't looking so well either. I haven't been sick on a level like this in a long time. I have some fun filled pictures from Saturday to post, and maybe I'll get around to that tonight or tomorrow morning some time.

Repelling boarders

Finally we see what a few guys with AR rifles can do when pirates try to board their vessel. It's a frickin' turkey shoot.




They even gave the pirates the courtesy of warning shots and they still tried to take the ship. Just after the 2 minute mark you can hear incoming rounds from other pirates.

The devil on your shoulder

I received a text yesterday from my brother asking if "any reasons come to mind as to why I shouldn't go buy it [a Walther PPQ]?" Hmmmmmm. . .what to do. . .what to do. What would I do in his situation? Firearms being a major investment and all, and spendy at that, I knew I needed to give this question my complete and total consideration, so I allotted a good .087 microseconds out of my not very busy day to respond in favor of the acquisition of said pistol. I mean, there's no way I was going to give my own flesh and blood bad advice. Truth be told, I had already read lots of forum threads and reviews on the gun and all of them held it in high regard. It's a sexy looking handgun too.



It's virtually the same size as the P30, with a .15" longer barrel. The grip feels a scootch shorter than the P30, but still retains a 15-round magazine capacity.




Holding the gun, there is almost no discernable difference between the feel of the grip between these two pistols. The angle and size are the exact same, with the P30 feeling more scratchy with its texture and the PPQ feeling a little more sticky. I think the PPQ's grip alleviates the main complaint of the P30's: the P30's grip tears and scratches the skin, making you wear an undershirt to prevent it.


The striker fired PPQ has a gorgeous trigger. I agree with the reviews I've read calling it a much improved Glock-like trigger; it has not a lot of takeup before the sear engagement, with a clean and predictable break without much or any overtravel. Reset is short, crisp, and tactile. Since the gun is brand new, there's a touch of grittyness in the takeup, but I've read that that goes away. The takeup is not heavy, but it's not light either like the HK's LEM trigger. I think that Walther did it right with this one.

While my brother was over, I made a trashy holster for it with the sparse materials I had lying around. With the last little piece of .093" kydex I had left, my intent was to make a riveted IWB/OWB holster with belt slides for OWB carry and pull-the-dots for IWB carry, but I didn't have enough material to do it. I ended up turning the abomination into the worst looking AIWB holster I've ever made, with the promise that when my kydex shipment comes in hopefully today or tomorrow I'll make a better one. He still needs to put a gizzilion rounds through it and test out some carry loads anyways, so we have time.



This whole ordeal is not the same as, but not quite unlike buying your spouse a Benelli shotgun or something and then innocently trying to tell her that one day she'll warm up to it, and until then you'll just keep is safe and maintained. My brother has a keen eye and is very informed when it comes to firearms, and putting myself in his shoes told me that I would request his council to give me that last 5% that I needed to commit to a gun purchase in a heartbeat. He wasn't asking because he didn't know if it was a quality piece; he was already writhing on the hook and wanted to see if I would pull him off for any reason. So if you look at it that way, I'm not really an enabler. He did tell me that I need to come over and shoot it most ricky-tick. Oh the things I put up with to appease my brother. . . . !!

BREAKING NEWS!!!

It seems that the US military makes lots of noise on its bases while practicing the art of killing people and breaking their stuff! Shocking, I know. As far as I've heard, there's not a suppressing device to quiet 155mm artillery rounds when they detonate, and the suppressors for the guns themselves is a no go. Also, when you close bases and transfer personnel to other facilities, there ends up being more vehicles and noise. Again, shocking.

Well, the local rag has posted the annual "the US Army base is loud and disruptive" article, and it's just like all the others that have been posted since Fort A.P. Hill opened in 1941. To put this into perspective, it would be like me moving in right next to a farm and then writing the local paper because the air smelled whiffy.

"Calling Captain Obvious! Come in, Captain Obvious. . . .do you read me, over?"

"Gunny, I can't get him. There's no response."

I admit, I do whine a bit about all the traffic and morons flooding into this area, but I would sooner see the roads clogged with HETs and MTVRs than Camries and Explorers. And while I have no idea why all these folks would want to live here, I do understand exactly why Soldiers, Marines, Airman, and Sailors would want to have 75,000 acres of their very own to practice shooting their unique weaponry.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to write a letter to the paper to get whatever idiot(s) that keep putting yellow dust all over my cars and stuff to stop.

If it's broke, fix it

I'm a rather strange cat in that I can be completely calm and collected after crawling out of the smoldering wreckage of a car accident, but then lose my mind when I can't get the lid off a mayonnaise jar. I know it's backwards, but whatever. That being said, one of the little trifling things in life that agitates me to no end is watching two of my small children struggle to buckle their seat belts in the back of the van.

In this day and age, we have minivans with more horsepower than the V-8 sportscars I had in the 80's and 90's; we have sensors that tell you when your tires are running low; there's sensors in cars that can tell if you've been in a collision and will route a telephone call right to your upside down vehicle; there's rear facing backup-cameras, FLIR cameras, bluetooth, navigation systems. . .etc. etc. etc. ad nauseum. But for some frickin' reason we can't make inertial locking mechanisms on seatbelts to allow kids to pull the needed slack to buckle up unless every stinking millimeter of belt is first fed back into the reel. I mean, the car isn't running, hasn't moved in days, and is sitting calmly in the driveway, so why oh why does the seatbelt insist on staying locked!!! Do you have any idea at how wonderful it would be if my kids could buckle their own seatbelts?!?! Oh, the time it would save me not having to crawl to the back of the minivan to un-jam the least sophisticated safety device in the car!!

This technological blunder drives me crazy because I thought mankind could do better. It reminds me of this picture:



For all our alleged intelligence, it's a marvel mankind is still at the top of the food chain.

Appendix Carry Illustrated

AIWB threads pop up in forums here and there and it's unfortunate that internet cowboys with no knowledge or experience feel the need to throw in their two cents, muddying the water. To counter this I decided to make some simple, yet creepy, illustrations to show my dear readers the mechanics of how this form of carry is supposed to work.

Before we get into the pictures, the first thing to clear up is: Why? What does appendix carry (AIWB) have to offer that other modes of carry do not? The main answer is concealability. If you haven't noticed, there's an arms race amongst the firearm manufacturers to make the smallest and lightest blaster chambered in the largest caliber they can reasonable cram into it. The reason to go small is so you can conceal it, and thus not draw the ire and shame of your fellow Wal-Mart shoppers while browsing hemorrhoid cream. The only problem with that is that smaller guns are hard to shoot, are chambered in sub-calibers, hold limited ammunition, generate tons of muzzle flash, blast, and recoil, and with their small grips and frames can be more difficult to draw. A solution is to carry a larger gun, but they're harder to conceal. This is where AIWB comes in; I'm of average height, weight, and frame, and I can carry and conceal a Glock 17 -- a service sized pistol -- with absolute comfort all day long. Dropping down to Glock 19 or HK P30 size is no sweat, and now you have a gun that is reasonable in size, carries a standard payload of ammunition, has a full sized grip, and with its reasonable sight radius allows one to actually aim it instead of merely pointing. Second to that is draw speed approaching that of a USPSA Grand Master (a little bit of embellishment there, but lots of speed, none the less).

The main thing that the morons on gun forums chant is their squeamishness at pointing a holstered handgun at their twigs and berries, or femoral artery. First off, unless you're carrying a J-frame or short slide auto way off your centerline, you're not going to be aiming at your femoral artery, as I'm going to demonstrate. Second, get over the gun being pointed at your crotch; if it's in a serviceable holster, then the trigger is covered and there's nothing to be concerned about. If you have concerns that your gun will spontaneously discharge in your holster then carrying a firearm in any fashion is not for you. Have you ever tried pocket carry? Carried in a shoulder holster? If you have then your loaded albeit holstered handgun has been pointed at everyone: kids, grandma, the guy at register behind you at the liquor store; that's why you don't buy shitty holsters, so that when you snap your gun into that sucker it becomes just another inert object that you carry around with you.

Now that that's out of the way, here's some pics:

This is me with a Glock 17 carried appendix style:



The gun is close to my centerline, but not actually on it. I'd say it was at my 1 o'clock. This is what the gun looks like in relationship to my femoral artery:



Not pointing at it, huh? Amazing. Well now the next thing people whine about is how uncomfortable it "must" be when sitting. I say "must" because these folks have never tried to AIWB, or at the very best they pulled some canted IWB holster out of a box and gave it a try for ten minutes before passing judgment, and just assume that it's uncomfortable. I'm here to tell you that if you have a holster that lends itself to AIWB carry, it's as comfortable or more so than carrying on your hip. Here's why:




Yes, that's a creepy mannequin picture; get over it. Try googling "sitting mannequins" to get a sense at how disturbed this world really is, and then get back to me.

Anyhow, take notice of the crease of the hip meets the leg, and how the holster or muzzle avoids jamming into the thigh area. It really shouldn't touch it at all. Also notice that the gun and holster are sitting upright, so the back of the slide is not pushing into the abdomen. This picture depicts the gun at 12 o'clock, right on the centerline. If you want to move the gun further from the centerline and more towards your pocket, you need to either raise your pants or shorten the slide:




Some people still prefer to carry smaller guns like a J-frame revolver, and if you do then you can probably carry it directly over the leg, as the barrel is short enough to allow it. Doing that does make the gun point at the femoral artery, but if you have a serviceable holster then this is moot. The closer to your centerline the gun is, the longer slide/barrel length you can get away with. Go back to the first mannequin picture and see how much room you have for the muzzle. This is how people get away with carrying a full sized 1911. The only danger here is that with a long slide, you have to sit down on hard surfaces carfully, or you could smash a nut under the muzzle of the gun. So be smooth. Also, a gun with a longer slide/barrel will help to keep the grip tucked towards your body; where your body pushes out against the muzzle makes the gun see-saw against the belt, torquing the top of the gun in.

The other thing you can do is reverse-cant the holster:



This works fine as long as there's enough room to get your fingers wrapped around the grip; you don't want the grip to be sitting right on your belt unless you don't care if your draw speed is slowed down.

From what I gather, the belief about the gun being uncomfortable while sitting stems from the idea that the back of the slide, where the hammer is, will jam into your guts. If it is jamming into your guts then you have the wrong holster. . . period. It shouldn't happen. If you're sitting with a straight back, the gun should be straight up and down too. If you're reclined, the gun should be parallel with your spine. When you sit up, the gun should slide over your abdomen and rest vertical; wearing an undershirt helps this because it keeps the gun from grabbing at your skin and belly hairs. If you're going to experience discomfort, it's going to either be under your belt where it rides over the holster, or it's going to be in the crease of your crotch where the muzzle is. Concerning the former, loosening your belt a notch will usually fix the discomfort; and I highly recommend pants that have elastic sewn into the waist which will allow some "give" for when you get back into the car after eating two triple pounders with cheese. Regarding the latter, that's caused by your oversized guts pushing out on the back of the slide, using the belt as a fulcrum to tilt the muzzle into your body. A daily regime of exercise to lose your gut is one remedy, or you can go up one waist size for your pants. If you have a large gut, moving the gun away from your centerline will get it out of the way.


Hopefully this helps stiffle the yayhoos who don't know what they're talking about. I learn well from pictures, and showing the mechanics of what's involved can be helpful.

OWB concealment for the ladies

This teeny lady shows how easy it is to conceal a Glock 19 with two spare mags wearing jeans and a cover garment. It can be done!

Lights, camera, action

I've got a whole lot of nothing for you this morning except this clip from the movie Proof of Life starring Russell Crow and David Caruso. ***NSFW Warning: Language, gore, bad-guy-getting-his-throat-cut-out-with-a-multitool, hostiles-getting-massacred-with-a-M249***




The tactics are pretty realistic, or I should say much more realistic than most militaristic action scenes out there. I found the clip in an ARFCOM thread and thought I'd pass it along.

There are various Colt M4ish carbines, an M203, an M249 SAW, some decrepit AKs, a LAW launcher, some M67 grenades, and my favorite - what looks like a Colt officer's 1911. Enjoy.

Why scumbags always gotta be scumbagin' up in this piece?

You may remember hearing about a dude with a CCW getting jumped at a gas station by two scumbags in Dayton, Ohio sometime last year, and he blasted one of the morons twice in the guts with a .45 caliber Glock. There's a huge thread on it with input from the man who blasted the moron at Ohioans For Concealed Carry, which also details the shenanigans that went down after the shooting by the moron who didn't get shot, along with his inbred family. Well, it appears that that second moron done gone and got himself shot too at another gas station over what looks like a drug deal gone bad.

This is a clear indicator of the fact that most people who are shot with handguns survive. Moron #1 who was shot twice last year survived, and from what I've heard is serving time somewhere. Moron #2 was shot in the neck, and one of his accomplices was shot in the legs. Both encounters were filmed, so we get an inside look into the scumbaggery.

If you want more details on both shootings, either go to the one OFCC thread above, or check out the Shooting of Moron #1 and Shooting of Moron #2 at ARFCOM.

Who says torture isn't effective?

Last night I was setting dinner on the table for the kids and was short one fork, so I went to the drawer to get one, but there were none. Remembering the dishes in the dishwasher were clean, I reached in there to fetch one and when I did, a tine from one of the forks slipped about a quarter of an inch up under my thumbnail. In the space of about ten seconds afterwords, I confessed to all sorts of things, though I'm reasonably sure I didn't give up any cuss words. I had an audience of impressionable people, and I've been making a genuine attempt to not swear anymore. I could have done better with my temper, though.

The Walking Dead roundup

I just finished up season 2 last night; and believe it or not, my wife and I didn't even start watching the show until early last week, but we're caught up now. There's plenty of reviews and threads out there that cover everything well, so I thought I'd collect some links and drop them off here.

***Spoiler Alert in case you record shows and haven't finished yet. Just a friendly Spoiler Alert here. (Ace of Spades ruined it for me. Thanks jackass!)****


My favorite - College Humor: 10 Reasons Why The Walking Dead Should Just Kill Carl. Spot on. I would have had serious words with worthless Lori after the first time that stupid boy went wandering off, and after the sixth or seventh time Lori would be sporting irish sunglasses and both of them would be handcuffed in the basement. I get that boys wander about to do boyish things - I did when I was a boy - but that isn't acceptable behaviour during the zombie apocalypse. Really this one all boils down to poor script writing, in that Carl is only a facilitator to get everyone isolated in small groups in the woods.

Castra Praetoria: The Walkind Dead: There's No Crying In The Zombie Apocalypse and Thoughts On The Walking Dead, Season 2. America's 1stSgt points out that the scavenging and security abilities of the survivors are shit-in-a-brown-bag (thanks, Dad!). All the M16s and M4s laying around haven't been picked up, and the main character's weapon of choice for two whole seasons only holds six rounds. What does that tell you? The gun handling and weapon expertise in general in the show is terrible, and the show's execs need to find a competent firearms trainer and fix it. That would go a long way towards satisfying some of the estimated hundreds of millions of Americans who actually know a thing or two about guns and security.

Cracked: 5 Reasons 'The Walking Dead' Has to Get Better. I especially note the part about Dale; every time he started talking I treated it like it was a commercial. Who cares about morality in the zombie apocalypse? Seeing him ripped apart was such a relief. If the show is going to keep a stockpile of zombiefood characters to add occasional sadness and tension, the least they could do is not let them speak (Carrol). And yes, the farm was a terrible place to film the show.

ARFCOM Walking Dead season 2 thread. This is just for general entertainment. At 230+ pages, there's a lot to read if you're in to that sort of thing.


I didn't read the comic books, but I dig the show. I do think season 2 started to get really dull about halfway through, and hope that somebody does something about the laughable gun handling for the 3rd season. Pity the 2nd season had all those lush fields for someone with an AR rifle and a couple ounces of skill to pick off tons of zombies, and they missed the opportunity because the script writers decided to let Carl wander off for the 19th time. And Lori needs to get eaten, or lose her footing and stumble into a running wood chipper. Seriously, now that Dale is dead, she's hands down the worst character, and on top of that she is now relieved of having to choose between Rick and Shane, meaning that her presence on the show is now pointless. What kind of drama can she drum up now? Her character sucks and she should be the first to go. Even clueless Carrol is capable of picking one dude to want to be with, and mostly keeps her mouth shut.

I do like the zombies though. I'm more in favor of the slow, mindless zombies instead of smart zombies who are quick in their feet. Early into the first season I told my wife that I would have a sword, which means that I would have to make one, probably out of a leaf spring from a car. The cutesy Gerber machete thingies would do fine for one engagement, but there's a reason the Spartans and Romans didn't make their edged weapons out of eighth inch steel - longevity and toughness. If you're going to make it picking off small groups of zombies for months on end, and don't want to attract giant herds with gunfire, you need a substantial piece of hardened steel so you can save your ammo for shooting food. I'd also want a sword for close in encounters that are typical of the show, and not a pistol that holds a finite amount of ammo. That's my take.


***ETA: Check out IMFDB thread on the guns of The Walking Dead. The gun that Sheriff Woody Rick Grimes uses is a Colt Python, and there are also Sigs, Glocks, Brownings, Mossbergs, and a plethora of other guns. I note that T-Dog's Glock is a Glock 19, not a Glock 17. You guys are slippin!!

All hail my dorkiness

Dorkiness isn't recognized by spellcheck, by the way. Anyhow, because I have very little shame, I give you some pictures of the epi-pen holster I made:



In the wild:




The 1/4" holes in between the two epi-pens are for one half of the rivet dies to pass through, which sandwiches the neoprene support between the holster body and a flange that rests against my sock. The holster is reasonably comfortable, at least for the next few weeks or months until I have the time to make a better one. This one was done on the fly, with little to no planning, but now I have a better idea on what would work. Retention is by the way of friction (no screw to tighten), and it's very secure. It stays put and doesn't wander around my ankle; that's more than I can say about my old method of sticking one of the pens in my sock.

The important thing is that they're both on me at all times, so my main requirement is met. There's lots of "stuff" in between the liquid medicinal goodness and the 98.6 degrees of my leg -- epi-pen cartridge, case, kydex holster, neoprene, kydex flange, sock -- so I should be within the temperature excursion requirements. It's secure, so I won't lose them, so that's another requirement met.

I don't suppose that there's a market for such a device, especially since I didn't make it out of platinum and hang a bunch of charms and stuff from it, or border it in faux barbed wire. People can be so fickle. Hey, why are you laughing? Are you laughing at what I just said, or are you. . . . oh. . . .right. Yes, I'm a dork. But where are your epi-pens?

Range Report

I left work on Friday and headed straight to the range to shoot. I wanted to try out the latest batch of handloads in the P30. So how did it pan out? Well, as usual I clicked off five factory Speer Gold Dots, 124 grain +P, just to get another data point under higher temperatures (81 degrees), and my velocity was 1,191 fps, with an extreme spread of 34 fps. A nine round group of my 124 grain Gold Dot handloads gave me - 1,191 fps and an extreme spread of 24. I can't do any better than that.

The tenth handloaded round went into denim clad water jugs to find out if they do as well as the factory rounds I water tested, and I don't have a picture but the expanded bullet looks identical, and measured almost the exact same -- .55" at the widest point. Denim has a way of slowing the expansion process a bit, but it doesn't seem to be able to stop a Gold Dot.




Also, the handloads shot to point-of-aim at 25 yards and 50 yards, just like the factory rounds, so no sight adjustment is necessary. Something I've never tried before until a few days ago is sealing the primer and case mouth, and I did it because CCI/Speer seals the primer/case mouth on the Gold Dot line. I've read that it doesn't make a bit of difference in real world testing, but I found out from my testing that it certainly does. I submerged three rounds each of non-sealed and sealed handloads for five days; one round of each tip up, tip down, and on its side, and I had two of the non-sealed rounds give me lower velocities than normal (801 and 851 fps), and one of the sealed rounds gave me 1,018 fps. Since the sealed rounds were my very first attempt and my technique sucks, I'm giving it another try against factory Gold Dots to see if I can match or beat their standard.

While I was there my brother and I ran another 250 rounds of Federal 115 grain loads through the P30, and he shot his M&P Pro at the plates. That puts my trouble-free round count at 1,798 rounds, and my brother's somewhere in the neighborhood of 4,000 rounds he reports. Plastic guns are super reliable these days.

Saturday I was home with just me and my two youngest sons, basically kidless for me, and I took the time to wash approximately 4,000 9mm cases in preparation for some bulk reloading. I've decided to cast 147 grain bullets for this gun, so that's going to be underway here very shortly.



I also got a chance to make a double epi-pen ankle holster, a picture of which I didn't get a chance to upload yet. My wife halfway mocks me on the matter, considering what a huge dork that I am, but I'm not out to win any fashion shows and I remind her that I am now carrying both epi-pens with me at all times. My next move is to make that medical ID bracelet I've been bitching about.

That's what I've got for the moment. Anyone else have a ranger report to share?

Spacial profiling

Old NFO has a post regarding a LEO's instincts and perception while looking for scumbags, and something from that conversation with said LEO brought back a memory of mine from a few years back. The quote from Old NFO's post that provoked the memory:

"Another point he made is he picks out a lot of CCW people by their attention to their surroundings and having one hand free at all times. He said paying attention will, many times 'cue' him to that person, and he goes down his mental checklist, then goes back to scanning for the perps. He said the perps tend to be much more furtive, and once he sees one, he starts looking for others (as most gangbangers tend to run in groups of at least three or more)... "

I am hyper aware of my surroundings when I'm out and about, and I didn't get that way because I get a kick out of it. I learned to instinctively, and this is a total recall of a non-incident that I feel would have gone differently had I not been paying attention to my personal space that led me to be this way:

It was approximately five or six years ago, because I recall only being out with my wife -- no kids. I was armed to the teeth, as per the usual, and my wife and I had stopped at a McDonald's for some grease induced sickness before heading out to who knows where. This particular McDonald's is the oldest one in town; really, Adam and Eve used to get McFish sandwiches and apple pies from this place, it's that old, and the local vagrants that live in the nearby woods come out to panhandle in this area now as it's in the center of town.

I'm paranoid of McDonald's anyways because when I was in High School I worked at a little McDonalds for about two months, and my old manager was shot in the back by two scumbags who held up another McDonalds across town the same week I quit. She was in the process of emptying the cash drawers when they shot her, and fortunately she survived.

Anyhow, we're waiting for the food to cook as we have already paid, and there's only about half a dozen people in the restaurant at the moment, when this thuggish looking teenager comes in the door on the East side of the building. He doesn't look at the menu or even enter the store at all; he walks just inside the door and steps one step to the side and with a poker face watches the two or three people ordering at the register for a couple of minutes. I noticed him immediately and didn't like the look of him, and I thought I had seen him with two other teens walking around outside when we first got there. Well, as soon as I thought it one of the other teens walks in from the West door, a female, and she quickly makes her way to the restrooms. A minute or two later the third teen -- also thuggish looking -- comes in the West door and steps off to the side like the first kid and is watching the people in line.

The alarm bells are so loud in my head I wondered if anyone else could hear them. Both teens stood there like statues at the doorway for about three minutes, the whole time closely watching the people at the registers, and I was trying my hardest to burn holes through their skulls with lazer beams from my eyes. I had been sitting down when they first came in but then stood up, and they both noticed that I was gazing right at them the whole time, back and forth like a dog watching a tennis match. I didn't stop looking at them until they remembered that playstation tourney at their friend's house that they were late to, and they turned right around and went out the doors they had came in from, almost at the exact same moment. About thirty seconds later the chickeedee finished whatever she was doing in the bathroom (loading her frickin' Uzi, I'm convinced), and joined her buddies and left. My firm belief is that they were going to rob the place, and noticed that I wasn't one of the grass eaters like in all the other places they had robbed.

I can't say whether I would have been able to save the day or not, but the very second one of those kids pulled a weapon it would have been the Matrix lobby scene all over again. Since then I make it a point to watch what's going on whenever I'm outside of my house. LEOs like in Old NFO's post are perceptive because they have to be, but there's no reason at all why anyone else can't pay attention. That isn't an excuse to be a vigilante, but it does mean that you should know what's happening in the public space where you're at.

Carrying with kids

This video is the first I've ever seen on the subject of carrying a firearm while out and about with kids, which is something I deal with almost every day. I'm not about to make a video, but I'll take a minute or two to pour out my thoughts.

When most folks consider being armed in public and mentally rehearse how they would act if a squad of jihadi-joes in full shemagh attacked the Piggly Wiggly they're shopping in, they no doubt think their reaction is going to be all VTAC and highspeed. That's all fine and great, and practicing the tactical reload stuff with that drop leg rig while maintaining cover and full magazine retention is awesome, but the reality is that a great deal of folks are not in the realm of any of that. I'm a full on walking arsenal when I go out for the day with my family, and train fairly often, and I can say with absolute certainty that I have zero use for the Jack Bauer stuff. But I live in a different world.

First thing to point out about being out with kids, especially little children or toddlers, is that your sidearm may not (probably won't be) accessible at all times. You can have the finest and fastest kydex that money can buy concealed with an awesome Arc'teryx jacket, and you won't be able to get to it when the arm you typically draw with is holding a 20 lb bag of drool. You can carry your kid on the opposite hip from your weapon, but sooner or later you're going to switch arms for some reason, probably when you're fishing for your keys three steps from your car (when you're potentially the most vulnerable to predatory scumbags), and there you are basically unarmed. Practicing drawing with your support hand is good to go, and I would encourage learning to do that, but having a separate small auto or revolver available for your support hand would be even better. It's almost as if J-frames and Kel-Tecs were designed to ride comfortably in a pocket for this specific reason; I don't know and I can't say for sure.

To complicate things: you're holding your kid with your support arm so that your shooting arm is free to access your heater in case the Hostiles decide to make your day, but didn't you walk into that store to buy something? Which hand were you planning on carrying that case of Keystone Light in? Where are your car keys? Are you alone, or do you have a spouse or family member with you? Do you only have one kid?

That last point is crucial for folks like me; I have three toddlers and a baby, and when I'm alone with them it can be really tough. When I go to the store, I have one shopping cart completely dedicated to kid transport, and I still have one on the ground holding my hand. If I need to pick up lots of stuff, I'll have two carts. Two or three kids is basically just as hard because you have to look after them first and foremost. And to further muddy the water, all that "grabbing cover" and "limiting your exposure" that you learned about during that weekend gunfighting academy -- are you really going to break from your stroller to find cover, leaving your heathen spawn crying in the middle of the parking lot or medicine aisle? Oh yeah, we can't do that, huh? Now think about this hard: if you are unfortunate enough to end up in a gunfight with some banger while you're near your kids, are you going to cover them with your body or move away to try and draw fire away from them (assuming that in the moment you have mental ability to calculate the choice)? I've thought about it, and in the end I find the answer to be in what bodyguards do in a protective detail. They put their body in between who they're protecting and whatever the biggest threat is. I was watching a show on the Secret Service on NatGeo or something the other day, and one agent explained how they were trained to "get big" when taking fire in order to catch more incoming rounds with their body; and sure enough, while showing the video playback from when Hinkley tried to shoot Reagan, one agent did just that at the first crack of the assassin's gun, making himself a larger target. Amazing. That agent absorbed a round that could very well have ended Reagan's life. I note too that "getting big" is the opposite of military and other doctrine on surviving a gunfight, which teaches you to "get small." So there's that to think about.

Next up to talk about is awareness. This is even more important when you have distractions, like the screaming thing in the stroller you're pushing. I always always always have a plan when I leave a store, and the car keys are already out and in my hand before crossing the parking lot or wherever. Standing there in the dark next to your car is not the time to be fumbling with anything, so be ready before you walk out. The kids are the very first priority; get them in the car first, and then load your stuff. If there's some sort of danger, you can drive off without your stuff. It's just stuff and can be replaced. Pay attention to your surroundings. One good thing about having kids is that no yayhoos approach me anymore to ask for smokes or money; I guess they assume I have none because I just spent all mine on the visible boxes of diapers.

When I go out with the kids without my wife to say a mall or large store, I park right next to a shopping cart return with at least one cart, and I typically park way out in the middle of the parking lot where there's no other cars around. Scumbags use cover and concealment, and I'd rather see them coming from far off. Being next to a cart return means I don't have to wander away from the car to return it when I'm done. If I'm carrying a kid in one arm and stuff in the other, the kid goes on the support arm side because I'll drop whatever is in my strong side hand if I need to. When getting gas, or at any time when the kids are in the vehicle and I'm not, all the doors are unlocked, that way I can get in from any part of the vehicle if I need to. I will not get into an argument or pissing match with anyone when out with my family (or by myself; it's good policy). I don't need to prove that I'm a man, so I'm not going to risk getting into a fistfight where I can potentially be knocked out, allowing the dude who hit me to ride off in my car with my kids. This is doubly true if you have a kid in one of the slings the lady in the linked video has. I know there are some who have their heart set on knife fighting their way through the Tangos because they ran their FDE pistol dry stacking bodies, but try that with your son in an ERGO and you'll be sorry. The fist fight scenario is a heavy argument to throw at naysayers who tell you you don't need a gun because a real man only needs his hands. A real man would see clearly that fighting while holding a child is a no-go. On top of that, I know highly trained, physically fit, bona fide badass and very large men that have been maimed by one lucky punch that got through and connected, and that ain't gonna be me.

Violent flash mobs: I haven't heard about any of these in awhile, but they present a challenge if you have kids. With one kid, you can probably pick them up and run off -- hopefully. If you're alone with two or more kids, that's not going to be an option, so I'm of the opinion that my kids are going to get stuffed in a closet or car or off the beaten path somewhere while I try to fend off any savages. If it comes down to it, I hope one shot would be all it takes to disperse the crowd, but I think being prepared for the worst is important. That definitely wouldn't be the time I'd want to be standing there with a J-frame and five extra rounds on a stripper clip. A good fighting auto is a must, with at least one spare reload; two if I'm going out for the day and I have adequate time to prepare.

Lastly, unless I'm in the store, you won't finding me dickering around with my cellphone. I'm paying attention to everything, and I don't tarry in parking lots to browse facebook on my phone or call my mom about the burn on my finger. I can do that at home. I think when my kids are a little older, we'll discuss how to work as a team when out and about, with a "code word" or other indicator that there's danger or to leave the area. By then at least some of my kids will be a bit more useful. Right now, my oldest is the only one who can get the seatbelt clicked on her own, while everyone else needs help for everything.

(H/T The Firearm Blog)

Who knew pop videos could be tasteful?

Katy Perry's new music vid leaves out the dancing sluts, doesn't paint the Marine Corps as a bunch of baby killers, and Perry herself doesn't look like she slathered herself in Elmer's Glue and ran around the Hobby Lobby, adorning herself in random shiny things. Some bigshot media exec must have called in sick that day. There's still the weird Horus eye thing near the end though:


I got a kick out of the ARCOM thread on this one, with the Marines picking out the flaws in the video. I say it's a more accurate depiction than anything Hollywood has come out with. Someone showed her how to put cammie face paint on correctly (despite the use of black). Hopefully this is a new trend from the music industry? I doubt it, but whatever.

Whoa, dude!

If this Apache pilot had pulled this off it would have been way cool. From the caption, everybody came out of this alive, but I don't know how!


***ETA: I found the Apache video at this thread on ARFCOM, and this video was also on it:



I play inverted :(

Long weekend

I left work on Friday with full intentions of hitting the range while it was sunny, but that never happened. This asshole I've reluctantly known for half my life, who lives in dilapidation on the corner of L-5 and S-1, decided to come and stay with me for the last month or so, against my wishes, and had annoyed me to the point that I instead raced home to hang out with my friend Jack - a true Gentleman. Jack brought me much needed comfort, and I know I'll be hanging out with him for some time until I get this problem with said asshole sorted out.

On top of all that, all of my kids have the latest sickness to be making its rounds in the form of high fevers and super-snot. Things went bad last night when the kids' fevers spiked without warning within an hour's time, and as I was imersing them in semi-lukewarm bathwater to quickly cool them down, I had a sudden nasty allergic reaction to the turkey burgers I ate a half an hour before (I've made them exactly the same since the begining of time). I was alone, so I'm frantically swallowing all the meds in my tactical pillcase while texting my brother to please please please get here quick so that if Ana breaks through my defenses and knocks me out, there will be somebody who can pull the kiddos out of the tub. I'm done with this sickness stuff, and I'm done with the damned allergies. And it's not just that my kids are sickly; everyone I know has been fighting the sickness in their kids since fall, and we all bitch about it. I don't remember being in a constant state of sickness when I was a kid, so this has got to be either a government experiment gone horribly wrong or we are in fact in the end times.

Despite all this, I managed to crank out over a hundred beautiful Gooooooooooold Dots over the course of two days, two rounds at a time. My handloading doctrine has been so fine tuned over the last four years that I can maintain a high degree of consistency and quality control even with the constant interuptions from the kids.

6.6 grains of sweet sweet Vihtaviori goodness per 24 carat gold nickel plated case:



There's no chance of double charging a case, either; in order to have the room to seat the bullet over one charge, I have to lightly tap the case with my finger for a few seconds to get the powder to settle, kinda like a bag of potato chips.



1.129" is close enough. The varience from one bullet to another can be as much as .008", so you have to accept that you won't get that last digit right where you want it. I'll accept .004" inches of variation in total, or .002" in either direction.




Loading cartridges makes a mess on the bench. Being the neat freak that I am, I have to accept that there's going to be stuff laying around everywhere for awhile.




I learned that my oldest son enjoys watching 24 with me while I'm at the press, which is way cool. My boys also like to help pull the press handle down to seat booooolets, which is good to go as well. In time, I hope to teach them the secret art of accurate cartridge making so they can go forth and win shooting matches.

Lastly, my wife and I started watching The Walking Dead on Netflix this weekend, and we're hooked. Ever since 24 ended, there's not been a whole lot to get my attention on TV, but I'll make an exception for this show. Good stuff.

When it all goes bad

It has been said that practice makes perfect. I agree, and note that some people practice perfect, meaning that they practice things in an environment that doesn't include the chance that something might go wrong. When it comes to defensive shooting and the practice thereof, it's helpful to learn to shoot not only while standing upright with a functioning weapon, but also while moving, walking, crouching; while kneeling and prone; on your back and on your face; with your right hand and your left. The reason is because you may wind up in a precarious possition if ou are ever unfortunate enough to be attacked, and having the skillset to defend yourself like this may save you.

Another aspect that I've rarely ever seen practiced outside of the military is failure drills. Because, if you haven't heard, firearms can fail you at the moment of truth, and being able to deal with it could potentially be helpful. What do you do if your trigger mechanism fails, or a badguy's round disables your weapon? Hopefully you draw another gun! If you do that than you're not only a big dork, but you're a prepared big dork, and I like you. If you don't, than I hope you've tried to incorporate some failure drills into your range session so you have some idea of what to do if you draw your weapon and the slide and barrel stay in your holster.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into your swim trunks

Along comes the Girl Scouts and their stupid (and yes, delicious) cookies to completely and utterly destroy your waistline. The cookie boxes should have a BMI chart on the side so you can quantify the damage to your body, that way you would at least be informed.

It's bad enough that the calorie count in the nutrition facts label is measured in metric tons instead of grams, but the serving size is between 2 and 4 not-even-bite-sized cookies! I mean the things aren't even the size of a single Doritos chip! Lookie - the appropriately named Thanks-A-Lot wields 150 metric tons of calories for every two (2) cookies. Did you know a grown man can easily manage three cookies per bite?

In a moment of weakness, I smashed through the better part of a box of Samoas right after dinner last night, and it took me not even thirty seconds to condemn my flanks to several extra pounds. I might as well have swallowed a shoebox full of 1 oz. fishing weights and chased it with four cases of Stella Artois; at least I wouldn't have felt so sick afterwords. And before you judge me, I'm not the one that orders a cord of them every year; but when they're sitting there on the counter all vulnerable and defenseless, all the willpower in the world can't keep someone from devouring them with total abandon. I'm serious when I say that Girl Scout cookies need to be heavily regulated, with red-light districts put up all over town full of establishments that serve them so that those who must have them have a place to go and eat, and the rest of us who know well enough to avoid them won't be tempted.

Hunting buffalo with Cold Steel

I admit to finding Lynn Thompson's self defense handgunnery to be not only laughable, outright dangerous, and foolish, (go to 7:30 mark to see his technique of firing as soon as the muzzle leaves the holster) but there's no denying that the man pushes the limits of his world.

Here a buffalo goes all ninja on Lynn's well aimed spear throw and tries to take him out. He's pretty handy with a double action .454 Ruger, and fortunately doesn't take his own advice by firinghalf of his rounds into the dirt while getting the front sight on target:


Too close for comfort!

I love GoooooooooolllllldddddDots

I was fortunate enough to escape the melee at my house for a quick range session to test the next batch of handloads for the P30, and I have settled on a load. But first, check out the expanded Gold Dot that was shot into water jugs, the second one from left:

The one furthest to the left is a 147 grain HST, and the 124 grain Gold Dot expanded just as much - .708" at the widest point, and I didn't bother to get the average because it was so uniform. The third from the left is the same 124 grain Gold Dot bullet that I fired through denim, and thinking about it now so is the HST. The bullet to the right is a .45 caliber 230 grain Remington Golden Saber that I recovered from a bucket of damp dirt that I was firing into a couple of years ago. I haven't put calipers on it yet, but to my calibrated eye its expanded diameter is the same as two of the 9 millie bullets sitting next to it. Here's the back end where you can see what I'm talking about:

Now you can see why, with modern self defense loads, the 9mm performs in the same league as the .45 ACP. When bullets for the most popular defensive handgun cartridges - 9mm, .40 S&W, .357 Sig, and .45 ACP - are all calibrated to expand while penetrating to the same depth in ballistic gelatin, why not go with the round that has the least recoil and most capacity? It makes sense. If we were all stuck with ball ammo, mind you, I would chose the .45 ACP every time. That's a bit different.

As far as the Gold Dot handload I've settled on, the 6.6 grains of VihtaVuori wins the day again with a 1.692" five-shot group at an average velocity of 1,193 fps and a 17 fps extreme spread. It matches up close with the factory Gold Dots that gave me a 1.565" five-shot group at an average velocity of 1,182 fps and a 27 fps extreme spread. The last time the 6.6 grain VV charge gave me a 1.421" five-shot group, so I know this isn't a fluke. I'm also not going to dicker with the seating depth as I'm quite happy with inch-and-a-half 25 yard groups from a sub-compact length barrel. Also, I have to workat it to get that much powder settled in the case so the bullet can seat down all the way.

My brother also put some rounds through his M&P9C while the chronograph was up and the sun was shining. He thought the 147 grain HST +P rounds in his gun were recoiling a little excessive, and after shooting it I have to agree. You could feel a hitch in the slide when it went back, like it had some overtravel and was going back further than it should. Fortunately, the 124 grain +P Gold Dots did well in his gun, so he's switched to those under the promise of a steady supply of free ammo since I can make them so cheap.

Also of some interest, I broke down and added some duct tape to my home made appendix holster this weekend:

To go the extra mile on my trashiness, I couldn't locate my roll of duct tape and, because I was in such a hurry, as always, I had to use the duct tape from my Glock AIWB holster. This time though I'm using some soft gel and a synthetic shammy cloth to pad the holster, and I'm content with it at this point.

A blow to my community

Some of my earliest memories on this earth were of hearing Brian Strobel on the radio in my dad's truck in the morning while riding in to school. As a young man working to help my dad in the family business, hearing him on the radio while we sweat in the sun was an everyday occurance. We never missed Brian's radio show; in fact, one day while my mom and I were cleaning out dad's old Izuzu pickup to sell it, we tried to change the station from WFLS where dad had set it the day he got the truck, and even though the dial would show different stations coming up, it wouldn't stop broadcasting WFLS. That show was a part of my family for over three decades, and I'm sorry to hear that Brian Strobel was killed; he will be missed.

Farewell, sir. Thanks for the memories!

Hump Day roundup

US Special Operation Forces operating in an operational training exercise. Jumping out of planes with all that gear on in the dark of night is bad ass. And, it's good to once again confirm via pictures that Marine Special Operations types are still being issued 1911s. Way cool.

Cannon fodder: a drunk dude uses a home-made assault thingie to shoot his girlfriend to death through the walls of their trailer. It sounds like the children made it out OK.

The contents of a can of Whoop-Ass poured out for the NorK's viewing pleasure: Countless F-16s sitting ready for war on the flight line in South Korea. That's a whole lotta mean sitting there!

Speaking of warbirds, here's an ARFCOM thread on the F4 Phantom. While I have said before that I believe the Spitfire to be the most gorgeous fighter plane ever, I have to say without a doubt that the F4 is the meanest looking war plane ever devised. Even while sitting perfectly still on the flight line, that sucker looks like it's fed demons to keep it from lashing out at the world.

Do you watch Top Shot? Season 4's Gabby Franco has bravely registered at ARFCOM and has a thread where you can ask her stuff about the show.

Combat AAR by those in-the-know on the M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle. I'm still not a big fan. I understand the principle of ammo efficiency and conservation in a firefight, I'm not convinced that this weapon is going to give fire superiority against a modern, well trained and equipped army with belt fed weapons. From reading the thread though, it does seem like the Marine Corps intent the whole time was to field a full auto battle carbine and not a replacement for a LMG.

Again from ARFCOM, a 50-some page thread on making Kydex holsters and stuff for the end of the world. It's arts and crafts skills for the crazy gun people!

Needful things

Having owned all sorts of magazine and utility pouches in my time, I concluded that virtually all of them fell short of my expectations, so I thought I'd do something about it. First, to give you an idea of where I'm coming from, I should describe where I find magazine/utility pouches (hereinafter "pouches" or "mag pouches") to not meet my requirements.

Almost every one I've used tries too hard to tilt the top of the magazine in towards the body to aid in concealment. This is great and all, if it didn't cause the corners of the magazine to poke into my flabby bits, making me take the thing off because of discomfort. Only one pouch I've encountered -- a Galco DMC -- does not do this, but instead lets the magazines cant outward, making the fact that I had 34 rounds of ammo readily apparent. The most uncomfortable pouch(s) I've come across was the Fobus paddle type; I have many of them, and every single one of them felt like I was spearing a gladius into my love handles when putting them on. The single Glock mag pouch was fine when it held a shorty Glock 26 magazine, but was unbearable with a tall Glock 17 magazine.

Two mag pouches that work great and are very comfortable are the FIST Double Mag Pouch, and the Bladetech Single Magazine Pouch with Bladetech clip. Both of these beasties do the unthinkable: they hold the magazine completely vertical, so it doesn't rip open your gut or tent your shirt. The only problem is that I don't rock a 1911 anymore, so that's a no go. With that piece of Bladetech praise out of the way, the Tek-Lok mag pouches from Bladetech are an abomination; getting the Tek-Lok clipped on is like trying to feed a mangled fork down in between your belt, and when you get it locked down the mag pouch slides back and forth on your belt. That's a no go. The Safariland Model 74 is an awesome mag pouch, but again stabs the corner of the magazine base plate into my side.

So in the end I decided to make my own to my requirements:





They are fast to put on.
They stay exactly in the spot on my belt I clipped them to.
They are a PITA to take off, so they won't come off when I don't want them to.
They can be worn OWB or IWB.
They are cheap as dirt.
They don't stab me, so they can be worn indefinitely.

My Leatherman Wave pouch came apart like a two dollar watch a few years ago, and I haven't found a suitable replacement since. The one above took me no time at all to make, and is easy to put on and holds the Wave tight.

You can literally order a ~$7 sheet of .093" kydex from Knifekits.com and, using your wife's hairdryer (or a heat gun), make ten of your own in about 20 minutes. I cut mine out using a bandsaw, but that's because I'm lazy; a razor knife works fine. I just heat up one side at a time and use something flat like a couple of pieces of wood to make the 90 degree angles. Tweak it with some heat and an empty magazine until you get it to hold like you want.

I have a template from the one I came up with if anybody wants it. Just shoot me an email if you do and I'll send it, or if I can remember I'll post it online this week.

Dad World problems

The alternate post title would be: You know you're a dad when . . . .

So my 2 year old is sitting at the table this morning, prosecuting a bowl of Kix for a half an hour; at this point, he's foregone the spoon and has resorted to filling his milk-soaked maw with handfuls of the now soggy cereal, and he's making a mess. A novice parent would treat this problem like you would clear a firearm: immediately take away the source of ammunition (bowl), clear the weapon's chamber (kid's hands), and do a quick function check to confirm all is safe (make sure there's no food left in the kid's mouth that he/she can choke on). Pffft. . . amateurs. The best solution is clearly to add more ammunition! The mess is mostly caused by the excess of milk, which happens because there's not enough cereal left, so the solution is obviously to add a ton more cereal on top to balance everything out! I'm a genius.

When I want silence throughout the house? The answer is not to yell at the kids to shut up, but to hand them what I call 2 minute quiet tokens: Ritz Crackers. Kids love those things. Did you know that when a child's mouth is full of crackers, there's little chance of them screaming or talking? That's a pro-tip. Another option that works wonders on the 1 - 2 year old crowd is to spread Cheerios out on the coffee and end tables, so they have to work at collecting each and every savory morsel, which buys me time for filling my coffee cup.

Loaded diapers? The secret is to prep the clean diaper before hand, and to set out two or three doubled-up sets of wipes. You don't want to be staring down the dirty barrel of the kid while trying to open the new diaper with one hand, and the wipes never come out of the box one at a time. Be prepared.

Baby proofing the house is a must, and buys peace of mind. If I'm going to someone else's home, I do a quick kid proofing before letting the kids wander. And I don't worry if the folks where I'm at get bent out of shape or offended; they don't live with the challenges I do. Even at my parent's house -- I've walked in there several times to find a huge meat clever sitting in the floor which they use to chop kindling for the fire place. A meat clever. You can see the danger in my 3 tear old waving that sucker around like it's the toy Thor hammer he got for Christmas. Yeah, ouch!

I remember the exact moment I realized that I was a veteran dad -- I was by myself in a Wal-Mart or other public venue and there was a woman clutched onto a recalcitrant, thrashing and screaming toddler like her life depended on it. I walked right past her without even noticing what was going on, and as I did I saw about half a dozen people standing there staring at the melee with their shocked faces on. . . . it was then that it even dawned on me that there was a screaming kid being dealt with. Pffft. . . . amateur. The best way to keep little Johny/Jannie from a full on catastrophic meltdown boils down to timing. Wait until the signs of pressure they're showing is approaching critical mass, then take them near (not in) the toy section and hand them each the cheapest toy you think they will enjoy and get back to your shopping business. By the time they're bored with the toys you should be almost home. This may not work so well for women because they go into a store not on a mission with an idea of what their target is. Men go into a store to purposely grab the object they want and pay for it and leave, but I digress. . . .

Yeah, these are dad world problems, and they are of my own doing. I love it, but damn I'm tired.

It's not the car, but the driver

Or an alternative is that it's not the rifle, but the shooter, that wins matches.

A man takes 3rd place in a rifle match using a rifle with a barrel made from rebar and scope mounts epoxied and wired on. It's in the March issue of Precision Shooter magazine which I do not have access to at the moment. This goes to show you that all the high dollar equipment in the world doesn't trump good 'ol fashioned talent.

Knives = Assault thingies

In Massachusetts, some 14 year old boy was caught with knives and brass knuckles, which are being called "Assault Weapons" by officer Bullhonkey, or whatever his name is. There was a small throwing knife set as well, and three larger novelty type knives.

Folks who know a thing or two about knives should be quick to point out that these knives are very inexpensive and are of below average quality, and are sold in flea markets and such pretty much anywhere. Want to know the reason they're so readily available and inexpensive? Because men like the look of stabby things, and cheap knives with crappy steel that won't ever see any use can fill that role well just by hanging on the wall. Folks who know a thing or two about youthful boys should be quick to point out that boys have a strong attraction to big gnarly looking novelty knives and brass knuckles. Want to know the reason? Because they're boys! I know it's hard to believe, but boys in today's time love pointy stabby things just like boys two thousand years ago did. Weird.

Didn't some wise dude from some old book say something about there being nothing new under the sun? I think today we use a term along the same lines - "Boys will be boys."

The boy in the article may or may not have said something about using a knife against some unamed somebody (we'll never know; they took down the boy's facebook page), and based on this he's now in a heap of trouble. The question to ask now is whether officer Bullhonkey also confiscated all the knives from the kitchen and then made especially sure to remove anything from the house made of metal. The best throwing knives I've ever had were made from grinding a point onto some of my mother's butter knives (sorry mom!); and I made swords, knives, and metal knuckles from old bed frames and scrap metal around the yard. I made two solid pairs of 'chucks from door chains and hickory that I cut and formed myself; I made a miniature bow and arrow from Constructs, a rubber band, and 1/4" dowel rods from a toy Tee pee and used it to kill birds and rabbits, and I've made things far deadlier than all of this stuff combined that I won't even talk about here.

Looking at those shiny brass stars on officer Bullhonkey's shoulders, I could easily use them make any number of edged assault thingies that would definitely make the day more interesting. Maybe some fangs; they could tear out a jugular vein like nobody's business! OOooo. . . oooo. . . . I know. . . .I could make arrow tips! I bet they would work better than the arrow tips that I made from bone harvested from squirrels I slayed with a slingshot.

Try as you may, you won't stop boys from making cool weapons from any materials they can get their hands on. When you're a boy, the world is your deadly oyster, and all it takes to capitalise on this is an active, youthful mind. Why this is lost on the crazy people interviewed in the article's video is the question of the day. I guess some people lose sight of where they came from (or maybe I'm crazy for making weapons out of anything I see). These days, I'm having a blast making things that hold weapons, like this holster I made last night:




Boys will be boys. . . .

Busy bee

I've been as busy as I can be, y'all. Sorry about the lite posting. To make up for this, please see this video of 9 JDAMs dropped on a compound in Afghanistan at the same time.


After all the immediate splody' stuff, look for all the big pieces of slag from the bombs hitting the water in the wadis several hundred yards from where the compound used to be. Scary.