What? No BOWL?

I know everybody is feeling deprived because blogging has been slow. But fortunately, Marv is more industrious than I am.

Ammunition Glut

I’m such a liar. I said I was going to do .38 Super today, but then I went out to the workbench and saw the .45 stuff sitting there, and one thing led to another…

I now have 750+ rounds of pretty lead .45 ammunition, and I’m tumbling enough brass to get me to about 850. At that point, continuing will not be an option. I have around 180 .38 Super cases ready to go. That’s more than enough to make for a fine range day later in the week.

I truly need to improve the rigidity of the press’s attachment to the bench. Two bolts just won’t cut it. I’m still getting enough powder flying out of cases to jam up the primer punch every 150-200 rounds. I may have improved the situation by using slow force instead of plain old momentum on the upswing, which sets the primers in the cases. We’ll see on the next go-around. When you swing the handle into the up position, it really rocks the press, and mechanical things don’t like momentum. Seats the primers real good, however.

I’m getting advice on the OAL for Hornady hollow points. Someone said the OAL wasn’t important, because you can get any OAL you want by shoving the bullet into the case the right distance. However, I thought the pressure inside the case was related to the depth to which the bullet was seated. I thought that was the big worry, with regard to OAL. Otherwise, why would they vary so much for similar bullets? It can’t just be about feeding smoothly, can it?

It’s hard to believe I have to worry about .45 cases, where the pressures are below 15,000. That’s less than half the pressure you get with .38 Super.

I guess I’ll have 2-3,000 rounds of ammunition on hand eventually. Imagine how scary that would sound, if a biased journalist got ahold of it. And of course, it only reflects a common-sense effort to save by buying in bulk. I’d be totally thrilled to buy and store less, if I didn’t get hammered financially for doing it.

Marv has seen the story about the Japanese parrot who told the cops his address. Marv is not impressed.

Someone get George Holliday

Someone tell me why reloading companies have such great service. Is it because they’re terrified of losing their customers to frustration, or is it simply because they’re solid conservative people who believe in giving customers a good deal? Probably the latter. A lot of gun companies have great service, too, paying to fix stuff their customers destroyed through stupidity. And I don’t think they have the same worries about frustrated customers who are ready to throw their products into canals.

I have a Lyman XP1000 (or 1000XP) powder scale. I kicked the power cord and knocked it off my bench. The little plastic lid broke. I could glue it together, but I hate it when I buy something nice and new and I screw it up and I have to patch it up like a hobo. I contacted Lyman and asked if I could buy a new lid, and I admitted I broke it. Their response? “We’ll send you a new one.”

How about that?

The scale seems to work very well. I have had no problems with it.

I am thinking it might be a good idea to try to worm my way into gun writing. I know virtually nothing about guns, but I’m very enthusiastic, and I’m a lawyer, so presumably I can be of some use, writing about gun rights. Something to think about. I could bring some fun to the genre; that’s for sure. Is there a gun humorist out there, in line ahead of me? Can’t think of one.

I decided to get some new clips. If you’re one of those people who has a seizure when someone says “clip” instead of “magazine,” let me just say that I will try to clip this habit in the bud, although at present I tend to say the word “clip” at a very high clip.

Try not to swallow your tongues.

Up until now, I’ve thought of the 1911s as range guns, but it can’t hurt to have some real-life ammunition for them. If I buy some, I’ll want to load two clips permanently. So to shoot cheap ammunition at the range, I’ll have to unload one clip for each gun and then reload it later. That’s not great for the bullets, and it’s a pain. So extra clips are a must. Here’s the big problem: how do you store them with a gun in a bag? If you toss them in loose, everything gets scratched up (Glocks excepted). My tentative solution: buy a really cheap sunglass case for each clip. If you have a better solution, let me know.

I only have one clip for the Desert Eagle. I don’t keep it loaded, because I don’t use it for protection. I will regret this if attacked by an elephant or a brontosaurus, but around here, most burglars are people, and I don’t want to shoot through one and have the round go through a wall and kill my neighbor’s Mercedes.

I am still not sure what the .50 Action Express is good for, other than fun. One good thing about the Desert Eagle: pimps like them. And they’re very hard to shoot, so this makes it less likely that a pimp will be able to hit anyone.

I looked at some bullet-casting videos the other day. Doesn’t look too bad, with a 6-bullet mold. Talk me out of it.

Before you start, let me tell you I already heard about the parrot in Japan that gave the cops its name and address. If it’s on Drudgebart.tv.com, I have seen it. I haven’t taught Marvin his address. It’s not really a great idea. What if you move? The cops would force an annoying parrot on the people who bought your house.

Marv has little useful information to impart to the cops. If they interrogated him, they would hear things like, “Can I rub your fat head?”, “Let me squeeze your toes,” “TURD TURD TURD,” and “You’re stupid.” I guess I could teach him to say “doughnut” or “pension.”

There is a beatboxing parrot on Youtube. If it ever gets caught by the police, they’ll beat it to death. You know how cops hate rap. Here:

I know I tempt people to buy African greys. Don’t do it. Some are good pets, but many are miserable.

I’m going to try to make .38 Super ammunition. I was going to finish off my .45 lead, but I can’t take the boredom any more. And I’m out of empty boxes to put it in. I looked at the prices of plastic ammunition boxes. Like 3 bucks for a 100-round box. Are they high? This is the kind of thing you get free when you buy things other than bullets. In fact, a lot of cheap bullets come in reusable boxes. I’d be thrilled to pay a dollar each, but three bucks seems like a ripoff. Maybe I’ll just put bullets in my pockets.

You laugh now. Next year, everyone will be doing it.

Maynard = the New Che

Over at The Answer Bird, Maynard is crying oppression again. I think he has been listening to Jeremiah Wright.

He is an Independent Contractor

Marv is still airing his remarkable views on immigration. I hope he never runs for office.

Selfless to the Last

In spite of my best efforts to stop him, Marv has blogged again.

This time he is giving advice on the disposition of a malfunctioning cockatiel.

Readers Stolen by Squawking Turncoat

There is a traitor in my midst. I got up today and checked my blog comments, and then I went to The Answer Bird to see if anyone commented on Marv’s latest post. The score? Marv 8, me 0.

For this, I fed him for six weeks with a spoon. For this, I let him eat my quilt and climb on my head to give my hair his special brand of conditioner.

How sharper than a serpent’s tooth. That’s all I have to say. I should get him some Blogads and make him pay for his own toys.

Maynard is his co-conspirator. I know how these things work. They pretend to be at odds, but in private, they share a common goal. Overtake the human’s traffic and crush him like Stalin.

Hey, if you love them so much, go read their silly blog. I don’t need you. All I need is this ashtray. And this paddle game. And these matches.

Why are you still here? Bird lovers.

In other news, my father’s friends have him all excited about the Sebastian area. That’s Sebastian, Florida. Where you will find the Sebastian Inlet. Here’s an odd thing about the east coast of Florida. It has an ocean. And you would think people would really, really want to be able to run their boats into the ocean. So you would expect a whole bunch of man-made channels through the barrier islands. However, there is a huge stretch between Cape Canaveral and Sebastian Inlet, with no ocean access whatsoever, except for people on the barrier islands. So if you want a waterfront home with an in-water boat, you pretty much have to stay within 10 miles of the Cape or the Inlet. Weird. You would think someone would start building channels, and there would be a real estate boom, because people would want homes with ocean access. But it doesn’t look like that’s happening. So my father’s friends have urged him to home-shop in the area of the Inlet.

I wonder if the greenies are at the root of this situation. They freak out whenever anyone cuts a mangrove tree to build a channel. You would think mangrove trees bore fruit full of diamonds, but in truth, they’re useless, except for smoking fish. The greenies managed to get protection for the mangroves by claiming fish reproduced in them. Then we found out the fish reproduce out on the reefs. So now we’re stuck with millions of acres of steaming, bug-infested, worthless mangroves. Fish may not breed in them, but mosquitoes and tiny gnats that descend in clouds and cover people in stinging bites sure do.

If the greenies had been around a thousand years ago, humanity would have died out completely, from famine, disease, exposure, and overwork. Just the way people do now, in places where normal human progress hasn’t taken place. And that would have made the greenies very happy.

With any luck, we’ll shoot up that way soon and see what’s what. I had this idea of getting a house in that general region, and then he decided he liked the idea, too, and his budget is bigger, so the plan is to establish a compound.

I’m still trying to figure out why people are willing to pay three times as much for similar properties in Miami. A palace on the water, with a giant boat dock, in a place with better weather, nicer people, and less traffic. OR a comparatively tiny inland house in the rudeness and traffic capital of the universe. Is that a hard choice? I guess one answer is that property appreciates faster here. I don’t know if that will be the case in the future. My theory is that the Internet is going to make it unnecessary for people to clump up so much in big cities. If you can work from a nice place instead of Manhattan or Atlanta or whatever, why not do it? Maybe ten years from now, the little communities will be more desirable than the big ones. If you’re within an hour of a mall and you have an Internet hookup, you are connected to society. You don’t need to be any closer.

When I was a kid, my sister said Miami was unpleasant because it attracted aggressive people. Her theory was that it was highly desirable due to its geographical features, so pushy people would naturally want to live there, just as they want the first five rows at a concert. I think she may have been right.

What else is happening? Drudgebart.tv.com links to a story about implanted Bluetooth devices which can alert medical personnel when people are having heart attacks. That’s just stupid. That’s not the highest, best use of these things. What you need is a device that senses drops in blood sugar, orders you a pizza, and gives the driver your location. As usual, I have to explain the obvious.

Oh, man. Marv just got two more comments. This bird aggression will not stand, man.

The Perch is on the Other Foot

This is a rare occasion. Today the Answer Bird asks YOU a question.

Wrong

Over at The Answer Bird, Marv explains why parrots bob their heads.

Some People Call Him Maurice

I was just looking at a Drudgebart.tv.com-linked story about Minnesota blogger Michael Brodkorb, who exposed Al Franken’s tax and insurance problems. It’s good to see a blogger getting court protection as a journalist. That’s one of the things the story mentions. On the other hand, I am not particularly impressed by Franken’s screwups.

I’m no Franken fan. He’s not much of a humorist, and he’s annoying. But he claims he paid his taxes in the wrong state, and as for failing to pay workers’ comp. insurance, it’s embarrassing, but not as embarrassing as his movie. If the GOP is hoping to portray Stuart Smalley as a scofflaw, I think they’ve failed. He’s probably just a doofus who screws up when doing paperwork.

There are an infinite number of reasons to avoid even considering voting for Al Franken. The tax and insurance things are insignificant compared to his general craziness and his addiction to discredited socialist notions.

One reason TO vote for him: it will make Bill O’Reilly mad. This will make his show much more entertaining during the weeks or months it takes him to get over it. The lugubriousness of his pecksniffian bloviations will increase a hundredfold. Popinjays across the globe will tremble before his wrath. Much as they already do in his fantasies.

Maynard is on a roll over at The Answer Bird. Not literally “on a roll.” Such as a toasted roll with lots of sauteed onions. But he is posting again, and this time he is answering questions about sharia.

I have to go to the gun range and practice being bitter and hating immigrants, so I don’t have much time to write. You know how hard reading and writing are, for Bible-thumping Republicans. Especially Southerners. If only I had Stuart Smalley’s giant Yankee brain.

Guess that’s all.

Stand Down

Maynard would like everyone to know that the situation is finally under control.

If not, Shame on You

Today at The Answer Bird, Maynard reports on a serious bird rights abuse.

He is no Rodney King

Today Marv gives his thoughts on peace. When it comes to making peace, Marv is nearly as smart as Jimmy Carter.

Spring Claims Another Victim

Today Marv blogs about romance.

Approach with caution.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Blogs

I was starting to think Marv had given up blogging, but no such luck. He has apparently been posting at The Answer Bird again.