I Have Company

I wondered what people would think about what I wrote last night. I’m not all that surprised to see positive comments. Blogs are funny; they reach out into the world like the tendrils of a climbing plant, finding like-minded people and putting them in touch with each other.

Let’s see what we have.

“Ever think about Eastern Orthodoxy? It is the Church of the apostles; pretty much the same now as it was then.”

Don’t know much about it. Aren’t some of the guys who look after the Church of the Holy Sepulchre Eastern Orthodox? I can tell you this. I could never join a church that requires praying to saints. Not after reading the story of Saul and Samuel. I don’t know if the Eastern Orthodox Church fits that description. Another thing that bothers me about the older churches is that they seem very bound up in rules and internal politics, so you end up with a lot of worshipers who think they can be Tony Soprano all week and then get clean on Sunday. Or, worse, Easter and Christmas. I think faith, a personal relationship with God, and inner renewal via the Holy Spirit get cut out of the picture, so the result is worldliness. I believe that explains the gay “mafia” in the Catholic Church, as well as disturbing radical priests who want to be rock stars.

“Facinating reading this. It seems like there is a tremendous pull being exerted on some very smart, savvy people. I’ve watched you get pulled into the divine orbit over the last year or so. The same thing is happening with vanderleun. Interesting times.”

I don’t know who Vanderleun is, but the thought you express has occurred to me, too. It seems like God has a lot of “sleepers” out there. People who have been less active than they felt they should, who are now gaining strength and trying to shape up and accomplish more. And the curious thing about is that even if it has become more obvious recently, I can tell you that it didn’t take place over the last year or two. Not in my case, anyway. I have been working on this for a long time. The thing that has happened over the last year is an acceleration in the payoff. Maybe something is going on that has been in the works for quite some time.

In addition to spiritual awakenings, I have noticed that an awful lot of the same people seem to be shooting these days. Don’t know what to make of that. Is it my imagination?

Unfortunately if you want to be a Methodist pastor you must mash your brain flat to dull any sense of politically incorrect thought while passing your body through five or six years of the Emory educational experience.

So today finding their so- called “leaders” going with the flotsam lifted by the anti-Israel tide is not surprising to me, but it is the very reason I’m religious but don’t attend services with a congregation regularly

I didn’t know academics were involved. That explains everything. Teachers corrupt our kids. They make up a huge percentage of DNC operatives. They espouse socialism because they’re all union members who work seven hours a day, nine months a year, with near-total job security, plus benefits and pensions. And to top it off, they don’t teach us how to read any more.

Maybe the best reason for homeschooling is to put teachers out of business.

“I think that I’m on the same spiritual path that you’re describing, though I concede that you seem to be a bit further along than me.”

I would not count on that last part.

Paul C, a Catholic, has a different take on rules and ritual:

Interesting comment as to how “Christians” and I quote that on purpose will change doctrine and idealogy and scripture to effectively match a viewpoint they have. I don’t speak as an expert and this may sound arrogant however as a Catholic we have a lot of rules people don’t like as it interferes with all the things you have listed here. Our Church has had many centuries to evolve and reform and with good reason and good effect and I believe it is strong because of the moral authority it brings to faith for all Christians . . .

Our civilization is decadent and decaying, we have lost too much from a moral standpoint, morally bankrupt if you will. I would have hoped that people within my church would not leave the congregation each Sunday and resort back to decadence through out the week it has been a thorn in my side since my father pointed it out. We can sit in church for an hour hear and respond to a wonderful homily and then fight like mad to be the first out of the parking lot.

I think a church can have too few rules and be too loose. On the other hand, when a surfeit of man-made rules comes to supplant faith and supernatural renewal, the kind of behavior you describe is probably inevitable. I think the older churches have blown it by giving up on the baptism of the Holy Spirit, which is intended to change people from within and “write God’s law on their hearts,” making it easier for them to behave. I was a fairly good person, by modern standards, in my own right. But that isn’t saying much. There were persistent moral flaws I could not beat on my own, and they were not minor, and they frustrated me very badly, and I am positive I am only making progress on them now because God is working inside me.

Here is some good news before I post this. As is often the case, World Vision is having a sale. Sort of. Right now, if you donate money to provide anti-parasite medications to children in need, they’ll get matching funds multiplying your gift by fourteen. That’s a fantastic deal. If you were planning to make a charitable donation this week, I can’t think of a better choice.

Might be Time for You to Change Churches

Here is appalling news. The United Methodist Church “will be considering divestment resolutions and other anti-Israel measures at its General Conference that takes place in Texas April 23-May 2.” And they’ve already done other rotten things, like putting out a children’s book that teaches kids Israel is to blame in the Israel-Palestine conflict. Funny, I thought electing terrorists and shooting an endless rain of rockets at innocent civilians might somehow be contributing to the problem.

I know other denominations claiming to be Christian have demonstrated this kind of hostility and unfairness. I am really ashamed. Of course, many of these churches are no more Christian than an EST seminar.

It seems like you can tell a lot about the validity of a “Christian” church by checking a few things. Acceptance of gay pastors? Bibles rewritten to support a feminist perspective, with no scriptural basis? Endorsement of other faiths, especially Islam? Where you see things like that, you can pretty much assume you’re dealing with a church that has nothing to do with faith or salvation, and which leads people farther away from God. And don’t be surprised if they tell their members Israel is evil. Jesus called the church of his time the synagogue of Satan, and these are the modern-day churches of Satan. Deny that the God of the Bible exists, deny that Jesus is the only path to salvation, deny the clearly defined morality of the Bible, and you have a fetid abomination that prevents people from finding peace and salvation, and from feeling the indescribable pleasure of being in the presence of God.

I don’t know if the UMC fits this description, but a whole lot of churches do. They fool ignorant people who think Jesus and Buddha and maybe Richard Simmons are interchangeable, and that nice people all go to heaven. Or that there is no heaven at all, and that Christianity is just a philosophy. All that stuff is nonsense. Christianity means believing there is a person we call God, and that he is an immortal spirit who rules the universe, and that He gave us one and only one Messiah, also immortal, and that Messiah is Jesus. It means believing a Gentile can only be saved by accepting the sacrifice of Jesus, and that there is an afterlife. And by extension, that Buddha and all the other non-Christian saviors were tragically ignorant and mistaken.

It must be very hard for Jews to figure out which Christians are on their side. The Catholics have always been a problem, and I think to many Jews, they represent Christianity. The general rule is, fundamentalists and charismatics are one hundred percent behind Israel. I used to think “evangelical” was a clue that a church preached the true message of Christianity and supported Israel and the Jews, but at least one church with “evangelical” in the name is attacking the chosen. So I don’t know how strong an indicator “evangelical” is.

It’s funny, but a lot of people want everything about Christianity except its essence. They want to go to church and feel like good people. At the same time, they want to have unlimited sex outside marriage. They want to be materialistic and arrogant and selfish. They want to make up their own commandments. And they don’t want to bum anyone out or seem less cool, by calling sin what it is.

You have to be cool! Cool is the only thing that matters! You have to have lots of sex and listen to immoral music and snort a little coke or smoke a doob once in a while. You have to have the option of killing your children in their mother’s womb, making it a sort of portable abattoir, so the uncomfortable subject of sensation-killing rubber devices doesn’t spoil your super-important fun. You can’t ever say someone else’s sinful behavior bothers you. You can’t even admit sin exists, or that shame is a good thing. No, no. You have to have your tattoos and piercings and vile entertainment, and you’re not allowed to judge anybody’s behavior. Except of course for people who try to please God. The actual, real God. Not the chloroformed, confused version your church talks about. God is fine, as long as you put Him in a box and make Him behave. Come on; you can’t let Him be a buzzkill! After all, He’s not important. He’s just God. And anyone who talks about Satan, angels, or demons is a psycho! The Bible mentions them over and over, but you’re not supposed to actually believe the Bible. It’s just supposed to make you feel good! Like dope!

Look, God is not something you can edit, regardless of what irrational people say. The other day I saw something on the web about a far-left nut claiming the Bible was “an open document.” What? That’s like saying the formula for salt is subject to alteration. There is nothing “open” about a book that was finished almost two thousand years ago. You may translate it differently, if you have sound linguistic arguments. But you can’t just cross out “Jehovah” and write “Gaia” or, worse, “Me” all over the pages. It is what it is, and God is what He is. Salvation, sacrifice, sin, eternal life, hell…these things are realities. If you disagree, that’s swell. But you’re not a Christian, and if your church disagrees, it’s not God’s church.

God is what He is, and one thing He is, is a Jew. God is a Jew. And regardless of how many Gentiles accept Christ, the Jews will always be closer to His heart than we are. That’s in the Bible. And Eretz Israel is in the Bible. God promised the Jews a nation with Jerusalem as its capital and center of worship, and it’s bigger than the nation they have now, and they’re going to get it, and I support it wholeheartedly. Every Christian should. I don’t want to hear the secular arguments. Number one, they’re filled with error and tacit anti-Semitism and hostility toward Christianity and God. Number two, I don’t care. God is right. Everyone who disagrees is wrong. I will not oppose God. Your opinion on this matter means nothing. End of story. You will die, and your opinion will die with you, and God and the truth will still be here. Why should I care what you think?

Funny coincidence: I’ve been considering investing in Israel. I want to bless the Jews, and I want to link my fortunes with theirs. I’ve been thinking about buying Teva Pharmaceuticals stock. Great company. And it’s outside the US, where Hillarycare can’t do much to destroy it. It’s amazing how liberals want to destroy pharmaceutical companies and take their profits. Here’s a question. How many life-saving drugs have come out of the USSR and Communist China?

Vodka is not a life-saving drug, before you say it.

I keep trying to improve myself. I was born into a miserable family followed by misfortune, and over the last few years, I have been striving to pray and obey my way out of the curses that seem so hard to shake. And things have improved, slowly but surely. I once compared constant prayer to the stone-cracking force of a plant growing between rocks, and I still think that’s a good analogy. Things don’t change overnight, but the trend is clear and unstoppable. I feel like the dividends are really rolling in now. The other day I realized I was finally losing all desire to be cool, and I was losing my fear of being good and of being perceived as religious. I feel like I dropped a backpack full of lead. And I know it was not me, but God working within me. Giving me exactly what I asked for, I should add.

It is becoming more clear to me what I need to fix in my life. Here is something I just came across tonight, from the book of Galatians, chapter 5: “When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these.” That’s really helpful; I found it a little disturbing, as a matter of fact, because I saw little pieces of me in there. It’s easy to think you’re okay if you try to observe the Golden Rule and avoid the obvious sins, so a list like this is literally a godsend.

I think I’ve mentioned the fact that I’ve had concerns about being too hostile; it has been on my prayer list for quite some time, and possibly on the prayer lists of people at whom my hostility has been aimed. Between Internet rage and road rage, it’s a wonder any of us have a moment when we’re not furious and consumed by contempt. I think my moments are becoming longer and closer together.

It’s funny, but back when I was going to a charismatic church, I thought I was being diligent, but I really didn’t read the Bible nearly enough. I listened to preachers a lot, and unfortunately, a lot of them were self-serving, greedy, and completely lost. Lately I have found that there is no substitute for going to the source on your own. And again, here is a great website where you can do it. A computer tends to become an instrument which distributes and feeds lust, anger, greed, pride, and so on. But it can also be a tool for learning about and pleasing God. You can study online, you can write things that are helpful to others, and you can even vet and donate to ministries and charities. That’s fantastic! That is real power; beating the devil with his own weapon. Finally the web is truly good for something.

I feel very different from the way I felt a few months ago, even though I was pleased with the progress I was making at the time. With regard to some issues, I look back and feel as though I used to be brainwashed. I can’t believe I thought as I did. That’s growth. And if it happened to me, it can happen to you. Pray regularly, and try to remember, it’s not all about asking for things you want. Ask for wisdom and knowledge and help with obedience. Use a list, so you know you’re being consistent and persistent. Set aside time in the morning and time before bed. It works. I know. I was right about homemade pizza, wasn’t I? It’s not a hard job. The more you change, the more you want to change, and the easier it gets. Have faith that in the future, as you improve, you’ll want and enjoy the things God wants you to have. Don’t expect a perfect life. But do expect more peace. Relief. Comfort. And more satisfaction with yourself. And of course, help with your problems.

If you’re as disgusted as I am by the anti-Semitic propaganda coming from churches that aren’t really churches, maybe you’ll want to do something about it. Invest in an Israeli company. Write something positive about Israel on your blog. Give money to the IFCJ and help an oppressed Jew move to Israel; that would really hurt the enemy.

Israel will win in the end. Eretz Israel will be established. The only question is, whose side will you have to say you were on when it’s over? I’m very, very comfortable with my choice.

Greenjeans was Always Smarter

Let’s start the day with a fresh quotation from the memoirs of Christopher Walken:

Keeshan thought he was a player, until Mr. Greenjeans sold him out to Rogers. He was always at Keeshan’s side, with a 12-gauge pump under his overalls. He kept Keeshan safe while he muscled his way into cereal sponsorships and got free content by obtaining compromising photos of Tom Terrific and Mighty Manfred. Sick stuff. Straps and ropes, I mean. Pulleys, I’m talking about. Cables. Not just the bestiality angle.

Anyway, one day Greenjeans put chloral hydrate in Keeshan’s corn flakes, and when he woke up, he was in the Land of Make-Believe, in Rogers’s compound, tied to a papier-mache mountain. Sad scene. He looked around and figured out where he was, and then he looked at Greenjeans. And he said, “I always thought it would be Dancing Bear.”

So Fred offers us milk and cookies and then he gets down to brass tacks. “Boys,” he said, “I have a wonderful opportunity for you. That’s a very big word, isn’t it? ‘Opportunity.’” We both agreed that it was quite large. So Rogers goes on. “There is this fellow down at PBS, and I’m afraid he doesn’t know how to play nice. He doesn’t know how to share. Sharing is very important, don’t you think?” Definitely. No argument from us. Then Keeshan starts mumbling, like he’s having a dream. “Ping pong balls…NO…no more ping pong balls. Jesus help me…can’t breathe…” But he shut up again, and Fred went on.

I had a real crisis this week. I lost my Winn-Dixie reward card. I’ve written about it before. This is a bar-code keychain tag that opens the door to a world of glorious discounted pork. It’s not really mine. Years ago, my father got one, and I stole it. I don’t want to get one in my own name, because they use the damn things to spy on you, and I don’t want David Chertoff monitoring my pork habits. Although now that I think about it, it would probably convince him I was not a terrorist.

I tried signing up online and having them send me a new one, using my customary alias, “Red Butz.” But I guess they smelled a rat, because it never arrived.

Fortunately, I thought to look in my jeans. I wear long pants about five times a year, sometimes for periods as short as two hours, so the jeans don’t see the washer very often. I’m not one of those disgusting people who wear jeans until they get greasy brown stains on the thighs and they stand up all by themselves, but I’m not washing my jeans after two hours. Come on. So anyway, it turned out the precious card was in the pocket, and I am overjoyed.

WD has center cut pork chops on sale; buy one, get one free. Not quite as good as the regular chops, but I’ll take them. No word on chitlins this week. The lamb chops look tempting.

If you are willing to brine your pork, you can eat dirt cheap for the rest of your life. Picnic hams and Boston butts often stink, but a nice baking soda brine kills that, and then you have like ten pounds of great pork for eleven bucks. And if you bake it with the skin on, you get delicious, crunchy crackling-type things. I baked a picnic ham last week, and even though I eventually got sick of it and gave up, I still got five meals out of it for eleven dollars. I’m not cheap about food, but when you can get top-quality grub for ghetto prices, why not do it?

Switching subjects due to the discontinuation of my Ritalin prescription, I guess you’ve heard about my wacky neighbor, Mr. Calin Wong. He lives in Homestead, a few miles down the road. The cops just busted him for making online threats to reenact the Virginia Tech massacre. It would have worked, at the University of Miami. Gun-free, brain-free, safety-free. On the streets, however, he would have lasted a maximum of five minutes. Red state.

Wong owns several AKs plus some other crap. Like a number of people I could name (cough), he had a lot of ammunition. Scary! HELLO, ammunition is cheaper when you buy a lot. And no matter how much you have, you can only shoot one bullet at a time.

Even right-leaning Fox News went into pants-wetting mode over this guy’s “weapons cache.” Greg Kelly, a Marine reservist (colonel!) who used to appear on camera in a windcheater haircut, marveled at this character’s paltry weapons collection of a dozen guns. Thanks, Greg. That was very helpful.

Here’s a quote from The Miami Herald’s typically even-handed coverage:

He’d been banned from websites for fraudulent selling tactics, he’d been buying and selling weaponry over the Internet for two years, and he owned six or seven AK-47s and other firearms.

Still, they couldn’t charge him with a crime until they unexpectedly received a fax a month later from the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office.

Good God. All this apparent kook did was complain to the sheriff about an Internet ripoff, and the Herald says, “Still, they couldn’t charge him with a crime.” They mean before he supposedly made his threats. So if you work at the Herald, your default position is, if a person has a gun collection, it’s amazing that he can’t be arrested!

I probably have three hundred readers whose collections put this guy’s to shame. I wonder what the idiots at the Herald would think of you. No, I know what they’d think. If “think” is the appropriate term.

Anyway, Mr. Wong allegedly threatened to perpetrate a massacre, and he was turned in, and now he is no longer a gun owner, and he won’t be owning any guns in the future, unless he buys them illegally. Looks to me like the system worked.

Here’s another genius for you. Detective Rocky Rivera, of the Homestead PD: “Unfortunately, the way the law is written now, you can have as many guns as you want.” Thanks, Justice Cardozo. Thanks, Thomas Jefferson. Thanks for offering your help, rewriting the Constitution. I’m sure you’re qualified.

What is it with cops and their desire to control the public? This is the kind of person the founding fathers wanted to protect us from. A possible lunatic in Homestead has a few semiautomatic rifles, so the rest of us should be disarmed. Next, we need to get rid of those pesky fourth and fifth amendments. Because Officer Rocky the social engineer knows how to run your life better than you do. The cops are perfect; the rest of us need to be told what to do. Funny, wasn’t Drew Peterson a cop? Weren’t the Miami River Cops, who murdered in order to protect their cocaine-selling ring, cops? Isn’t Chicago having a major scandal right now, over lovely events like the beating of an unarmed female bartender who hadn’t committed a crime? We just had three faultless, infallible Miami cops convicted for planting guns on people they had shot, and lying about the shootings. And oh, yeah, cops aren’t famous for domestic violence beefs in their own homes. That never happens.

You know what? I’m sorry the cops have a dangerous job. I mean that sincerely. But the answer isn’t disarming the rest of us and trying to create a Nerf environment for the police to swagger and bark orders in. If you think we need to be disarmed so you can be safe while you work, it means you don’t have enough guts to do the job you signed up for. So quit and let somebody tougher than you step up to the plate.

Someone needs to explain to me how the number of guns Wong owned is an issue. How many can he shoot at once and hope to hit anything? Duh. Are you going to be more scared of an assailant with five rifles than an assailant with one rifle and five magazines? Sure. If you’re a moron. If you want to be concerned, be concerned that he didn’t have them in a safe, to keep them from being stolen and distributed to career criminals who aren’t stupid enough to announce their intentions on the Internet.

The folks at Fox were amazed that this guy got out on bail. WHAT? Look, his guns are gone. He’s going to be tried. He didn’t commit any acts of violence, and now he lacks the means to commit them in the future. I would be amazed if he is ever allowed to buy a gun again. He thought he was a big man, but now he’s No-Gun Boy and an object of ridicule. He now lives under a microscope. Bail is almost certainly appropriate, by the standards applied to other criminal defendants. O.J. Simpson got bailed out after being credibly accused of armed robbery with a firearm. Use your head, Greg Kelly. Due process exists, even for complete idiots who make Internet threats.

You know, I love to shoot. It gets me outdoors. It gives me a feeling of accomplishment. It’s tremendous fun. I think I might want to hunt in the future, because it’s a good skill to have, but I can’t stand watching anything die, and would much rather hand over my wallet than shoot another human being. While I believe in the right to self-defense, I’m not at all sure I could exercise it, unless another person was in danger. But the tiny minds at the Herald conflate boring, harmless hobbyists like me with immature cranks who threaten to murder people over the Internet. And if you have guns, you’re in the same boat. You should be arrested NOW, because some day you MIGHT make a threat. It’s Minority-Report-style pre-crime, only instead of relatively intelligent psychics, we have far-left fascist pinheads.

Great. Always nice to know you’re going to get a fair shot from the media.

I can’t believe Greg Kelly’s reaction to the guns. Which part of the Marine Corps does he belong to? The Martha Stewart Brigade? The Marines still have weapons, don’t they? There’s a fan site dedicated to him. It calls him the King of the Embeds. I’m sure he saw a weapon or two in Iraq, and I know he has a positive attitude toward the military. How could he get so excited over the obligatory “entire collection piled on a table” photo? Those photos represent a classic cop and newspaper tactic intended to inflame public hysteria and help get gun control laws passed. They rarely pose with other confiscated items. Gun collections? ALWAYS. How could he fall for it? I’m a Fox fan, but come on.

“Weapons cache.” I used to have an “arsenal,” but now I have a “weapons cache.” I guess I also have a CD cache and an aged beef cache and a beer cache and a birdseed cache. David Koresh had nothing on me.

Anyway, if you’re ever in Homestead, feel free to drop in on Calin Wong and demand his lunch money. There isn’t a hell of a lot he can do to stop you now.

Hurry up With That Bosco

I think that every morning for the foreseeable future, I should post a memorable quote from a Christopher Walken story. I’m going to get a head start on tomorrow.

Anyway, I recently contacted his manager and got the dope on Wesley by applying a Vise Grip to the end of his left index finger. From Sears. A real Vise Grip. Not some cheap Chinese knockoff. The Chinese ones tend to twist off just when the information is starting to flow.

Let me tell you one thing. One piece of knowledge you can cherish and utilize until your dying day. Which will not be soon, let’s hope. Unless you aggravate me. When you’re applying pressure to a man’s fingernails to find out, say, the location of a dead midget you accidentally offed in a moment of high spirits, you really need American quality. However the Chinese ones are fine for smacking people in the mouth.

In the Black!

FINALLY a satisfying day at the range. With my exceedingly tactical Stanley rolling toolbox.

I started out with the PSL/Romak III. I thought I had fixed the trigger spring problem, but it failed to cock itself after two pretty awful shots. So I put it away and got out the K31, and I shot this target at 50 yards with my Rock, Jr. rest.

I felt pretty good about that. The shots at the upper edge are PSL shots. I didn’t do great, but I was getting better. Turned out the scope was loose for a couple of those, but I wasn’t shooting well enough for it to matter.

Second bunch:

Much better. So I got cocky and moved to 100 yards.

Given my previous efforts, I was pretty happy. And I realized something. My trigger pull was most of the problem. A guy next to me was telling me I needed a rear bag to keep the gun on target, but the sights stuck to the red dot in the center of the bullseye like they had been nailed to it. So I worked on it, and things got better. So much better I sometimes thought I had missed the target entirely, because the pattern didn’t open up when I shot.

I am totally thrilled with these results. I had one flyer, but working on the trigger pull made a gigantic difference. Now I know what my big problem is, so I expect to improve a lot from here on out. And even now, I can shoot well enough to kill stuff.

I moved on to the pistol side. I missed the old days, when I shot better than I currently do, and I wondered if going from a Glock to a 1911 was the problem. So I shot my Glock 22, in .40 S&W. It really is easier to hang onto and shoot. First 25, at 7 yards:

I was actually happy with that, because while I wandered vertically, I started noticing and fixing things about my trigger pull. I seem to be flinching sometimes, from back in the wrist. It’s obviously not a bad flinch, but it’s something to work on. I shot another 25 rounds, and then I shot 25 with the SW1911, to see the difference. Trail Glades has a ridiculous rule that you can’t have more than one bullseye on a pistol target, so I decided to shoot a hole in the upper right area and use it as a second bullseye. Let’s see them make a rule against THAT.

My concentration went to hell on the last 25 because I was tired, and because one of the range officers dragged a bunch of noobs over to my area and started using me as a teaching example. Very flattering, but not great for my aim. Anyway, the first 10 or so shot well enough to convince me that the 1911 is more accurate for me.

Man, I feel better. Finally, some progress. I was starting to think I would never be able to shoot a scoped rifle. Now I have hope again. And I think the lesson I learned from the rifle is going to make a big difference in my pistol shooting. I really look forward to that.

Nice $350 scoped rifle, huh?

Whee

For some mysterious reason, Trail Glades keeps changing its hours and failing to post the information on the web. So last week I was pretty surprised when my shockingly late arrival at the range turned out to be uber-punctual. They open at 1:00 on Thursdays. But wait…those are the winter hours. According to a sign at the range, during the rest of the year, they open at…1:00.

I’ll be making a visit today. I fixed the Romak III so it would cock itself properly, and I received a new ring for the scope on the K31, and I want to shoot a few .40 rounds, too.

I couldn’t find rings that would fit the Accumount anywhere, so I emailed the guy who made it, and he sold me a new ring for five bucks, shipped. Not bad.

I’ll be taking the new Tactical Trolley with me. This is the Stanley toolbox I got for the range. Very exciting. Don’t you wish you were me? I just bet you do.

My Speer manual is on the way. I can’t believe it’s impossible to walk into a store and buy it, but there it is. On the way to the range, I’m picking up a drill guide, and I’ll get a two-by-six for the bench, too.

I guess I’m a gun nut now. Although I’m not positive I qualify, since in addition to owning a lot of paraphernalia, I also put bullets inside the black on occasion. And I’m still holding off on a full-body camo tattoo.

I’m glad I wised up about going to the range on weekends. Weekdays are much better, although the likelihood of being embarrassed by better shooters is dramatically higher. I think weekdays are safer. Last time I went on a weekend, a bus full of kids unloaded, and for a while, it was like March of 2003 in Baghdad. The rangemaster probably lost his voice by the time the range closed.

Wish me a totally tactical afternoon.

I’m on a Roll

I ruined a supporting two-by-six on my workbench last night, implementing a clever scheme to enable me to drill straight down through seven inches of wood without a drill press. It works like this: you make marks at the far end of the workpiece, so that when you sight along the side of the bit, you can keep it aligned with them. The theory is that if the bit tilts either way, it won’t be vertical any more. And it works. Just not well enough to be worth doing. In other words, it works about as well as guessing. Which, I guess, means it DOESN’T work.

Oh well. Seven dollars down the toilet.

I should have bought me a drill guide. But unbelievably, Home Depot didn’t have them. A trip to Sears is in order.

I knew a day would come when the lack of a drill press would bite me in the ass pretty hard. And here it is. But I think I would rather blow forty bucks on a drill guide than nearly five hundred on a press. And it would be a good thing to have, press or no press.

When I finally buy, it looks like Steel City is the best choice for a drill press I will never outgrow. Out of the stuff available at the prices I can stand to pay, this one has the longest stroke, plus a few other features I forget. This job, all by itself, is a good argument for a long stroke. It would be a pain, drilling these 7″ holes with a short stroke. If the prices start to creep up, I’m going to get one. Sooner or later, it has to happen. Oil is high, the dollar is low, and the Chinese will eventually get spoiled.

There are a lot of neat old commercial drill presses on Ebay. But even if you eliminate the 220 and 440 machines, plus the machines that are just too big, you’re looking at worn-out items over a thousand miles away, with no warranty. For this risk, you save about a hundred bucks.

I’m going to go ahead and get .45 bullets in the Hornady promotion. I guess it’s the best choice. Now I have to worry about primers and powder, which means I need a manual. The ABCs of Handloading has a chapter where a guy who makes match ammunition for pistols recommends a bunch of stuff, but I’ve gotten so paranoid from warnings to read the manual, I am afraid to listen to him. He recommends something called Bullseye powder. I would like to go ahead and order it with the manual and save money (can’t get the manual in local stores), but I guess I’m screwed.

The guy in the book says you don’t have to sort or trim cartridges for pistols, so that’s good. But he likes very slow loads (under 800 fps), which is a bummer. I would like to learn to shoot, using loads that feel similar to defensive ammunition. But I guess it doesn’t matter. An inch or two of difference at fifty feet probably won’t make me lose a gunfight. One comforting thing about self-defense is that if you can shoot at all, and you have done any preparation worth mentioning, you are miles ahead of a typical moron criminal. I suppose you don’t need pinpoint accuracy, if you can reliably pump someone’s torso full of lead at distances from which a generic criminal can’t hit a house.

More Tool Woes

Once again I must call on the tool gurus for help.

I have to mount my reloading press on my workbench. The best way to do it is to drill holes and use hex bolts. But the holes have to be over 7″ deep, and they have to go vertically through a two-by-six. And obviously, it will be bad if they aren’t straight, because they will come out of the side of the wood.

So, what’s the deal? I have a foot-long bit already.

“He’s Out There Again!”

Got a few shots of the vegetables. I can already hear the whiners pointing out that they’re really fruit. Hope I didn’t confuse one type with another.

1. Prig ki nu peppers. A small sampling from a huge bush.

2. Jamaican hot chocolate peppers, on last year’s bush.

3. Habanero gold peppers.

4. More habanero golds.

5. More habanero golds. Sometimes I like what “auto levels” does to photos. I believe Steven den Beste first mentioned it to me.

6. Kentucky beefsteak tomato. Looks bigger than it is, sadly.

7. Cherokee chocolate tomato. Small, but not freakishly so.

8. This is a tomato from a plant whose type I forgot. I liked this tomato because it looked sinister. Like the sentinels in The Matrix.

That’s all.

Mr. Hughes, Your Toilet is Working

Don’t you love having plumbers around? I sure do. I can’t get enough of it. And they always want to shake your hand, which is great. One “Monk” moment after another.

I think I’ll go outside and try to photograph my produce.

Here, watch TC cook.

We Eat Ham and Jam and Government Cheese a Lot

I am looking at a Drudgebart-linked story about a 12-year-old boy who killed a nutcase who was in the act of strangling the boy’s mother. Salomon Noubissie, a family friend, flipped out and started beating Cheryl Stamp, and he eventually ended up with his hands on her throat, and he refused to let go. So her son took a knife and killed him. This is the story, as told by the boy and his mother. So far, the authorities say it’s consistent with the evidence.

They’re trying to decide whether to indict the child. The Washington Post felt the boy’s unusual height and weight were somehow relevant, so they mentioned them. Fine. I get to call him “the child,” the way the gun-grabbers call 24-year-old pimps killed legally with pistol bullets “children.”

At first, I was outraged by the story. Then I realized it was reasonable to look at the evidence before making a decision, and I figured the authorities were doing their jobs. Then I thought about the situation. An attack inside the victim’s home, in front of a 12-year-old. And I started to lean toward outrage again.

This happened in Washington, DC, more or less. It was actually in Maryland, but it a lot of what we think of as DC is in Maryland. So it happened in a heavily liberalized area. Presumably, then, the authorities there are hostile to the second amendment, and to self-defense. When politicians represent an unruly constituency in which many voters have relatives who commit crimes, they tend to support the public’s view that self-defense is mean and that criminals should be allowed to live long enough to reform themselves. After killing a few dozen people. Who are somehow less valuable than the criminals.

Had this happened in Florida, I am fairly sure it wouldn’t have made the news. First of all, most newspapers have a policy of killing stories about successful acts of self-defense, especially when they involve dead criminals. Second, in Florida, if you’re in a person’s house and you act up, and you get killed for it, the prosecutors know they will have a very hard time putting your victim in jail. We have the Castle Doctrine. It’s not really a doctrine. It’s a statute. Anyway, barring some indication that there was foul play–and a dead body does not automatically qualify–I doubt the cops and prosecutors would waste their time on a matter like this in Florida. The authorities wouldn’t want to act on it, and the newspapers would not want to report it. And the public would go insane, reading that a child might be prosecuted for defending his mother.

There isn’t enough money in the world to make me move to a place like DC or New York or Detroit or LA. Jesusland is where it’s at. We’re citizens. The Blue Staters are subjects. Sharecroppers for the Mommy Dearest state.

Honestly, sometimes I think secession would be a great move. We keep the wheat, the guns, the cattle, the vast majority of the natural resources, and most of the military. They would defect to Jesusland anyway. You keep Fire Island, San Francisco, Broadway, and the cast of The View. I’d jump at that in a heartbeat. Think of all the miserable, annoying people who would leave Jesusland and move north and east and west. Now that I think about it, that kind of migration is already underway.

It’s possible that the authorities have a good reason for considering an indictment, but if that’s the case, it’s not apparent from the story. If such evidence exists, it will have to be powerful. They’ll have to ask a jury or judge to go after a kid whose mother will testify that she was attacked in her own home. Maybe they think she was involved with the dead man, and that the child just didn’t like it. But the story also says the attacker was combative even after he was cut. He fought the police. That’s not consistent with an unprovoked slashing.

If it’s true that this guy went nuts and refused to stop choking the woman, then what the child did was completely appropriate, except that he didn’t finish the job. You don’t point a knife at a nutcase and ask him to be reasonable, after it’s obvious that he won’t listen. You have to stick him right away, because the alternative is to risk having him take your knife and stick you. If the boy hadn’t acted, we might be reading about a mother and child slashed to death by a lunatic.

Look at the attitude prosecutors have up there: “‘In Maryland, there can be a legitimate defense of third parties in the event of a violent attack,’ State’s Attorney Glenn F. Ivey said. ‘That is a possibility in this case.'”

“In Maryland”? Is he seriously suggesting he thinks there are jurisdictions where you can’t kill to defend someone else? News to me, if there are. Thanks for the chilling effect, Glenn. And why does he use the word “possibility”? Judging from the story, it’s damned likely. Clearly, he’s playing to his liberal public. Brilliant. Law-abiding people will see that and hesitate to do the right thing. Criminals won’t pay any attention. Besides, they can’t read.

What a snake pit Greater DC must be. Imagine, coming to someone’s aid, knowing the alternative is to watch a murder, and then having Mr. Ivey say there was “a possibility” you might not go to the penitentiary for your bravery. I guess places like that are lost, and the only answer for decent people is to flee. Flee, and let the fools who remain suffer the consequences of their irrationality and unfairness and immorality. That’s the time-honored solution, and I’m a hundred percent in favor of it. If you want to see justice in action, go to a city where the parasites have driven out the hosts. Mosquitoes make a damn poor living, biting each other. Thank God people in America are still allowed to move. If the kooks were in charge, they’d take it away from us, in order to keep the tax dollars flowing. It’s funny how leftist utopias have to seal their borders to keep people from leaving.

Let’s all leave. God bless the warmhearted, enlightened socialist fascists; they’re so smart, they don’t need our help. We would just be in the way. Let’s get out and let them create their Marxist paradises without our interference. I’m sure everything will be fine. Their new nation, the People’s Republic of Kumbayah, will be…the Macintosh of countries. Perfect in every way. Even the climate. Global warming will continue in Jesusland, but in the PRK, they’ll have frost in May. And not just in Hillary’s bra.

I feel a song coming on!

The rain may never fall till after sundown.
By eight, the morning fog must disappear.
In short, there’s simply not
A more congenial spot
For holding up a liquor store
Than here in…Cam-e-lot.

STOP THAT!

I suppose people will say this article proves newspapers don’t kill stories about self-defense. Wrong. That rule only applies to stories with happy endings, i.e. dead criminals and defenders who aren’t charged. And sometimes they print stories about people who defend themselves without violence, to “prove” a rape whistle beats a switchblade every time. They printed this story because the defender is in trouble. They printed Mr. Ivey’s ridiculous, ominous, veiled threat. The message isn’t, “Brave Child Kills to Defend Mother.” It’s, “See What You Get?” Self-defense is almost as vile as…being a snitch!

Jesusland, Jesusland. I feel like going outside and kissing the ground.

I Look Back on Ignorance With Fondness

Oh, God. I hate it when I try to make a responsible effort to gather information, and I only succeed in learning that I don’t know anything.

I have been reading The ABCs of Handloading, in order to help me figure out how to get started making my own ammunition. I figured it would help me decide which of the free bullets I should order in the Hornady promotion.

I was leaning toward .45 bullets. Simple, right? I want good accuracy in a bullet similar in weight to typical self-defense loads. This ought to do it.

But hold the phone! I read a chapter about accuracy, in the above-mentioned book. And the accuracy guy talked about the difference changing the ammunition in a .45 can make. Now I’m wondering…do I want to fool with the free bullets, knowing that if I perfect an accurate handload, I’ll have to use expensive jacketed Hornady bullets from now on, OR shoot all the Hornadys and then start from scratch with cheaper cast bullets? I plan to use cast bullets in the future, because they’re way cheaper than jacketed. And the Hornady .45 rounds are not optimal for self-defense, according to web lore. Supposedly they don’t expand very fast. So saving them for that purpose would be pointless. Besides, who needs 1400 bullets in one pistol caliber for self-defense?

Maybe the best move is to get .308 rounds instead, for the K31. But that’s a can of worms in and of itself.

I considered getting .38 bullets, figuring they could be used for the .357 or the .38 Super. But it turns out the .38 Super requires a bizarre bullet, the diameter of which which differs from the .357 by a thousandth. Is that an important difference? Damned if I know. Do I have to slug the barrel? Overload…overload…brain melting…

I’m also bummed out because the accuracy-chapter guy posed with a couple of .45 targets he was relatively happy with, and they were not all that much better than the results I get now, with cheap ammunition. The difference was very significant, but he was still putting rounds as much as maybe eight inches apart. He was shooting at 75 feet, and on my last outing, I got similar results at 50. And unlike him, I don’t use a rest. So I’m wondering…is it worth it to try to come up with accurate 1911 loads? I should not expect to outshoot this guy; it’s what he does for a living. So presumably, if I have perfect ammunition, if I continue shooting without a rest, I will still be all over the place at 50 feet.

I always thought pistols were more accurate than that. Now I don’t know what to think. Why…it’s almost as if all those cowboy movies contained factual inaccuracies.

I’m starting to think my Glock .40, which gave me such nice results in the past, is a much better gun than I realized.

Of course, if I make handloads for that, I’ll have to get a new barrel with a support chamber. Arrgh.

Anyway, the book is wonderful. You can’t open it and follow the directions and make pistol ammunition, but there is a ton of good information in it.

Adrift in a Sea of Seemingly Contradictory Facts

I learned a few things about hard chroming and the .38 Super today.

I was planning to have a ramped, supported barrel put in my bright stainless Colt. And I wanted to get it chromed, to reduce the inevitable scratching of the finish. But I called Tripp Research–incidentally, they are shutting down their chroming business in June–and someone there patiently explained that while hard chrome is wonderful, the gun would not have the shine that it now has. So screw that, I guess. He also informed me that the gun is almost certainly very safe in its current configuration. He said Colt’s chambers are probably deeper than they need to be, and that you don’t see problems until you get up around 1400 fps. A guy from Briley told me .38 Super cases are stronger than they used to be, so I suppose I should not be terrified of shooting reloads that are not too hopped up.

I am still wondering if I should get Briley to put a new ramped barrel in it. I don’t know how accurate a 1911 is supposed to be. Using Aguila FMJ +P at 7 yards, I put 25 rounds in an area the size of a golf ball. I don’t know how much of the error is me, how much is the gun, and how much is the ammunition. For all I know, the gun is perfect. But if there is no down side to a ramped barrel, and it’s safer, why wouldn’t I want to get one? The guy who runs .38super.net claims he fired Cor-Bons in a gun like mine, and that the cases bulged.

I was also considering getting it set up with a second barrel that would accept 9 x 23mm cartridges. I’m totally confused about that. I don’t know if the magazines will work with 9mm, and I’m sure they would cost a lot to duplicate, if I wanted the gun to keep its stock look.

One thing is certain. It needs to go back to Colt to get the rollmark and the asymmetrical dehorning fixed.

The guy from Tripp said Colt and Smith & Wesson have very highly trained individuals who dedicate their existence to polishing guns, and that Tripp could not do it as well or restore the gun to its original appearance after chroming. I thought that was damned honest of him.

Have a Safe and Happy Breakfast

I appreciate all the info on reloading. I’m sure it will be useful, and it reminds me of something important. I never got around to buying a reloading manual. I have The ABCs of Reloading, but that’s not a manual. I think there was some sort of delay with the latest version of the Speer manual, and that’s why I didn’t buy one. Not sure. Anyway, I’ll be all over it now that I’ve remembered.

I don’t understand reloading yet, but the one thing everyone seems to be sure of is this: you absolutely have to have a manual, and no other source of information is worth a crap. Don’t look at the web. Don’t ask your friends who reload. Read the manual. I don’t get it, but I will assume it’s gospel. When information I get from other sources is inconsistent with the manual, I will obey the manual. I guess.

It’s too bad I’m all excited about the .45 and the .38 Super. One thing I’ve learned at the range is, nobody who likes .40 S&W should ever have to pay for brass. It’s far and away the most common item on the pistol-side pavement at Trail Glades. Big ol’ drifts of it. All over.

People are advising me to buy stuff at gun shows. Wish I could. I keep checking all the listings I can find, and it looks like gun shows in Miami are damn rare. Hard to believe, given our proud tradition of violence.

I had an interesting experience this morning. I have been trying to get more serious about concealed carry, because it’s just a good idea, and because I feel silly walking around unarmed, with an expensive carry permit in my wallet. How would you like to die under those circumstances? Tragic, and also embarrassing. Today I had my usual Tuesday breakfast with my father, and I took a Glock along. It’s surprising how quickly you get used to it. That’s what I was hoping for. Carrying can make you self-conscious, and that discourages you from doing it, so I want to get past that.

As we left the restaurant, I passed the cop who always watches over the strip mall. I think this was the first time in my life–in Miami–I had stood within a few feet of an on-duty cop, with a loaded piece on me. The fact that it felt odd shows how successful the gun-hating pansies have been. It ought to feel as natural as carrying a cell phone. My right to my carry gun is as strong and as reasonable as the cop’s right to his. In fact, it’s more reasonable, because civilian guns stop crimes more effectively than police guns. And unlike the police, armed civilians cost society nothing, and the potential supply is gigantic.

The cop had no idea I was carrying, and neither of us had any idea who else in the area was carrying. Did that make me feel uneasy? Far from it. It gave me hope and made me feel more secure. I realize that lawful carry by ordinary citizens makes life infinitely safer in a crisis. Imagine what one person like me could have done at Virginia Tech. Well, you don’t have to imagine. Because two armed citizens not affiliated with the police recently put a quick end to a similar massacre in Israel. You can argue that an untrained person like me is more likely to soil himself and faint than shoot an armed criminal. But statistics don’t bear that out. The general rule is, people who fear for their lives step up to the plate and use their guns effectively. The press conceals it from us, but it happens all the time.

It’s too bad the press works so hard to hide successful incidents of self-defense by armed citizens. Because publicizing them would prevent a lot of crimes. If the criminals in Miami understood that every coffee shop is likely to hold one or two armed individuals–people the criminals can’t identify in advance–they’d be a lot less likely to cause problems.

Imagine you’re a criminal. Contrary to anti-gun BS, most gun crime is committed by habitual slimeballs, not ordinary people who go insane the second their skin touches bluing. So you’re a criminal, and you want to hold up a store to get money for meth. But you live in a carry state AND the TV talking heads have been yammering persistently about how common carry permits are. And it’s a very high rate. Are you going to be crazy enough to commit a robbery? Almost certainly not. Criminals who are willing to take on armed victims are very uncommon. That’s why we see massacres on school campuses. They’re stocked ponds.

Shameful Omission

I can’t find any pictures of Maynard on this site. So I’ll post one.