I'll never learn...

So I'm trying to catch the climax of NCIS on TV this evening, when Lagniappe up and decides that it's time for him to eat. I don't know what he bases this decision on since he doesn't have a watch, but every night at about this time, he starts capering around, and when I ignore him, as I did tonight, he starts barking at me.

I tell him to wait until commercial but he keeps barking. Apparently he thinks that he will starve to death before the next commercial break. But I raise my voice and let him know that he'll get fed in a few minutes, and he backs off.

So I make him wait until the show is over. Silly dog can't tell the difference between the show and the commercials anyway. Then I go into the kitchen and pick up his dish. This spurs him to break into yet another rendition of his "feed me" dance. He prances, he hops, he bounces... I swear that you'd think that this dog just got off the last bus from Ethiopia or something the way that he acts.

So I go into the pantry area where the food bag is and put the food in his dish, and when I turn around, he sits right in front of me so I can't even get back into the kitchen where he's supposed to eat. His eyes are focused like lasers on his dish.

"Oh, ok? You really want some food that bad? Here ya go." I take one nugget of his Eukanuba dog food and hand it to him. He takes it and chews it up. Wow--he actually chewed it. This is a dog that normally wolfs a whole bowl down in about ten seconds. I hand him another piece. Then another. And he chews each one. So I'm giving him his dinner one nugget at a time, and this is kinda fun. It's like feeding a huge squirrel. I figure this could take about half an hour or so, but he suddenly gets impatient and lunges at me, hitting the bottom of the bowl with his nose and flipping it right out of my hands. Dog food goes everywhere.

So now we're in the kitchen, and there's dog food all over the floor. I'm thinking that he's going to eat it but he just sits back down and looks at me, then at the bowl upside down on the floor, and then back at me, as if to ask "So, you gonna fill that back up, or what?"

Well here we go...Obama calls for gun control

We all knew it was coming, but I didn't think it would be so soon.

Obama's new attorney General Eric Holder just announced that Obama plans to enact more gun control, starting with a renewal of the old Clinton Assault Weapons Ban of 1994.

You folks remember that bill, right? It banned a few scary-looking semi-automatic rifles--forcing manufacturers to create virtually identical copies that were just different enough to fall outside of the ban--and it limited the size of new magazines for our firearms to ten rounds.

This bill also cost the Democrats control of Congress the next election, and when it expired in 2004, no one was sorry other than people like Larry Pratt and Sarah Brady who make their money by ginning up anti-gun hysteria.

Well they want to bring it back now, probably with more restrictions and no sunset provision that will cause it to go away unless renewed. The last one had that, which is why we're not inconvenienced by it any more.

This sort of restriction on what law-abiding Americans can own isn't needed, as these so-called "assault weapons"--semi-automatic copies of military-issue select-fire weapons--are used in less than 1% of gun crimes in this country. source

And that aside, it's also true that violent crime rates in America have been falling for nearly a decade now. Clearly these firearms aren't a problem in this country, and even the advocates of banning them admit that the real goal is simply to help advance the cause of gun control, period.

But now we have a new argument being offered by Obama through Holder. Now they say that we have to prevent Americans from buying and owning these guns because some of them are getting smuggled into Mexico and used by drug gangs. Apparently we have to give up our guns in the name of security for the Mexicans now.

Per the ABC News article,

Holder said that putting the ban back in place would not only be a positive move by the United States, it would help cut down on the flow of guns going across the border into Mexico, which is struggling with heavy violence among drug cartels along the border.

"I think that will have a positive impact in Mexico, at a minimum." Holder said at a news conference on the arrest of more than 700 people in a drug enforcement crackdown on Mexican drug cartels operating in the U.S.

Mexican government officials have complained that the availability of sophisticated guns from the United States have emboldened drug traffickers to fight over access routes into the U.S.

Well I have a common-sense solution that I doubt we'll ever see the Obama administration enact. It's called "Let's get serious and build that border wall."

Seriously, we wouldn't see truckloads of American firearms driven over the border if there was a twenty-foot high double fence topped with razor wire, and a cleared zone several hundred yards wide on either side, lit up with floodlights at night and overseen by towers and cameras and Border Patrol Agents (or soldiers) with guns and the authority to use them on anyone who crosses a "dead-line" near the fence. Yeah, I know that it would also keep out drug runners, terrorists, and people who just want to come here for the welfare, but that's the problem because the Democrats look at that last group as a solid source of eventual Democrat voters. That's going to be the snag, right there.

But it makes perfect sense to me to build a credible wall from the Pacific to the Gulf. In line with the need to boost our economy, it would create a ton of jobs, both in it's construction and also in it's monitoring and maintenance, and it would serve to keep the drugs, terrorists and illegal aliens out of our country and our guns in. Everybody wins.

But that sort of common sense isn't common in Washington, DC. So if you haven't bought that AR-15 that you've been wanting, you'd better hustle and grab one while you still can. Granted the panic-buyers and speculators hoping to re-sell them later at a huge profit have already scooped most of them up, but the manufacturers are working to crank out as many as they can right now, so if you're patient, you can still turn them up at a fair price as of this writing. Lagniappe and I aren't really worried because we have ours, but I may still have to grab a couple more before the door closes, just the same.Lagniappe says: "Fear the government that fears armed dogs!"

Mid-week ramblings...

So I'm driving down the road yesterday--a two-lane rural highway with a 55mph speed limit--and I wind up at the back of a line of cars that are all bottled up behind a red Chevrolet Caprice that's putting along at between 40 and 45.

My fist though is, of course, that people should not allow their grandparents to be out driving around on roads that other people use to get places.

I'd like to pass this vehicle but the road is winding and hilly and passing zones are few and far between. And of course the mountain road curse applies--the one that says that you won't see an oncoming car for 2-3 minutes, but as soon as you hit a passing zone, here comes eight of them all in a row, just to keep you from executing that pass. So we all just poke along like floats in a parade, fuming.

Finally we catch a break--a passing zone that's actually free. Every car ahead of me shoots around this Chevrolet and I'm right in there too. For a second, I feel a bit of pity for this old person driving it. It's got to suck to be so slow and feeble and watch everyone blow past you all the time.

But then as I pass this "geriatric" and look over, I see that it's not an old person. It's a 40-something fat guy talking on his cell phone! And he's giving the bird to all of us as we pass.

When I get to be President, it will not be illegal to just sideswipe cretins like that right into the ditch. In fact, it will be mandatory.

So then I pop into the gym and try out this ab workout/circuit-training class. This is my first time in here, and I'm hoping for a good workout, but I don't know what to expect. A cute young gal (alas, wearing a ring) comes in, and I find out that it's her first time in this class, too. All right... now I don't have to worry about looking like the newbie. I do the protective male thing tell her to just stick with me and we'll play it as it comes. She smiles and agrees, and we go get our equipment, to include some weights and one of those step benches. Everyone else grabs the small step benches. She grabs a tall one. Not to be outdone, so do I. I also grab the big weights, because I'm a guy and we do that without thinking.

Well the class starts, the tempo increases, and it soon becomes apparent that this little gazelle that I told to stick with me is very adept at this program. In fact, it would not be an exaggeration to say that she was kicking my ass like one of those chicks on the TV exercise shows. But I'm a macho guy, so I cannot and will not admit that despite the fact that my shirt was literally soaked with sweat an hour later and she looked as fresh as when she'd just walked in. She decided to mention on the way out that while she was new to this class, she's taken and taught similar classes elsewhere.

Yeah, that went well. And damn, my abs hurt today. But I'm a guy, so I'll be back in that class the next time...as far away from that little mutant as possible.

And finally, I have to say a few words about the concept of encroachment...specifically the K9 variety.

When I first got Lagniappe, I decided that he was going to live like a dog, and that meant sleeping on the floor like dogs are supposed to. (It also meant no people food, but my saintly mother ruined that by getting him addicted to ice cream and popcorn when she watched him while I was in the police academy.)

Anyway, Lagniappe had no problem sleeping on the floor, but when I went to midnights--my preferred shift--he was constantly waking me up, either by barking at people out in the hallway of my apartment building, or just clicking around with his nails on the floor and playing with his toys. So to make sure that I could sleep, I started making him come up and lie on the bed with me. He was assigned a spot down on the corner of the foot-end of the bed and that's where he was to stay when I slept.

This worked fine, and he soon learned that he was not allowed on my bed--or any other furniture--unless I was on it and gave him specific permission. If I caught him up there on his own, he got a scolding and a swat. Soon he learned to wait for permission, and every time that I went to bed, he'd stand next to the bed and just wait to be invited up. He would not come up on his own, but neither would he leave. He would just stand there waiting, and if an invite was not issued, he would whine. So he always got invited up, and he always slept in his corner down on the foot-end. And live was good.

Now here we are years later. He still waits for permission--and refuses to leave until he gets it--and he still goes down to sleep in his corner. The problem is, now more and more, I'm waking up early in the morning to find a German Shepherd head up on my pillows. Apparently he's trying to re-negotiate the agreement all of a sudden. So I nudge him awake and send him back down to his corner, but the next morning, these he is again.

Next thing you know, he'll be wanting his breakfast there. No wonder the police department kicked this lazy cur to the curb.Lagniappe says: "Hey man...it is a dog's life. Get over it."

Lunch with Russell

So yesterday I had a pretty heavy workout in the gym, in large part because The Magnificent Seven was on the gym TV so I had to run and ride the bike longer just to watch more of it. I wound up running six miles and I forgot to see how long I rode, but it was a good workout.

So as a treat to myself, I went down to Mario's Pizza in Berryville, VA to have a nice lunch. And it would have been nice too, except for Russell and his family who were also in there.

Now Russell is a little boy in a Cub Scout shirt who is probably ten years old or so. His parents brought him there along with four other little boys about the same age. They stuck Russell and the others at one table and sat by themselves at another, and then proceeded to ignore the brats as they all loudly tried to talk over one another, obviously oblivious to the concept of "indoor voices" v. "outdoor voices". And I got to know Russell on a first-name basis because his mom addressed him by name several times, scolding him for practically everything except of course shouting inside a restaurant.

And shout Russell did. It was impossible to tune out that shrill soprano voice of his, and his four peers weren't much better as they all tried to be heard over each other. They jabbered about video games, and cartoons and a movie or two, and all this time, the two adults who had inflicted these kids on the rest of the diners just sat there and ignored this maelstrom.

Now to be fair, I probably should have said something, but I was really feeling my workout and wasn't all that up to engaging two obviously thoughtless and insensitive people, and I pretty much figured that if I asked the parents to either crank their kids' volume down or take their food to go, there'd be an argument. Normally I'd be all over that, since such arguments are fun for me, particularly when it's clear that I'm right and I could expect at least a bit of support from the other diners, but I passed on the chance, naively hoping that the restaurant staff would say something, or fate would intervene and Russell would choke to death on a piece of his pizza. (He has six slices. His mom was counting and intercepted him when he tried to grab a seventh. And we all heard her explain how he'd reached his limit.)

Fortunately they finished their meal/shouting session and left just about the time that my food came. And as they were walking out, a little girl who'd been sitting at another nearby table walked towards me on her way back from the restroom. So I took the opportunity to rather loudly address her as she approached. "Well hello! Aren't you just the quietest, most well-behaved child?" I then turned to her parents and said just as loudly: "I never even saw her there, she's so quiet."

Russell's mom stopped in her tracks and turned to give me a nasty glare. And I found myself hoping that she'd say something as I returned her stare, because NOW I suddenly felt like playing. But alas, she just turned and followed her flock of screaming monkeys and her milquetoast husband out the door as the mother of the well-behaved girl grinned and whispered "Thank you for saying that."Now I wish that I'd said something earlier. People like Russell's mom really need to be told that they need to either control their kids in public or just keep them home and call Domino's. I'd like to think that she caught the hint but I doubt it. People like that are proud of their obliviousness to others around them. They won't do their part as responsible parents so the rest of us will have to publicly suffer Russell and the other little louts until they mature enough to catch the clue that their parents should have caught at least ten years ago. I could easily see this woman a few years prior, bringing an infant Russell to the movie theater and refusing to take him out when he started crying because she wants to see the movie. In a just world, the rest of us should be empowered to walk up and slap parents like that on the back of the head with no fear of legal consequences. But this is not a just world and parents like that don't feel required to keep their litters of caterwauling spawn in check any more.

Oh--and as much as I generally like Mario's, the wait staff or the owner (who was right there) really needed to step up and suggest to Russell's parents that they simmer their brood down. They might have made one family embarrassed or mad, but I suspect that they'd have gained a lot more support from the rest of us in the dining room.

EDITED TO ADD: This is gratingly reminiscent of my encounter with another band of urchins a couple years ago, notably the infamous "Mitchell".

So what else could we have spent the money from Obama's Porkulus bill on?

Well now that Obama and the Democrats have picked our pockets and raided our bank accounts for years to come to the tune of 787 billion dollars (most of which will be wasted on projects that enrich those who supported the Dems and paying off the mortgages of irresponsible people who bought houses that they could not afford, articles like the ones at the Boston Globe and StoptheACLU got me to thinking what else we could have blown all that money on.

According to The Globe, it could have paid off all of the student loan debt in the country, with over 230 billion dollars left over. Stopthe ACLU figured out that it could pay for Oh--and it could also pay for 1,210,769,230 3 day packages to Disney World, including airfare, meals and the obligatory set of mouse ears. (So basically we're all each PAYING for a trip to Disney World, courtesy of Obama and Congress. We're just not going to get to go.)

So what else could we buy with $787,000,000,000?

Well I could go to the Civilian Marksmanship Program store at Camp Perry and buy 11,746,268,656 cans of .30-06 ammunition. At 240 rounds per can, that works out to 2,819,104,477,440 rounds. Lagniappe and I could shoot for quite a while. I guess that we'd better break out the Browning 1919A4 for this one. At 150 rounds per minute--the gun's maximum rate for sustained fire--it would take us 35,757 years to fire it all if we shot 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and that's without stopping to change barrels or hit the head.

But Lagniappe would rather eat pig's ears than shoot. He loves those pig's ears that Petco sells for $1.49 each. The 787 billion dollars could buy him 528,187,919,463 of those delicious treats. Hope you're hungry, fella.

One could also buy 984,365,228 plasma television sets, about three for every man, woman and child in this country. Of course many of the welfare homes already have one or more plasma TV's, so subtracting for that, there'd easily be enough left over to pay for cable TV hook-ups for everyone as well.

So what would YOU buy with $787,000,000? It is your money, after all. Most creative submission gets honorable mention and possibly a German Shepherd dog. Please show your work, and yes, the math needs to work out.

Ah, such is life...

Sorry I've been off here for a bit...been flying the last couple of days.

I went out on Monday for a little refresher hop, and there was a nifty crosswind at the airport that was really making things interesting and challenging...which is usually how I prefer things. The winds were almost 90 degrees to the runway at 11mph "with gusts". Well that was all well and fine for a bit as I got to work on crabbing and landing with one wing lowered into the wind. But on my last landing of the day, one of those gusts came up and hit me when I was low and slow, just over the numbers and setting up for me flare, and it shoved the aircraft right off the side of the runway. But I'm good, and because I'm good, I slammed the throttle into the firewall, killed the carb heat, dropped the nose, and reefed the plane away from the field lights that I almost collided with. The road of the engine drowned out the curse words that I yelled, so no one on the ground heard them, but as I inadvertently hit the push-to-talk radio button on the yoke, the tower got an earful.

I managed to get the bird down properly a bit down the runway, just as the tower let me know that the gust had been measured at 21 mph. Needless to say, I wrapped it up for the day. I'm good, not stupid.

So I went back up yesterday, and yesterday was perfect. No wind, no ceiling, unlimited visibility...couldn't have asked for more. I shot a few more touch-and-go landings, then flew around just playing for a bit.

Coincidentally, some folks in my neighborhood seem to have observed a low-flying aircraft overhead at roughly the same time that I was up. For some reason, my name reportedly came up in the discussion. Now since I would never violate the FAA minimums, it could not have been me. But I'm shocked--shocked--to find out that someone was flying low over this area.

Lagniappe did not make this flight with me, but as you can tell from past posts, he does hold a Bird Dog rating.

Sorry for the lack of flying pics on this one. Didn't bring the camera aloft this time. But if you click on "flying" below, you'll see plenty more.

Another new toy to play with

So my tax money came back, and while most of it went to bills and savings, I allowed myself the luxury of one new toy.

Feast your eyes on the Super Sniper 10x42 scope, shown here attached to a Savage 110 Tactical, special limited left-handed edition.

I've had the rifle for over a decade, but until now, I've never done anything with it other than mount a cheap Tasco World Class scope on it and banish it to the back corner of the gun safe. I hadn't really seen a need for the rifle all these years but I bought it way back when just because it was a left-handed tactical rifle. I'd frequently said back then that if a company ever decided to make a left-handed tactical rifle in .308, I'd buy it. Well Savage eventually made a run of them back in the early 1990's and I snared this one. Of course back then, I wasn't much of a bolt-rifle shooter and didn't know a thing about optics, so the rifle just languished.





These days, I've got plenty of time to shoot but not a lot of extra cash to drop on new guns. I also need to re-think my own tactical scenarios since I'm arguably not as fast or agile as I once was. That up close and personal CQB stuff is better left to the younger folks, ideally those with two natural feet.

I can still play those games, mind you--former employers spent a lot of time and money training me to do just that and I haven't forgotten or stopped training--but I think that it's time to revamp my tactics around skills and equipment that give me the edge via distance.




Sure, I can hose bad guys off or cover whole areas from a distance with the Browning MG, but it's really not the handiest tool in the safe for most applications due to it's weight and rather voracious appetite and the requirement for an assistant or two to lug it's fodder and keep it in action. While the Browning has it's niche, I really need something a little lighter for routine distance shooting.




So the Savage is now out of mothballs and it's been topped with this professional-grade scope. It's a fixed-power 30mm scope that's currently seeing much use in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as here on the home front with numerous police department SWAT teams. It's got a mil-dot reticle and nice target turrets--a perfect compliment to this great police-grade rifle that Savage crafted.

I took it out to the range today to zero the scope, and once on paper and dialed in for the M852 military match round that I have a quantity of thanks to a generous Uncle Sam, I had no trouble putting three and four round groups on the 100M targets that could be covered with a half dollar. And it doesn't hurt that this rifle shoots the 7.62x51mm cartridge. Thanks to the aforementioned Browning, I've got tons of it that I can use for low-cost practice.

Me likey.

I'm still getting used to this new tool, but I see a lot of potential here, plus I get to learn a new aspect of shooting that goes beyond the basic iron sight skills. With this set-up, I can theoretically hit head-sized targets out to 500m and consistent torso-sized target hits out to 1000m if I do my part. I figure that this'll give me something to do for a while and help keep me out of trouble while I work on mastering some new techniques.


No Lagniappe. You ain't getting it. You'll just have to keep dealing with the neighbor's cats the old-fashioned way...by chasing them like normal dogs do.

Oh yeah?

The censorship nazis are at it again. This time, a 27 year veteran of the Iowa State Patrol has just been suspended for 30 days over an e-mail that he sent while off-duty and at home. According to KTEV:

OMAHA, Neb. -- An Iowa State trooper who was investigated after it was shown that he forwarded an e-mail showing mug shots of people wearing Obama t-shirts has been suspended for 30 days.

Sgt. Rodney Hicok was at home and off-duty when he forwarded the e-mails, said an official with the Iowa Department of Public Safety Bureau and Professional Standards.

The e-mail made disparaging remarks about 15 people in the photos and referred to Obama as having "quite a fan base."

Hicok was not making a racial statement, the official said, but, rather, a political statement.

In a statement, Hicok said, "I am deeply sorry for my actions … I apologize to anyone this e-mail may have offended, as well as my family, citizens in my community and Iowa taxpayers."

Hicok ended his statement by saying he guaranteed "nothing like this will ever happen again."

"I regret what happened and wish I could take it back," Hicok said in the statement.

He violated the department's policy and his permanent file will reflect the suspension, the official said.

The 27-year veteran, who has no prior offense on his record, will also attend DPS training on policies and procedures.

OK, I've seen the e-mail. It was just a compilation of mug shots put together by The Smoking Gun and it isn't graphic, racist, sexist or otherwise insulting to any group of people...except that group that voted for Obama, obviously. You can go to the link, or you can see it here. It's nothing but an amusing observation about criminals and their apparent presidential choice. Click on the picture to enlarge it and you'll note that every one of these arrestees is wearing an Obama shirt. Surprised? I don't think that anyone really is. Everyone knows that criminals prefer the party that promises to give them something for nothing in exchange for a vote, and that's why Dems court the felon and incarcerated prisoner populations every election season. Frankly, this has circulated for a few weeks now and I really didn't find it worthy of passing along...until now, that is.

Suspending a veteran trooper for a month just for forwarding this from his home computer on his own time? That's outrageous. So Sgt. Hicok, Lagniappe and I have your back on this one. I'LL forward it via this blog, and if you're department has a problem with that, well they can send someone clear out here to kiss my ass. They can't suspend me now, can they? Heck, they can't even force me to write out a humiliating statement of public apology like they did you. And I don't see anything to apologize for. The photos are actual mug shots--public records--and the fact that they're all wearing Obama shirts is just that...a fact. The Democrats court these people. Why is it somehow wrong to point out the obvious?

Well what's wrong is punishing a man for something that he did on his own time as an individual. Political speech is deserving of the highest level of protection per our founding fathers and 200+ years of case law, and that applies to every citizen, including those who work as police officers, and when any citizen's political speech is suppressed or punished, we as a nation need to stand in support of that person. But because this one is a police officer, he's got my support just as a matter of principle. Mess with one of us, mess with all of us. And thanks to this blatant violation of a good man's First Amendment rights, I'm betting that this collection of Obama supporter mug shots is going to get a lot more visibility than it ever would have otherwise.

If you agree, spread this around please.

What is wrong with this picture?

According to this story from Washington State, three women presented another woman to the Border Patrol as a possible illegal alien in need of deportation, but instead of deportation, the suspected illegal was allowed to leave without her status being checked and the three women are now facing possible charges.

BELLINGHAM, Wash. — Three women believed a 28-year-old woman was having an affair with one of their boyfriends and came up with a plan to get rid of her by having her deported.

A Bellingham police spokesman, Lt. Steve Felmley, said two of the women shoved the victim in a car Friday and took her to a Border Patrol station.

A Border Patrol agent, Michael Bermudez, on Monday said they took no one into custody and called police to deal with the women. The police spokesman said they don't ask crime victims whether they are in the country legally, so the 28-year-old is free.

Meanwhile, the three women are being investigated for unlawful imprisonment.

Felmley said, "I don't think this plan is working out the way they thought it would."

Now ok, I'll grant you that snatching people up and detaining them is technically wrong, but when the subject of such a snatch is an illegal alien and when they're being grabbed for the purpose of surrendering them to the lawful authorities, I don't see a real bad thing happening here. And there's no way that she should have been able to walk away from the Border Patrol station if she was illegally here, and if she was illegally here, then the three women who brought her in deserve a medal, not criminal charges, IMHO.

This is almost as bad as the case down in Arizona where an American ranch owner named Roger Barnett is now being sued in an American court by Mexicans illegally in our country because he scared them with a dog when he detained them for being on his land after they illegally entered our country.

Again, this man deserves a medal and these illegals need to do some time in a US jail for illegal entry before being deported right along with their MALDEF lawyer scum. There's no way that he should be paying out money to lawyers or worrying about losing his property and life savings to a bunch or criminal scum who aren't even supposed to be in our country.

Our immigration system isn't just broken any more...now it seems to be running backwards!

Another day, another Dem fails to pay his taxes.

This time it's DC Councilman and former mayor/convicted felon Marion "the bitch set me up" Barry.

Prosecutors are once again trying to have him jailed as he has once again not filed a tax return, the eight time in nine years.

Barry, 72, was given three years of probation in 2006 after pleading guilty to misdemeanor charges for failing to file his tax returns from 1999 to 2004. As part of a plea bargain, he agreed to file future federal and local tax returns annually.

Two years ago, however, prosecutors sought to have that probation revoked after Barry failed to file his 2005 taxes. But U.S. Magistrate Judge Deborah Robinson refused, ruling that prosecutors did not prove Barry willfully failed to file his returns, even if he was aware that he missed the deadline.

How the hell does that work? I'm thinking that Magistrate Robinson is smoking some of the same crack that Barry can't seem to stay away from.

But he's only a Democrat, so it won't hit the news like it would if, say, it were some conservative or a Republican.

Still, we can just add his name to the list of other politicians who aren't paying their fair share--Congressman Charlie Rangel and Obama cabinet picks Tim Geithner, Tom Daschle, Nancy Killefer and the husband of Hilda Solis. (NOTE: All Democrats. Coincidence? I think not.)

And as wrong as this currently pending Stimulus bill being considered is--and it's plenty wrong--I'm thinking that don't need any stupid stimulus bill to fund our government...we just need to get the Democrats to pay their taxes.

New Icon

Well since that multi-colored Obama poster (created by the graffiti vandal who stole the picture from the AP) is all the rage, Lagniappe decided that he wanted one so that he could make his statement about the pending Obama Trauma facing our nation.


I knew that I love that dog for a reason. Long live Freedom!


Thanks to Retread Ranger for turning us onto this poster-making site.

Long live Freedom!

Blah, blah, blah...

Sorry I've been absent a few days... I just can't find much new to post about.
I did get a new pistol this week. A neighbor gave me this nifty Hopkins and Allen (by Numerich Arms) underhammer black powder pistol in exchange for my helping him with something. It's a .45 caliber percussion pistol with the lockwork beneath the barrel, and the mainspring is the trigger guard. I cleaned it up and took it out to shoot the other day. I was able to put a dozen rounds through it before I felt it starting to foul.
It's got a good trigger and nice sights, and if I'm less than 25M from the target, I can hit a paper plate almost every time. Any farther back though and it really starts to get tricky. Such is accuracy with black powder and cast lead balls.

This one's fun to play with but I think I'll keep my P7M13 as my primary defensive sidearm.


Shooting aside, I hit the swimming pool with my swim fins and my dive foot yesterday. WOW, what a difference! My normal swimming is mainly upper body work, and I can swim a length of the 25m pool in about 40 seconds. Using these fins and a coordinated stroke, I can make that same 25m dash in less than 15 seconds! Eleven kick cycles is all it takes. Big difference. Now if I can work out a routine here, my swimming's going to take off. It takes a conscious effort to coordinate the arm strokes and kicks right now, but if I can get it down, I'll be able to do whole LAPS in under 30 seconds and easily halve my mile time... Onward and upward.

And then there was today. Since it was so nice out, I took Lagniappe for a hike down by the river. It was pretty muddy out, but he had a ball running up and down the trail and walking out on what little river ice remained.

We spent a couple hours playing "Fetch" and "Tug of War" with countless sticks (He's obsessive about sticks. No one can have a stick but him. All your sticks are belong to him. If he sees anyone with a stick--even me--he immediately goes for it and he will not stop until the stick has been taken from that person, triumphantly carried a short distance away, then bitten in half. If the stick breaks off in the person's hand and Lagniappe gets 90% of the stick, he drops that and goes after the remaining piece that he doesn't have. Crazy dog.

Here he is atop the remains of an old stone building, doing his "Master of all he surveys" routine. What a ham...
But it was a nice time, despite the mud, and when we got home, we both took well-earned afternoon naps. Since I'm the boss, I at least got the couch.

There's "annoying", and then there's "really annoying".

Annoying is when you cannot find something that you need in order to leave the house. It could be your wallet, your keys, a shoe... just something that you can't really leave without.

If you are like me, most of these items have a "special place" where they habitually get put, and on those rare occasions when one gets mislaid, the stress level starts to rise in direct proportion to the urgency of your need to leave and go somewhere. Just want to go to the store? No big deal. Got an appointment or getting late for work? BIG deal. That's when it gets annoying, and I start pacing the house, going from room to room looking for the missing item.

But if you want really annoying, you need a German Shepherd like Lagniappe to follow you around as you pace from room to room. Everywhere you go, you hear the click-click-click of his paws on the hardwood behind you, and every time you spin around to go look someplace else, you trip over him because he's right behind you!

And he'll skitter off if you yell at him, but in thirty seconds or so, he's going to be right on your heels again, waiting for the moment when you will once again turn and trip over him and practicing his "I'm surprised" look. We've been doing this comedy act for years and it never seems to get old with this dog.
"Fine. Be that way. See if I tell you where your phone is."

Eco-terrorist gets 22 years

Of course the media still refers to Marie Mason as an "environmental activist", despite her admission that she was involved in numerous arsons and other crimes as a member of ELF--the Earth Liberation Front, one of which caused over a million dollars worth of damage to a lab at Michigan State University.

Sorry, Marie, but when you cross the line from pickets and petitions and letter-writing campaigns and start setting off bombs and burning down buildings, you're not an activist and more--you're a terrorist who belongs at Gitmo with all of the other dangerous psychopaths.

Now maybe some of the liberal goof-ball groups will stop begging for money for her and crying about how she's "dying" in prison because they won't accommodate her vegan meal preferences. Maybe she should have thought of that before she decided to become a serial arsonist.

Funny part was, as part of her plea deal, the prosecutors agreed to not charge her in the other twelve incidents that she'd been party to--but the judge still exceeded that recommendation, in part because Marie had been stupid enough to list Ron Coronado--another eco-terrorist who'd been convicted of an earlier arson at Michigan State in 1993--as a "hero" on her MySpace page. These green weenies really aren't too smart, are they?

Mason and he ex-husband Frank Ambrose admitted destroying homes under construction in the Detroit area and in Indiana, among other acts. Their spree began in 1999 when they traveled to Michigan's Upper Peninsula to set fire to two boats owned by a man who formerly raised minks.

Total damage: $4.1 million.

Sometimes, the bad people really get what's coming to them. Today was one of those days.

It shoots!

So I took the 1888 Commission rifle out to the range this morning, using a box of factory hunting ammo for the test. Saw the price sticker on that box of Winchester 8mm and wanted to cry: $7.00.

Yeah, I've had that ammo around for a while. Gee, it'd be nice to pay $7.00 for a box of American-made factory ammo again. It's about triple that these days, if you can find any.

But the rifle shoots, and it extracts and ejects just fine. No deformity to the brass noted, and everything works as it should. The downside: It prints about a foot and a half high at 100M.

Now this is probably a throwback to the old "volley firing" days, when soldiers were taught to aim at an opponent's belt buckle with the expectation that the round would produce some sort of upper-body hit from point-blank out to near maximum range, but it makes for some aggravating target practice when your only "opponent" is a paper plate stapled to a backer. Windage looks pretty good though--if I hold under the plate right, the rounds smack it pretty much dead center. (Good thing, too. There's no windage adjustment on the sights other than the old standard of taking a hammer to the front blade.)

The rifle's a pleasure to shoot otherwise, though. Nice trigger pull and no overly-harsh recoil. Hopefully that shooting helps clean the bore up a bit. It'll probably never be a match rifle, but it balances well and fits the shoulder and I look forward to taking it out again just as soon as I can load some new ammo for it.