Sunday evening

The grandchildren just went home. We have a Sunday afternoon tradition that everyone comes to our house for the evening meal on Sunday. Tonite my oldest son wanted to cook steaks on the grill, and I wanted to try a dirty rice recipe. We had both, with garlic toast and bratwurst. Just because we wanted it.

After supper, I conned my daughter into cutting my hair. Cutting my hair is easy, as she puts a #4 guard on the clippers and runs wildly across my head, cutting anything in the way. There is not much art, nor craft, in my haircut. I am shorn now, for another month.

Tomorrow, back to the grind. The uniform has the accouterments on it, and the leather is freshly polished. I've been off all week, and my sleep pattern reflects my sloth. Five a.m. is going to come awfully early, so in another hour or so, it's off to bed for Pawpaw.

Earlier today I loaded some .45-70, with the incomparable Lee 459-500-3R bullet. All the bulets are lubed with Junior Lube. My hasic load is 3.4 cc's of H777, with a grease cookie. Slight crimp, as it will be fired in the Sharps rifle. This load gives me almost MOA accuracy and I have settled on it as the standard load for that rifle. That load gives me 1128 fps. The recoil is interesesting without being punishing. It closely approximates the load that was used in the 1870's to eradicate the buffalo herds on our Great Plains. I have no doubt it would be just as effective today.

I haven't picked up a newspaper in over a week. I'm sure something is happening beyond the range of my scopes, but I am ignorant of it. Tomorrow morning will be soon enough to find out if we have won the war yet. Good night, all.