Wrong Nose

Heh!

An airline maintenance worker in Oklahoma found 31 pounds (14 kg) of cocaine in the nose cone of an American Airlines jet after it arrived from Colombia, police said on Monday.

 The flight, a Boeing 757, originated in Bogota, and landed in Miami. It was sent on to Tulsa for maintenance checks because the base in Miami was too busy, the sheriff said.

Somebody in Miami is in big trouble.

Building Targets

Building targets, getting ready for the spring shooting season.  Went out looking for material to make light boxes.  Who knew that they make something called 6" channel.  This stuff looks like it will be the cat's meow.  It's steel, so the magnets will stick to it and it can be welded conventionally with a MIG welder.

It comes in 20' joints and I didn't have my truck, but the honcho at the steel place is a reserve deputy, and I told him I'd bring the truck to work on Thursday and pick up a joint.  He's going to cut it in half so that I can transport it in the pickup.

Once I get the metal to my son't shop, we'll start building targets.

And, that's about all I accomplished today.  Other than work.

New CFDA Video

Great new video from our good friend, Miss E, of the Big Thicket Bushwackers showing the color and style of Cowboy Fast Draw.



It's worth the four minutes.  And, while you won't see PawPaw in there, I've shot with most of those folks.

Is the Left Over?

Andrew Klavan asks that question at PJMedia.  It's something that certainly bears analysis.

No one knows the future, of course, but I can't help wondering if the marches, large as they were, were not rather the end of a movement, a fond farewell to an amalgam of obsolete leftist causes that either never had a reason to exist in the first place or have lost whatever reason they might once have had.

We can hope that Mr. Klavan is right.  Movements often go through severe contractions just before they die, thrashing about and creating havoc as they do through their final throes.  Some movements never die, they simply become irrelevant, or they are so thorougly discredited that right-thinking person aligns with them.

I take some relief in looking at this map.

 There are still blots of blue on that map.  They represent the areas that Hillary Clinton won in the recent election.  But, even as scarlet as that map is, the election was a close thing.  Even in my blood-red home parish, Hillary Clinton got a third of the vote (18K)

No, we can't assume that the Left is done, but we can assume that they lost the most recent discussion.  They've been discredited.  They  are also angry, upset, and vocal.  We're going to have to keep up the pressure, make the good argument, and bring them over to our side.

We should never forget that they won the popular vote.  There are a whole lot of blue voters hidden under that red map.  We've got to keep preaching freedom, small government, individual responsibility, all the things that Make America Great.

The Coin Badge

The legend is that the first Texas Rangers cut badges out of Mexican coins.  Legends, being what they are, are easy to remember and hard to authenticate.  However, the Texas Ranger museum says this about that:

The first Texas Ranger badges were made for individual Rangers from Mexican coins at their request. Some were probably made by jewelers, others may have been made by gunsmiths or metalworkers. The legend of Rangers cutting them out These first badges were used as a means of identifying Rangers in the midst of feuds and disputes that might involve several law enforcement agencies, or where hired guns were introduced. Photographs taken in the 1870s through the 1920s show that there was a great variety of badges and that comparatively few Rangers wore badges.

Still, the idea of a badge being cut from a coin appealed to me, and last year, I was plundering around in a shop that had some coins, and I spotted some foreign coins that the merchant said were made from pure copper.   I bought a couple of them, and asked my metalworking son if he'd ever thought about making a badge.

He took the coins and said he'd think about it.  Then, I forgot about it.  Art takes time, and what I was asking was way out of his comfort zone.

This morning when he came over, he showed me his work.

 
IT's smallish, as most coins are.  It measures 1.5 inches with a pin on the back.  I'm very pleased.  It's lightweight, very distinctive, and it weighs a whole lot less than the dinner plate badge the Sheriff makes me wear.

Yeah, I like that a lot.  I'll have to start wearing it when I play cowboy.

Sunday Moring Dawg

It's been a while since we featured the dawg, but he's still kicking around.  After Belle and I came back from Natchitoches yesterday, she wanted to try on her new outfit, and of course, the dawg had to photobomb her.

Yeah, the dawg is doing fine.  Even if it is about time for a trip to the groomer.

Flyers

One thing I've been learning to do this week is make flyers.  A work associate recommended Poster My Wall.  Even an old dunder-head like me can make a presentable flyer.

That ain't bad a'tall.  I'll have to make some copies and send them to Natchitoches.  My associate there can paper the town with them.

Louisiana State

Belle, Zach, and I went to Natchitoches today to meet with the head of the Historic District Business association.  It was a very productive trip, they're all-in on our event.  It helps when the business community is on your side.  Of course, it's a win-win.  We're getting a great venue, and they're getting new customers.

Lots of shopping along that little street, and Belle had to look in some of the boutiques.

She says that the ladies are rally going to like this shop.  Plenty of stuff that can be used in Fast Draw, to include jewelry.  A gal must be able to accessorize, and the prices seem to be very reasonable.

Of course, all that meeting and shopping makes a person hungry, so we had to pop into a local restaurant and try the fare.

Zach is trying to get around an over-stuffed po'boy.  He made good work of it, too.

Louisiana State

Slow ad steady gets the job done, and we're doing a little bit every day, trying to get the stuff together that we need to have a safe, fun, productive shoot.  We've got one of the prettiest venues in Louisiana and we're working to make sure all the bases are covered.

We're trying to get a little Louisiana flavor, and today I made range signs.  These will be enlarged and planed where folks can see them.

It's the little things that give an event "flavor".  Slow and steady wins the race.

Non-Citizen Voting Rights

Just exactly how does a non-citizen get to vote in this country?  Evidently, a lot of them cast ballots.

Based on national polling by a consortium of universities, a report by Mr. Richman said 6.4 percent of the estimated 20 million adult noncitizens in the U.S. voted in November. He extrapolated that that percentage would have added 834,381 net votes for Mrs. Clinton, who received about 2.8 million more votes than Mr. Trump.

Of course, according to the Democrats, voter fraud is so insignificant as to be virtually meaningless.  Which is why they don't want to fix the problem.

Crawfish

It's finally crawfish season in Louisiana.  Belle's favorite boiler opened this week, and I have a small cooler in the car.

I've got my marching orders.  Don't come home today unless that cooler has crawfish in it.

Equal Work, Equal Pay

Every Place I've ever worked, if a man and a a woman were doing the same job, they got the same pay. I'm not talking about working in the same office, I'm talking about the same job, with the same duties and responsibilities.  Equal Pay for Equal Work.  It's the law, and has been for decades.

Evidently, New Orleans never heard about that.

NEW ORLEANS -- Mayor Mitch Landrieu signed an executive order Wednesday afternoon banning questions about salary history when a candidate is applying and interviewing for city positions.

Of course, New Orleans is a liberal hell-hole, almost a third world city, and a bastion of the Democratic Party in Louisiana. I'm surprised that mayor Landrieu admitted that the city is not following equal opportunity law.  But then again, that's how Democrats treat people.

The Border Wall

Yeah, Mexico is pissing and moaning, but that ain't no problem.  Tax imports and remittances, and they'll pay for the wall soon enough, whether they like it or not.

I see that we have a map of proposed construction.

Looks about right to me.

Hat tip to Angel.

Planning

We're still on for Louisiana State Championship 2017, and planning continues apace.  The list of stuff keeps getting longer.  It's doable, but we're less than 90 days away.  Miltary staff work is all planning, and I was a staff officer for about ten years.  That was good training for this, and I'm giving myself what we used to call In Progress Reviews.

Belle and I are going to Natchitoches on Saturday to meet with an asset, a shaker in the local business community there.  Lots of folks don't understand what Cowboy Fast Draw is about, but my good friend Mary Eileen has put up some grand videos about our game, and if a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video is worth a few more.

So, I'm going to leave this right here where I can find it later on the tablet.



It's a great little video that highlights the color of the game, and the safety.  If you notice at about the 10 second mark, you see a car drive by on a road over the range.  Of course, our ammo won't go that far.

The two shooters, by the way, in that opening clip are Slowpoke on lane 1 and Plain Jane on lane 2.  Slowpoke is the ladies Top Gun points champ for this year, and Plain Jane is the US National Champion.  They are both friends of mine, both phenomenal ladies, wonderful people, and very, very good with a six-gun.

God, I love this game.

Clueless

It seems that the Democrats are holding classes and seminars on how to talk to real people.

Manchin and nine other Senate Democrats are up for reelection next year in states that Trump won. Much of the event appears geared at figuring out how to turn people who supported Trump into Democratic voters in 2018.

The problem is that liberals despise people who think differently than they do.

 As for this election, and the locals, she continued, “I think they thought the liberal elite was looking down on them, and I guess, in some ways, we were. Because we couldn’t believe anybody would vote for Trump.”

If you disagree, they want to shut you down.

 “My job is to shut other white people down when they want to interrupt,” Brown said during a DNC candidate forum.

A lot of big city Democrats don't see how devastating Obama has been to the party.  Since he took office in 2009, they've lost most governorships, both houses of Congress, and over a thousand lesser elected offices nationwide.  Their big women's march this past weekend was a debacle that descended into parody.

And, in case the Democrats didn't notice, the Dow jumped over $20K today, for the first time ever.

Fun, for the Win!

President Trump is using his pen, undoing crap that Obama overlooked or instigated.

Like stripping funds from sanctuary cities.

Or, looking at a draft EO that would expand Gitmo and maybe open black sites.

And, he's talking about starting the wall in months.

It's a day full of Win!

Secret Service Agent Faces Discipline

It seems like one Secret Service Agent has pissed in her Wheaties.

A Secret Service agent with an overdeveloped sense of sharing finds herself in hot water with her superiors after posting a note on social media that she’d “take jail time over a bullet” and refuse to protect Donald Trump if so assigned. CBS News reports this morning that the agency has already opened an investigation of Kerry O’Grady, and that they plan to take some sort of action soon:

I learned a long time ago to separate personal and professional, and to not talk about the job online.  I've been a cop for a long time, and I've told cop stories on this site, but I never talk about anything current as it applies to the job.

Bless her heart.  After they suspend her for a couple of weeks, they should just assign her to Hillary Clinton's detail.  Hillary Clinton will get Secret Service protection for life as the wife of Bill.   From what little I know about Hillary's protective detail, and the way she treats "the help", being assigned to that detail might be just exactly what his Agent needs.

I LOL'd

Murphy talks about a photo he received.

Evidently taken early on the morning of inauguration day, the mall is nearly empty.  Of course, security sweeps, and libs blocking entrances and yada.. yada.

Other folks have asked me where all the Trump supporters were on inauguration day, and I simply answer, "We were at work."

I didn't have time to go, duty called.  Nobody I knew went to the inauguration.  We were working, either in the public or private sector.  Walking a beat, tending a shop, caring for patients, there are a whole lot of Trump supporters who simply cannot.  Will not miss a day's pay to go see someone get inaugurated.

Oh, and while we're at it.  The Women's March?? Pure silliness.  The costumes were offensive and in poor taste.  The rhetoric was overblown, divisive, and sexist.  From the perspective of a down-home guy, it looks like the Democratic Party is imploding. Take a look at the map above and tell me what you see.

Nevertheless, t- the DNC is looking for new talent, and in interviews today, we learn that white-bashing is the new rallying cry of the liberals.  As wise men, we must recall that another wise man once said, "Never Interfere With an Enemy While He’s in the Process of Destroying Himself"

Headline

They told me that if I voted for Trump, attacks on immigrants would begin almost immediately.

DisruptJ20 Anarchists Torched Muslim Immigrant's Limo, Costing Him $70,000 in Damage

It looks like they were right.

Thorn Valley

A late picture from this weekend.  When we have visitors at Thorn Valley, we try to make them as comfortable as possible.  We're a welcoming bunch, we want to spread the good vibes we get from using single action revolvers, and to make everyone feel at home.

Sure enough, we had visitors this weekend, and it wasn't long before Blue Eyed Belle had our visitor strapped up and on the line.

Blue Eyed Belle (l), and visitor Sandra.

I keep telling folks, that a CFDA club is a welcoming place.  If you happen to stumble into a club, find domeone in charge, and they'll fit you with someone who will treat you rught, answer your questions, and help you along.  A listing of our affiliated clubs is here.

We hope our visitors come back and bring other visitors.

Browning's Birthday

I am reminded that today is the anniversary of the birth of John Moses Browning.  Browning, born in 1855, grew to be one of the most influential gun designers of the late 19th and early 20th century.  He is credited with no less than five cartridges, and dozens of handguns, shotguns, rifles, and machine guns, many of which are still in use today, both in the military and the civilian, sporting realm.

Some of his designs are still in use today, most notably, the M2 machine gun and the M1911 pistol.

Elections Matter

I remember this from several years ago.

Maybe tomorrow morning some of the liberals will be back at work, and the rest of them will be out looking for work.

That might be the best thing for everyone tomorrow morning.  To get back to work.

I am satisfied that Trump is doing a great job already.  Look how many fat, old women he got to take a brisk walk outdoors this weekend.  Lots more than Michelle Obama ever did.

Let's Make America Great Again.

Sunday Already?

Saturday was a blur, and absolute blur of fun and frolic.  The highlight of the day was the gun club, a couple of hours of shoooty goodness.

Video is important, and in today's world it's easy to get video.  Virtually everyone carries a video camera in the form of a cell phone.  Some of them are very good, and even allow for slow-mo video, to let you analyze things.  Like my daughter's draw, below.



PawPaw hisself got video'd today,, but not in slow-mo. Late in the session I decided to run the long gun.  That 7.5" barrel requires a whole nuther draw stroke than the shorter 4.75" barrel.  It takes some learnin', and some practice.



Later, over supper and coctails, my son told me about a cop blog he's been following.  Raindogblue, so I looked it up this morning, over coffee.  This guy is a beat cop, and while I'm reading his stuff it feels like I'm in the cruiser with him.  Go read his stuff.  I've added him to the blogroll.

Allegiance

I particularly liked this passage in President Trump's inaugural speech.

At the bedrock of our politics will be a total allegiance to the United States of America, and through our loyalty to our country, we will rediscover our loyalty to each other. When you open your heart to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice.

That resonated with me for some reason, probably because of my Army service.  I thought that the rest of the speech was workman-like, but not particularly inspiring.  I take consolation in the fact that Barack Obama is a great speech-ifier, but was a terrible president.

As long as Trummp is a great president, I don't care if he never gives another speech.

It's Over!

After eight years in the wilderness, today marks the day that we start to Make America Great Again.

Like many Americans, I don't have time to drop whatever I'm doing and go to Washington to celebrate.  I'll be at work, doing my job, my small part in this great experiment we call the United States.

As my duties allow, I'll try to catch snippets of the cotillion that is the peaceful transfer of power.  This should prove to be a very interesting day.

Leadership

I'm watching the nonsense emanating from the Democratic leadership (if you'd like to call it that today), and I'm wondering who is in charge.  Lots of us are wondering.  For justa smattering of opinion, go no farther than The Puppy Blender (cultural reference there) and read Stephen Green's snippet.

But it isn’t about policy. It’s about virtual signaling and the infantile joy of throwing a public tantrum.

Initially, on the days after the election, the meltdown was amusing, but we all figured that the adults would catch themselves, take a deep breath, and get back to work.    No, instead, the outrage is becoming farcical, almost a snit-fit, and it's growing to a crescendo that hopefully will be over soon.

As I type this, some five-dozen Democrat members of Congress are boycotting the inauguration... because...  I dunno, it's now like the whole Democratic party has devolved into petulant 14-year-old girls who have been stood up for the high-school dance.

A month ago it was mildly amusing.  Now, it's just pathetic.

The 4-Bore

I mean, c'mon, who doesn't want to know about 4-botr rifles.



Just wow!

Wisdom, from Comments

One of the thing that bloggers learn is that their commenters bring another level of experience to the conversation.  One such example is found in comments, here.

jon spencer said...If the magnets don't work, try 3M VHB tape.
There are several types of this tape so contacting someone who knows is recommended.
I have used it to mount radios and other electronics on boats and they stayed in place while taking severe vibration and shocks. ....

Thanks, jon!  Your comment got me to pondering, and while tape might work very well, I'd like to be able to pull the sensors off to be stored indoors.  My targets are outside and rain, moisture, sleet and all the other forms of Louisiana are tough on electronics.  But, I remember from my Army days that we used to hang electronics on the side of tanks and other vehicles with good, old fashioned velcro.

I myself, as recently as five years ago, used velcro to hang a control box under the roof of my Kawasaki Mule.  That control box is still hanging there, even after all the bumps, knocks, and jostles that I've been able to subject it to.  And, with teaching five grandsons to drive off-road vehicles, it's been through plenty.

If the magnets don't work, I know where I'm going to turn next.

BOYCOTT

As we turn to the inauguration, we see that some folks are going to boycott the inauguration.  Most famously, Representative John Lewis (D-Ga).  Rep Lewis, you might recall, is a civil rights icon who was famously beaten into a coma while marching with Dr. King.  We note, for the record that Lewis was beaten by Democrats, but that hasn't stopped him from being a reliable voice for his Democratic masters.

At any rate, Lewis intends to boycott Donald Trump's inauguration, and some say that this is unprecedented.  Not so, as Ed Driscoll points out.

“Newspapers continue to cite the boycott as an unprecedented act….But this isn’t the first time [John] Lewis [D-GA] has boycotted a presidential inauguration. According to a Washington Post article written on January 21, 2001, Lewis and other members of the Black Caucus boycotted George W. Bush’s inauguration because they didn’t ‘believe Bush is the true elected president.’ Lewis spent the day in his Atlanta district.”

Representative Lewis is simply a poor loser.  If his candidate doesn't win, he stays away.

Of course, before you can be a sore loser, you have to be a loser.  I think that describes Rep Lewis exactly.  The people of Georgia deserve better.

Switch Sensor Mount, V 1.5

We continue to experiment with the hit sensors, trying to make a "cleaner" mount, but one built with readily available materials.  So, this morning, I cut some lucite more closely to fit the box, then got a materials list together and headed to the store.  First stop was Harbor Freight, where I found some little ceramic bar magnets.

These little magnets are readily available, and fairly inexpensive.  at 99 cents per pack.  I also picked up some epoxy.  Then I went to a hardware store where I got some 10X24X1" countersunk machine screws with nylon lock nuts and flat washers.

Then, I came home, roughed up the lucite where the magnets will sit, then mixed up some epoxy and adhered them to the lucite.

I'll leave everything stuck to the target until the epoxy cures, then mount the sensor box between the two magnets with litle screws.  Like so.

It looks like a lot cleaner installation, and I don't have to scrounge magnets out of hard-drives.  If those magnets adhere properly to the lucite, I'll go down later this week and buy enough for the full range.

Proof Of Concept

If you remember the post from Friday, we were playing with magnets.

Today, I found a box on my front porch, containing the sensor I had ordered.  And, the kids were over for lunch, so the boys and I repaired to the garage to see what we could cobble together.

We started with a common CFDA sensor that looks like this:

Then we mounted it to a little piece of lucite, and added magnets to hang it on the back of the target.  This thing is a piezo transducer that records hits on the target.  It's normally hard-mounted to the target, but I wanted to hard-mount it to a piece of metal or something.  My very capable sons decided that a small piece of lucite would be just the key, so in a few minutes we had cut a pice and mounted the magnets to the lucite and mounted the sensor box as well.

So, there is the sensor box and two magnets, mounted on a piece of lucite.  It's not very elegant, but it is a prototype, so we walked out to our range, got a small target, and decided to see how it would work.  It mounts cleanly on the back of the target.

So, nothing else would do but to hook it to the electronics and see if it works.  In the video below, the target is hard to see from the background, and it helps if they hit the target, but I feel like we had some fun and proved that the prototype works.



Yep, once you hit the target, the sensor works and we are able to get a time.  Now, all I have to do is get some better screws and we'll be ready to make some of these things.

I love it when a plan comes together.

Magnets

As you all know, I'm spending a lot of time playing with CFDA shooting, acquiring equipment, learning shortcuts, and having a lot of fun.

I want to expand my personal range, and we're making some changes at our club range, and I'm experimenting.  When we use the CFDA timing equipment (and that's about all that's available right now) it requires that you drill holes in your target to install a hit sensor on the back of the mild steel target.  It's a simple piezo switch that hooks to the back of the target.  It wiggles when the target is hit, and it trips the timer.  It looks just exactly like this:

The description on the CFDA webstore page says:

These sensors are constructed with highly dependable piezo transducers, they also have a foam box filler which nearly eliminates false hits recorded on the timer.Comes with 2-10/32 screws, with lock nuts, for secure attachment.

There may be a good reason to screw them to the target, but I don't see it.  I'm thinking that putting a faceplate on them, and affixing them to the back of the target (which is, again, mild steel) with magnets ought to work just fine.  To that end, I started looking for suitable, inexpensive magnets this week.

Talking to a tech at work, over coffee, it turns out that every hard-drive has two magnets installed inside.  And, with thousands of computers in active service at any time, there are a certain number of hard drives that go defunct (ask Lois Lerner).  So, I was able to scrounge a couple of old, defunct hard drives, with the understanding that as I salvaged the magnets, the remainder of the drive would be completely destroyed.

I did, in fact, destroy the hard drives.  And, after destruction, I mailed them to the IRS for their attention. (just kidding).  Yeah, they've been destroyed.  A half-inch drill bit run through them, then a session with a propane torch had rendered them warped, holed, and completely defunct.  But I digress.

One thing that I learned is that all hard-drive magnets are not created equal.  Some are very strong, some only marginally strong.   But, they all come with cool little mounting brackets.

So, I've ordered some spare switches to experiment with, and I have some freebie magnets to experiment with.  Hopefully, the switches will be in next week and we can begin experimenting with vigor.

The journey continues.

The Fort Lauderdale Airport Shooting

Everybody has heard about it by now.  I was aware of the incident late last Friday, where a gunman opened fire near the baggage claim area of the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood Airport.  Five killed, eight wounded, and about 36 injured during the ensuing panic.

Milady mentioned to me earlier this week that she had heard that the shooter carried his gun in carry-on luggage.  That rumor is bogus.  All information seems to indicate that he checked his gun through the standard protocol that TSA follows for traveling with guns and ammo.

A county official says the Fort Lauderdale airport shooter pulled a gun out of a checked bag, loaded in a bathroom and started shooting, killing five people and wounding at least eight.

Competitivie shooters and hunters routinely carry firearms and ammunition on commercial flights.  There are procedures in place to safely accommodate the transportation of firearms and ammunition. Evidently, this knowledge is brand-new to some groups, who think that airports are gun-free zones. Joe Huffman reports on the activities of one such group.  Following Joe's link, we come to this tidbit.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 11, 2017 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Passengers should be able to count on TSA and local and state law enforcement authorities to protect them.  The principal lessons from Lockerbie, the 9/11 attacks, and the Brussels, Istanbul and now Fort Lauderdale airport massacres are that air transportation continues to be a prime target for terrorism and mass murder.

I hate to butcher Ben Franklin's quote on liberty vs safety, yet it seems as if the usual suspects are lining up to once again try to abrogate my rights.  A pox on them and their efforts.

Options

There are options out there for concealed carry.  I freely admit that I haven't kept up with the current state of the art, but this video shows some of what is possible.  Go ahead, full screen it.



There is no reason for the well-dressed woman to be defenseless.  The link she touts is here.

Great Meltdown Piece

I'll say one thing for him.  He knows how to craft a sentence. T wit:

 The conservatives of the heartland have lashed back against the coastal elites' condescending, classist prejudices by defiantly confirming them: that they're pathetically dumb and gullible, uncritical consumers of any disinformation that confirms their biases, easy dupes for any demagogue who promises to bring back the factories and keep the brown people down.

That's a great sentence.  Truly, it is.  Nice construction, proper punctuation, it's very well crafted.  It's also illuminating.  That is what they think of us.

Ignorance and bigotry are actually the best possible motives for having voted for Trump — they are at least honest, if not honorable. But I don't believe all Trump voters are ignorant, or bigoted; most of them are just evil 

It's a great rant, really it is.Even if he's wrong about everything.   He admits to knowing exactly two Trump voters; a Texan and a Marine.  The difference between Tim and I is that I know lots of liberals.  Good, honest, gullible liberals.  Kind-hearted liberals.  Their arguments ring hollowly against experience and practice.  We look on them as mentally challenged, or developmentally disabled.

But, they think we're evil.

The Confirmations

Like many of you, I'm trying to keep an eye o the confirmation hearings.  The predictable left is going batshit crazy over Senator Jeff Sessions for Attorney General.  There are those on the predictable left who don't think that any white man from a Southern state is morally qualified to fill that post, and their over-the-top rhetoric is illuminating.

As Jon Gabriel so famously said, "My favorite part of the Obama era is the racial healing."

Along those same lines, we have the upcoming (today, I understand) confirmation hearing for General James Mattis.  General Mattis is Trump's pick for SecDef, and it's not hard to draw a clear line between the General and that wimp, Ash Carter, who is Obama's SecDef.  Under Carter's meddling, the Social Justice Warriors have proliferated, to the point where women can now be assigned to combat roles, and openly transgendered individuals can serve.  I have a hard time believing that General Mattis will subscribe to either of those theories.

Let me say, for the record, that I served wtih some outstanding female soldiers over the years.  Mainly in the Military Police, which has a combat support role.  They did the job just fine and I have no complaints.  I did NOT serve with female soldiers in the combat arms (Infantry, Armor, or Cavalry) that I was assigned to at differing points of my career.  Women did just fine, in my experience, in a combat support role (and in today's modern battlefield, it's sometimes difficult to know wheterh you're in a support role, or whether you're in active combat).  It depends, I guess on which way the tracers are flying.

Whatever my beliefs on the role of women and gays in the military, I'm fairly certain that the hearings of General Mattis are going to stir the pot thoroughly.  If McConnell can get Sessions and Mattix confirmed quickly, the SJW/Race-hustlers/Sexually Confused will melt completely down.  What a glorious day that will be.

Bullying

Bullying is a problem as old as mankind, with new twists as technology advances and people change.  And, the state requires that school personnel get training on combating bullying once a year.

That's what I'm doing today.  Bullying Awareness and Prevention.  It's a compelling subject, which is why so many people sleep thru it.  And I'm an instructor.  I feel like there's a little cord in my back.  They wind me up, pull the cord, and words come out of my mouth. I feel like a Chatty Cathy doll.

Question: Should repeated PowerPoint presentations be considered bullying, or just harassment?

The Submachine Gun

One of the blogs I read every day, is They Make All Kinds.  It's over in the sidebar, easy to find, but today they highlight an archaic, historical weapon, the German MP 3008 submachine gun.

Yeah, I took the pic directly from their site.

This is one of the many submachine guns produced by the warring nations during WWII.  The Brits had the Sten, the Americans had the M3, and the Germans had the MP 40.

Another last-ditch weapon produced to arm German National Militia units. The MP 3008 submachine gun was developed and manufactured during final stages of the World War 2. It is also known as "Volks Machinenpistole" (People's submachine gun). Several German factories, as well as smaller shops, produced about 10,000 (?) of these MP 3008 submachine guns in several minor variations, with several types of buttstocks, including metallic skeletonized or tubular butts, or simple wooden butts. 

All these little guns are pretty much alike.  Simple, rugged, blowback actions.  They are all a lot of fun to shoot.  I admit no experience with any but the M3 that I was issued as a tanker, but I'm pretty sure that they are all a lot of fun, spraying bullets nilly-willy across the landscape.  They were also extremely inexpensive to produce. By inexpensive, I'm told that the US had less than $25.00 in each copy of the M3 in the original contract.

That's cheap shooting.  I'd love to have a sack full of M3s, or for that matter a sack full of MP 3008s.  I imagine that I could have a lot of fun teaching the grandkids about submachine guns.

Traffic Stop

It was several years ago, on a cool, clear night.  I don't remember exactly what the occasion, but I had been at the high school where I worked since before daylight.  Probably a sporting event, or a dance, but I had arrived at the school house before daylight and when I left that evening, it was long after dark.

I remember that as I drove home, stomach growling, that the fast-food jonts were closed.  It was probably after midnight, and it had been about 12 hours since I choked down the school lunch. at noon.  I was a bit dismayed that the burger joints had closed, but home was a scant eight miles away, and I know how to fry bacon and eggs.

I wasn't in a police car, I was piloting my F150 pickup.  But, I had my police radio on my belt, the microphone near my shoulder.  As I motored down the road toward the house, I heard the crackle of static, and a voice come over the radio.

"RP2, dispatch.  I'll be out with a white Explorer,on 28, about a mile east of Holloway."

"What the hell?", I wondered.  The Chief Deputy hisself, on a traffic stop at this hour of the night.  Still, he was the Chief, and I was just a lowly Resource Office.  If the Chief wanted to make a traffic stop, who the hell was I to wonder about it.  Besides, bacon and eggs waited just a few miles down the road.

Another mile down that two-lane highway, I happen to see blue lights flashing in my rearview mirror, so I pull over to the shoulder to let him pass, then I'm a bit amused when he pulls in behind me.

I hear his radio traffic.  "123,dispatch, I'm going to be out with a silver F150, license, WRF235, on 28 near Libuse."

I figure, what the hell, two can play this game.  So I key my mic.  "920, dispatch.  I'm going to be out with 123."  Dispatch replied "10-4"

I stepped out of the truck, into the headlights of the police cruiser.  "What the heck are you doing?"

The young deputy crawled out of his car.  "They sent me down here tonight to do traffic enforcement.  So far, I've stopped three state troopers, two city policemen, a registered nurse, and you."

"Well," I replied, "it's been 18 hours in these boots.  If we're done here, I'm going home to cook some breakfast, and lay down."  I cautioned him, "Be careful, the Chief is making traffic stops in Holloway."

He looked down the darkened highway. "Naw, not me.  I'm going back to Tioga and tell the sergeant that traffic enforcement ain't happening tonight."

He went to his cruiser, and I got back in the truck.  "920, Dispatch.  Everything is Code 4 here.  Show me out of service, please."

Just another night of traffic enforcement on the state's highways.

Perception?

It seems that the University of Chicago is offering $500 to student tour guides to come up with "creative" solutions to change the perception that Chicago is dangerous.

The University of Chicago’s admissions office is offering an incentive to its student tour guides: Come up with “a creative way to dispel the negative perception'” that the city is unsafe.

Perception?  With nearly 800 homicides, and over 3600 wounded, that sounds like more than an unfounded perception

But, hey!  Good luck with that.

Two Years

I was piddling around in the shop today, working on a target for Cowboy Fast Draw.  Suddenly, I realized, it's been two years.  Two years since I started this game.  It's been a wild ride.

Small Target for CFDA shooting. This one is 17 3/16"

It was January 2015 when I was first invited to Thorn Valley to try this sport, and in February, I bought Belle her first rig for Valentine's Day, and by March, we were hooked.  Little, at that time, did I know what we were getting in to.

Since then, I've bought nine guns, at least that many holsters and belts, I've bought target electronics, made targets, constructed a home practice range, bought clothing, jewelry, hats, we've gone whole hog.

We've traveled to several shoots, planned a couple, slept in hotel rooms, traveled around,eaten strange things.  And, we've met a lot of people.  Good people, salt-of-the-earth people.  The people is the reason that we've continued on this journey.  These are folks worth knowing, worth shooting against, worth worrying about.

This is the only shooting organization I've ever been in where the competitors sincerely want everyone to have a good time.  Where they'll take a minute to coach a competitor, someone who might meet then on the line during the next round.  Where equipment is loaned freely, to help another shooter,

Two years of making friends, and laughing, and shooting, and sharing equipment, and sharing stories, and winning a few trophies, and educating young people on safe gun-handling.  I am convinced that the Cowboy Fast Draw Association is one of the premier organizations in the US today.  For organization, gun-handling, education, and connecting with members, the organization is simply un-paralleled.

It's been quite a ride.  I hope it goes on for a long, long, time.

Crawfish Etoufee

Some folks have been asking for Belle's recipe for Crawfish Etoufee.  Etoufee is many things to many people, and recipes vary.  Some make it dark, with a roux.  Some make it red, with tomato products, some make it golden.  The difference in the recipe is something that is passed down from family to family, and based more on preference than any other criteria.

Belle's etoufee is red.  Serve it over rice.You'll notice that there are very few proportions and absolutely no measurements.  Do what you gotta do.  Make it yours.  Prep and cooking time, 2 hours.

Crawfish Etouffee

Ingredients.
Crawfish tails, prepped and packaged.
Tony Chacherie's seasoning
Onions, chopped
Bell Pepper, chopped
One stick real butter
Small cans tomato sauce (one small can per lb crawfish)
green onion tops, chopped.

Cooking

Put your crawfish tails in a bowl, season them with Tony's seasoning.  Set aside.

Sautee onions and bell pepper.  When sautee'd, add one small can tomato sauce for each pound of crawfish.  Add stick of butter.  Simmer on low heat for about an hour, stirring occasionally.  Add crawfish tails, simmer for 15-20 minutes. Add a little flour if it needs to be thicker.Add chopped onion tops.

Serve over rice.

First Practice of 2017

We had a great practice today, with five shooters.  Luckily, Big Mark was able to find a heater for the barn, one of those jet-engine gizmos that blows fire out the tail.  Unfortunately, it sounds like a jet engine too.  But, otherwise, a great practice.

Many of us hadn't cleared leather since before Christmas, but we fell right back into the routine.  Blue-Eyed Belle is solid in the 9s, and hit a couple of 8s today.


That's Big Mark, our club Marshall on Lane 1, and Blue Eyed Belle on Lane 2.


It was a great practice.  We shot, we planned for the state shoot, and we spent a couple of hours with like-minded folks.   Now, we're home enjoying a cocktail.  It was a very good Saturday.

Saturday BRRRR!

It's cold, it's sunny, and the roads appear to be open.  Belle and I are heading to the range this morning.  It's been three weeks since I cleared leather, and I need some practice.

More later, maybe, if we survive the aftermath of the Great Louisiana Ice Storm of 2017.

The Great Louisiana Ice Storm

The first Louisiana ice storm of 2017 is continuing apace.  It has sleeted here all day long, lightly, all day long.

That's about the extent of it at this point.  I've been watching the local channels, and it appears that the temps are going to plunge into the 20s tonight and all the bridges are going to freeze over.  They're closing bridges as we speak.  Travel will be sketchy tonight.

But, tomorrow, the  sun is supposed to come out and temps will rise into the 40s.  Hopefully, by tomorrow afternoon, the Great Louisiana Ice Storm of 2017 will be just a memory.

Red Beans

The weather being what it is, wet and cold, Belle decided to try out the pressure cooker on red beans.  So, she took out a bag of dry red beans, washed them and put them in the pot with a some water.  I cut up some good sausage and added to the mix.

Thirty minutes later:

Just about the time that the timer beeped, I put on a pot of rice and she slid a cornbread into the oven.  By the time the pressure had bled off, we had red beans and sausage with rice and cornbread.  Figure 45 minutes from start to finish.

Heretofore, the quickest I've ever cooked dry red beans was about four hours.  Red beans are best done slowly, and I still like the slow cooker method, but I have to admit that this newfangled digital, electric pressure cooker sure shortens the cooking time.  And, it does it without the bother of a stovetop pressure cooker.  Plug it in, set it and forget it.

We're going to give it a good run for its money on Sunday.  I went this morning to the butcher shop and got eight pounds of good stew meat.  On Sunday, it's going to be beef tips and rice.  That is always a crowd-pleaser around here.

Proofread!

The Lord knows that PawPaw has trouble proofreading sometimes.  My mind gets ahead of my fingers, and this keyboard and my vision problems make things interesting sometimes.  So, I've tried to learn to proofread more carefully before I hit the PUBLISH button.

My problems are minor, but when you get your finger on the wrong key, they can be monumental.  Like this tweet from Yahoo! Finance.

Yeah, I spit coffee across the keyboard when I saw that.I'm sure that what Trump wants is a much Bigger navy.  But, some poor intern at Yahoo! is getting his ass handed to him to wear like a hat.

Wintry Mix

The big news across Central Louisiana, (and most of the south), is the winter storm that we're currently experiencing.  The forecast calls for a hard freeze with the possibility of wintry mix of sleet, freezing rain, and snow.  Oh, joy.  Below, the map from just a few minutes ago.

All that pink, I presume, is icy stuff.  We don't do that really well i Louisiana.  As of this minute, the water that has fallen on my car is still liquid, but that's liable to change as the day moves forward.

The Weather Channel, of course, is freaking-out.  The very idea of snow in places like Georgia and the Carolinas is news, and they're hammering it.  PawPaw will keep a weather-eye on it.  We ain't skeered, but we're interested.  Thankfully, not much is planned for today or tomorrow, so we'll stay hunkered down here at PawPaw's house.

2017 CFDA Map

Gentleman George and Texas Rose put up a handy-dandy map of all the CFDA titled events in the US.

If any of y'all are in the area on the date indicated, drop by and say Hi!

He Went There

The Firearms Blog is one of my daily reads.  TFB aggregates firearms news from around the world, and it's interesting to see what they highlight every day.

One post that got me chuckling is this one, and I'll link to the YouTube video where some dude makes the argument that the .45 ACP is not optimal for self-defense.



It's an interesting argument, and it's one that I've made over the past decade.  The vast strides that the industry has made in bullet manufacture, metallurgy, and better powders has put the lowly 9mm and the newer .40SW into serious contention as premier self-defense rounds.

I myself carry a .40 SW Glock every day at work.  For my personal, pocket carry, I prefer the .38 special revolver.  I get the guy's argument, I really do.  But, it doesn't convince me to dispose of my 1911s.  Short and fat still gets the job done.  It may not be optimal, but I'm not optimal either.

Still, I can't believe that he went there.  He must be getting some real hate-mail.

Road Trip

Today, a couple of buddies and I took a road trip to Natchitoches, LA to meet with town officials about the upcoming LA State shoot.  It was a very productive day of planning, and meeting.

Even after living in that little city for 20 years, I am yet amazed at the depth of the history in that town, and how connected the people are to both the history and the present.

That's Big Mark on the left, and Sinister Sal on the right, talking about the relative merits of one venue over another.  After meeting with city officials (the mayor and police chief), we've got a better understanding of the task ahead of us, and we're really looking forward to making this a first class event.

Who Owns A Truck?

Just about everybody I know owns a pickup truck.  In the South, they're fairly ubiquitous.  Every family has at least one.  A sizable percentage own more than one.

Evidently, that's not the case in liberal bastions.  Someone asked the questions, and the journos melted down.

Simple question, right?  Not to liberal reporters.

The top 3 population centers are New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago.  I know someone in Chicago, but I think they live in the 'burbs.  They are Cubs fans.  See?  I can answer that question without getting my feelings hurt.

I see that we're resorting to profanity.  Very professional.  Who is Adele?  Do they still sell albums, except as novelties or retro pieces?

Now we're resorting to name-calling.

The point of this whole exercise is that in many parts of the country, the pickup truck is as common as dirt.  They're everywhere.  As Dana Loesch so succintly noted, You can't run a country you've never been to.  How can journalists write about people they've never even visited?

Ammo Solutions

There's a good article up at The Firearm Blog, talking about folks who regularly carry concealed weapons, and the choices they make concerning what they carry,  Go read the whole thing.  It's worth a few minutes.  He breaks down the "classes" of concealed-carry folks into three classes of people

1.  The tactical instructor, or dedicated concealed carry enthusiast.  This person shoots regularly, spends a measurable portion of his/her income on equipment, ammunition, and training.  He estimates that this person comprises 10% of CCW holders.

2.  The average citizen, John or Jane Smith.  This person takes the class, gets the license, and tries to stay current on equipment and range time.  They might get to the range twice a year, They're intelligent, raising a family, working a job, and trying to keep it all together.  They pay attention to the law, and try to stay current on the ever-changing legal regime that we live in.  This portion of the CCW populaiton is about 80%.

3.  The Borderline Ignorant Concealed Carrier.  This person went to one class, bought a gun and a box of ammo.  He or she took the class, and that's it.  For whatever reason, this person moves mentally away from keeping current on the law, and may be careless or even dangerous in their gun-handling skills.  Hopefully, this segment occupies less than 10% of the sample.

After defining the population, (and I think that his assumptions on the population are valid, even if we disagree with the precise percentages), he morphs into equipment/ammo choices.  He brings out the old tropes of revolver vs semi-auto, and practice ammo vs "self-defense" ammo.  THen he talks about the practice of some folks who keep a magazine of "self-defense" ammo and runs FMJ at the range trips, with the added problem of bullet set-back when a single cartridge is chambered repeatedly.

It's a pretty good article, and then he asks a question for which he never posits an answer:

When buying a new carry gun, you purchase a couple hundred rounds of FMJ, and then that box of 25 “Self-Defense” ammunition. And for what I ask?

My answer is simple:  Because that's the current state of affairs.  In 1986, the Miami Shootout happened, where FBI agents were pitted against two violent suspects and the resulting carnage changed the way we look at gunfights.   For better or worse, the FBI began conducting tests, publishing results, and millions of reams of paper (and billionsof electronic pixels) have since been used to debate the question.

When I say everything changed, I mean everything.  Even the .40 SW cartridge was designed as a direct result of the lessons learned after that shootout.  Law enforcement agencies began adopting semi-auto pistols, ammo companies started designing better bullets.  Premium lines of self-defense ammo came into production.

Today, it's common practice to have two styles of ammo.  Good, hot self-defense ammo, and reasonably priced range ammo.  The practice is what it is.  Personally, I understand the logic of shooting good ammo and once a year or so, shooting the self-defense ammo, and buying fresh loads.  That's good practice, but for that great middle ground of shooters, the average J. Smith, they might have forgotten to replenish their supply.  The ammo in their gun might be two, three, or five years old.  That will probably never be a problem.  Good ammo normally will last for several decades before deteriorating.  I've shot ammo that was fifty years old, with nary a problem.

The simple truth is that the vast majority of CCW holders will go their whole lives with never the opportunity to use their weapons in a self-defense hooting, and for that I am mightily happy.  And, frankly, I'd rather have ten-thousand good, honest, law-abiding citizens carrying whatever they carry, regardless of what brand/caliber/action type/ or brand of ammo they carry.  That sure knowledge makes the criminals nervous.

God forbid that you're ever in a fight for your life, but in that rare circumstance, the record will probably reflect that the gun and ammo you have with you is better than the one you left at home.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go reload some range ammo.

The Job.

Heh!  Yeah, it's a lot like that sometimes.  Sometimes, complainants are notoriously stupid.

Nothing to Report

Nothing much to report today,, and nothing I saw in the news struck me as remarkable.  So, I'm not remarking on it.

I did go out to Camp Beauregard today to take care of an errand, and while there, went by the PX.  I was out of hooch, and wanted something suitable for mixing with cola.  Swilling whiskey, it you will, not sipping whiskey.  Something with bite that didn't bite the checkbook.  Rotgut, as it were.

And, I found it.  On the bottom shelf of the booze aisle, this isn't top-shelf stuff.  No, this is decidedly bottom shelf.  Three year old bourbon, distributed by the Atlantic Distillery, whoeverinthehell they are.

I surfed around, tying to decipher the actual distilller.  Some think that it's Barton's distillery out of Kentucky, another thread thinks that it's Heaven Hill distillery, another well known bourbon distiller.  When Belle gets home this afternoon, and it's time for a cocktail, that's what is going in my glass.

Don't get me wrong, fellows, I appreciate a good sipping whiskey as much as the next guy.  But, when you're mixing it with cola, there's no sense in wasting the good stuff.  For 90% of my drinking, it's rotgut all the way.

Cheers!

Siilly Signs

Moving around the other day, I happened to see a sign, nailed to a utility pole, and had to laugh.

I had to stop and snap a picture.  I'm still wondering just exactly who this sign is supposed to enlighten?  I've been a cop for a long time, and I generally don't pay attention to such signs while I'm on duty.  If someone calls me to a location, I'm bringing my gun.

If I'm off-duty, I do my very best to honor the wishes of those folks who want their premises to be gun-free.  If they don't want my business, that's fine, I'll stay away, but if they call me on-duty, the gun comes with me.

It's a wonder that people spend money on signs like this.

Sowell on Guns

Dr. Thomas Sowell, who we recently reported as retiring penned an article for National Review on the subject of liberal thinking on gun control.  As always, his analysis is excellent and his prose is exemplary.  To wit:

Liberals imagine that law-abiding citizens do not have any idea how to use a gun responsibly — and that criminals will start following rules.

And, the good professor reveals that he, himself, has used a gun in self defense.  Like thousands of others, he didn't have to pull the trigger, the simple presence of the gun was enough to stop the attack.

 The only time I ever pointed a gun at a human being, it was when someone was sneaking up toward me from behind a shed in the middle of the night. I never fired a shot. I just pointed the gun at him and told him to stop. He stopped.

Thanks for your testimony, Dr. Sowell.  Given the opportunity, I;d go shooting with you any day, and if we ever meet inn a bar, the first round is on me.

New Year's Getting Busy

Due to the oddity of the school calendar, PawPaw is off this week.  The holidays are officially over, and it's time for thing to get back to normal.

PawPaw didn't want to piss away the whole day, but the weather weenies are predictably predicting foul weather.  A quick view at the radar and another view outside shows what is in store for the next couple of hours.

Yeah, it's raining outside.

And, the radar confirms my observations.

It's going to be lousy weather until later today, with a strong line of storms pushing through.  However, all is not lost.  The garage is covered and I can make some lexan lenses for some CFDA targets that I intend to weld-up later this week.  Our targets are steel, with a lexan lens that shields the start light from bullet impacts.  We use poly-carbonate so that we can see the light.  When the lens is installed, it looks something like this.

It's not always easy to find a scrounged supply of lexan, but PawPaw knows a guy who runs a glass shop.  A year or so ago, I told him that I'd need this stuff, and he said he'd keep an eye out.  Later, he called me and asked if I wanted some lexan out of a piece of John Deere construction equipment.  I jumped in the truck and went right over.

He gave me three of those that had to be replaced.  Good, nearly 1/2 inch lexan, totally useful for stopping wax bullets.This morning, as the thunder popped, I went outside in tot the garage, fired up the table saw, and started cutting lenses.  Then, got on the drill press and made mounting holes.

That's seventeen lenses cut from one of those equipment panels.  That should keep me in lexan lenses for a year or so, depending on how many targets I build this year, but for the meantime, I'm set.

At least today wasn't a total waste with the foul weather.  The weenies tell me that the weather is going to get worse over the next couple of hours, so maybe it's time to hunker down in the house and find something else to occupy my time.