Don't Take Your Eye Off These Putzes

Not even for a second.  That's the advise of Instapundit, when he links to PJMedia, who reports that gun-control advocates are quietly building support for another bill.

Thompson said the bill protects rights under the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution by providing an exemption on background checks for firearm transfers between family and friends.
“You won’t have to get a background check when you inherit the family rifle, borrow a friend’s shotgun for a hunting trip or purchase a gun from a buddy or neighbor,” Thompson said.
It further bans the creation of a federal registry and makes the misuse of records a felony, punishable by up to 15 years in prison. It allows active duty military to buy firearms in their home states and the state in which they are stationed, authorizes the use of a state concealed carry permit in lieu of a background check to purchase a firearm and allows interstate handgun sales from licensed dealers.

That doesn't sound bad at all, does it?  Until you realize who's pushing the bill.  And we've been lied to by these bozos  before.

 “So we’re going to pass this law,” Schumer said. “We are going to finish the job and pass background checks and then move on and do other things we have to do to get guns off the streets and stop gun violence.”

Yeah, right, Chuck.  Tell me just exactly again how you intend to get guns off the street?

Friday Afternoon News Dump

Evidently, it was Black Friday today.  Drudge tells me that the search for the all-holy deal is getting a little rude.

Mall mayhem...Suspected shoplifter shot after dragging cop through KOHL's parking lot...Brawls...Woman uses stun gun in shopping fight...Man stabbed over parking spot...Shopper Kicked Out Of WALMART For Filming Fight...Man shot walking home with big screen...Shoppers Trampled In Race For $49 Tablet...SALVATION ARMY kettles stolen...REPORT: Profit margins jump for sales 'hoax'...

Really?  Someone stole the Salvation Army kettles?  Stun Gun?  Stabbed over a parking spot?

I'm glad I wasn't out there today.

In other news, Milady trotted down to the Dollar Store today and invested in real estate.  She bought a cat-house.

I've always wanted to own a cat-house.  Now I can say that I do.

Hunting with Dogs

When I was a young scrapper, Thanksgiving was a closed day for deer hunting.  In fact, it separated a split in the season, the earlier portion for still hunting only, and the later portion for hunting with dogs. The still hunt season closed on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and the dog season opened the Friday following. In those days, hunting with dogs was a popular past-time and many hunters kept dogs for the late deer season.  Indeed, for many years, I'd eat lunch with the family, then we'd head north to Minden, LA where I hunted the whole weekend with my good friend Melvin, whose family kept deer dogs.

In effect, we'd ring a large portion of the forest with hunters, as many as two dozen or more, then two men would drop the dogs and follow them through the woods.  If the dogs jumped a deer, the chase was on, and it was considered poor form to miss a running deer.  It was considered even poorer form to let the dogs get past you if you were a stander.  I suspect that the deer season was closed on Thanksgiving to keep the hunters near the house on this most American of holidays.

Nowadays I hunt in Area 2, as defined by the Louisiana hunting regulations.  I also note that Thanksgiving is an open day, and the dog season doesn't begin in Area 2 until December 4th.    In most of Louisiana we now have deer leases, posted land, and the large timber companies no longer have open land.  Hunting with dogs is proscribed on most private land, and has fallen out of favor.  But, there was a time where I'd gather with  hunters on the Friday after Thanksgiving and hunt deer with dogs.  Sometimes we'd have a good day, and we'd stack deer up in a pickup truck like cordwood.

I never remember any of that meat going to waste.   The rules were simple.  If you were a hunter, you had a right to a portion of the game.  If you wanted to donate your portion, there was always a family nearby in dire financial straits who would gladly skin, dress, and butcher those deer to fill the family freezer.

So, on this Friday after Thanksgiving, as you read this, I'm sitting on a stand in Area 2, but I'm not hunting over dogs.  We're all a bit poorer, because we don't spend much time hunting deer with dogs.  It was a gand tradition, and like all traditions, it's passed with our time and circumstance.

Good hunting.

Thursday Song

I heard this one on the oldies station, coming home from the Thanksgiving feast.  Clint Black and Lisa Hartman Black.



Y'all have a wonderful evening.

Prepping

Today is the final prep for Thanksgiving.  I've got to run to the store to pick up a few items, fill the truck with fuel, and drop by Momma's house to hug my sister.  She flew in from Knoxville yesterday and I want to see her before the hectic that tomorrow will  become.  We're all gathering on the family property tomorrow to share a meal and fellowship, then we'll retire to the pasture for a little target practice.  That's been a family tradition for several years, and as family changes we're never sure which traditions will change, or what the next year will bring.

Traditions change slowly, over time, and when we look back we see that what was once tradition is now simply a memory.  As families grow, and blend, and change, traditions change.  What we did when I was a child is certainly different than the way we do things now, and what my grandchildren experience in their youth will change as they grow and mature.  That's the nature of things and we cherish what we had and what we have, knowing that nothing lasts forever.

So, to each of you, I pray that you have a blessed and happy Thanksgiving.  That you experience the tradition that suits your situation, and that next year will find your traditions complete and fulfilling.  Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

Tuesday Teaser

I'm watching a grandson today on a cold, rainy Tuesday in November.  Nothing much happening around the casa today, except that we've got to go shopping after while to restock our larder.  PawPaw is going to make a big gumbo later today because a cold, rainy November day demands a gumbo..

The kiddo is watching cartoons in the toy room, and PawPaw is surfing around the intertubes.  It seems that Nosler is bringing out a brand-new, whizbang cartridge.  The .26 Nosler.  According to their teaser, it's a non-belted, long action cartridge that will launch the 129 grain Accubond at 3400 fps.  Surfing around the usual forums doesn't reveal a great deal about the new cartridge.  Nosler is keeping the information close-held until the SHOT show roll out, and I can understand that they're trying to create buzz.  I get it.

Some folks are wondering if they'll use the .375 Ruger cartridge as a base for their new cartridge.  It seems to fit the criteria.  Non-belted, plenty of powder room, fits in a long action, etc.  Maybe so, it ought to hold a lot of powder.  Shades of PO Ackley and Charlie Newton, there's nothing new under the sun.  Many of the wagging tongues say that it's bound to be a barrel burner, but I suspect that this won't be a cartridge where people worry about their barrel throats.  Two kinds of shooters don't.  The first is the long-range target crowd, who regularly change barrels anyway.  The second is the pure FUDD hunting crowd, which aren't high-volume shooters.

Before you get your shorts in a knot, I readily identify with that FUDD group.  For example, my .30-06 gets shot maybe 20 times per year.  A few three shot groups to verify zero, then whatever I burn during the hunting season.  If my -06 was a barrel-burner and only good for 1000 rounds, at 20 rounds per year, I'd have to change the barrel every 50 years. Hunters simply don't care about throat erosion.  Nosler might be on a good thing with this new cartridge, or in five years it might just be an interesting footnote.  We'll see.

Honor Band

Milady and I are traveling to Baton Rouge today, with a host of family.  Our grandson, Michael was picked to play in the Louisiana Music Educator's Honor Band, Symphonic Band, as 1st chair Trombone.  He's a high school junior and we're thrilled at his accomplishments with the trombone.  As a junior, it's quite an honor to be chosen as 1st chair, and he deserves the honor.

The old saw about how you get to Carnegie Hall?  Practice, practice, practice.  I've heard him practice solidly for hours.  He's got a rare musical talent, with the drive to turn that talent into a reality.  Scholarship offers are already coming in, and he's starting to pick his schools.  As a senior next year, he's way ahead of the curve.

At any rate, his concert is today, so we're traveling to Baton Rouge to listen to him toot his own horn.  If anyone is interested, the concert is at the Crowne Plaza Executive Center, Baton Rouge, LA at 2:00 pm.

Sunday Morning Dawg

It got cold and rainy yesterday, cold for these climes, and we've been spending time indoors.  The dog wanted to play "Don't Look At  The Camera", so getting a reasonable snapshot was interesting.

That will do, I guess, but I'm not sure how to caption that one.  Feel free to caption it in comments.

Off

Finally, I'm home, in my tennis shoes, wearing jeans.  It's been a long week.  I estimate I've worked nearly 60 hours this week, the majority of those before today, which only accounted for my standard 8 hours.  Just Damn!

It's not that the job is physically demanding.  It's not.  People offer to swap jobs with me every day.  I tell them that the job isn't hard, in fact is a really great job, right up till the moment it sucks.  And if the job ever goes to SUCK, it will go that way in just a few seconds.  But, this week is over and I'm looking forward to the weekend.

I've hooked the Mule to the truck, and partially loaded it with things I'll need in the morning.  Reports from the deer lease indicate that the rut might be starting to kick in, and I intend to be there before daylight.  In another hour, I'll go buy a pizza for Milady and myself, then commence with Happy Hour.

Good For You, Harry!

It looks like Harry Reid wants to change the rules on filibusters.

A senior Democratic aide told The Huffington Post on Wednesday that there's "a greater possibility" that Reid will hold a vote this week instead of waiting until after the Senate comes back from recess in December. The proposal that Reid is planning to put on the floor would strip the minority of its ability to filibuster executive and judicial nominees, but wouldn't apply to Supreme Court nominees.

I think that will work out great, Harry.   Go ahead, make it easier for a majority to overrule a minority.  You'll enjoy that when it's your turn to be in the minority.

.22 Ammo Prices

I went by Academy Sports during the hour between work and more work, and bought some sock hats to keep my noggin warm.  While I was in the store, I wandered over to the ammo aisle and inquired about .22 long rifle ammo.  They had it in stock, limit two boxes per customer, so I asked for my ration.  The guy handed me two boxes of Remington Thunderbolt ammo, 50 round boxes.  I didn't ask about the price, but headed to the register.  $2.29 per box, which comes to just 4.5 cents per round.  They're still rationing ammo, but the prices are getting more reasonable.  I was pleasantly surprised, especially as I got out of Academy for less than $12.00.

Oh, just for the record, I'll be working a lot of hours this week.  The school-house is trying to close for Thanksgiving, so they've scheduled lots of things this week.

Tee Shirts and Price Match

I went to Wal-Mart this afternoon to buy some tee-shirts, then started just looking around.  I found a 2-pack of PNY Sd cards, 4gb, for $13.88.  On a lark, I took out my cell phone and scanned them on Amazon.  It came back at $10.00 on the phone, and when I went to the checkout line, I showed the cashier my phone and she called her manager over.  He said to give me the price match.

Score!  Two Sd cards for $10.00.  That isn't bad at all.  Who says you can't quibble at Wal-Mart?

I came home later and researched Wal-Mart's price-match policy.  It turns out that they don't do price-match on internet pricing.  But what the heck.  It worked this once, and I've got some spare Sd cards for the game cameras.  .

Natchitoches

Natchitoches (Nak-u-tush) is a little town in north-central Louisiana.  It's just like tens of thousands of other little sleepy towns all over our country.  Good people, a small college, a local historical society, but it's got one thing that other little small towns don't have.  Fairly deep history.

In 1714 a group of French soldiers came up from somewhere (New Orleans hadn't been founded yet) and built a small fort to garrison as a bulwark against Spanish expansion.  They called it Fort St. Jean Baptiste, and it was poised against the eastward expansion of the Spanish, just 20 miles up the road at Los Adaes.  For some reason, Natchitoches "stuck" when other settlements were abandoned, giving Natchitoches the distinction of being the oldest continual settlement in the Louisiana Purchase.  It's older than New Orleans, and has the distinction of being vaguely French, but not too French.  It's founder was a French Canadian, from whence the Acadians, who populated south Louisiana later came..  It's a point of distinction to trace lineage back to an ancestor who garrisoned the fort as the tip of the French spear.

I went to college in Natchitoches, at Northwestern in 1973.  I graduated in 1975, went into the Army, then came back in 1980 to raise my family.  Natchitoches is a great place to raise a family.  I left Natchitoches in 2001, for all the right reasons and moved closer to my childhood home, fifty miles south.  Still, I have lots of friends and a soft spot in my heart for that little town with the strange name.  I am told that they're celebrating their tri-centennial next year, and I'd like to pass along congratulations.

Happy Birthday, Natchitoches.

McAllister Wins

Political newcomer Vance McAllister has beaten State Senator Neil Riser for Rodney Alexanders US 5th District seat.  And when I say beaten, I mean with 60% of the vote.  Think about that for a minute.  Let it sink in.  This was McAllister's first political race.  McAllister's not a politician, he's a businessman.

And all the cards were stacked to make Riser the winner.  Riser had the governor's endorsement, the seat seemed to be Riser's for the asking.  We know that Riser was in on the details of Alexander's retirement from Congress, because the day after Alexander announced his retirement, Riser campaign signs started showing up.  How many people can get campaign signs designed, printed, and installed in 24 hours.  Not many.  Riser was able to get it done, if you believe that he made the decision to order signs when Alexander announced his retirement.

A 60% win over an entrenched political machine is huge.

Vance appealed to several constituencies.  He appealed to the working man, he appealed to the anti-politician crowd, he appealed to those who dislike Governor Jindal.  Some will say that McAllister's election was a rebuke to the Tea Party, but I don't buy that.  The Tea Party is fairly undefined, but in its inception it was a backlash against taxes and the political crowd.  The only political rally I've ever attended was one where Rodney Alexander was booed from the stage by folks who attended the rally.  The Tea Party, as defined by lots of folks, is an unaffiliated conservative movement representing low taxes, small government, individual freedom and personal responsibility.  The fact that the name has been co-opted by politicians doesn't change the fact that a lot of folks like me identify with the movement.

Still, congratulations to Vance.  He ran a good race and took advantage of a number of different things to put together a winning campaign.  He can attribute his win to a backlash against government as much as he can to the endorsement of the Duck Commander crowd.  Willie Robertson helped him win, but that wasn't the reason we sent him to Washington.

And, one word of caution.  We're watching you.  The power and influence in Congress is heady stuff, but if you forget who sent you, we'll send your ass packing without explanation or remorse.  We've got high hopes for you, but don't let us down.

Sunday Morning Dawg

Waiting expectantly for a chicken nugget.

Some say I spoil that dog, but when we go to a restaurant, I make sure that he gets an order of chicken nuggets.  And some fries if there are any left over.  It's part of his payment for watching over the place.

And he loves him some chicken nuggets.  He can't decide if he likes them best from McDonalds, Burger King, or the fried chicken joint.  Tonite, he got some from Red River Grill, and he didn't turn up his nose at them.

Voting Day

It's Saturday morning, and normally I'd be in my deer stand.  Except for a couple of things. First, I'm not mad at those deer, I'm going to give them a break today..  Second, Milady and I made other plans today and in a few hours we're going to get in the car and head east, toward Mississippi.  We're going to spend the day in Natchez, LA, look at something different, play together the whole live-long day.  And it's voting day.

Before we leave for our play-day, we're going to vote.  We're electing a US Representative today, for the US 5th District and because that's the only thing on the ballot, it's going to be a low-turnout vote.  In elections like this, every vote counts.  I've seen small rural elections turn on one vote.  I've also looked at balloting for different types of elections, and I'm amazed at the people who vote once a year, or once every four years.  Sometimes small elections, like this one, have less than half the registered voters show up at the polls.

We had one election recently, where the locality had 8500 registered voters, and they were voting on a vital economic initiative and less than 2400 people actually showed up to pull the lever.  What's up with those other 6000 people?  Too busy?  Too apathetic?  Too stupid?  Well, those 6000 have no reason to complain if they didn't show up at the polls.  They let other people make the decision for them.

Go vote, Louisiana.  It's important.

Legalizing Pot

For those of you who haven't been paying attention, last year Washington and Colorado both passed initiatives that legalize the recreational use of marijuana.  The regulatory regimes were supposed to be regulated in "a manner similar to alcohol".

For the record, I'm not advocating for the legalization of marijuana.  I've heard the arguments on both sides, and I'm simply not convinced.  However, the voters in those states were convinced and they passed the proposition.  Now, the state is trying to figure out how to deal with it, and it looks like they're going to tax the living hell out of it.  Which is fine, except that the free market is at work.

The upshot of such actions is predictable and depressing. Colorado lawmakers are banking on about $70 million a year in taxes from pot and their Washington counterparts have projected new revenues of $1.9 billion over the first five years of legalization. There’s just no way that’s going to happen if a legal ounce of pot is double the price or more of back-alley weed. Even the most stoned pothead isn’t that easy to scam.

Taxes have to be seen as fair on luxury, or sin items (and marijuana is definitely considered one or the other) or people will find a way around them.  The linked article says that a legal ounce of marijuana, after the tax man gets his bite, might be as much as between $482 an ounce and $723 an ounce.  The black market is going to love those prices.

If you're supposed to regulate it in a manner similar to alcohol, the most consumers would expect to see packs of Alcapulco Gold pre-rolled, right next to the Jack Daniels on the likker store shelves.

Again, I've heard all the arguments, and I'm not convinced, but it looks like the state tax-man is going to do his best to suppress the pot that the voters want.  Let Freedom Ring.

Wednesday Woes

If you've been watching the news, you know that ObamaCare is taking hit after hit.  HotAir is all over it, hit the link for the full run-down, but it looks like the Democrats in the Senate are in full uproar, including my own Senator Mary (hack, spit) Landrieu, who is offering a bill that will only increase the rate of spin.  The bill is in a death spiral, enrollments are in the toilet, the website is a total debacle, and the numbers are abysmal.  Other than that, the president is having a great week.  It looks like Iran is going to get the bomb, the economy is stuck in the doldrums, and ... well, hell, why go on?

This is turning out to be the best November evah!  With leadership like we've got, it's amazing we lasted this long.

Locally, I just got a call from the Neil Riser campaign.  Our idiot congressman, Rodney Alexander decided to retire before he was primaried, so we're having a special election.  Given Louisiana's jungle primaries, where everyone votes and the two highest candidates go to the general election, we have a choice between two Republicans.  Neil Riser and Vance McAllister.  Neil is a classical Louisiana politician and has been groomed for this position.  Some say that the timing of the special election was set by the Statehouse Crowd to give every advantage to Neil.  Neil was supposed to take it in a walk.

Except for one thing.  Vance McAllister is a successful businessman and he decided to throw his hat in the ring, having never been in politics.  He promptly picked up some great endorsements, including the endorsement of the Duck Commander clan, the Robertson family.  MrAllister has never run for anything, so he's not a career politician, and he's spending his own money on the campaign, so he's not beholden to anyone.  I like Vance and I intend to vote for him on Saturday.  This is going to be a low-turnout vote, so it will be interesting to see the polls on Saturday night.  The vote from the individual precincts should tell us a lot about the demographics of the race.

A Mess of Bream

Looking at my daughter-in-law's blog site, I see that my grandson (one of several) has learned to fish for bream.  They're living on family land, and fishing a pond that my father built.  Evidently, it's full of fish and the other grandad taught him how to fish for the tasty little fish.

That's a pretty good stringer of fish for the first time out.  Hopefully, he took good notes because it's a skill set that will keep him occupied for a long time, probably the rest of his life.

Up the little hill, in the barn behind the young'un is my father's shop.  My son has been working in there, blending his knowledge of old time woodworking and my Dad's tools to craft a piece of furniture for his family.

It's good to see a kid fishing the pond, and a family member using the shop.  I am glad that piece of land is continuing to educate and shelter our family.  The circle continues.

Geese Overhead

Standing at my duty post, the air crisp and clean from the cold front that's passing through, I heard geese and watched a flight of small geese (blues and snows) flying down the river.  Classic chevron pattern.  As usual one side of the Vee was longer than the other one, and I thought about that for a minute and decided that I might pass on the knowledge of why geese fly like that.

Do you know why one side of the Vee is always longer than the other side?