Gun porn, incomplete

Too late, after I locked them back up, it occurred to me that that I was one gun shy of hilarious vulgarity.  There's 38 on top, descending to 22. The shot needs another 38 below, but I don't feel like  re-opening the safe.

The Police Positive is sort of a B-cup  D-frame -- in .38 Colt New Police, equal to .38 S & W. There's no real difference, but originally there was an up-front variance. Colt got caught with its pants down in the revolver ammo wars of a century ago, so it stole the .38 Short Wimp. It gave up when no one was fooled by the cosmetic difference, a flat bullet rather than the sensuously curved Smith and Wesson nose. 

It's 1918 vintage. Someone  later dressed it in beautiful Colt OEM walnut bloomers. They would be lovely adorning any of six or eight other D-frame models, just not this one. Anyone with proper hard rubber care to swap?

There's a small stash of .38 SW here, but I'll probably want to shoot  more than that. I can reload with the .38 Special dies (albeit possibly with some crimping challenges). The .357* cast bullets will work well enough,  and in extremis for brass I can trim .38 Special cases to fit. (Probably, anyway.  I haven't looked into the rim-thickness question yet.)

The Hi-Standard Sentinel is one of those comfortable mid-grade guns that just "is" -- not special, no particular history or other distinction, but a kick to shoot. We pulled onto K's personal air strip on the way home and ran a few cylinders offhand just for the pleasure of listening to the noise and watching dirt fly around the only handy target, a corn husk 20 - 25 feet off. I nailed it a time or two double action and figure I scattered the rest over a dinner plate area. A big dinner plate.

But Jim, you damned fool, you already got enough guns and, besides, you ain't made of money.

Quite true, but let me explain it this way: "Bugger off."

Alternatively, take the $xxx Federal Reserve Cartoon  price and calculate how few zillionths of a nanosecond it will take Ben to create xxx new ones out of thin air.  He can't make Colts or even Hi Standards at all, even if we give him a 3D printer.

---

*The .38 SW caliber spec is .361.  The Brits designated the round .38-200. It used a 200-grain bullet which gave Tommy's leftenant leisure for a spot of tea before it became time to see if his projectile had yet struck the Hun.

The latest gun market report

At a small country auction this morning in Northwest Iowa:

 Mossberg Model 185D-B 20 ga. bolt action, 2 3/4" chamber;  $160

Winchester 3030 Model 94, used very little; $900 and note that this was recent production, routinely available NIB at near half the hammer price.

Marlin Model 19G, 12 ga. pump shot gun w/long barrel;    c. $125

Marlin Model #37 -22 pump rifle; $210.  I dropped out  at $150 due to condition; the butt stock was too trashy.

Colt DA 32  (sic) w/case & US issue holster, was Jim's dad's WWI issue;  $500.  My "sic" was sic.  It was a .32 Colt, an old 4-inch Police Positive,  and undoubtedly a POW rather than an "issue" revolver. The holster was issue but too long for this piece and likely intended for the earlier GI Colt .38.

Colt Huntsman 22 long rifle, auto;  $500. Arguably reasonable, but I considered the condition to be low-average and the price too high for a shooter.

Rohm 22 Magnum Model 66;  $160. Junk in any condition, and this one was about average.

Ruger .22 auto .22 long; $310. A routine Ruger Standard, 6-inch, which are all over the loopholes here at c. $210-220.

---

I believe I mentioned that our agripersons stagger under the load of Obama/Bernanke/Congressslug cash and tend to get somewhat "excitable" when  under the thrall of a good auctioneer offering blue steel. I apologize for the poor characterization and should have written that they get galactically freeken hysterical.  

A little gun lust

Next Saturday morning is reserved for a lethal weapons bazaar out in the country, a backwash farm not from from the head waters of Stony Creek where Inkpadutah's band of Wahpekute Dakotas liked to hunt elk when they were not busy killing white people for stealing their land.

Nothing on the auction goes back as far as the ~ 1855 to 1865 period when old Inky was making a pest of himself in these parts. Only the Colt D.A. .38 comes within a long generation of being contemporary. It could be a model as early as 1892 or as late as 1905, the latter only as a USMC variant. It took Colt a long time to get this one right, especially to make the cylinder turn the right way. I owned one decades ago, flimsy lockwork, impossible trigger, and all.

The lineup, with the three that interest me in bold:


GUNS: Mossberg Model 185D-B 20 ga. bolt action, 2 3/4" chamber; Winchester 3030 Model 94, used very little; Marlin Model 19G, 12 ga. pump shot gun w/long barrel; Marlin Model #37 -22 pump rifle; Colt DA 32  (sic) w/case & US issue holster, was Jim's dad's WWI issue; Rohm 22 Magnum Model 66; Ruger 22 long, auto.; Colt Huntsman 22 long rifle, auto; WWI steel helmet; WWI gas mask; 1917 Camp Dodge pic.; 1917 Soldier's Handbook; lrg. military shell

World War 1 is a bit outside my interest, probably because I have never fully shaken the vague notion that Mrs. Wilson may have chosen the wrong side.  Kaiser Bill wasn't really an evil dude, and it might have been useful to have a bunch of snobbish Prussian junkers between us and Joe Stalin in the middle third of the 20th Century.  God knows the Frogs and the Brits weren't all that useful.

Still, the Colt is a bona fide U.S. Military relic, so maybe I'll bid even though it was a miserable design first built for a pipsqueak cartridge. Also, this example is rough.

So is the Colt Huntsman, but I'll try for it anyway. In the first place the one already resident in the local vault is lonely. In the second, it will make my friend K grit his teeth in jealousy again, and that's worth something. :)

The Marlin Model 37 would likewise make good company for the M-38 already in hand. They're fraternal if not identical twins,  and a sweeter little rabbit gun/plinker never existed.

So, we'll see, but I'll show up at Dick's auction prepared to be disappointed. Our agrarians are flush this fall with crop money, drought disaster money, ethanol mandate money and Lord knows what else from the generous hands of His Ineptness and master gardener Tom Vilsack.  This tends to make them excitable at auctions.

Actually, it is kind of a porn gun.

But please keep it under your hat. This is being written in the wee hours when my compatriots are sleeping and won't find out somebody snuck back to the loophole for:

Provenance? You demand provenance? I got your provenance right here:

Corporal Styng of the 101st Airborne took it from a particularly thuggish SS Oberstleutnant on the Cotentin Peninsula about sunrise, June 6, 1944. For 11 months it was a comforting presence in his pocket, loaded with 7.65 rounds also liberated from the German supply chain.

Then, in early May on the Elbe, victory won, his artistic side appeared. The battalion armorer made up the grips from the wind screen of a downed Stuka, and S/Sgt. Styng lovingly fitted the photo of the Girl Back Home.  (A more sedate picture of the future Mrs. Styng is under the right grip panel.)

Geeking it out: FN Browning Model 1922, .32ACP, Nazi proofed, made in the captured FN factory in Liege, Belgium, probably in 1941 or '42, although it bears a batch serial number (with a letter suffix), making dating somewhat tricky. The slide is well polished and blued. The number-matched frame shows more hasty manufacturing. Insofar as the Luftwaffe had an official pistol, this was it, but the 1922 was widely carried by Master Race officers of all services.

The 1922 is a stretched version of John M. Browning's , PBUH, Model 1910 which Colt didn't want. So he had it built by the Walloons who showed it to the picky damned Yugoslavs who wanted a longer barrel and greater capacity.

Most guys would probably grade this one at very good, maybe a little better. 85 per cent? I expect it to shoot well enough -- minute-of-Nazi thorax  across a small courtyard. But that's secondary. What it is is foxhole art and the one of the most intimate possible pieces of history.  What is war if it isn't the story of a lonesome warrior, too far from Her?

 

The gun market

Mid-October , 2012, guns-only auction in northwest Iowa; all from one owner; all in excellent to NIB condition.

Junk on my bunk

Six pieces of it, sent my way through a friend for a value opinion and an offer. The friend will buy the scabby but working Remington 11-48  as a spare gun.

Leaving a neglected and butchered Remington 31, dinged, rusty, and with a receiver gouge that could only have been done with a grinder. It sports one of those old Lyman screw-on choke tubes, likely frozen in place. Too bad. It was a graceful gun from John Pederson who undoubtedly tipped his hat to Mr. Browning (PBUH) for some of the basic design.

Leaving also a J.C. Higgins bolt-action 12 gauge, a Stevens 16-gauge single, an Ithaca 72 (by Erma of West Germany)  lever .22,

And the heartbreaker, a Winchester 37 in .410,  bad enough to require butchering -- like this -- nearly unthinkable for an old Winchester.  Stock cracks and chips. Battered butt plate. Hints of blue highlight a motif of rust. It just spent too much time rattling around in the leaky rumble seat of a Model A.

My offer for all five is on the table, probably so low as to insult the owner, but high enough I really hope he declines. It isn't as though there are too few projects cluttering up evey damned horizontal surface I own.

(The cheap Ithaca is somewhat presentable and probably works. Having a little experience with Ermaverksjerks, I'd just shoot it until something breaks -- more likely sooner than later --  then screw it to a barn board and sell it to some older party who needs to decorate his rumpus room.)

Ammunition shortage, politics, and other Mad Monday mIscellenia

1. I cleaned out the local WalMart supply of bulk-pack .22 long rifle hollow points yesterday. Which is to say I bought one pack, Federals, at $19.97 plus tax, and consider myself lucky to get that. My WalMart has hired a rarity, a personable sporting goods clerk.  I asked about the dearth of .22s. She said there's a run on the stuff, that when she re-orders it can take three weeks to get any at all, and it disappears in a day or two.

(This large, pretty woman is especially treasurable compared to the usual Wally munchkins  whose default response to any question is a shrug and a grunt. I came perilously close to proposing marriage.)

The mania to buy ammunition is, of course, a vox pop phenomena, better than any other poll.The people say His Ineptness will be swept into power again, carrying a valise full of greater flexibility.

2. Joe Scarborough and his supporting cast are having quite a party down in a Florida cafe this morning, setting the scene for the debate-like teevee program tonight.  A lot of parents were in the place,  getting their existence validated by waving their hands and babies at the teevee cameras. Joe and Mika each held some racially balanced kids. It was cute for a couple-three minutes, then not. I  knelt before the porcelain throne, brushed my teeth, and switched to a C-Span channel where...

3. C-Span was interviewing college kids about the great issues to be decided this evening. Back to the throne. Look, dammit, kids are in college to learn something about grown-up life. By definition they're a few years shy of knowing what the Hell they're talking about . Giving them teevee time to advise adults on adult topics is presumptuous at best, but "stupid" is a more accurate term.  (There are a few exceptions, of course, but I've already talked too much about my grandsons.)

4.  The Sunday gun auction was astounding. Fine classic handguns at prices phenomenally greater than I and my comrades are willing to pay, even in Bernanke's Federal Reserve Cartoons. (More anon, assuming  any ambition remains after my light-heavyweight bout with leaves. Damn, I love trees,  but my adoration fades every October when I rediscover the annoyance of living downwind from 400 acres of them.

Guns galore

...and some nice ones. They go to auction this afternoon, so if you need me for emergency political or philosophical consultation I'm afraid I won't be here.

The queen of the hop is an apparently original Rem-Rand 1911A1.  The joker of sadness is a Colt GI issue .45. Chromed.  Add some Pythons to the mix and you at least have plenty of eye candy.

I seriously doubt I'll bring anything home. Auction prices around here have been astounding recently -- not just over the market, but off into the realm of stratobucks (thanks in part, of course, to Ben Bernanke's starship Kwee* Three Et Seq.)

I'll be leaving in about 90 minutes, so if you want to place a proxy bid...

---
*Q.E., quantitative easing, i.e. the Charminization of the Greenback.

Aye! Carrumba! Es no Colt

The guy outbid me and others and was smug at winning the Colt 1901,one of the earliest double-action revolvers in general U.S. military service. Except it wasn't.

Barrel inscription: ".38 Spc or U.S. Service Ctg." No other markings visible.

Those danged Latinos again.

This particular gun seemed tight enough. It probably would discharge a cartridge. Otherwise it scored about 9,5 on the one-to-ten ugly scale.  Still, it would have been fun to have on the wall for a price less extravagant than  $155. If nothing else I could make up a nice yarn about having had it analyzed by a crack metallurgist who confirmed it was made of melted Arbuckle's cans.

I can't explain the  ".38 Spc" except by speculating that the Mexican (or possibly Spanish) gun maker knocked it off after about 1909, by which time everyone still  devoted the the . c. .357 diameter bullet gave up on the .38 Long Colt and started  chambering these revolver types for .38 Special.

---

A middlin' High Standard HD,  4-inch heavy-barrel version, brought $$320, and I  am middlin' regretful I didn't make the other guy pay quite a little more.

Sunday catchall, loophole edition

The 50-dollar Winchester 97 has a new home. If my negotiating skills are up to it, the proceeds will cover most of the adoption fees for a 1940s SW Victory Model. it's tight but maximally ratty on the outside.

Previous owner Bubba had a nice big power grinder. He use it to worry off the hammer spur so he could quick-draw from his OshKosh bibbies. While he was at it he lost  the lanyard ring.

Another previous owner was a Nebraska sheriff's department .These fellows autographed it in hesitant cursive with an engraving pen and added  a warning: "Range Use Only."

The original owner was the U.S. Navy. Hence the attraction. If $200 will do the deal, it's mine. Maybe a tad more.  We'll see.

---

It's a pleasant little 60-table show, and the new operator-- a one-man operation --  is learning about promotion as as he goes. All of us local gun freaks are supporting him. We've been without a snow for three or four years, and we miss them.

---

I'm running slow this morning, haven't even showered yet, much less grabbed another box of junk and a couple of bait guns for the table. I blame the pure animal pleasure of setting in front of a little fire on the first really chilly morning of the season.

Life is good .

It isn't often I wake up with Rachael Maddow,  just the occasional Saturday morning when the electrical teevee happens to be on Channel 63 as I click the power button. That usually happens only on mornings of lazy and lethargic grumpiness.

What the Hell.The primary alternative is Fox News, similar lies, only in shorter sentences and smaller words. Not worth the effort of  another clicker punch.

So Rachael and I communed for a few minutes as Miss Folger trickle charged my  heart.  I wasn't too surprised that she was analyzing the Romney and Obama campaigns, nor that she was operating from a V-word base, although she didn't use the word. Takeaway: Republicans hate women.

Then, on a lighter note, she shifted to her closer, the cocktail of the day, mixed on-camera, right before your very eyes, accompanied by the sort of coy giggling you often see in a high school girl about to commit her first venal sin. (That's the sort of thing I always associate with girls who like boys. But I digress.)

Which brings me to my segment closer: The Rachael cocktail is made of cognac, grenadine, lemon juice, and champagne. I submit to you, my fellow Americans, that anyone who accepts political advice from a woman who hustles crap like that should be instantly and permanently disenfranchised.

---

There is nothing like waking up with the Maddow woman to make a guy relish the thought of a nearby loophole.

I'm about packed, taking just enough stuff to justify having a table. The idea is to buy, not sell, so I'll have to listen to other lies today.

"Jim, this gun comes with quite a story behind it...".

As Skeeter Skelton once remarked on the subject. "Great. But how much is it without the story? I already heard a couple-three Rachaelwhoppers today."

Serendipity in .30-06

So whaddya do when you've had three magazines for a Remington 760 in .30-06 rattling around in the miscellaneous box for years? You haven't been able to locate a buyer of sufficient taste and discernment to own a 760 (or anything else in that action family) in a proper caliber. Or at least you can't find one anxious to acquire your mags at anything near a fair price.

You despair, of course. Unless you're of my cheerily optimistic persuasion. Then you wait for a fine1963 production model to pay an unexpected visit to your quarters. And wait. And wait. Years.

But eventually it happens, at least to those of us who lead clean lives, devoid of impure thoughts.

T' hee. I'm looking at it now. At a very fair price it is mine. MINE! Including the vintage Redfield 3x9 on that tank-like Redfield mount. And with enough clips* to handle 21 rampaging terrorists before having to fumble individually with any of these noble rounds.

(Pictures possible if and when I find the three-volt Cockroach by Canon.)

Among the beauties of the Second Amendment is this: Here in the Land of the Free, it is not forbidden to buy a rifle primarily because you already own a magazine or so for it. Bless the Founders.

Funny, it didn't start out to be a particularly good day.

---

*Oh hush. I'm just trying to temper tautology.

Pornographic gun prices

The only explanation I have is that Ben and the Feds announced QE 3 and QE 4 and QE5 yesterday and everybody heard about it except me. Am I supposed to go trade my green money for orange today?

The chief pleasure down in Spencer last evening was making a guy I dislike pay close to $300 for a fair-to-good 10 gauge Remington 1889, Grade 1.  It was tight and original, but the left hammer wouldn't cock, and I hate getting into the innards of old doubles. Otherwise I'd have laid it in against my next trip west, into serious Cowboy Action Shooting country where it would be desirable trading stock if working.

Otherwise: The rattiest old Stevens single shot .22 bolt gun you ever saw for $100.  A Ruger 10-22 of no distinction for $290. One of those rattletrap Rohm .22 single-sixes  for about $230. A post-64 Model 94 Winchester for $490. ('course that included the rubber slip-on recoil pad. Who's that frail?) And so forth.

The standout, though, was a Findy Sickle Iver Johnson .32 rimfire breaktop,  nice, bright silver thanks to a soaking in naval jelly and enthusiastic wire brushing. Bubba didn't bother to dissemble it first. Not a part would move. One hundred bucks.

---

I settled for some shooty or otherwise lethal  bric-a-brac -- a little ammunition and a nicely preserved Western 4 1/2-inch hunter from the '40s.

Gearing up

I've never even handled a Commie rifle. While there are tragedies in my life, this is not one of them. The freer markets of the world have produced all the firearms a guy could ever need or even want. On the other hand, Dunham's Sports down Spencer way is overstocked on 91/30s and peddling them at $99.99 (a $30 savings!)

What an ugly rifle. Only the Brits (for sure) and the French (possibly )could have offended the eye so grotesquely. Still, it seemed to do its work adequately for all ranks and brilliantly in correct hands like those of White Death Simo  (who used a variant). It's hard to argue with the one-man-and-a-rifle combination which dispatched invading Communists at the rate of 5.05 per day that cold winter when the main contestants (Nazis vs. Brits and Frogs) mostly contented themselves by making  ominous honking noises at one another.

I have only a reading knowledge of the 7.62/54R, but I'm prepared to accept that it works like a .308 Winchester or, with finiken loadings, the .30-06. The accuracy reports are all over the place, and I suspect getting a natural tack driver involves a bit of luck.

So, if I can bestir myself to make the trip, I'll look down bores,  rattle actions, and try to get the Lady on my side. Then I would have to look hard at the possibilities of stripping away the ugly; a better stock for sure, and maybe it's possible to grind off that  magazine box to create an elegant single. Find proper cover, then go to work. One shot, one zombie, executed with great style.

---

This is a mere velliety.  and the odds of adding Boris to my stock of atavistic bolt actions are less than 50-50. They would be lower yet except that there is a Goodwill store right close to Dunham's, and with the next equinox just a month away, it's time to round out my fall fashion ensemble.

Winchester 1897

We begin with the gun, a Findy Sickle piece, celebrating its 111th birthday this year, born only three years after William Randolph Hearst started the Spanish-American war in order to allow Teddy Roosevelt to become president.

Winchester Model 1897, serial number C158xxx, one of about one million examples of this design from the brain of John M. Browning, PBUH. It is long-tomish with a 32-inch barrel, full choked in 12 gauge. (Boys, ya wanna see my bran' new goose gun?)


I've owned a few of them over the years, generally picked up as lagniappe  in multi-gun swaps or from folks who just didn't care to have rusty old guns cluttering the place. I bought them cheap, enjoyed them for a little while, and swapped them off. The only real attraction for me is the connection with my earliest days in the field, the times before I was allowed to carry a gun, that awkward stage when a little  boy was trusted to walk along in the line of  party-hunting adults as a sort of bi-pedal pheasant flusher, actually cheaper than a good dog because the folks were stuck with feeding me anyway. A fair number of the adults carried Model 97s. The majority, armed only with single-shot H&Rs  and the like, were jealous of the six-shot firepower. We bare-handed kids were even more so.

One other thing. I loved the exposed hammer, and I still do -- on any firearm -- despite their snagginess and mostly mythical safety flaws.The ability to see at the briefest glance that the gun is ready or not ready to go bang is part of my personal   security blanket.

---

(Isn't that a whole lot of wind about a common old gun, Jim? Especially one pretty well clapped out from a century of rattling around in duck boats and Model-A trunks?)

Yeah, I guess so, but it gives me a chance to bloviate on the transaction which brought her to the Camp J Armory.

We were at Cabela's in the northern Minneapolis slurbs. It's sort of a tradition when the family gathers in St. Cloud. We never buy much, but I do like wandering aisles and marveling at how many thousands of dollars folks are urged to spend in pursuit of the simple outdoor life. (Remind me to report on the absolutely indispensable $75 walking stick one of these days.)

This time, Number Two Grandson and I went directly to the gun section. The first thing catching my eye was the '97, and I idly checked the price tag. Ahem. $99?? I can make a buck on that. Or maybe, at that price,  it would be nice to grace the wall under the Maynard Reese (Nine Travelers --Canada Geese  708/950.)

I took it to a clerk who popped the trigger lock so I could see how bad the action was. The forearm was chipped, and its screws to action bar were missing. That's it. It would go bang. I frowned disgustedly anyway. The clerk said, "Maybe we can do something about the price."


Eh? Dicker in a Big Box?? I will be damned.

So I pretended to examine it in greater detail, sighing knowledgeably while finger-tapping the deeper dings.

"Well, if $70 will buy it, I'll take it."  Clerk and gun disappear for a couple of minutes.

"Seventy is fine."

He directed me to the computer  where I entered the 4473 information, permitting the Cabela's Bureaucratic Compliance Officer to check me out with Eric Holder and, not so incidentally, with all of the credit bureaus. Cabala's is smart. The same information that squares me with the BATFEIEIO justifies me with the usury industry, but I didn't think of that at the time.

The paperwork was cleared and I reached for "money" in the form of Federal Reserve Cartoons. Mr. Clerk stopped me. "Sir, you have been pre-approved for a Cabela's Visa card. "

"No thanks."


"But it comes with a $20 gift certificate."


"Uhhh,  does that mean I can deduct the $20 from the price of this gun."


"Yes sir. It does."


"Okay."

And that's how I walked out of a giant super store with a $50* Model 1897 Winchester and a brand new credit card with a limit astronomically high  considering my unimpressive personal circumstances.  In this narrow matter, I am even smarter than Cabela's because the plastic is and will remain TDY in a forgotten drawer corner.

Minor gunsmithing to ensue, followed by a nostalgic bout of scattering small pieces of toxic lead around the countryside. It's okay. No condors in these here parts.

---



*(Plus, of course, $3.50 for the state which, I am convinced, will use the money to further its efforts to persuade every Minnesota driver he or she is operating the only vehicle on the road.)

Merchanting Death in Bucolia

... and here, from W-T-M-R,   your weekend market report! (Sound of 66 wpm Model 15 teleprinter up and out)

--The 8 3/8-inc SW K22, as near-new, in box  --$740

--.38 H&R breaktop in ..38SW, very good -- $165

--Marlin Glenfield Model 60 with cheap scope -- $100

-- Hardware store branded .410 single, pretty good -- $105

--Early Marlin 12 gauge pump (Win. 97ish) very rough -- $125

--Winchester 97,  worse than the Marlin --$265

--Remington 572 (.22 pump), pretty good -- $355

--Tarted up Ruger 10-22, checkered walnut, near mint, 3 mags -- $265

--Remington 870 3", rib, very good -- $280

--Remington 700 in .270 Win, about unfired, Leupold 3x9 -- $600 

---

And that's what some lethal stuff is worth at a country auction in the northern plains.

Your reporter was in the K22 action through the 600s but, in the end, left with all but an even $50 of his wad still apocket while still acquiring enough to keep him busy the rest of the weekend -- sorting, cleaning, planning, gloating.

The swag:

A dandy pair of almost unused ancient Dreml tools -- one of the early rotaries and a  1/3 sheet sander, a tank weighing about three times as much as a modern counterpart.

A nice junk box holding bits, wrenches, and even a brass and rosewood try square.

A draw    tow bar to be converted into a combination dethatcher and driveway gravel stirrer-upper.

A hefty scissors jack, unneeded except in the sense that no man can ever have too many jacks.

And, Ta-Da, a mint -- never-sharpened -- CaseXX four-inch hunter from about the '70s or 80s. Did I mention that no man can ever own too many knives? 

Sometimes I wish I hated wrong-way revolvers

Ignore the junk and put your eye on the Smith Model 17, K22 with its 8 3/8-inch barrel.  

As much as I'd like to bring her home, I probably won't.  According to Mr. Internet, she commands at least $900 and probably quite a bit more.  That's enough Federal Reserve Cartoons  to gas up the more dependable truck for more than 4,000 miles of adventuring.

Guns draw my attention on three levels. (1) Users, the pieces I expect to shoot --ho-hummers up to some reasonably classic stuff.  (cf: 1911A1, for instance)  Some of them will help protect me from currency devaluation, but that's not why they're in the vault. (2)  Nostalgia, those few guns I grew up with or which otherwise resonate with something strictly personal.  (3) Investments, strictly a shield against the money printers.

The K22 -- especially in that barrel length -- is Category 3. You don't cram a  near-mint relic into a canvas Uncle Mike and go bashing up and down the ravines. Every scratch brings a grimace. One day of hard field use can turn a thousand-dollar beauty into a 500-dollar thing.

So the Smith-In-The-Safe makes investment sense only in a narrow scenario. The inevitable big devaluation happens earlier than I think it will, bringing on TEOTWAWKI but leaving enough social order intact to support an economy above the subsistence level; leaving, in other words, a a serious market for the utilitarian tool graced with beauty.  

Your objection is noted. But a classic like this will increase in value right along with the inflation we experience every day as the methed-up Bernanke elves crank the presses. 

Which may be true, but it ignores the reality of liquidity. Recouping the full value of a "collectible" is neither quick nor easy. See any episode about Rick the Pawnbroker.

---

Well of course I'm trying to talk myself out of even going to this auction, Bunkie. But what the Hell. I have nothing else on that day's social calendar. Maybe the crowd will be asleep.  If I get lucky, or stupid, I'll let you know. :)

Good morning, America

1. The day of glory arrives. It is a moveable feast. Let history record that on March 9, 2012 C.E. the  Master of Camp J, having read prophets in the Book of Aerology, ceremonially unplugs the heat tape.

2. Attention Willie Geist: It's none of your damned business why I'm up so early. I know. The marketing psychologists told you the way to maintain viewership is to get your audience *involved" with your show. Make them *part* of it by giving them an *ownership stake.*  Look, son, I don't want to own your program. I don't want to participate in any manner at all. I don't care to be your buddy. I want you to sit your eflin butt down behind a desk and read me the news off your teleprompter.  I don't need your clever exchange with the weather guy or your guesses about basketball games. (One concession. If you want to have some papers to shuffle on your desk so as to look more like a really studious and concerned journalist, why, I guess that's okay.)

3. The news this morning seems to be that  the Glory that was Greece is back.. Works like this: You loaned Athens a hundred bucks. Athens promised to pay it back. Athens then decided payback would be inconvenient. So you had your Travis McGee conundrum -- settle for half or take a dead loss. More technically, you had to trade your hundred-dollar IOU for a 50 dollar IOU, backed by colllateral identical to the original: the integrity and competence of Greek politicians.

4. Actually, we get two glory days in a row. Tomorrow is the big loophole in Wells, Minnesota. We may or may not loophole anything lethal, but it's always a pleasant pilgrimmage. Imagine. Hundreds of tables of death insturments in many calibers, most of them capable of bringing down a J3 Cub.  And they're all on display in a school. True, this travesty explains Wells' reputation for rivers of blood and streets of gore, but you can't have everything.

Gun prices

Back in January I noted an internet+live auction of 500 guns in Aurelia -- classics, oddballs, plain junk.

Cleaning up bookmarks this morning I ran across the final sale prices. Some of you may find it interesting.
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Gun auction giggle

To be sold tomorrow at an auction near me:

"Hi-Standard USA Model H-D 22 long rifle, practice gun."

I think I'll go and practice bidding; always liked that H-D Military iron, and the "practice" may be a country auctioneer's way of describing a higher-grade target model. 

H-Ds remind me of English automobiles from my youth -- lots of fun, very sporty, just so long as you don't mind  tuning them up every week or so. And they nicely illustrate a British (and French, for that matter) principle of industrial design. "I say, Cyril, why use only one part when three will make it work almost as well."


(This comes to mind because I've been reading more about Obama's passion for EuroSoc economic designs. It's just a revival of the recurring American notion that it's very hip and cool to import horse apples from the Old World and see if they taste better here.) 

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Also a Remington No. 4 in .22. Hmmmm. Don't need one of, course, but...

UPDATE: The High Standard was so-so and brought in the $400s. Out of the question. (No one knew why the "practice" word was used.) The No. 4 was fair. I was the second-highest bidder at something like $275, and, on reflection, I'm glad  not to own it. There's no shortage of wall hangers around here.