For washing blood off the altars?

We're all thinking about Mayans lately. We wonder if it's okay to spend all our savings on alcohol, tobacco, firearms, and explosives since the end is coming only six weeks or so after we re-elect His Obamaness.

But we hardly ever think about Mayan plumbing. Why bother? They probably just used buckets and really long ropes in the cenotes.

Turns out we're wrong. The Mayans had  sophisticated running water, fountains, and maybe even flush toilets, and There, I fixed It  has an entertaining essay on it.

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Strictly as an aside, a cult is running around these parts putting up billboards warning that the Revelations version of TEOTWAWKI is divinely scheduled for two weeks from tomorrow.  Personally, I find the Mayan logic more persuasive.  

..fish nor fowl nor good red herring; the .22 long

We didn't know anything about ballistics. We just knew .22 longs were a dime a box cheaper than .22 long rifles. Shorts were cheaper yet, but we were led to understand by our elder experts  -- mostly eighth and ninth graders  -- that they would ruin our guns.

So we happily shot longs up and down the wild (really) Des Moines River valley -- squirrels, rabbits, Blatz beer cans, floating debris, and spawning carp.

The .22 long was born in 1871 for S/W revolvers as a supercharged improvement on the short. It held  the same 29 grain lead with  a longer case and a black powder charge upped to 5 grains.  The ballisticians were divided on its actual worth but felt it might offer a small improvement on the  short in handguns. In rifles, the  powder burn pooped out before the bullet left the muzzle.

Re-specked for smokeless, it was routinely available for about 100 years, disappearing from the hardware store shelves when the makers could no longer offer it cheaper than the long rifle.

So it was neat to find this while sorting an auction-sale can of odd nuts and bolts. The head stamp is "U," from the Union Metallic Cartridge Company, later part of Remington. It's a treasure to be placed in my can of oddball cartridges, perhaps never to be examined again. So what?  As the philosopher Travis McGee wrote, the best collectibles are moments of pleasure.

Thinning the herd - Iowa Caucuses 2012

Mike Pence is out, leaving 18 known or suspected common scolds to pester Iowans between now and January.

Pence says he'll run for governor of Indiana to replace Mitch Daniels, who remains at least somewhat likely to swing by Camp J and barter for my vote.  I dunno, probably not, Mitch, but if you want to open the bidding  with a 98  per cent, 1918 manufactured Model 1911, I suppose we could talk, assuming it comes with a half-dip magazine and original grips.

Meanwhile, your comprehensive guide to all the men and women of gold studying up  on corn and beans and hogs so they can talk to us like really concerned experts has been updated.

Yvette Vickers

There was some shilly-shallying about posting a shot of Yvette.  She wasn't in the same league with the usual TMR  choices. Besides,  she stripped for Playboy. That's not automatically disqualifying, though it adds demerits for tastelessness and/or unseemly career desperation.  Still, she's cute in the face and was said to be  a nice person.

I suppose the decision tipped toward publication when my friend John of the GMA   remarked that the circumstances of her passing argued strongly against automatic bill-pay schemes.

So, strictly as a public service and in memory of hot July nights at the drive-in: