Feb 26, 2011
With me loophole on me shoulder
No one else in the Smugleye Irregulars lusts to hit the Fort Dodge loophole today, so I'm passing too. That's manageable if I can steel myself into cramming a full quota of weekend loafing into a single Saturday. That would leave me free to attend an auction-style loophole tomorrow .
The offerings are uninspiring and include a real-live Rohm RG10. I have done many reprehensible things, but owning one of those once upon a poverty-stricken time is among the most shameful.
Otherwise the handguns include a stainless Taurus revolver in .22 magnum on which my top bid would be in the $75 range, and that only on grounds that I might quickly find a Greater Fool. I have never understood the caliber except as a marketing con -- a few hundred extra FPS over the .22 LR at about three times the cost, and unreloadable.
A Hungarian called PA63 -- which certainly lacks the pizzazz of a name like Zsa Zsa -- is offered in .380 ACP. The internet peddlers suggest I could pay about $160 if it's nice, but I won't. Don't like that caliber either.
Otherwise it is a barnyard pile of hardware-store shotguns, pump and singles. I pick those up if they're cheap and have been known to chop the barrels to 18 1/2 inches, remove the patina with a wire wheel, and paint them flat black. (Krylon. Always insist on quality!) Extra loopholes on me shoulders against a putative risin' o' the moon.
But I'm really going to try for the WW2 stuff -- GI dog tags and "German medical kit." We'll see.
The offerings are uninspiring and include a real-live Rohm RG10. I have done many reprehensible things, but owning one of those once upon a poverty-stricken time is among the most shameful.
Otherwise the handguns include a stainless Taurus revolver in .22 magnum on which my top bid would be in the $75 range, and that only on grounds that I might quickly find a Greater Fool. I have never understood the caliber except as a marketing con -- a few hundred extra FPS over the .22 LR at about three times the cost, and unreloadable.
A Hungarian called PA63 -- which certainly lacks the pizzazz of a name like Zsa Zsa -- is offered in .380 ACP. The internet peddlers suggest I could pay about $160 if it's nice, but I won't. Don't like that caliber either.
Otherwise it is a barnyard pile of hardware-store shotguns, pump and singles. I pick those up if they're cheap and have been known to chop the barrels to 18 1/2 inches, remove the patina with a wire wheel, and paint them flat black. (Krylon. Always insist on quality!) Extra loopholes on me shoulders against a putative risin' o' the moon.
But I'm really going to try for the WW2 stuff -- GI dog tags and "German medical kit." We'll see.
We Irish Have Always Known
On this date in 1852, Ireland mourned the passing of Thomas Moore, poet, balladeer, and economist.
All in the Family Way
by Thomas Moore
["The Public Debt is owed from ourselves to ourselves and resolves itself into a Family Account" - Sir Robert Peel's Letter]
My banks are all furnished with rags,
So thick, even Freddy can't thin 'em;
I've torn up my old money-bags,
Having little or nought to put in 'em.
My tradesman are smashing by dozens,
But this is all nothing, they say;
For bankrupts, since Adam, are cousins,
So, it's all in the family way. ...
.
All in the Family Way
by Thomas Moore
["The Public Debt is owed from ourselves to ourselves and resolves itself into a Family Account" - Sir Robert Peel's Letter]
My banks are all furnished with rags,
So thick, even Freddy can't thin 'em;
I've torn up my old money-bags,
Having little or nought to put in 'em.
My tradesman are smashing by dozens,
But this is all nothing, they say;
For bankrupts, since Adam, are cousins,
So, it's all in the family way. ...
.
Feb 25, 2011
Elmer Fudd to the rescue
We don't have as many hunters as we used to, but plenty of us still lurk in the forests, plod through the brome, climb for bighorns, and (masochistically, if you ask me) sit on our damp and frozen arses in dark swamps, waiting for the ducks to fly at sunrise.
How many? The official USFWS guess was a little over 12 million licensed hunters in 2006. Other estimates run much higher, But even if you accept the government guess and then cut it in half, we field more than six million armed men and women who at least think they know something about field craft and shooting.
That just happens to be roughly the number of souls in the armed forces of the largest four foreign military establishments combined.
I wonder if the Pentagon has war-gamed this?
Yeah, I know invasions a la June 6, 1944, are the archaic visions of grouchy old Luddites. On the other hand, when General Dynamics, Rockwell International, and other merchants of highly technological death start demanding payment in gold, even I with my sporterized 1903 might start looking militarily viable.
---
North Korea and Russia, 1.1 million each, India 1.3 million, China 2.3 million.
--
(h/t Alan.)
How many? The official USFWS guess was a little over 12 million licensed hunters in 2006. Other estimates run much higher, But even if you accept the government guess and then cut it in half, we field more than six million armed men and women who at least think they know something about field craft and shooting.
That just happens to be roughly the number of souls in the armed forces of the largest four foreign military establishments combined.
I wonder if the Pentagon has war-gamed this?
Yeah, I know invasions a la June 6, 1944, are the archaic visions of grouchy old Luddites. On the other hand, when General Dynamics, Rockwell International, and other merchants of highly technological death start demanding payment in gold, even I with my sporterized 1903 might start looking militarily viable.
---
North Korea and Russia, 1.1 million each, India 1.3 million, China 2.3 million.
--
(h/t Alan.)
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