My Favorite Libation & The Walking Dead First 6 Episodes

I figured what could be better than some good stiff Irish Whiskey and a bunch of walking stiffs so, on the way home tonight, I picked up 2 bottles of Knappogue Castle Irish Whiskey. Why 2? Because there was a bottle of their 1995 labelled vintage and the new stuff labelled 12 years old. The newer stuff seems just a tad darker and I will bet it will taste just a bit different. so I got both, the 1995 labelled one for later, much much later (as maybe a keepsake for future years). I sat down several minutes ago, tuned in the tube and settled back as I turned on AMC. Great, only 2 minutes till show time. Brendan called down to me, then came down and gave me a t-shirt. I had us both pause a moment to watch the opening scene of the show, then took a good look at the shirt. I is OD and pictures Walter, one of the characters from The Big Lewbowski, in star spangled red, white & blue face. Above his head, going from ear to ear, it says:

"i DON'T ROLL ON SHABBAS"

Okay, great, I love it. What else did he say in the movie: "I'm just sittin' here drinkin' my coffee"? I think that was it. Well, I'd just be drinkin' my Irish in a moment but first I thanked Brendan. Brendan went back upstairs and I took the metal trim off of the bottle top. I was about to grab the stopper, the plastic topped cork stopper and pull it out, when it fell off. Not a good sign when the cork has dried so badly as to fall apart like that, or maybe it got broken when put into the bottle. Well anyway, and I am not about to figure which, that bottle will be headed back to the liquor store tomorrow. If it crumbled and cracked because it is dried out then chances are that the booze has been effected and not in a good way either. I have had wine bottles with dried out corks and the wine tasted like piss and vinegar. If it just broke off, well then once I get it out, with what am I supposed to seal the bottle? I will leave it just as is because I am not about to take a chance on a $41.00 bottle of whiskey and then when I try to return it maybe they will and maybe they won't take it back thinking I opened it and did something to it. This way they can see it was messed up and they can return it to the distributor as is - broken cork still in the mouth of the bottle - bottle unopened.

Shit Heck, now I either have to have some vodka or maybe the bottle of Louis Jadot beaujolais I just picked up for the wife. Wine and zombies, nah just doesn't seem as right as wine and vampires would seem. I think I'll stick with the hard stuff. I have a bottle of potato vodka somewhere around here, now to find it during the next commercial break and grab myself a small dram of those fine spirits.

By the way, he just shot bicycle girl! Great show but where in Hades is season number 2????????????

All the best,
Glenn B

Ballseye's Gun Shots 125: Annual Ammo Inventory

Speaking of buying ammo in bulk, as I did in my blog post immediately prior to this one, I guess before I go out and buy any more of it, I should do an inventory of what I have in the ammo locker. Then I suppose I should arrange it all to store newer ammo at the bottom and older ammo at the top (or something like that) so I can use up the older stiff first. (I always set it up that way but for some reason rarely seem to shoot it that way.)

I figure it will take me at least a few hours and figure those will be hours well spent. I also figure this is about the best time of the year to do an ammo inventory. It is still fairly cold outside, I am still in the winter doldrums sort of mode, there is not much going on this month, so why not spend some time counting my ammo. Sure, even though I just mentioned why I ought to do it, I a know I could think of lots of other more exciting things, maybe even some more useful ones to do but there are some practical reasons to take an annual inventory of your ammo, especially if you have a good amount of it on hand and if you shoot on a fairly regular basis. First of all, I want to know what have on hand and want to know which types of ammo I have that may be in short supply. Those in short supply will need to be supplemented by new purchases. Secondly, it is a good idea, if you have a good amount of ammo, to document what you have for insurance purposes should something go wrong and the ammo be destroyed, ruined, stolen and so forth. Thirdly I check the condition of the ammo as I inventory. (I do not check each and every round but do a spot check on ammo from different areas of the ammo locker to see if any seem to be effected by moisture.) Fourthly, I decide which ammo I have in my collection to cull from it - either to be shot up soon, or to be sold, traded or given away.

I just rearranged my ammo locker, probably not two weeks ago, and for the life of me I don't know why I didn't take an inventory while doing it. So, I imagine that I will do it this weekend. The actual inventory will consist of me taking all of my ammo out of the foot locker and ammo cans, counting how many boxes I have of each caliber, how many of each brand, how many of each type in the same caliber such as soft point versus hollow point versus FMJ or one grain weight against another and so on. Once it is all out on the floor, I will clean out the inside of the containers that held it, getting that done before actually doing the inventory so the containers have a good amount of time to dry out. I will also make sure to turn on the oven to low heat, then to place the desiccant containers into the oven, atop a sheet of aluminum foil, to dry them out to revitalize them - so to speak. Then I will turn on the dehumidifier in the basement to dry out the air. Then I will start the count. As I count, I will be writing down the inventory count and then placing the ammo back into the ammo cans and locker. I will keep stuff I intend to cull on the side, probably going into ammo cans for easy to get hold of availability. As I go along I will also take photographs of it all, this is for insurance purposes. Once everything is packed away, I will remember to turn off the oven, retrieve the desiccant and place it back into the ammo locker. Then I will lock up the ammo locker and I will think about doing the annual firearms inventory and cleaning - that job will certainly take longer - not because I have a huge arsenal of guns but because it will include a good inspection and cleaning each one of them. That could literally be an ongoing project over several days but as I said, this is a good time of year to do it. Once the weather gets nicer, I'd rather be out shooting or gardening, or fishing, or caulking my windows (yeah right), or enjoying whatever other fun things I could be doing.

All the best,
Glenn B