I have not been keeping up much with the news lately and how could you blame me since I am on vacation but I have been checking a bit now and then. Today's quick review of recent events in the news brought some sadness into my day; I just found out today about the passing of one of my childhood favorites - Bozo The Clown (aka: Frank Avruch). More at the source.
He was one of the top entertainers of children (and probably of many parents too) during my formative childhood years (yes I am as old as the dinosaurs but not yet quite as old as the hills). Bozo The Clown was a staple, a must watch and just downright wholesomely funny. I have never heard a peep alleging that Mr. Avruch molested children nor that he was a weirdo or criminal of any sort nor do I recall him spewing forth apolitical agenda of one extreme or the other (just try to even imagine any of that with a star today, especially one who entertains children). Even though he (Like many other things) became a part of my childhood lost to me long ago, how can he be forgotten - he will be missed.
Brendan and I went shooting yesterday, at Bear Mountain Range - a public range on federal land. He shot his new Yugo SKS, his Beretta M9A3, his Glock 43 and most of the guns I brought along. Mine were the Ruger Redhawk, Glock 30 and a S&W revolver. or some reason, y little gray cells never thought of taking the Colt Detective Special out of my pocket for him to enjoy as well and the Glock 26 never left my hip. Regardless of not shooting those two, we had lots of fun.
After that, we headed to a fishing pier, on the way home, that was located on Remmel Dam Road. We fished for about an hour but had absolutely no luck catching anything (what else is not new). The pier was located in a cove in nice little park that is not on Google Maps. Nice pier on a beautiful cove of the Ouachita River. I am guessing there must be fish in it but it will be up to us to discover that some other day. Being I have one week here, and as luck would have it Brendan started a new job just before I arrived, it will have to be this coming weekend or not until next time I get down to AR.
Anyway, at least I remembered to get in another kind of shot while at the pier. I do not like selfies, they are not flattering with me looking about 10 years older than my actual age but since Brendan is in this one too - how can I not share it. Him being in the shot makes it worth it. Got some other pics of him too.
Fish or no fish - we had lots of fun - it was an excellent day yesterday!
I already know why it is so important as do many if not all of my regular readers. I hope I do not live to see the day that slaps everyone into enough awareness of reality to realize why the RKBA is so high a priority for us but should I be alive on that day, I will be ready. The thing is though, I figure by that day - should it come - I and many of you already will have died trying to prevent that day from happening.
Tonight is a sad night for me and I may sleep worse than usual, which is none too good already, after having learned that the oldest manufacturer of firearms in these United States - Remington has filed for bankruptcy (source). Should I hit the Power Ball or Mega Millions for say - a half a billion after taxes, I would make them an offer. I mean that too, that is how much that company means to me.
I learned how to shoot on Winchester and Remington rifles at summer camp. The heavier Remington became my favorite, especially since I shot better with them than with the Winchesters. My first personally owned shotgun was a Remington 870 Wingmaster, sold it to raise cash when I was poor. My next was a Remington 870 Express combo that I still own. I also owned at least another one of them - gave it to my son. I also have an 870 Express synthetic. In addition I have a Remington 513-T Matchmaster, a Remington Model 31 in 16 gauge and a Remington R1 1911 pistol in 45 ACP. I used to own a Remington 241 The Speedmaster and have a bad case of seller's remorse over that one. My choice of carry longarm, while I was a federal agent, was for many years a shotgun and the only shotguns I ever carried for work were 870s (both issued and personal). I also use their ammunition frequently for target, self defense and hunting purposes. My son shot his first big game animal, a black bear, with a single round of Remington 35 REM Core-Lokt ammo for a one shot kill and I took most of my deer with Remington slugs out of my 870 Express. So to hear that Remington, an American icon, is going belly up saddens me greatly.
I have to wonder how this will affect Marlin since they are part of Remington as of late. I have owned my fair share of them too nd have at least four Marlins right now. Hopefully both of them will not fold, one is more than bad enough sad news. If they do, then it certainly will be a great loss to our nation and a feather to tickle the insanity bone of the leftists.
Yet, as can be seen I the embedded video, unprofessionalism abounds as seen and heard in the reactions of police officers responding to a 'shots fired' call.
While the video is pretty amusing, I think there are also some serious considerations to be examined after viewing it.
First of all, I believe that the officer who calls the suspect a fucking liar should be suspended - no pay and face departmental disciplinary action. There is no call for behavior like that in law enforcement and I mean that quite seriously. Behavior like his, rhetoric like his, combine to set an atmosphere of a crime having been committed and of the 'suspect' being guilty before any facts can even come close to substantiating it. While there was no crime committed, they did have probable cause to investigate whether or not shots were fired but that was all they had. There was zero reason for the officer to falsely accuse the mechanic of lying and certainly absolutely no call to use inflammatory and foul language in this situation when they are making an armed response. All he is accomplishing is nothing short of potentially inflaming the situation.
Imagine if the suspect/mechanic decided to sue him for defamation of character/slander. Not much of a case, you say. Maybe there is not but then what if the suspect were to file a formal complaint against the officers. Why should he, you may wonder. If the cops can act like totally disrespectful assholes then why not the accused take corrective action. Add to all their indiscretions the fact that there was no apology forthcoming from the officers for their armed incursion and false accusations! Their response to a report of shots fired was amazingly unprofessional but the unprofessionalism it did not stop their.
Did anyone else besides me even consider, other than the foul mouth and false accusations, how very unprofessional and unsafe were these officers. They suspected the mechanic of firing off weapons or at least of having heard rapid fire gunshots that the police themselves claim to have heard. They come in fairly heavily armed, at least half expecting to find guns. They obviously believe the guy is lying to them about not having any guns or at least about not having heard guns shots. Then they let the mechanic, whom at least one of the officers obviously believes is lying to them (the same officer who over reacted at first by saying he had heard cannons), go to a vehicle that evidently has not been searched so he can demonstrate to them that the car was backfiring. What could have ensued had he reached into the vehicle and pulled out an AK? Officer safety was not a given proper consideration in the minds of the officers - instead, their thought the guy was lying had taken first priority and right then and there that was all that mattered. While the bald cop told the mechanic to demonstrate the problem with the backfiring, I note that once again, the unprofessional acting and foul mouthed cop was center stage in telling the guy to go to the car and prove it - and it is apparent that cop was 100% certain (his mind made up in advance) that the mechanic was lying. Luckily for them, the mechanic was evidently telling the truth.
In addition to a lack of consideration for officer safety, what about the safety of the mechanic and his coworkers? These officers are making an armed response and officer foul mouth is inflaming the situation and then gives instructions to the 'suspect' to go to an unsearched vehicle, unattended by an officer, to demonstrate the backfiring. What is the suspect had tripped and fallen - would that have been seen by the officers as a move to grab a weapon? Would they then have opened fire. Stranger things have happened leading to the death of a person who was nothing more than an innocent bystander. Proper control of the situation was not being exercised and the potential for disaster had been set. Luckily it ended without violence.
That one cop, the one who started all of this was the one who said he heard the shots (remember he called then cannons), he also was the same one who inflamed the situation with foul language and by calling the mechanic a liar and was the same one who urged the mechanic to get into the car to prove it had been backfiring while obviously believing the mechanic was lying and thus was one of the two who placed the lives of the other officers and of the mechanic into potential jeopardy either had the mechanic actually been lying or had he innocently made a move that would have made at least one of the officers feel threatened. Sure no one got hurt but what bout the next time that same cop overreacts and fails to control the situation as it should be controlled. A different and much more professional approach was called for and would have been better at taking into consideration safety of everyone involved. All the best, Glenn B
...if indeed it gets confirmed. I refer to the single shot that took out an Isis commander from approximately 1,500 meters. A one shot kill, in almost total darkness even if using thermal imaging optics is one heck of a feat and considering it was reported that the sniper had only a 15 second window of opportunity it is even more impressive. Not impressed enough, then consider that it was an instant kill head shot and bear in mind that head shots on moving targets are one of the most difficult to achieve.
That shot was supposedly fired by a British sniper near the Syrian border. The shooter is believed to have been a sergeant with the SAS G-Squadron and is reported to have used a McMillan TAC-50 sniper rifle. More here from the source.
The McMillian TAC 50 was made in the USA and has been succeeded by
the TAC 50 A1 - a newer improved version. More here about the TAC 50
and more here about the TAC 50 A1. Photo source.
Heck, I am happy if I hit a deer at 50-75 yards but then that is with a 12 gauge with a slug barrel and iron sights. Then again, about the furthest I have ever shot with a scoped rifle, more than once, was 150 yards (and maybe shot one session at 200 buy my little gray cells only vaguely seem to recall such). Anyway, I did okay but neither 150 nor 200 yards are almost a mile and I was not taking head shots on moving target at night - not by a longshot!
Hitting something at almost a mile away in near total darkness with only 15 seconds to do it is phenomenal. The linked article quotes someone as saying: “He is definitely the best sniper around at the moment.”. While that may or may not be true, he sure is a lucky one because no matter how skilled, and I figure he is indeed an extremely skilled shooter, luck played a part. It was very excellent luck for the sniper and the worst luck there is for the terrorist. It was also probably the best of luck for the McMillian Firearms because a shot like that, out of one of their rifles, can only work wonders for their business.
Did I mention - that shot was/is undeniably impressive!
My trip down to AR was pretty uneventful and there were no super special highlights to the drive down here except maybe most of the trip itself and there was only one low point. That was the traffic through Long Island, NYC and NJ. Being that was the only real low, and the rest of the drive went well, I guess it made 95% of the drive a highpoint! I left NY on Wednesday pretty much precisely at 1300 (130 PM).
Within 10 minutes of my house, I ran into traffic and it lasted intermittently for the hour and a half it took to drive only 85 miles.
Luckily, once I got about midway through NJ, traffic had disappeared. The ride the rest of the at was much better as can be seen in this brief clip of the road in West By God Virginia.
Around midnight, I stopped at a Motel 6 in Huntington, WV but did not stay there because they could not check me in due to a local power failure. Drove another 50 or 60 miles and got to a motel in Morehead (yes it is Morehead not Moorehead), KY at about 0130 (130 AM) Thursday morning and stayed at a quasi-dump of a Motel XXX. Even though I had been the sole occupant in my car, I had a little help while driving that kept me going for that 12 hour drive with only one stop of maybe 20 minutes to eat and gas up.
The stuff really worked, at least this time.
I departed Morehead at 1130 Thursday morning, then stopped in Bowling Green, KY for an hour for lunch but it wound up the first place I stopped at did not serve food. Who would have thought an Irish Pub did not serve food; of course, they did serve Irish whiskey.
Three folks walked in right after I had ordered a shot
and they asked for menus. That was when I found out
they did not serve food, kitchen was being redone.
After a wee dram of Jameson's, I walked around a bit, then went to another place and had a bit of breakfast at around 1430 (2PM). Took off back on the road again shortly after that.
I arrived at my son's place in Benton, AR at about 2145 (945 PM) or thereabouts at 1313.3 miles from my front door to his. That was on Thursday night. On Friday, he was on his second day of his new job for orientation, so I went food shopping. I picked up groceries for both of us and a fishing rod for myself. Also got a couple of shirts for us to wear on St. Paddy's day.
He modeled it but I wore it when we went out on the Saturday night of St. Patrick's day. He wore the other one in he background on the box holding the Yugo SKS. (I wonder where that came from!)
Before we had a chance to go out on Saturday, we went out to a local bar with Brendan's friend Walter. We got pretty smashed.
On Saturday, St. Paddy's Day, we had hoped to go canoeing on the Caddo River but found out the river was running low so we opted to go catfishing. We went to pond owned by Jimmy, a friend of Walter & Brendan. Walter was along with us. None of us caught a thing but I may have gotten a few bites, I pulled at least 40 to 50 ticks off of me - most very small nymphs but definitely ticks after a walk along the brushy shoreline. I forgot to use the Deep Woods Off Brendan had in his tackle box. Have not found any of them on me since and hope none are hidden somewhere doing their best to suck me dry.
I have to clean the selfie lens!
On Saturday night, Brendan and I went to Fassler's Hall, A German style bier garten. It was packed with plenty of elvin folk wearin' the green. We had a bite to eat and he had a couple or few biers. I took measures to avoid a gout attack and drank only club soda after getting bashed the night before.
Sunday, it was just me and Brendan and a day that promised to be rainy. We took a ride over to Hot Springs and went to a small gun show at the local fairgrounds there. It had maybe 125 to 130 tables. There were not many potential buyers, I am guessing that maybe 50 - 60 shoppers, at most, were inside at any given time. Prices on guns & ammo were high. Regardless, I found a magazine for my Glock 30 at a decent price of $23 and bought it so I'd have three mags for when we take the Glock 30 to the range, probably next weekend. It only came with 2 mags and while I had ordered three mags for it before leaving NY, as luck had it, they arrived at my house the day after I left on this trip. The rain held off until after we were back at Brendan's apartment.
After getting back to Brendan's place, I cooked a 5.5 pound corned beef, a head of cabbage and several white taters. It may have been a day late but damn it was delicious. We ate over half of the corned beef in one sitting.
Maybe it tasted even better than usual because we waited an extra day for it.
He will be working his new job all week so it gives me plenty of time to get into mischief by myself. It's been fun so far and I expect it to be fun for however long I stay here, especially on the weekends when I spend them with Brendan.
Sooner or later today I'll get my ass in gear and hop in the Corolla and get in it gear as well to begin my road trip to Arkansas to visit Brendan. I had kind of planned to leave at 0900 this morning but after having to crawl out of bed 5 or 6 times last night to hit the head, I needed to sleep later than usual. That has been happening almost every night for months now.
Before I leave though, I at have to make a stop. Yesterday I went to my urologist. He sent me for a CT scan of my lower abdomen to see what is going on that is making me go so many times each night. Too bad he did not do that when I last saw him over a month ago since the problem has been ongoing since December. As my luck would have it, which is all to often bad luck, I got to the radiology pace and they told me I'd have to wait to see if they could repair their CT Scanner which had been out of service all day. I waited an hour only for them to tell me it was kaput! Why they made an appointment for me in the first place is beyond reason when they could have sent me to one of their other locations. Anyway, I a going to try to have that done today and then leave. If I cannot get an early enough appointment, I'll do it in AR.
...and thus the weather forecasters were wrong once again! This morning there may have been 1/2 inch of snow on the ground on my side patio, maybe an inch and a half on the concrete sidewalk out front, and maybe three inches on my car. That certainly was not the 4 to 6" or more that was predicted along with high winds and much higher gusts. They kept stressing the "or more" too. As it turned out, no further accumulation landed upon us even though it snowed a bit more.
That made me somewhat disappointed that I had put off my pending road trip due to the weather forecasts I had heard yesterday. It would have been no big deal to drive in that snowfall. Then again, I heard a weather report saying that the snow had been piling up high and winds were blowing sideways in Patterson, NJ - only about 37 miles northwest of here. I would pretty much have to have driven through that to start my trip so maybe it is better that I decided to wait until tomorrow. Decisions, decisions.
Had the oil and air filters changed on my car today. After that I was a bit hopeful I'd get out of here today but tomorrow is only a day away and I had too much to do today not to put it off until then.
In case you are wondering, I am Arkansas bound to visit Brendan.
At least that is what the all-confusing weather gurus are yammering about today. Supposed to start snowing tonight but then again it is 43 degrees right now. Of course, no doubt it can drop pretty quickly the snow may come, in fact judging by what they have been saying it seems sure to come. They are saying 4 to 6" or more in my neck of the concrete jungle but who knows.
Had it not been for this forecast I probably would have been on the road tomorrow for a little bit of a road trip. Now, I guess I should wait until Wednesday. I prefer to make it t where I am driving, in one piece and otherwise good health and driving in a nor'easter is probably not a good idea with that in mind. Of course, if it is not too bad tomorrow, I may just say damn the snowflakes - full speed ahead (well legal highway speed anyway). No, I did not say to where I am headed; later for that. All the best, Glenn B
There have been more than a few times when someone I know has tried to hand me their infant or toddler when I did not want to be bothered; if only I had thought of that reply years ago maybe it would have been much less often.
...but just in case no one has mentioned it: Do you think the only reason that Kim Jong Un invited President Trump to North Korea is so that he can call it off shortly before the scheduled meeting and then blame it on Trump for it falling through? You know, Rocket Boy saying something like Trump set too many conditions! Of course, President Trump is setting conditions and would have to be a fool not to do so. Then again N. Korea has said it will do certain things before the meeting. So, if President Trump's conditions are that N. Korea does what it promised, who can blame him if it falls through besides maybe a psycho like Kim Jong Un or an American made leftist loon.
I just checked mine through a free service from my bank. Wow, it does not suck at all, as a matter of fact it is excellent. Not quite the top score you can achieve but pretty darned close. Makes me wonder though, what does one have to do to get a perfect score because my house is paid off, have some money in the bank, have a steady income (at least until the government defaults on government pensions), I pay my bills on time, have had the same credit cards for years, well one maybe only for a year or so but all the others for many years and not too many of them either, have never defaulted on a financial obligation, never declared bankruptcy and so on. So what does one have to do to achieve credit score perfection???
