Dial 911 Push HARD and FAST

ZOMG Eleventy! Everyone I've shown this too has had the same reaction. Laughter to tears.
H/T to AD

I HATE VACUUM TUBES

So, the amplifiers at work for our balance that was built in the mid 1940's are run by vacuum tubes. No big deal in that they give a decent amplification of the analog signal to the motors that drive the balance. Problem is, the tubes are getting harder and harder to find. I have a source through a music store for a couple of them that are the same as electric guitar amps. However, one in particular is only available as Russian Surplus. Add to that the fact that the motors used in this beast haven't been made for years and are no longer available. We tried to get a shop to rewind them but the answer was NO from several shops.
So part of the problem is availability of replacement tubes, part of the problem is availability of replacement motors and part of the problem is finding someone who can actually work on the amps. I am tired of dealing with them myself. the old boss was good with them but he is gone now and I am the person that has the most knowledge of them around here now. SCARY!
Sorry, just venting. Did I mention that the room the balance is in is temperature stabilized? Being Texas, it is stabilized at a "warm" temperature so any prolonged troubleshooting involves a profuse amount of sweat. I now offend myself!

Firearms Reliability Rediculousness

I am kicking myself for not bookmarking the post that started these thoughts to coagulate in the bone structure that holds my little brain thing.

Someone posted on their blog that they were thinking of getting or building an AR and wanted to get readers advice as to whether they should buy or build and why did AR's cost so dang much from name vendors.

The responses are interesting and one in particular is what set me off. The writer responded that frankenguns are garbage and the only real AR that you can trust is one made by the higher end vendors. Problem being that most users really couldn't tell how good or bad their AR was until they went through a 3 day carbine class where you had to shoot 1500 rounds a day to see if your gun would hold up. That is where you see the failures of the lesser AR's.

UTTER! BULL! SHIT!

Bear with me a moment.

In handgun reviews you will also find folks that insist your handgun must shoot flawlessly for 200 rounds without lubrication and 2000 or even 10000 rounds without cleaning.

WHO! CARES!?

If you find yourself as an armed civilian needing to fire 200 rounds in a single engagement, you need a fire team, not a more "reliable" gun. So long as the gun goes bang every time for the first 20 rounds EVERY time you draw your fresh gun from leather, you are good to go for a carry gun. That is a 2-5X factor of safety for any gunfight you might find yourself in.
Disagree? Find me an example of a real gunfight where a civilian needed 200 rounds to survive. I double dog dare you.

It just doesn't matter if the gun is tested to a safety factor of 50 100 or 1000. At some point the reliability is moot because it is no longer based in reality.

Back to the AR discussion that started this whole post. If an armed civilian is in a firefight that requires 1500 rounds in a day without a break for any maintenance, you don't need a more reliable rifle or even a fire team, you need close air support.

I would love for someone, anyone, to give an example of an armed encounter where a civilian needed to shoot their handgun 200 times without break. Or even had 200 rounds on them loaded up for this running gun battle. Or they needed a defensive rifle or carbine to fire 1500 rounds in a single engagement and had enough loaded mags on them to survive.

Anyone?

Katrina or Rita? BZZZZT
Ike? BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT
Rodney King Riots? BZZZZZZZZZT
Northeast Blackout of 2003? BBZZZZZZZTTTTT
'92 Chicago Bulls Victory Riot? BZZZT Not Even!
Any of the Stanley Cup Riots? BZZZZT

So, what about the future as opposed to lessons learned from the past and or lessons learned from events overseas? Beslan Massacre? What about this weekends murders in Norway? Could that happen here? Definite possibility of a firm maybe. Would a citizen carrying concealed need to or even have the ability to fire 200 rounds from their handgun is a single encounter? Not very bloody likely that they would have a single reload on them much less 200 rounds worth. Would an armed citizen even need to fire 200 rounds in an encounter like this? Not likely either.

As Tam is so want to point out, there all those that really wish for an armed rebellion of some kind to break out because that means they don't have to go to work tomorrow. They don't live in reality. I do.

As maybe an academic exercise, it might be interesting to see how robust a guns design and build are to extended torture testing. And that is exactly what this is. Torture testing. Nothing based in reality.

Shooting last night

So there was a family violence shooting last night in Grand Prairie. Unfortunately there were multiple casualties out of this. The money quote from this tragedy?

The shooting call came in at 7:10 p.m. The first officer arrived about 90 seconds later, he said. “It just started raining police,” Brimmer said.

Once four or five officers arrived, they went in, he said. By then, the shooting had stopped.

Highlighting mine. By the time the officers arrived, the shooting was over. there is nothing they could have done to prevent this terrible event.

This dovetails off of the shooting in Norway. That rises to the level of Horrific! A lone shooter dressed as a police officer went on a shooting spree on an island full of young communist campers. Due to their national firearms law, no one on the island was armed and there were no real police on the island to provide any sort of protection. The gunman had free reign for close to an hour before police could get a helicopter ride out to the island to engage the shooter and stop him. Reports are lots of people ran and or swam to get away while other faked being dead to avoid getting shot. NO ONE made any attempt to stop him or fight back in any way. At least there is no word of that as of yet. We are turning into a world of cowards who look to the government for everything. Protection, income, housing, healthcare, everything. A total loss of personal responsibility.


H/T to Texas Fred.

End of an Era

So, manned spaceflight by America has come to an end. I watched enraptured as the first man walked on the moon. AN AMERICAN. Before that, I had the opportunity to hold in my very little hands, an original of the rams horn Handheld Maneuvering Unit our Astronauts used to guide them on spacewalks. I followed the space program with great anticipation of what great thing we would do next. I watched skylab and the joint USSR/NASA docking mission and wondered what we as not only a nation but as a planet would do next. Of late, I was an active part of the team that helped bring STS-117 and her crew back to earth safely after suffering a torn thermal blanket on liftoff. Now, NASA is relegated to a footnote of history charged with making Muslims feel good about their contribution to science and technology. What a sad day this is indeed!

Overheard in the Truck

RADIO: Casey Anthony found not guilty....BLAH BLAH BLAH

misbeHaven: Now she just need to take up golf so she and OJ can discuss how to find the real killer.

Me: GAACK, CHOKE, CHORTLE. While trying not to run off the road laughing.

Happy Fourth !!!!!

So since we are under a burn ban as well as fireworks ban, the next best thing is to make noise and smoke. My neighbor Brass Valley Shooting was doing some tune up drills and fun shooting and I wandered over to put in my two rounds worth. It was nice to go shoot just for fun and put some lead downrange and do some transition drills with the carbine and pistol and just get out and shoot. Anyway, made noise and smoke, help a couple shooters (I Hope) and it's still mid day. Need to get misbeHaven outside on the range so she can tune up and put some rounds through her Kimber. Oh yeah, when someone asks, "Hey, you want some steel targets?" the correct answer is SURE!. I now have a stack of 3", 4" and 6" steel plates to setup as additional steel targets for the range here at the house. I may get some more and make a dueling tree for the .22, that would be a blast. HAHAHAHHA.

Somebody's Kid needs a woodshed and a switch

So last week during the Dyer Mill fire in south Grimes County, there were two fires in north Grimes County that pulled resources out of the major fire and put lives at risk through out the area. Now there have been at least six fires in the same area along the border of Grimes and Madison Counties.
My thoughts are that this is the work of someones kid who is bored and has no respect for others lives or property and just want to see fire trucks and action in their area. They need to be stopped. IMMEDIATELY. If this is an adult, they need to be arrested and locked away for a long time while their brain is taken apart and studied. This is going to get someone killed before it is all over as they keep putting more and more people in danger and that is not acceptable. The idea that they keep setting fires about the same time of day in the same area says they are unsupervised and probably lack transportation. This is just flat wrong and there is NO justification for their parents not taking them out behind the woodshed and learning them a lesson in respect for others.

UPDATE: They have a suspect in custody. The Fire Marshal's office brought in an Arson Dog and took all kinds of samples and they made an arrest. Hopefully this will put an end to these fires.

Tough day for Dallas Police

So in one day the Dallas PD had to fire three officers. First because one office rgot into a fight with owner and bouncer at a bar....... But police are the only ones allowed to carry in a bar because us mortal non sworn citizens would be too dangerous with a gun around where alcohol is served. The second for an officer that got into a fight at the Hospital ED and later made racist remarks about it. She must be clinging to her go d and guns as she is a racist. And finally, we have an officer steal a gun during a traffic stop. The officer searched a persons car and found a small amount of marijuana and a pistol. THe officer "let the offender go" but kept the gun and drugs. He then tossed the drugs and kept the gun for himself or to use as a throw down gun at a future crime scene. So, either it was a collectable or a piece of crap that he had a use for and decided to keep it. Just one more reason why police should be the only ones that have guns because we peons can't be trusted.

Rocket Surgeon

So yesterday in Sacramento a guy was arrested for having a gun in his carry on luggage. You KNOW there is going to be a search and x-ray of your bags so to do so purposely is pretty dumb. Accidentally is believable as I have a relative who had done that. Not smart but believable.

A 49-year-old man was arrested at Sacramento International Airport this afternoon after Transportation Security Administration employees determined that he had a firearm in his backpack.

Sacramento County sheriff's deputies assigned to the Airport Division responded to a security checkpoint in Terminal B at 1 p.m. today. During the screening process, TSA personnel reported that they believed a passenger was carrying what appeared to be a firearm in his personal backpack.

A search of the passenger's belongings revealed a loaded handgun at the bottom of the backpack, along with several rounds of live ammunition in a magazine, according to a Sheriff's Department news release.

The passenger, identified as Tam Nguyen (above), was arrested without incident. He was booked into the Sacramento County Main Jail on suspicion of unlawful possession of a loaded, concealed firearm and unlawful possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

Nguyen is being held on $60,000 bail and is expected to be arraigned this week.

Read more: http://blogs.sacbee.com/crime/archives/2011/06/man-arrested-at.html#ixzz1QlZAQF4O

Bold is mine! I suspect the anti's will still include this as "gun owner tries to get gun onto airplane." What a maroon! He's a convicted felon in illegal possession of a firearm and he carries it into the airport where he knows he is going to get screened and x-rayed?!!??!?! Never accused him of being smart. And this happened in California, that is unpossible since the gun show loophole is closed in CA so an evil gun dealer must have "lost" it and sold it to him under the table because that is the ONLY way he could have gotten it in CA with their enlightened gun laws.

News Bias or lack of Information?

This past weekend there was a flash mob in Austin. HSOI has a post up about it and a common friend of ours had a first hand report of it.
What bothers me is that the press had no coverage of this happening. This is something that would likely be of interest to the good citizens of Moscow on the Colorado. So, either the press doesn't care about htis happening or doesn't want to report it for one reason or another, or the APD is reporting/recording this in such a way that it is not picked up by the press. Not really sure which but either way it is a disservice at best and dishonest at worse.

TSA and other Government Assholes

So the TSA saw fit to humiliate and torture a 95YO Grandmother who is in late stage cancer and wears an adult diaper. The Texas Legislature had considered during regular session a bill exercising states rights making it against state law for TSA pukes to grope inappropriately. The feds stepped up and threatened to cancel flights out of Texas "For Safety". The fed has done all it can to destroy Texas and Texans along with the Texas economy since we have dared to grow and show the fed plans for the financial crap that it is. Now that the anti groping law is under consideration in a special session, the feds got to the LT Gov and he went and got legislators to "disappear" long enough for the bill to not be considered last week.

OK maybe it is me but this just fits into the pattern of the government forgetting that they are servants of the people not the masters of us. That or maybe I'm just tired of all the governments crap telling everyone that we are too stupid to know what is good for us and have just really had it with them.

Great Range Day

Long hot day at the range yesterday. Started the morning an hour early with Beyond the Basics. Think trigger control and site alignment. We spend the entire morning working on fundamentals and getting everyone the solid foundation that they need before they move on to more advanced skills. We also work on transitioning through multiple targets and how much sight picture you need for different targets at different ranges. The group we had was great, by the end of class everyone was getting it. That's the real fun from the instructor side of this class, you see the light bulb go on for people when they finally grasp the concept that has never been explained to them before.
The afternoon was Competition Pistol. That's an introduction to the different pistol shooting sports. We explain the various rules and classes of equipment and set up a few stages so people can shoot the different sports stages and get an experience and understand what they are doing when they go to a match. This was a fun class for both instructors and students. They all definately got it and that was clear on the IPSC stage we set up. They pretty much all shot the stage carefully and got close to maximum points. Out of 17 students and 10 targets on the stage and each student running the stage twice, I think there were 2 missed shots total!

Now I have rest and work around the house to catch up with.

Rightous Indignation

Being the Racist bastard that I am accused of since I am against ILLEGAL behavior be it immigration or attacks on police.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/06/22/mexico-demands-probe-in-migrant-killed-by-us-agent/

Phillipe Calderon is an ASS! After a US Border Patrol Agent was attacked by ILLEGALS trying to cross the border ILLEGALLY another agent discharged his duty weapon to save the life of his fellow officer who had been attacked by a man wielding a board with nails in it and rocks, Calderon had the balls to say, "I demanded punishment for the guilty,". What a load of horse shit. And that is really an insult to horses everywhere. I'll apologize to mine when I get home.

And not hte ACLU has gotten involved where they don't belong with this gem,

'The American Civil Liberties Union of San Diego and Imperial Counties questioned the latest killing.

"We simply cannot allow our law enforcement agents to use lethal force when confronted with rock throwers," said Kevin Keenan, the group's executive director.'

What a bunch of asses!

tell you what, the ACLU can come on over and we'll throw rocks at them and hit them with boards loaded with nails and we shall see if they want us to stop or care to use force to make us stop. Bastards need to mind their own business

What is that?

Well the rains finally made it to us. We have gotten 1.66" so far this morning and it is still falling at 0.16"/Hr. The firefighters are almost as happy as the residents of the area.