Sunday 11 December 2011

Busy weekend

Just got back from the biggest range trip ever. I managed to fit nineteen, yes 19, guns in the back of my Nissan. There's still that 8mm Mauser I bought three months ago that's still in the box, so I didn't take it along. But, the important thing is, they all got their exercise and there is no more dust lingering in their barrels. Had two buddies and a 10-year old kid with me. We all had a great time. Got a chance to break in the Browning lever-action .22 and try out the Sig P220. I also tested the H&R single-shot 12 gauge break-action I picked up a while back. Word of warning: recoil is much worse with an ultra-light shotgun. Even light loads seem like buckshot. On the plus side, I found that it ejects shells quite enthusiastically.

Now here's a home surgery story for the books; for a long time, I've noticed a skin tag just below my left underarm. More recently, I've looked for the best way of dealing with these nuisances. Google skin tag if you don't know what one is. It wasn't large, by any means, just a floppy piece of growth shorter than a .22 bullet. Several sources stated that skin tags are benign and can be removed by any means available, as long as everything was sterile during the removal.

So, I decided that tonight was as good a time as any, and right before I got into the shower, I grabbed my Kershaw(the knife pictured in the post below) and proceeded to saw away at it. It was tricky, because I had to pinch it with the fingers of my left hand, while looking in the mirror and trying to find the right place to cut. Wow, those Kershaws are like scalpels! After a considerable amount of blood got on the blade, and trickled down my side, I had successfully removed my own skin tag. YMMV.

The 100th post

Here we are, the 100th post on my blog, and it brings good news. Yesterday I was discussing some things with my pastor, and he advised to check in with a certain local business. I had previously tried to get a job as a low-voltage electrician with them, and they didn't have any openings, although they were very interested in hiring me. Well, today I headed down there and dropped in on one of the head managers. She was delighted to see me, and said that they had wanted to get a hold of me a month ago. They had simply lost my resume, and couldn't find any means of contacting me.

Anyway, the long and short of it is, it looks like I'll be working there in the near future, which will be a big help for the apprenticeship program I'm in by eliminating the need for a length commute. I'll still need to drive all the way to Clackamas Community College for school, but it's only one night a week, so no big deal. And I still have all my tools from the last job, and now I have a real work truck so I don't have to worry about getting the inside dirty from work stuff.

Yeah, that little Nissan hardbody 2x4 is a sweet ride. I hadn't realized how much I'd missed the manual shift until I'd driven this thing for a couple days. It needs a tune-up, and maybe some hardware upgrades, but it's all minor issues. I think my first couple of paychecks will go towards the truck and the credit card, and after that, I'm gonna celebrate by purchasing my first AR-15, maybe chambered for 9mm Luger. All is well. I am at peace.

Progress

Tomorrow I pick up my new vehicle, a '94 Nissan pickup with 69K miles on the motor and considerably more than that on the body. Paint and body are in great shape, and the clutch was just replaced. New tires and brakes, and tags good through '09. Drives really smooth, and shifts easily, despite the amount of time that has passed since I last drove a stick-shift. And I'm getting a decent cash flow going, with my Kimber being sold to one of my close friends and the Lee-Enfield gone. Not to mention about 30 computer games passing through eBay's virtual garage sale.

Book review time: The Winner, by David Baldacci. Great suspense thriller, somewhat original plot and solid action sequences. A dirt-poor girl from the South is living the white-trash life, when a man offers her a chance to win the national lottery. What happens after that is a wild ride of intrigue and she must decide who to trust....her life depends on it. Not bad.

Also: The Seven Myths of Gun Control, by Richard Poe. Excellent book, well worth getting two copies so you can lend one out and still have the other to read. For me, it's just preaching to the choir, but I still enjoyed it. Poe presents a logical and an emotional argument in favor of guns, and the last chapter of the book, "The End of Manhood" is a must-read, dealing with the consequences of feminism and liberal social engineering. Swing by Amazon.com and they'll have it at your doorstep in no time.

Major car accident

Well, I have now had my one major automobile accident for my lifetime. Last night a bunch of us were headed home from the Cheesecake Factory in Tigard, and we were neck and neck with another car load of friends, and they were waving and laughing, etc. Well, the guys were horsing around, as usual, and my right side passenger was trying to hit the switch for my emergency flashers, which is on top of the steering column.

Anyway, I'm trying to get him to knock it off, and then someone from the back seat lunges forward and sticks his hand through the wheel to try and hit the emergency flashers button, somehow the wheel got jerked to the right, and we started skidding along the shoulder. The problem was, there was gravel all along the side of the road from when the snow storms had hit that hadn't been shoveled off yet, and traction was a serious problem. We went into a very fast spin, at some point the front end hit the dirt embankment and we finally ended up in the ditch, with the nose facing the highway, on our right side. Then it kept tipping, and we were upside down with the windshield and roof crunching under the weight.

I shut the engine off, and tried to unbuckle my seat belt, which is really tricky when it's holding your entire body weight. All four of us yanked the doors open, and crawled out. The firefighters and cops that showed up will all amazed that we were all right, our suits weren't even wrinkled. There's no two ways about it, it was the power of God that kept us from flipping like a pancake when the car was doing the Disneyland Teacups at 60 miles an hour down 99W.

I give thanks to Jesus that we all walked away from it, and I had full insurance coverage, plus rental car coverage. I don't know what in the world I'm gonna do for another car though, gotta start shopping soon. You may notice the "Donation" button that has appeared on the sidebar. This is my car money fund. Any funds you could direct my way would be greatly appreciated, and will go towards my getting something for transportation.

I also got to ride in a sheriff's car up to the Shari's in Newberg, where the rest of my friend's were waiting while I handled the tow guys and made sure the important stuff was out of the car. It was really awesome, because he had a Heckler & Koch MP5 chambered for .40 S&W sitting right between the seats in a locking mechanism. He wouldn't let me hold it, though. Anyway, any assistance would be greatly appreciated at this point. I'm still job hunting, so hopefully something will work out there.

Here's to peace and long life.

Dead Center

Man, I hate being unemployed. Every day just kinda drags by, nothing going on. The unemployment insurance is decent, and I'm getting all kinds of junk up on eBay for extra funds. Just the other day I actually sold my No. 4 Mk. 1 Lee-Enfield for $140 plus shipping. Good riddance. The stupid thing wouldn't feed from the magazine for love or money. At least with Remmy soft-point ammo.

I sold a pack of six computer games for like $50 plus shipping on eBay a couple weeks ago. To some guy from Kazakhstan. I couldn't believe it, the big K, I mean, do they even speak English there? Granted, this dude's actually pretty intelligent, and he does speak good English, but so far we have not found a single transaction site that will accept payment from Kazakhstani banks.

Bidpay, Paypal, it's all the same. "We do not deal with banks from that country." It looks like it's gonna be US cash mailed directly to me. Or cancel the auction entirely and back out. What a mess. On a positive note, I found a treasure trove of cat pics. One example of which is found at the top of this post.