August 2009 Archives

I was sitting at my desk reading a PDF my friend Hsoi forwarded me from arfcom comparing some ammunition.

My son, who we shall call bar.c and is 3 1/4 years old, came in and saw some of the pictures.

After he said the usual, "That's for Daddy." He said, "guns go FIRE and make people cry." Obviously, guns don't go "FIRE," they go "BANG," and he parroted the word in such a way that I think he saw something where someone gave an order to fire. Or maybe he saw something with some muzzle flash. Who knows ...

Now I don't try to shelter my kids from the real world, but we don't allow them to watch violent stuff either.

I have intentionally exposed him and his brother, baz.c, to only a few gun related things:

• We have done the Eddie Eagle video and repeated the mantra
• They have seen me open carry around the house from the time they were very little
• Very occasionally I will have a rifle or shotgun out to move, clean, or what have you

These are all non-violent things.

We will have to be more vigilant about the TV.

I thought it was interesting how at a basic level it was similar to the anti-gun position. The guns went "FIRE," not the people. It might have some implication as to why people with no direct experience or knowledge of guns may become hoplophobes, or I could just be over-analyzing the whole thing.

I'm excited.

I'm really excited.

I haven't been dove hunting in probably 20 years, maybe longer. To say I'm rusty would be an understatement.

I used to be pretty good with a shotgun when I was a kid. It wasn't unusual for me to out-shout the adults in the party. I'm hoping it will be like riding a bike, but I'll just have to see.

I think I got everything: shotgun, shells, camo, hat, glasses, vest, camelback, stool, license (with appropriate stamps and certs), and hunter's ed cert.

Believe it or not, I'm trying to run light. I live just a few minutes away from the lease, so I'm hoping I can do a lot of walking on the lease from time to time before the other hunters arrive. (There are several food plots for the birds on the lease, so I think flushing them should be a productive strategy.)

I've been reading some online articles, and based on the suggestions I've taken off the fiber optic front sight (I kind of expected it to fall off after a few shots anyway) and replaced the "Dove Duster" choke with an improved cylinder choke.

The reason for tossing the front sight is that unlike other forms of shooting, with a shotgun the front sight or bead is rather superfluous (one article called the bead the "miss bead") so you don't want to draw your eye to it, tactical shotguns, turkey shotguns being exceptions. (I was thinking I would do some Turkey hunting this spring, which is why the sight was on there to begin with.)

I'm running the improved cylinder choke because I expect, at least on opening day, that the shots will be around 30 yards.

Speaking of chokes, a lot of people think that a tighter choke (full choke) causes the pellets to fly farther. Actually, the pellets travel the same distance, they just don't spread out as much. So running a tighter choke isn't going to help you reach high flying birds. If you can reach the bird, it will allow you to get more pellets on the bird than you would get otherwise.

Sunday morning I'm chilling on the couch, watching the pundits tell me what a selfish redneck I am, when Hsoi calls me up asking me if I want to go shooting.

He had a match at ARC get rained out, so he gave me a call since I only live a few minutes away.

We were doing some kind of unnamed drill where we each had 4 paper plates on a target stand, and then shot 'em all up in various orders and round counts. I tried every combo I could think of.

After about 50 rounds of this (I think), Hsoi's fiber falls out of his front sight. Now, you need a little backstory: He and I have argued about so much gun related stuff it isn't even funny, and one of those arguments is about night sights. I like them, and I can't see any reason not to have them (other than cost, I guess), while he says with a fiber optic front sight it gathers in lots of light under low-light conditions, and if it's really dark, you need a flash light anyway.

So anyway, when that fell out, I couldn't resit the urge to call night sights the clear winner of that argument ... and then about 10 minutes later the roll pin on my EMP's front sight starts poking up during one of the nameless drills, by the time it's over, the darned thing is over halfway out.

I tapped it down with a magazine and it didn't bother me again after that.

So, finally getting to the point, I had to go to the server colo this afternoon so I stopped by Home Depot on the way home and I picked up a couple of roll pins for my front sight.

I attempted the install tonight and for the most part it worked out ok. The roll pins I got are about 3x as long as the OEM roll pin. I decided to tap one in and mark it, and then just cut it to size. Well, that didn't work out quite like I wanted. Once I finally got it in, that sucker wasn't coming out, so I trimmed it off VERY CAREFULLY with my Dremel. It's as near to flush as you can get without getting into the metal of the front sight.

I think the end result is that the roll pin won't be coming out again. Cosmetically, the ground off roll pin doesn't look that great, but I think a little dab of black paint will fix that.

Sometimes, a gun is not the answer. I believe this was one case.

To this blogger, #4 Buckshot, while effective against bats (LOL), is ... what's the word ... OVERKILL!

The thread kind of devolves into your typical message board BS, with one side calling this nuts, and one side saying its perfectly reasonable to blast a bat in your house.

The poster goes to lengths to state why the shot was safe, and I'm inclined to agree that as long as he knew his target and what was beyond it (and followed all the other rules) that it might actually be safe, however, I'm of the opinion that one should use a firearm as a last resort. Sometimes you should put your shotgun down and open a window.

Took a few pics for some friends who are possibly interested.

Idiocy in the New York Times.

For many, the nonnegotiable issue in the Vick case is cruelty to animals. But let's climb off our high horses. We know many fans hunt. They track down innocent animals, blast them with shotguns, shoot them out of the sky with rifles -- for sport. Some take off animals' heads and mount them as trophies.

Perfectly legal.

It's funny. I just took a Hunter Education class this weekend with Hsoi, and the class really stressed hunting ethics, and conservation.

This isn't something new either. I was lucky enough to be raised in a household that hunted and from a very early age I was taught to respect the animal, and be thankful for what I had received.

Humane and ethical hunting is no way the same as what Vick did. To be frank, the comparison is offensive.

I also want to point out that no one is shooting anything out of the skies with rifles. That is an ignorant statement.

I previously posted a link to an AP article calling Obama's tax pledge unrealistic.

Well, here's an excerpt from another article:

During his presidential campaign, Obama repeatedly pledged "you will not see any of your taxes increase one single dime." But the simple reality remains that his ambitious overhaul of how Americans receive health care -- promised without increasing the federal deficit -- must be paid for.

I'm hoping "Not one single dime" will become synonymous with "Read my lips", because the taxes are coming.