link roundup update

i've been remiss. i've posted new links for a while, without talking about them. shame on me. so here's a roundup of the latest links added within the last couple of weeks.

submariners

• OK2bnot he's a retired navy enlisted that went mustang
• Jason's Journey check out his other blogs listed in his profile. they are online books! and pretty damned good ones too! I'm going to have to track this guy down, since he lives within a stone's throw of where i work.
• Alex Nunez a frequent poster over at Ultraquite No More

amigos and folks i'd like to sit down and have a glass of beer with to help solve the world's problems (non-radical crazy right wingers like me- everyone needs balance!)

• Irritant #4
• Scriptorium or as he's better known: Ryan. i've actually had a beer with this character. good guy. i'm interested in reading about how he adjusts to being a daddy. hey ryan, get lots of sleep NOW. you know, stock up on the zzzz's while you can.

reporters, observers of both the mundane and the manic

• Ben Hammersley. check out some of the links to his other work. good stuff. and i think one of the reasons i really like this guy is his confessed weakness for Cuban Crafters Cigars. looks like a good site to visit if you do stogies.
• Michael Totten's Middle East Journal. a different insite into what is going on in that part of the world.

and of course, MY PEOPLE

• Knowledge is Power a totally wacked denizen of the greater PNW
• Debbie Schlussel one of the "babes of the right" with none of the psyco glazed eyes found on at least one of the other "babes of the right". this one makes sense.
• Resistance is Futile home of the weekly carnival of cordite
• Important stuff- or not


• Bad Example Lots of great blogging tips, like how to change blogsite providers without losing all of your comments
• Stop the ACLU
• Letters from an Enthusiast this guy is a thinker!

that's the latest. sorry about waiting so long to get the updates posted.

if you think i put you in the wrong catagory, or would like to be shifted, let me know!
if you find something wrong with one of my links, let me know so i can fix it. thanks

and finally, if you would like to be linked here, let me know via email, and i'll do the link exchange thingie.

cheers

nobody is surprised, are they?

reigning moonbat and all around slimeball, former atty gen ramsey clark has decided to lend his weight to the defense team of none other than madman hussein.

Clark, who was attorney general under President Lyndon Johnson, is a staunch anti-war advocate who met with Saddam days before the 2003 invasion. He has also consulted several times with one-time Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, who is on trial in The Hague, Netherlands, on war crimes charges.

seems things are a bit up in the air over in the sandpit regarding hussein's trial

i just checked

and as far as i can tell, the south has yet to "rise again". i guess they're biding their time, about 150 years worth of time.

just keeping it real.

i saw some pinheaded bozos driving around town with bigassed confederate flags and plate frames stating the south will rise again. well, excuse me, but vacaville california is way fucking far away from selma alabama buddy. and i'd look for a different horse to hitch my wagon to. that one is dead, dead, dead.

john stuart mill's quote rings true

to our brave young men and women in the military throughout the world, let me say that i had a wonderful thanksgiving. that's right. a wonderful thanksgiving. and why?
to quote JSMills again ( i think i did this last year too)

"War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself."

thank you for your service, and thank you for helping keep my family safe. may the cosmic joker skip you the next time he plans mischief.

happy thanksgiving

i hope everyone out there is having a great thanksgiving holiday.
this year we went small, only 25 or so guests. that's immediate family. small by dinner standards, but still active enough to keep everyone engaged.
frying a turkey, smoking a ham, and my sis-in-law is bringing a "traditional" roasted turkey. i think i've finally figured it out. none of the women liked the smoked turkey i've done over the years. the men all loved the hell out of them, but it must have been a stretch for the women, having to deal with a fried turkey and a smoked turkey. i can hear the conversations now. "we have to figure out how to get a regular turkey. i can't stand that smoked thing". " i know, just tell him ____________ will be heartbroken if she can't do something." (fill in name of sacraficial victim, to be determined by drawing straws). "he'll think we're just trying to help" "yeah. i hope he never finds out how much we hate that smoked turkey. it would hurt his feelings".

hahahaha. goofy shit you think about when you get up to finish the cleaning and prep work.

hey everyone....... "Happy Thanksgiving!"

keeping the record straight

i was going to link to this the other day, but got sidetracked. mean mike, who is the notoriously nice mike's hydian alter ego posted a link to a video that i urge everyone to view. not because i'm trying to change any minds, but just reminding folks on how we got where we are in iraq.

clicka de linque

range report

so, i picked up my new pistol today. want to see a picture? Here's one from the official springfield armory site. i don't have any geegaw ninja junk hanging underneath it. i guess S.A. figures they can't just show a picture of the pistol without the junk showing.
i took the pistol apart. pretty easy, but i had to find a paperclip to cut down to hold the spring assembly together when i dissected it. ran a swab through the barrel, wiped it down and gave it a lite lite lube, reassembled it (after fighting and pissing and moaning about how tight the spring on the slide stop plunger was (it's a bitch getting the slide stop past the plunger. a right royal bitch that i hope loosens up with use). loaded a couple of chip mccormick magazines and the two provided magazines with some cheapo cheapo CCI blazer 230 gr. ball ammo, and blasted away at a target at 15 yards.

first impression: with the extra 4 ounces the light rail adds, this pistol shot like a 9mm. no b.s. i have a paraordinance 745LDA that bucks and slams with each round. not this pistol. the model PC9105L (TRP Operator) is just too damned sweet for words. it was a bit of a surprise to see the tritium nite sites glowing even in the somewhat lighted indoor range.

second impression: i need to adjust the rear site. not a problem since it's a fully adjustable setup. i'll wait until i've cooked up about 30 different loads using 200 gr. lead oregon trails lasercast semi-wadcutters, some 230 gr. rainier electroplated ball, and some 230 gr speer gold dots, and a few of the remington golden saber hollowpoints i have left from loading for the para. can you tell that i think that MidwayUSA is the best thing that has happened to the shooting sports, especially when it comes to reloading supplies?
then it will be off to the outdoor range where i can sandbag the pistol for grouping tests. if this gun is anything like my browning h.p., i should be able to develop at least one load that will give me 1 inch groups at 25 yards offhand. sounds unbelievable, but i got that browning to shoot way better than the factory says it should. it's just going to take some time, and a bag full of wolff recoil springs! anyone need a bunch of browning springs? i've got a bunch of them i'm not using since i found the right rating to go along with my loads.

third impression: 65 rounds later, i had 3 ragged holes on the target (albeit a couple of inches too low and to the left...again, that will go away with a site adjustment), and there was absolutely NO fatigue from firing that many rounds in 20 minutes. can't say that with my other 1911.
i think i'm in love. again. and with an inanimate object no less. now i have a favorite firearm in each of 4 pistol calibers.
you know, it's good to be a shooter when you have a firearm that feels like it was made specifically for your hands, and the way you hold and fire a weapon. the discomfort i felt chunking over my hard earned bucks went away with the first magazine of ammo i put down the barrel.


and here's a little something for the gunporn freaks out there. some videos from a full auto gunshow in oklahoma this september. i'm not sure, but it certainly looks like there were folks out there with waaaaay too much loose change in their pockets, and a place to spend it. i'm a gun nut, but these folks kind of scare me. not that i wouldn't be sitting up on the ridge pounding rounds down the range given half a chance!

stealing this from mike

ok. i won't steal the picture, and hog his bandwidth. but i will send you over there to visit notoriously nice mike, and leave him a comment on that picture.
i think i'm going to steal it off the web and photoshop a poster of it. it's going on my front door.
funny stuff

damn, that's a big ad

stole this link from over at martini's subboard. pretty funny. you need quicktime to watch it tho.

this is a big ad. love those aussies. they have just enough warp in their humor to make me think there were submariners scattered throughout the office that dreamed this one up.

today's installment of bill's email jokes

A husband was in big trouble when he forgot his wife's birthday.

His wife told him "Tomorrow there better be something in the driveway for me that goes from zero to 200 in under 10 seconds".

The next morning the wife found a small package in the driveway.

She opened it and found a brand new bathroom scale.

Funeral arrangements for the husband have been set for Saturday.

light politics and a comment

comment first. i just ordered a basketload of warm stuff for the kids over in afgahnistan. mainly for my pup mikey, but if he doesn't get it, hopefully someone that needs it gets it. one of the things he's asked for in the past was those chem-warmers. you know the kind, where you crush a capsule inside a pouch that heats up for something like 20 hours. i hope the company i ordered from does APO's, and it gets there before the spring thaw!

politics: i've been laughing all day at the newspaper's coverage of the dustup in the house of reps last night. the latest round of bush-bashing generated a lot of heat. i think the whole "define a set date to leave" mentality is so wrongheaded that i won't even go into it. needless to say, i'm seeing the degradation of support that will lead to another vietnam era split in the country. too bad. this isn't vietnam, and the bunch of weasels out there screaming and raising a ruckus are looking to relive their glory days. i do think the govt is messing up by kid gloving this whole affair in the middle east. time to let the dogs of war loose, without a bunch of handwringing or second guessing. let them do the job we sent them over there for. break things and kill people.
anyway, regarding the dustup. all of the loudmouthed naysayers jabbbering about how we need to get the hell out now were called to put up or shut up. the republicans (an organization i'm only loosely associated with) called for a non binding resolution to leave the middle east immediately. put up or shut up. the vote was 403 to 3, against.
just more wind from the east coast. blablabla.

this is too damned funny

ever wonder what cletus and jeb's dogs look like?

redneck huntin' dawgs

makes you wonder who's calling the shots

ok, that was a bad pun, but you won't get it unless you finish reading this post.

the nice neo-neocon has hatched a theory about the recent killings of saddam's defense lawyers. in this messed up world, her postulation makes more sense than anything else i've seen or read. as a matter of fact, she's not the only one that has forwarded her ideas as a possible scenario, but she and her post responders do a credible job.

interested in the musings of an uber-liberal turned neocon? check out this post.
damn, i like smart women. and smart men for that matter. i don't know how much credence to place on her ideas, but she at least has the where-withal to string them together in a coherent and understandable manner.

arab-french youths turn their anger towards another symbol

have you visited Iowa Hawk lately? remember him, the guy that had you laughing so hard once you passed most of a bite of baloney sandwich through your sinus cavities and all over the monitor? he's at it again:

Immigrant Parisian youths, enraged by lack of job opportunities and a growing shortage of flammable cars, tonight turned their wrath on another hated symbol of French cultural oppression - the accordion.

"You try listening to that shit 16 hours a day," explained 'Tariq,' a masked teenage activist holding aloft the smoldering carcass of a charred musette.

Fearing a spread of musical violence to Great Britain, Edinburgh Lord Mayor Gordon MacInnes warned local Scots against leaving their bagpipes unattended in certain neighborhoods.

good stuff. you really need a humor break? check out his latest

here's a cool idea: a deck of bloggers

that crazy gullyborg is out campaigning for a spot in the higher being blogger deck of cards. he's looking for a jack of spades, and has a reasonable explanation on his site for why. sounds good to me. i think anyone that spends that much time actively persuing the 2nd amendment via the "carnival of cordite" should get a little recognition. i've even had a couple of posts listed. so check it out, and if you think it's a good idea, follow his link to the source.

a quandary

should i buy this: for my next toy, or perhaps this: for my next installment in my campaign to maintain my 2nd amendment rights? inquiring minds want to know!

both are .45 acp model 1911 variants.

here's the deal. the springfield armory TRP is a serious firearm. 20 lpi checkering on both the front and back straps of the grip. the grips are a very rough textured plastic, which would almost guarantee gun control. the rear sights are adjustable (always a plus in my book), and are tritium night sites to boot.

the ParaOrdinance is a full sized 745, and i've already got a 745 LDA. i love the smooth double action trigger on the LDA series. the guy that invented it should get an extra tangerine in his stocking this holiday season. it's great. but do i need another para? i like the single stack of both, because even though i wear extra-large gloves, my hands are really paws, not hands in the conventional sense. i.e., mostly palm, with fat stubby fingers. that's why i love shooting the browning hp practical so much. fits my hand.

so, any thinkers with experience with the S.A. line of TRP pistols have any good advice? i like the S.A. with the light rail, not because i have a hankering to be hanging geegaw ninja junk off my gun, but because it adds a couple extra ounces to the front, reducing muzzle flip and increasing on target time. shot one this weekend and really liked it, but it's been through the gunsmithing blackhole already, and i'm not sure i want to spend a boat load of bucks making a new gun better.

i already have one para, and know the limitations and virtues of that platform, but the new extractor that para has come out with really intrigues me.

so what do you gun nuts say? any help for this poor wretch torn between two damned expensive pistols? the real fix would be to buy both, but then the grandkids and momma wouldn't be having christmas this year, and poppa would be out living in the back shed with his reloading press. cooking on a coleman stove. drinking from the faucet. peeing through the fence. you get the picture.

and getting the picture, how about checking out gullyborg's plaintive plea for votes for the jack of spades in the blogger deck? check out his entry here, and then scope out the voting rules and whatnot at aaron's.

bo the nook's movie review

yes, kiddies, it's time once again for "bo the nook's movie review". tonights review is "good night and good luck".
i'll keep it short. real short. if you don't go see this movie, you will have missed one of the best movies of the year.
how's that for short?
ok, a couple of observations to back up my statement:
1. the acting was incredible. i really felt i was sitting watching edward r. murrow on that screen. using black and white film, and interjecting actual clips from the telecasts was brilliant.
2. the heroism presented was unbelievable. these guys really took their futures in hand when they took on mccarthy during the peak of the insanity of the HUAC hearings.

i'll let others better equiped extoll the virtues of this movie. and i'll repeat... go see this flick. if for no other reason than the soundtrack, which fit the mood and texture of the movie perfectly

that's a good question

and i must respond "yeah, right."

all in response to a shit-stirring post by my amigo idaho bubblhead. hiya joel!

"the city lights of Paris are actually buring cars"

You might recall that thousands of of French Muslims condemned September 11th, packingthe Champs Elysee. Or that they thronged to the Eifel Tower when the Bali bombings occured. Or maybe you remember the moving footage of the tiny paper lanterns the Muslims of France floated down the River Seine after the Madrid bombings. Oh, you don't recall that? Sorry, I forgot- those things never happened. See, they only want to be tolerated, not to tolerate others.

been a while since i've linked anything from the Daily Demarche. i didn't forget, i just laid low on politics and social editorializing for a while. i'm better now. and back at it, i might add.

the american press seems pretty damned quite about 7 days of rioting in france. i know most americans could give a tinker's damn about what is happening in france, but any student of modern history and current events can see what is on the horizon for the u.s.. get used to it. i wonder if france has as unfrench an organization as america has in the american civil liberties union? right now, there is talk across the european and austrailian press about the anticipated civil war on eurabia has started. can it be long before we encounter the same?

and if that wasn't enough to get you fired up, follow all of the links (if you have the stomache) on his "Religion of Peace" links HERE. makes me want to put a combat zero on a couple of rifles rather than target range zeros, just in case. i'm not advocating violence, simply thinking survival. i won't shirk from pulling these hate-monger's beards, and from what i've been reading, that can be a dangerous thing.

must be some database they keep

up there in sacramento. the following is an email i just got concerning a state bill that the pinheads in our capital tried to get passed. it concerned serializing each and every bullet used in the state of kahleefornia. sure screws up my ability to cast bullets. i emailed the governor when i first heard about this stupidity, received a reply (automatic, i'm sure), and now this, as a followup. nice database they have.

Thank you for your email regarding SB357. I appreciate you voicing
your opinions on proposed legislation affecting our State.

Now that this legislative session has come to a close for this year, I wanted to let you know that SB357 was not approved by the Legislature, and therefore never reached my desk. For more information on how this bill came to fail, please refer to the Official California Legislative Website: www.leginfo.ca.gov.

Again, I appreciate your interest in California's future. An informed and engaged citizenry is important to effective government in our Golden State.

Sincerely,

Arnold Schwarzenegger

had a great time, wish you had been there

well, i'm back from a couple of weeks at the old pumpkin patch. damn, but i had a great time. good people, fun kids, incredible weather. it all worked this year. hardly a hitch, and none big enough to even mention. even the gang bangers kept it under control at the corn maze.

as usual, most of the pictures are linked to larger images. click for a bigger view

here's what the corn maze looked like this year:just a tad under 5 acres. the kids sure like running through the maze, and i'm always impressed with how many folks come out, pay money to wander through a bunch of corn, and have fun doing it. i'm glad casey (the guy pops grows the corn for) is a good guy. he works his kiester off for a couple of months setting this up and operating it.

our first day was 1 OCT, which was a saturday. we didn't have everything set up yet, and were scrambling to put the finishing touches up even as our first customers showed up. here's Trent repainting one of the displays. my nephew Anthony is helping out. it may look like he's supervising, but in reality we had him painting like a madman.

i've got to say that pop had a great crop this year, with a huge variety of sizes from the itty bitty "wee-bee littles" up to the "atlantic giants". i love the view from the bridge at the far end of the farm. the whole area is laid out in front of you, with the pumpkins set out in orderly sections. of course, the order lasts only until the first customer comes in with an energetic 7 year old. here's just a section of the field we had pumpkins set up on.

folks always ask me why i take a couple of weeks of hard earned vacation time to spend 12+ hours a day working at the patch. i can't really answer that with words, because it's hard to pin down. the sense of family, of working together for a common goal, thousands of kids, tractor rides. here are a couple of other reasons:

late afternoon, with the sun bathing the entire field in a warm golden glow: .

early evening, and the clouds scattered the sunlight in thousands of rays.

as the sun sets, the sky turns an incredible range of oranges and reds.





it's easy to say that i have learned to appreciate working outdoors, especially when the weather is good. this year, the weather was simply spectacular. the sunsets were always energizing, and the evening fog rolling over the hills separating fremont from the Pacific provided an awe inspiring tableau.

i also got to carve pumpkins. actually, i could have carved as many pumpkins as i liked. what am i saying! i did carve as many as i liked to. not all were captured by my camera, but here are a few. note that a couple of them were nearing the end of their existence when i remembered i had the camera with me!

ever carve a butternut squash? they are harder than hell, and you have to bore them out to allow the candle to breath, as well as light the eyes:

here are a couple. the little one in front was my attempt to carve a "coconut monkey". if you have ever been to Hawaii, you'd understand. it's one of the big sellers for the touristas:



here's one pops did. he's been doing these veggie-man pumpkins for 30+ years, using fresh produce out of his fields for the features:

i'm glad the season is over, because by the time this weekend rolls around, i'll have worked 35 days straight without a day off, with over half of them VERY LONG DAYS. and i'll do it again next year if the opportunity arises, because i love this stuff. now i can work my real job recharged, energized, ready to face the long winter ahead.

thanks Joe Perry, for both your daughter, and for letting me come play in your pumpkin patch.

too pissed to write

i picked up one of those freebie throwaway car dealership rags today. you know the kind, the one where a lot of dealers advertise their cars with pictures in it?
the first two ads, one of them the front cover of the rag, had the following in spanish (translated for the non-spanish readers out there) in bold letters across the center of their ads:
No License? No Social Security? No Problem!

man, do i have a problem with that. i'm so pissed i can't even write about how pissed i am, because i'm sure a) i'll type something that will end up costing me in the long run, and b) i'm so pissed i can't think straight.

i'm going to bed. thinking about this is just going to make it that much harder to sleep.