Delving into TBD

We start planning for TBD today, hopefully sketching out our 12 scenarios. First up will be production planning, how we plan to raise the already high production values of the show. This is sort of the horse latitudes for the firearms industry...the factories are running pretty much 24/7 as the massive sales bubble continues to spin up...if you're selling everything you make, not a lot of incentive to introduce new products.

Good Match!

My Sweetie and I had a good cowboy match in Byers, CO, with the Sand Creek Raiders yesterday. I came in 9th out of 73 (2nd in my Division) against some fierce competition. I was dead consistent across 6 stages, shooting the match fast and clean.

My Sweetie clocked in at 26th, winning her Division and finishing 2nd Woman.

The 6th stage featured a Texas Star. If you've never shot a Star, it will rattle your head. It's 5 places on roughly 2-3 foot arms, revolving around a central axis. Knock the first plate off, and the Star begins to rotate. As long as you look at your sights, no problemo! Look at those moving plates, as we sight-hunting primates are prone to do, and you will miss. I love Stars...we have an MGM Whirly-gig and it is one of the best practice tools ever.

Memorial Day 2012

"It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather, we should thank God that such men lived."

---  George S. Patton

What we need to remember most of all is that every day is Memorial Day. All that we enjoy on this day, the opening hours of summer, we owe to those who serve, who have served and those who have fallen. The dream that is America exists only as long -- and not one second longer -- as the greatest among us are willing to make that sacrifice.

As always, my thoughts are with my friends on lonely, dangerous duty in a country of no consequence and with all who walk that duty with them.

Rolling low key...

...this weekend, having dinner with friends, riding my bike, pulling the trigger now and then.

In the meanwhile, let me send you to Tam's place so you can read the appropriately titled, "Listen Up, You Primitive Screwheads:"

No, Khadija, I do NOT have to respect the culture. I no more have to respect the culture of those backwards goat-molesting savages than I do the culture at a backwoods Klan cross-burnin'; the only difference is that the Kluxxers aren't sitting atop the world's petroleum reserves, so I don't even have to pretend to respect them...

Read the whole thing!

A Cautionary Tale

Some comments on the little 1911 post reminded me about cautions for all of us in this spectacular "gun of the month" environment. Yes, it is the Golden Age of Handguns...any flavor you can think of is being sold by someone. The question was how did the Para USA Carry 9, a little 9mm LDA I liked from the first time I shot it (here's my 2008 review), hold up under regular use? The answer is, "Great," with a caveat.

With this flood of new guns has come the increasing phenomena of "orphaned" guns, e.g. manufacturers are quick to introduce new models, but they're equally quick to discontinue those that didn't meet the users' fancy. I figured the Carry 9 to be a hit, but it had two strikes against it. As a mini-9, it was about a year before its time. The mini-9 "revolution," spawned I believe by the flood of new people coming into the CCW market who purchased the little .380s and wanted to step up in caliber.

Secondly, Para was in the midst of a painful move from Canada to North Carolina...we didn't know just how painful until much later, and last year Para USA was purchased by Freedom Group. The Carry 9...in fact, all of the 9mm Paras with the exception of the full-sized single-action Limited, were pared from the line.

Short story, Para mags for the Carry 9 disappeared. Unfortunately, so did one of my 2 magazines that came with the gun...constant travel, packing and unpacking, range work, etc., can be hard on a gun and accessories, and somewhere between here and there I lost a mag. I discovered I couldn't replace it. The Para website doesn't list the extra mags as available for purchase, nor do any of the big Internet retailers who normally stock magazines (Midway USA, Brownell's, Cheaper Than Dirt, CDNN, J&G, etc.).

I recently found out Check-Mate mags did a run of 7-rounders, and I'm waiting to see if I can pick off half-a-dozen, which would allow me to put the little Carry 9 back in service.

I was also reminded about the Star PD, the first lightweight 1911 that worked well (unless you shot it to pieces...never a multi-thousand round gun). I carried a Star PD for a long time. I kept the Star after I moved on to other carry guns in 9mm because it's a neat little gun to shoot. I didn't shoot it because it has a recoil buffer system to protect the aluminum frame, and the buffer deteriorates. No more Star; no more buffers.

Interestingly enough, I discovered that buffers are now once again available — you gotta love American ingenuity! I ordered some in case I ever have this overwhelming urge to shoot the little .45 again...one never knows, does one?

So I guess the short story is when you buy a gun, especially an eclectic gun, for CCW and, after a test period, decide you really like it, buy extra mags and whatever parts of the gun that are "consumables," especially anything made of plastic, etc. Notice that I'm not saying don't buy such a gun...yes, there will probably be 1911, Glock and S&W revolver parts being dug up by alien races performing the archeological autopsy on the Late Great Planet Earth, but if you carefully plan — certainly plan better than me! — you ought to keep anything running pretty much forever. Or at least until the home fabrication machines become readily available and as cheap as iPads.

Also, note that just because I like something doesn't mean that it will be a success! LOL!

Headline of the Day

Man Arrested for OWI with Zebra, Parrot in Front Seat of Truck

A Cascade man was arrested outside of a Dubuque bar on Sunday night with a pet zebra and a macaw parrot in the front seat of his truck.

 He was arrested outside if the Dog House Lounge. No word on whether the zebra and the macaw had been drinking...

Little 1911s

My occasional compadre Rob Pincus is stirring up a bit of stir-up on Ye Ole Internet with this statement:

I have gotten tired enough of watching people fight with 3″ “subcompact” 1911 .45′s to put this video (and the accompanying challenge) out in public. I think 1911s are a bad idea to start with, but it is simply reckless to offer these mini-versions as defensive firearms to the public. They have a ZERO PERCENT Success rate in my training courses…. Never had one not fail. Yes, people will undoubtedly post how they have the magic unicorn Ultra Carry that never chokes. Cool— SHOW UP at a class and prove it…. I’ll refund your tuition and pay for the ammo if it really runs and you really run it...

Read the whole Facebook thread here, with uber-gunsmith Grant Cunningham and TBD legal correspondent (and founder of Firearms Academy of Seattle) Marty Hayes adding content, insight and humor.

Kimber Ultra Carry .45 by Wayne Novak; Detonics Combat Master .45 by Bill Laughridge

Lord knows Rob isn't known for his reticence and moderation (of course, neither am I), but I'm going to have to say that at least on the subject of itty-bitty 1911-pattern pistols, I agree with him. My experience has been that as a rule, they don't run worth a crap.

Like most things in life, there are exceptions, and I'll talk about those in a minute. I will of course take issue with Rob (as did Marty Hayes) that 1911s "are a bad idea to start with," but I think that's more of a generational thing. Marty and I have shot 1911s (that work pretty well) for a long time. And yes, I have gone through classes with 1911s, including out-of-the-box Commander-length 1911, that have worked flawlessly. Even the S&W that I intentionally didn't lube or clean. The manual safety, which Rob sees as a "bug," I see as a "feature." I have written extensively that I think manual safeties on semi autos are, on the whole, a plus for a lot of reasons I won't get into here.

But overall I suspect it depends where you come from. Marty and I (and some of the finest pistol shooters in history, I might add parenthetically) came out of first the Modern Technique of Pistolcraft and then IPSC. Because of our backgrounds, we have put quite literally hundreds of thousands of rounds through 1911 pistols, and we know those particular pieces of hardware intimately.

My take is always that there is no such thing as the "best" gun; there are only guns that you like and/or works best for you. That's a big difference. I also believe that anything made by human hands can and will fail. Yes, I know you have a [FILL-IN-THE-BLANK] and it has never failed and it is as if God Herself made it and as such it it impossible for it to fail...whatever. All machines can and will fail, and if we believe the dictates of Mr. Murphy, at the worst possible time. The neat thing is that we are CLEVER MONKEYS and can make those machines work again! Yes, I want my machine to be as reliable as possible, but I also need to be able to get that machine up and running as quickly as possible when it goes down.

The problem with "believing" in a machine, whether that machine is a gun, a carabiner, a scuba regulator or a motorcycle is the "lag time" in your head from "Holy Crap! I can't believe it broke!" to "Fixit...fixit...fixit!" The longer the lag time, the more likely you are to be a statistic. Sucks, don't it?

About small 1911s, I don't think John Browning would approve. The shorter slide guns (that is, shorter than Commander length) I believe compromise the basic operating integrity of the pistol...that is, there is insufficient mass in the slide for the gun to work as Browning intended. We try to make up for that insufficient mass by juggling the recoil spring weight or going to some sort of multi-spring system. My experience has been that some of those systems work better than others (e.g., the STI Recoil Master system, which is more-or-less based on the Detonics captive spring recoil system).

Walt Rauch wrote this in HANDGUNS Magazine back in 2005 (in a review of the revived Combat Master, BTW):

It’s not that these guns [little 1911s] are not good for the job; it’s just that they require more attention for their upkeep than I care to devote to a gun. As I’ve written in the past, the micro 1911 must have fresh springs, recoil and magazine to ensure that the gun will cycle reliably. Simply put, when the 1911 platform is decreased in size, there’s less margin for error, or, perhaps better put, they are unforgiving of neglect of these two areas.

Generally, the recoil spring life in a short slide 1911 pistol is short and brutish...more to the point, when the springs fail, there's very little warning...the gun just stops working. An unpleasant surprise in a class...worse if you badly need that one more shot in the Real World.

Obviously, we can mitigate this by regular maintenance, but I've found most of the little 1911-pattern pistols to have other strange quirks. I had an Officer's Model Colt I never could get to run...it was as if it was haunted. The Kimber Ultra Carry above is a pretty good gun, but it was completely rebuilt by Wayne Novak, who threatened to personally strangle me if I ever sent him another mini-1911.

In my experience (which is the only thing I'm qualified to talk about, I suppose), the true exceptions to the rule are the little Detonics Combat Masters. The Combat Masters seem to have gotten the balance between slide mass and recoil system (3-spring captive system) pretty well-balanced. I had one back in the 1980s and it was superb. I swapped it off for a couple of S&W .44 Specials when they were as rare as hen's teeth. I got one of the new Combat Masters when my friend Jerry Ahern relaunched the company for a brief period. They're beefy little things (34 ounces; 3 1/2-inch barrels) compared to modern mini-1911s, but they do work. I wish I'd gotten a bunch of the recoil spring assemblies at the same time. Technically, Combat Masters are for sale in their third iteration from Detonics Defense, Bruce Siddle's company, but I've never actually touched one.

STI LS-9

I've also had very good luck with the STI LS-9 9mm, which is a more or less 1911-pattern small 1911. I think the 9mm caliber coupled with the STI recoil spring system keeps the gun's reliability up. I'm probably going to buy one of the Sig P938s, the single-action 9mm version of the hugely successful Sig P238 .380, which is a shrunken down 1911 in and of itself.

I once ran the range for a police department qualification. One of the detectives had an itty-bitty Springfield that was his daily carry piece. I mentioned in passing that I had never had much luck with subcompact 1911s, and he proceeded to verbally maul me. According to him, his was a 100% gun, which is why he bet his life on it. In the qualification, it did not get through a single magazine with a stoppage, and it was a veritable catalog of Things That Can Go Wrong With 1911s.

Congratulations, Mike!

Mr. Completely wins big in Holland.

An excellent blogger and one hell of a rimfire shot!

The Pause to Catch One's Breath...

Am now in the break between GUN STORIES and RAPID FIRE, before SHOOTING GALLERY, ELITE TACTICAL UNIT and THE BEST DEFENSE, the sprint to Christmas. So far, so good. I'm getting ready for a major overhaul of my office, which is terrifying. I need to bring my recording studio, where I do the podcast and voice-overs for SHOOTING GALLERY, up to par. This will involve a level of "creative destruction," pretty much on a nuclear level.

We're headed into the summer doldrums on guns...everything that can be made is being sold, across the board. Even some bolt-action rifles like the Savages and the Ruger Gunsite Scout are blowing out the door.

Can't believe NBC is rolling out a ONE SECOND AFTER post-EMP series, REVOLUTION, for the fall. Actually, it does look more like the DIES THE FIRE series, though undoubtably not as good. Still, I'm up for swords and crossbows...

Marshal & the Lion

Scary, huh? Marshal Halloway goes head-to-head with Teddy Roosevelt's lion...rug. These Norwegians...actually, I think he was upset because the National Firearms Museum has the last Norwegian-made 1911, and he thinks it should go to the Last Norwegian, a.k.a., him. Good luck with that.

Take a look at the above pix...that's $5 million worth of Parker Invincibles, arguably the 3 greatest shotguns ever made in America. And you're going to see them in absolutely amazing, and pretty much unprecedented, detail when GUN STORIES Season 2 ramps up in July. Next level, baby, next level!

I have to say this is a gun I've always wanted to shoot, a .700 Nitro Express Holland & Holland. I talked at length about the guns and the cartridge with the guys at Holland when I was in London last year (I've recounted that story on the DOWN RANGE Radio podcast), and they've promised to let me shoot one when we visit Holland at some indefinite time in the future. This one is from the Robert E. Petersen Gallery and is worth substantially more than the Secret Hidden Bunker. In retrospect, looking back on the one time I met Bob Petersen, I should have thrown myself on my knees and begged him to adopt me. That would have probably worked as well as when I did throw myself on my knees and begged Sissy Spacek to run away with me.

That was back in 1980 when she'd gotten an Oscar for COAL MINER'S DAUGHTER. She was doing a photo session for some newsweekly cover with Loretta Lynn, who quipped, "That's just Michael, honey, he don't mean it." Sissy did say it was the best proposal she'd gotten that week, so hey.

The Truth About Guns notes that according to BATFE figures, sales on suppressors continues it's rocket-like trajectory upwards. It should, considering how hard we're all driving the meme (which happens to be true) that silencers are SAFETY DEVICES, no different than the ear and eye protection we all use on the range. At the very least, silencers should be moved to the AOW category, which is a $5, rather than a $200, tax stamp. BTW, now that I'm home for a time, I'll be picking up my 2 .22 suppressors that have cleared after a 7 month wait.  Both are from my pals at Tactical Solutions...one is the last of the Ruger Charger pistol integrally suppressed barrels; the other one of their excellent Cascade silencers.

My goal is an itty bitty very quiet 10/22 SBR like this classic "Red Rocket" pix from AR15.com a while back:

When I get some spare money (hahaha!) I'll filed the paper work to SBR the Charger (another $200 for that stamp!), and in another 6 or 7 months I can build the little shooter up. The Cascade is for a bunch of my .22s that already have threaded barrels.

Wrapped!

Wrapped principal filming on GUN STORIES at noon today and am headed home! I liked the season finale of CRIMINAL MINDS, which we all watched In the hotel bar, as well.

If I'm a Good Puppy tomorrow and run the Dillon, I 'll shoot a cowboy match at Pawnee Station on Saturday. If I am a sad, lame little pup, I'll sleep in.

More at the Museum

This is a very famous Model 29, one of the guns used in DIRTY HARRY. It was all scarred up from being slid down a sidewalk, then refinished by S&W and presented by Clint Eastwood and Warner Brothers to John Milius, the screenwriter for DIRTY HARRY and MAGNUM FORCE. Here's Joe at work with the same gun:

And Dan Ramm, who works with Joe and is a producer on both GUN STORIES and SHOOTING GALLERY, doing his best Harry Callahan imitation:

Better hang onto the day job, Brother Dan! Last night we went to a reception at the U.S. Capitol for the GI Film Festival, where Joe received a GI Spirit Award for his extensive work with the military...in fact, he's in D.C. to cohost the huge National Memorial Day concert.

As I mentioned in a tweet yesterday, it looks like we'll be making a big announcement on one of our pet Internet projects pretty soon...will be working in conjunction with the National Firearms Museum on this one, and it's a doozy!

TR's Silencer

Skulking around the back rome of the NRA National Firearms Museum, we came across this recent loaner...and 1894 Winchester, .30 W.C.F., with a 30-inch barrel and a factory Maxim silencer. The story is that TR ordered this gun from Winchester for those occasions when he didn't want to annoy his upscale neighbors like the Duponts with a little plinking. Here's a close-up of the Maxim:

Cool, huh? As you regular readers might remember, I saw a similar 94 Winchester, long-barreled, factory threaded, then sent to Maxim for the silencer installation, in Kevin Brittingham's private collection a year or so ago.

Here's Producer/Director Tim Cremin, getting ready for the next set-up at the National Firearms Museum. Tim hates to have his picture taken, much less placed on the Internet, so I couldn't resist it. And here's Joe Mantegna with one heck of a nice Artillery Luger:

It's a battlefield pickup, a DWM 1917 vintage, and is in such great shape it's obvious the owner didn't last long after he was issued the gun. All the serial numbers match, including on the wood stock, and it still has the markings of the unit it was delivered to.

Somewhere a Luger collector is crying!

Will have more from the Museum throughout the week.

A Few More Pixs from RAPID FIRE

Here are a few more pixs from the first week of principal photography on RAPID FIRE. Next week, we're going to come close to wrapping Season 2 of GUN STORIES, so we'll have some pixs from that as well

That's Seeklander on a KRISS, obviously.

Iain on the GE Minigun, the ideal home defense weapon!

Mutual admiration society...LOL!

Iain with the "primitive" Thompson! You know, the more we work with Thompsons, the better the gun seems. That slow rate of fire is a huge bonus, making it easy to get off the trigger after one shot. Years and years ago I wrote a story for a police magazine suggesting that instead of scrapping the pump shotgun for the M-4, agencies should think of digging up all those ancient Thompsons languishing in police armories and issue them to the troops, especially in urban areas My rational was:

1)  They're easy to shoot in both full auto and semi.
2) Yes they're heavy, but cops don't exactly tote their long guns through the desert (or dessert, for that matter).
3) The .45 ACP round is what it is (and I suggested this might lead to a return to the .45 in handgun selection).
4) The "Tommy Gun" is one of the most recognizable firearm silhouettes in the world.

I wasn't crazy then...

Imagine a modernized Thompson SBR, with the lighter aluminum receiver and synthetic furniture, an Aimpoint, a light/laser and a suppressor. Be a nattily little home defense/LEO gun, wouldn't it? Oh wait, did I just describe a KRISS? Or this:

Joyce Rubino at Colt moved heaven, earth and a few small planets to get us one of their wonderful Bulldog Gatlings...thanks, Joyce! If I had $40-50K buying a hole in my pocket, one of these guys would be sitting in my office right now.

Seeklander Doesn't Blink!

We discovered this doing Phantom footage of Seeklander on the Colt Gatling Gun...not sure what it means...

Tired Today!

The first full run of RAPID FIRE concept, so it was a long long day at the range. I'll post more tomorrow, promise...

Birthing RAPID FIRE

Things are going very well in the first filming session for GUN STORIES/RAPID FIRE, which you'll all see 4th Quarter this year. Think al machine-guns all the time, hosted by Iain Harrison and Mike Seeklander. Mike is, of course, one of our cohorts for THE BEST DEFENSE. You've seen Iain on SHOOTING GALLERY last season, but he's best known as the winner of the first TOP SHOT....parenthetically, Mike was the first person to be "voted off the island," so to speak, on that inaugural season...but don't worry, there's nooooooooooooo competition going on between those 2! LOL!

RAPID FIRE is something of a departure for me and my producing partner, Tim Cremin. We conceived the series over dinner one night with Larry Potterfield in Columbia, MO, then carried it through to the green light phase. We tapped Iain and Mike to host; a lot of the creative direction of the show initially came from Mike, and was then refined by Iain and Mike. John Carter of Hatch Entertainment, who produces SHOOTING GALERY and produced the late, deeply lamented COWBOYS, came on-board as Producer and did the heavy lifting on actually structuring the show and putting together the production plan, with SG/COWBOYS/GUN STORIES vet Gene Moffett as Director of Photography.

In other words, the show was developed more like a "real" television series rather than our usual "crash and burn" theory of management...frightening to think that maybe all those trips to Hollywood are starting to rub off on Tim and I! LOL!

So I'm in much more of a "traditional" Executive Producer position on RAPID FIRE, allowing me far more time to worry about ELITE TACTICAL UNIT, with principal filming beginning later this summer!

Don't tell anybody, but I still have a week of practice blocked off the the Colorado state cowboy action shooting championships, too! I plan to call in sick on everything else!

Birthday Cake!

This is what my Sweetie made for me as my "birthday cake." It is the single best desert I've ever had...no kidding!

Hopefully Lazy Sunday...

...since I'm heading into a really tough couple of weeks. Match yesterday did go as well as I hoped, but (as you know if you follow the Twitter feed) I did manage to carve out a category win by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin. Interesting point..you know how I've said every match is a learning experience? One stage was pretty interesting, because no matter how we gamed it, there wasn't a "logical" way to run it. Sooner or later you'd have to do an awkward transition to the next gun. I actually like stages like that...back in old IPSC days, I used to love to write stages that required the competitor to think.

I plotted out a gamey sequence that I thought would work well, then proceeded to fail to execute said plan.

Lesson Learned: Back when I did some hi-zoot windsurfing, the really good sailors had a saying -- never buy anything too trick to sail. Same goes for planning...it's easy to come up with a tricksy plan; much harder to execute he plan within the sub-30 second timeframe necessary for success.

After the match we spent some time with the contractor, a good friend and IDPA shooter who built the current Secret Hidden Bunker, on the property where the new, improved Bunker is going to be built (with a little luck). We staked out the house site and driveway, and hopefully we'll begin moving dirt this summer. The plan is for an off-grid solar house heated by propane, with a propane back-up generator.

I think I mentioned that right after we purchased the property a few years back, I was at a speaking engagement in Florida where I met a woman who lived in the area. "Oh my god!" she said. "I hope you haven't closed on the property. You definitely don't want to live up there! The whole place is full of survivalist types with guns!"

Fans, I hope!

Next week is all machineguns all the time. BTW, I'm thinking of doing a guest appearance on a big deal Discovery Channel special, talking about (surprise) guns. Will make a decision early next week.

 Nice couple of spring days! Snow tonight and tomorrow...

Good Filming Day...

...yesterday. We even had enough time and ammo left to spend the rest of the afternoon...shooting. There's a surprise. Cory Trapp hauled out his BAR and his wife Paula's AUG, which he added to the already big stack that included a couple of Thompsons, a mixed lot of AKs, a Galil (I like Galils), a Garand, etc. A good time was had by all!

As per yesterday's comment question! I do tend to be more conservative on gun choice for an appendix carry...I like either a long DA trigger pull, a la a revolver, or a manual safety. YMMV, but keep your finger off the trigger when you reholster! On reholstering a pocket pistol, I generally transfer the pistol to the off hand, remove the pocket holster from its pocket with my strong hand, slip the gun into the holster, then place the gun and holster back into my pocket.

Interesting that the industry is forming a new point-of-contact organization, Armed Citizen Alliance, for new CCW holders... This from the Shooting Wire this AM:

The first mission is to provide our overall concealed-carry and personal defense community and industry with an organization and a program to which personal-defense firearms customers can turn as their “first-contact” point for practice and familiarization.  The ACA enables the entire concealed-carry community to be pro-active on the issueof practice, preparation, and training.

On its face, certainly seems like a good idea.

Got the first filming for RAPID FIRE next week! Be fun working with Iain Harrison & Seeklander on that! Will be posting pixs as we make vast amounts if ammo disappear!

Push Day

We've got a lot of complicated set-ups this AM with the 1919 Browning, the MG-42, the AK and several other buzz guns. Yesterday went smoothly...working with Joe is great...so hopefully today will roll along on rails.

Interesting piece on the appendix carry on When the Balloon Goes Up. I often use appendix carry with a snub revolver, which is ideal suited for such positioning. BTW, just a mention for people who came in late, a gun in a holster is defined as safe! People who talk about "sweeping" themselves or other people with a holstered gun have a basic lack of understanding of fundamental gun-handling. The caveat is that everyone needs good holsters...that's why people who have been doing this for a while have the "box-o-holsters" in the basement...the stuff thatndidn't work. The key point is that once the gun is in the holster, it is the same as a rifle placed into a case...it is out of play.

Another caveat that comes to mind on holster selection is to understand the difference between a holster designed exclusively for completion and one designed for day-in-day-out carry. yes, there's a lot of overlap, especially in IDPA, but you do need to pay attention in your choices

And finally, darn it, be CAREFUL reholstering! There is no such thing as a "speed reholster." This is maybe the worst habit you can pick up from competition (and certainly no competition encourages this, but it is an easy habit to fall into, especially because in most of the practical sports your gun is cleared on the line and you reholster empty...this can lead to a casualness In reloading).

Regardless of the position of your holster, the moment of reholstering is a critical point...the point we see maybe the most negligent discharges. Reholstering is a good time to engage your brain! You finger is off the trigger, right? Ideally, you're standing up. If it's a pocket holster, you're going to remove the holster from your pocket, put the little gun in the holster, them put the holster back in your pocket, right? The gun is slowly and attentively placed back in the holster. If I need to glance at the holster, I will, but avoid the bad habit of having the off-hand involved in any way (steadying the holster, holding the holster open, whatever). You don't want holes in your off-side hand, right!

Politics...

...I'm not going to read too much into this..

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee had a private breakfast with New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg Tuesday morning at the the headquarters of the billionaire mayor’s philanthropic foundation. Romney’s campaign did not inform the press that the meeting would occur, although later confirmed that the men had met.

...

According to two people with knowledge of the Bloomberg meeting, cited by the New York Times, the pair discussed the economy, immigration, education and gun control over coffee and juice.

...but put Snowplow Bloomberg on the ticket, or give him a substantial part in or input into this campaign, and I stay home. And I will strongly urge all of you guys to stay home.

A Sure Hit at the Next Ruger Rimfire Match!

From High Tower Armory, a 10/22 bull pup that looks like an FNH P-90...the next iteration of Stargate is calling!

I wonder if anyone is working on a 10/22 that looks like Sarah Michelle Geller?

THAT would be a real winner!