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Something Wicked this way comes... Project X DECEMBER 2005 Thursday, 12-29-05: This is just insane. 100,000 dollars each for some old Jeeps? Jeeps where you can buy the build kit yourself for only 7500? The Army should buy the kits and just order the Motor Pool guy to build them. But back this truck up for a second... what is this for? This is for the Osprey program? What part of the program? The Osprey isn't supposed to be packing these little mini jeeps around, they are supposed to be sling loading HUMVEES... the vehicles the regular troops actually use. This Osprey program is becoming more and more expensive. With less and less capability on top. Now they need these little special runabouts? This is insane. This is our government who seems to care less about effective military vehicles, and more about spending money like Paris Hilton and Anna Nicole Smith out on a shopping date. The Osprey is a total failure in my opinion. And in the opinion of others. It was a good idea back when the idea was new, but the idea just didn't pan out. Like the Sgt York anti-aircraft platform. The Government needs to stop this Osprey project. The only thing it is good for is to line the pockets of certain government officials. And could someone please look into why the hell a $7500 golf cart is costing taxpayers $100,000 each? Seriously. This is just asinine. If you have Windows XP SP2. Read this. Now, what do you do about it? This. Yesterday I got my Linux Box, running SUSE 10.2 fully patched up and updated. It is running great on my old box. Better than I expected. With the proper video drivers, it looks awesome. 1600X1200 @ 80 Mhz. In Windows this card can't do that. Not even close to that. I can't believe how many fonts there are in SUSE's edition of Open Office 2... Its crazy. Too many choices. Almost. Ogre's Top Linux Distros:
Your mileage may vary, but these are the ones I like. *Linspire I really like for it's polish and its ability to work well for people trying Linux out for the first time, refugees from MS Windows. I would recommend Linspire to anyone who is less than computer savy, fully MS indoctrinated, or who just don't have the time to learn a new OS. Linspire isn't just the easiest Linux out there, but it very well could be the easiest OS, period. I am still wanting to put together my own Distro, and I've looked into doing just that. No, that is not what Project X is. If there are any Linux gurus out there in The Horde who know how to do this, wants immortality and fame, and could help me out, that would be great. I would probably base it on Fedora Core or Slackware and build it up from there. Just a thought. My email is going to be up and down shortly. Migration to a new mail server. Give it a week and it should be all ironed out. MadOgre.com should not be effected. HANDGUNS: Reading through some of the forums that I participate in, I am seeing a growing number of guys appreciating the CZ-75 family of handguns. When the CZ-75 came out, it was drastic improvement over anything else available at the time. Since that time, CZ has upgraded the 75 into a very serious handgun that is not just on par with all the other top dogs, but in my opinion better than most. The P-01 is a variant of the CZ-75 that is heads and shoulders above damn near every other 9MM handgun on the planet. But it isn't perfect. It needs a stainless steel guide rod, which you can order from Jackash Custom... It could also use a trigger job. Other than these two things... the gun is flat awesome. The P-01 has become my #1 favorite shooter. Second place is the SP-01, which is similar but not a compact... then there is the Desert Eagle pistol by Magnum Research – not the Agent Smith gun – but what is called on the street the “Baby Eagle”. But the word Baby isn't on the gun anywhere... it is marked Desert Eagle. These are CZ-75 variant as well, but with a full length dust cover and slide rails. Why do I love these guns so much? I don't know. Ergonomics, reliability, pointability, accuracy... what else do you need? Good styling... safety... everything you want in a handgun can be found there. If you are wanting a CZ handgun, I suggest getting one as soon as you can. The popularity is growing and the secret is getting out. CZ handguns rock. 9X23MM: I would LOVE a CZ-97 in 9X23MM. Others would like one in 10MM. Out of the box the 97 was the most accurate handgun I have ever owned. And it had a fantastic trigger to boot. With Jackash Custom's slimmed grips, it felt sexy. I think we shooters need to pressure CZ-USA to make a version in 10MM and 9X23MM. They don't think there would be any demand for such a gun. But I think there would be. Big time. All the gun rags and sites would be going nuts over them... myself included.
Happy Valentines Day. My Valentine 1 radar/laser detector has arrived. The thing is sweet and with a little testing, I found it to be scary sensitive. With it I watched a police car drive around the block, the V1 tracked it and the other Po-Po that drove past. Let me know where both of them were. Very cool. With a regular detector, I would only have known there was radar in the area. The best thing about the V1 for me out here is the sensitivity. With the vast distances measured in Astronomical Units out here, I need it. But we shall see. I'm going to still be driving carefully for some time... getting used to the V1's abilities. Then I'll be able to drive normally again. I don't speed in town. I don't condone speeding in town. But when you are out in the middle of freaking no where with nothing but ant hills and dinosaur bones for miles around – speed limits are just a source of income for the city at the expense of the citizens. If the roads are clear, traffic is nonexistent, weather is fair, and visibility is max... then why do we need an arbitrary imposed limit to an unrealistically low committee decided number from 20 years ago? That and hey, I just like driving fast when it is safe to do so. My condolences to Rob of Jackash Custom fame... Poor guy has caught the Off Roading Bug and went and got himself a Jeep. This bug never really goes away, ever. Email from The Horde's Chase who nails it on the head: “Regarding Tookie and pals- One of the arguments I hear often by the left is that if you believe in and support the death penalty, then abortion should fall right into line with that thinking. The problem is that when you suggest to them that a death row convict should be executed without a jury, judge, automatic appeal, years of correspondence with his attorney while waiting for the needle, not with the painless euthanasia, but with a blender and a vacuum, and a state appointed attorney (like an aborted fetus) they get all squirrelly. Never mind the fact that a fetus never coldly murdered anyone... Then I have the temerity to suggest that a pregnant woman be subjected to the same procedures for buying a handgun to get an abortion and they blow a gasket. Apparently, they would have me believe that if I buy a handgun it could spontaneously injure or kill an innocent child. Consulting the CIA world fact book I find an infant mortality (US) rate of 6.5/1,000. That works out to be a 99.35% success rate for pregnancies. They get this really confused look on their faces when you tell them while an abortion has a 100% chance of killing a child that has a 99.35% of surviving pregnancy and birth on its own in this country, a handgun, or any other gun for that matter, has something like a .001% chance of injuring or killing a child that just finds it laying around and loaded. This statistic does not include, of course, children committing suicide, killed in the commission or attempt to commit a crime, killed by the family swimming pool, etc, etc, ad nauseum, ad infinitum, you know the rest. Somehow I'm supposed to understand that while the remote, at best, chance of a child injuring its self with a gun in the home is to be avoided at all costs, while the blender/hoover option is not only acceptable, but somehow a right? What is it about a fact these people find so hard to comprehend? And while I'm writing let me bring up the liberals pontificating about "military strategy" in the news lately. Simply put, the average democrat in this country wouldn't know a military strategy if it showed up in a blue dress with a box of cigars and begged all night. The only thing worse than a liberal is having a person in your family that you love that is a liberal. I seem to remember something about you having to deal with this in the past. How did that work out for you? Have a great New Year, Chase” I've been having some interesting issues with my Linux Box running the latest SUSE. Not so much of an issue but some observations. My card being a ghetto ATI 7000, can run my display higher than any of the monitors in this shop can display. At 800X600 resolution, it can refresh at over 170 mhz. With Windows, this same card is lucky to hit 70. There is something about the way Windows generates its images that requires so much more hardware than Linux. Linux must have a much more streamlined process. And if this is the case, then Linux has much great potential as a platform for gaming, editing images and video, art production... anything that one would actually prefer a Mac for. The only advantage Macs have is the development of the software. Should someone be able to port those Mac applications over to Linux... you would really have something there. Faster hardware, cheaper hardware, and easier upgrading... Linux has all the potential. If the software companies would just come on board. This situation is only going to be so much worse when MS releases Vista to the public. Vista requires all the more hardware, all the more system resources – and this is just the OS! This leaves nothing left for your applications. No virus issues with Linux. No Spyware issues with Linux. Here at the shop we have one of our machines running Linux. We used SUSE for awhile, and now its back to Linspire 5.0. Backing up Windows hard drives, deleting rogue files... works better than our 64 bit machine running Windows XP Pro 64bit Edition.
Christmas went well. Peace and Joy as it should be. The boys are happy, Mrs Ogre is happy, and I am happy. Family is happy. What else matters? On Boxing day we took the boys and another young lad who's mother is recovering from brain surgery (she's doing great – a total miracle) to go see The Chronicals of Narnia. I've never seen a pack of lads so entranced in a movie before. Ever. It was crazy. They hooted and cheered and laughed and cried... they totally loved it. If you have a child who hasn't seen this movie – take them. What did I get? A new ergo keyboard from MS with a leather like wrist pad thing... geeky but cool and I love it. A Spyderco Native, one of my favorite knives ever but have given all the ones I had away, so the Kershaw Boa is resting in my “stuff” drawer. We shall see for how long. I got some other things of course. Serenity and other DVD's. Dean Koontz books. Socks. A horrible tie. A leather jacket exactly the same as one I already had but no longer wear, but I'm grateful anyways because it's the thought that counts. The boys got rifles and pocket knives and yesterday we had them lined up learning how to shoot from the prone position. Several bullseyes... I'm a proud pappa ogre over here. I hope all of your Christmases went as well. Thank you for all the show of support for the Soldiers who have returned home to a divided America. I hope all the Liberals got a shot to the mouth with a strong right hook from Santa this year. If you are a Liberal and you didn't get yours, the line forms to the left. Thursday, 12-22-05: I heard a comment that broke my heart the other day. My mother said that my brothers are feeling a bit depressed... they feel that their service in Iraq has meant nothing. I'm on the outside looking in on this issue. My brothers are in it. Look at all the news out there about Iraq. Look at all the politicians posturing about Iraq. And you know what? I would feel depressed too. Our nations “Media” and our nations “Leaders” are forsaking our Troops. But they are all wrong. All of them... My brothers are wrong.... what they did in Iraq did make a difference. They were a part of an operation that has changed not just the lives of the people of Iraq, but in the future... because of the freedoms the people of Iraq now have in part because of them... they changed the world. The Media is wrong and the Politicians are wrong – not wrong as in “they are incorrect” but wrong as in they are reporting things in a way that cast America as a whole in a bad light. Like this story... how come its posted in Russia but not in the US by any American news agency? They are doing ill on purpose. The New York Times, The Democrats... they are doing acts that are counter to the will of America and the best interests of America as a whole. They are not just casting doubts in the minds of Americans, soldiers like my brothers with their constant Anti-American rhetoric... but they are also bolstering the Anti-American sentiment that is raging around the globe. This can not be tolerated. This is unforgivable. Note to my Brothers: You served with honor. Your Unit served with honor. You guys helped make the world a better place. No man could hope to do anything better. So have cheer, my brothers. I, and all my readers here at MadOgre.com are PROUD of you and all of our troops... American Soldiers, Sailors, Marines, Airmen... and we are proud of all of our Allies who have stood with our troops... The troops from the UK, the Czech Republic, Italy, Japan, Norway... All of them. You all have stood for freedom in the face of all opposition. I salute you. I've got a new Radar Detector on the way... picked up in a trade with one of The Horde where we are both benefiting. The detector in question is the mighty Valentine One. Some guys don't like the V1 because it is sensitive. People in the cities don't seem to like them quite as much. However this is absolutely perfect for out here where the ranges are vast and the Highway Patrol hungry to fill quotas. The sensitivity that is a bane to others is a boon to me. What I would really love is a robotic mini AWACS that flies overhead... loaded with Shrikes. But until then... this will do. I'm looking forward to SHOT 2006. I'm going with Concealed Carry Magazine, bringing digital cameras, memory cards, and lots of batteries. There are a lot of very cool new guns coming out that I'm excited about. One of which is the new Springfield XD-45. One of those with a green frame and black slide... oh boy. In case I don't post again... I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas. To my Jewish readers, Happy Hanukkah. To the Senate Democrats... I hope you all get a lump of coal.
I've got some insider information on a couple things that are going to be hot topics... but my lips are sealed. One is a custom pistol, and the other is about a gun company. I want to throw this information out there – but I'm not. As soon as I get the green light to let slip the secret – I'll tell you guys about it. Very interesting things about. Very interesting indeed. The ballet went well last night, but no... I will not be posting photos of it. Sorry. I am sure you are all disappointed... but life goes on. Drink some Egg Nog and you will be just fine. Better off, actually. Series: "24". Steve hooked me up with seasons 1 through 3 and I started watching it late last night. I was up late and went through the first 3 episodes. 24 is some good watching. You get into the story... its gripping... Jack is a cool character... lots of shooting... I like this show. I'm just starting out on this 24 adventure, so no spoilers! I was just listening to the Sean Hannity show. Some idjit that called in said that you should not operate your vehicle if you get less than 40 miles per gallon. By government mandate you have to park your vehicle or “return it to the scrap heap”. This was his idea. I've heard this before from other liberals. The only way that this would work would be if you are a Liberal... you have aborted any and all pregnancies so you and your Life Partner only need a two seat vehicle that could get 40 miles per gallon while you drive to your favorite Tofu restaurant to eat your free range tofurkey holiday meal. Well, that just doesn't work for me and my family. I've got 5 sons. We go to Wal-Mart to buy groceries in bulk... 7 people, 2 dogs, 1 cat (who is on borrowed time) and groceries for all for a week? We fill our Mini van to the brim and have to overflow into the trunk of my car! And my boys are still all young. When they are all teenagers? We'll need an Expedition and a Trailer. Just how the fcuk do these liberals expect us to deal with 40 miles per gallon? No, seriously. We could all get our motorcycles... have our own bike gang. But combined we would be burning a lot more gas and still not have the ability bring home the groceries. You do not want to be late with Rangers 50 pound bag of Wolfie Chow. Seriously. A hungry Ranger means a lot of kitties go MIA. See, I live in what I call “The Real World”. This real world doesn't mesh well with the Liberal Utopia. If you want that, move to San Francisco and ban anyone under the age of consensual sex. How come: a monster like Saddam crying about being beaten (which never happened) is giving Liberals watery eyes? Who cares? People should be allowed to stand in line... buy tickets... to give Saddam a beat down. 2 bucks to slap Saddam across his face. Awards for good slap sound. Bonus points if you make Saddam bleed, cry, or whimper. 5 bucks to kick him in the nuts. Same thing for any and every terrorist.
Listen to FBMG's radio ad. That's a good ad. That's the best gunstore advertisement I've ever heard.
I had a good time there talking with my old friends about guns and things. It was great. Afterwards Steve and I stopped by Guadalahonkies, a little Tex-Mex joint there in Draper just around the corner from FBMG. Good food. Lots of good food. Steve hooked me up with 3 seasons of “24”. I've only seen one full episode of it, so really I know nothing at all about 24. I'll be catching up shortly. Tonight is the Ballet. Tonight and tomorrow night... I'm on stage. Its not that bad actually... being on stage amidst a crowd of pretty. Lots of little girls of course, but there are many older dancers who are just gorgeous. I was startled when one of the older and better looking girls (24?) comes running off stage at me pulling her top off. So doing this ballet thing has its... perks. I will not be doing this again though... ever. My take on the Patriot Act. I've heard arguments on both sides of the Patriot Act issue. Formulating my position about this, I had to look back at American History. I think I found the proper answer here. Especially now at this time, Ben Franklin has never been more correct: "Those who would give up essential Liberty to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” Ben Franklin back in his day was not a Right Wing Extremist Libertarian... Ben Franklin was a Liberal. Liberal in the classic sense, not the new modern kind. He was right then, and he is even more correct now. The Patriot Act is not just a slippery slope... it's a bloody ski jump. The Patriot Act is a threat to Liberty. No American should be in support of it... and I am truly disappointed that so many Conservatives are. While at the same time this issue is in question, the New York Times published stolen Classified information that shows that the President authorized the surveillance of communications between overseas contacts and contacts within the US. While I am against the Patriot Act, I am for this. This is fine. What is not fine, is the NYT publishing classified information. Let me remind you that mere possession of classified information is a felony. Someone stole this information – felony – or if they didn't steal it and got in by privilege of office, gave it to someone outside of the loop who doesn't have a clearance for it – felony – and this person or people in turn spread it around at the NYT – felony – and the NYT published it – felony. What I want to know about this is what is the State Department going to do about it? Well, the FBI should arrest the person in charge at the NYT for publishing classified information. Since this is a time of war, the threat of a good hanging should be something the NYT's is reminded of. Anyone that had anything to do with this from the top down should be prosecuted. The President was within his legal powers in doing this. If you don't like this, then you have to change the law. Changing the President wont do anything... because its not about him, but the law. Interesting timing of the release of this information, right when the congress is voting on the Patriot Act. Not an accident, that timing.
Friday, 12-16-05:
The Utah Highway Patrol is just going nuts out here. I can not drive on my little highway out here in the middle of nowhere, without seeing someone pulled over by a Trooper. I know a couple of the troopers, and they are alright fellows. But the UHP, I have to get it off my chest, they really bother me. They seem more concerned with generating revenue then they do with anything else. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm biased because I got a ticket the other day. Or maybe I'm just calling a Spade a Spade. I've not seen any accidents on this stretch of highway. I've not seen any traffic that would justify such an increase in patrols out here... This is a quiet and sleepy little community out here. We like it that way. I'm sorry, but I don't think we need such a heavy police presence out here ready to pull us over at the slightest infraction. Pretty much most people out here came out here to get away from that bullshit to begin with. I did. I know a lot of other folks who did too. We are very Libertarian out here. I've yet to see one of these troopers pull over one of the oilfield trucks... I know they are going over the speed limit through the town even and not out in the middle of nowhere. I think there should be open speed zones between towns out in places like this. If you are out where there is nothing but desert... who the hell cares how fast you are going? Only the UHP, because you are money to them. Who set the speed limits anyway? They say for Safety... but that's not the case. These arbitrary speed limits were set to the national 55 MPH limit to conserve fuel. That's right... not for safety, but so you don't burn as much gas. And that number sounds fine still today to those who live on the coasts or in big cities... but trust me, out here, it's flat retarded. After years and years of this intolerably slow limit, we got it bumped. On my little highway... whoa, careful now... 60 MPH. You can safely cruise this route at 85... in some places 100. There is nothing out here. No cross traffic, residences, towns... just dust and rocks and an occasional cotton tail. There have been so many advances in vehicle safety and automotive performance and handling and breaking... it's like forcing Jet Fighters to fly in formation with WWI Sopwith Camels to cross the ocean. Yet here we have it, with State Troopers eagerly and actively enforcing it. Some exciting news on the New Handgun front: Springfield Armory will be making their excellent XD pistol in good old .45ACP. This will require a redo of the whole gun to upscale it enough to handle the mighty .45ACP... bigger grip frame, beefier slide and the like. But here is what I expect when it hits the market: Fantastic ergonomics. Utter reliability. Accuracy. That's all I want from any pistol. Of course since it is an XD, it will remain ugly as a bulldog's butt, but hey... it if has the other three factors in line, then nothing else matters. While I'm talking guns, I've got a Kahr on the way here now. Might even be here later today. A smallish poly framed 9mm that should make for a light and easy carrying CCW piece. Kahr has some interesting little handguns out now, and this one is the their best seller. I will strive to find out why. I'm just about tapped out on ammo again so I'll have to start out fresh. I think I'll buy ammo most suited to a short 9MM barrel. I think I'm going to do this review a little differently. Oh. Wait a second. Speaking of reviews, I'm due for posting one of my CCM reviews in the weapons section, aint I? I think it's the Taurus review, isn't it? So when the Congress finally decides to do something about the southern border... like putting up a silly fence... Mexico's President Fox calls it “Disgraceful”. You've got to be kidding, President Fox. Disgraceful? This isn't even rating as a slap on your hand and you are calling it disgraceful? Well, you are right. We should be building a 30 foot high, 10 foot thick rock wall, topped with broken glass with auto-targeting sentry guns to shoot anyone even attempting to climb it. Anything short of this IS disgraceful. Speaking of Sentry Guns.... Remember them from Aliens? You probably don't if you've not seen the special edition. Well, if you do, Check this out. The Soft-Air gun is fun, but let's make it real. I'd like to see a big beefy version mounting a 20MM Bushmaster, and give it some serious optical ability for extra long range engagement. I think that would resolve a lot of issues we have on the southern border. Top Gear Magazine can just suck this one... 1 in 4 Britons are fat. Top Gear loves to mention that seats in American cars are comfortable because Americans are fat... they do that in just about every article involving a US car. Looks like we have a case of the Pot calling the Kettle here. Girthy, just like us.
For some reason I am just giddy about a new handgun coming out next year. North American Arms is developing an all new mini revolver in .32 H&R Magnum. I'm a huge fan of NAA, and I love their little guns. I used to carry an NAA Mini on my Key Chain many years ago. That's how small those little wheelguns are. If you've never seen one before, ask your dealer about getting one. Super Spiffy. The Guardians are great little autos. I reviewed a .32NAA chambered Guardian and found it to be fantastic. Snappy as hell and for some reason hit a nerve in my hand that made shooting it painful. But for what they are for, they are perfect. .32H&R Magnum is a fun caliber. Zippy, but not snappy... accurate too. The power is certainly a big step up over anything else NAA is currently chambering, but still shy of a good old .38 Special. However, for NAA's market nitch... I think it's perfect. Unlike the other NAA Mini Revolvers, this one will have a trigger guard. I'm liking this concept. I think anyone else doing this would be silly, but NAA knows how to do it right. This is one I'm really looking forward to it.
I'm conflicted: I love my CZ P-01. I love those grips that melt in my hand and fuse with my hands... just awesome. Yet I take a look a Hakan's Custom Stocks and I see these grips Hakan makes. The different woods are just gorgeous. Bloodwood, ironwood, buckeye, cocobolo... all so gorgeous. I think my favorite is the “Flame Amboina”. Do I change these dark and sinister checkered rubber grips for a set of seriously beautiful and slick wood grips? I can't decide. Change yes or no... then which wood? A man could stress over this sort of choice. Monday, December 19th... Be in Draper Utah for the grand opening of FBMG's new store. The guys there have worked hard putting together something special. They have a goal, a very serious goal... they aim to Help You get what you Need, and they will never sell you something you don't. James is real life a Spec Ops guy, huge supporter of the Second Amendment, and an all around genuine good guy. Larry is a 3 Gun competitor who is just sick with a pump action shotgun... ask about his quick reloading trick. In a blur he can reload 4 fresh shells and rock and roll at the drop of a hat. He knows 3 Gun, and if you want to get into the sport you need to talk to him to see what is what. He also handles a full sized FAL like most guys handle an M-4 Carbine. He's also an accomplished writer. I just got the day off for Monday, I'm there. I hit a deer last night. Huge White Tail the size of a Mule Deer. Thick body, tall, and quicker than a politician reaching for money. Jumped out right in front of me. I stood on the brakes and just brushed the critter. No damage. Deer was unhurt. Oh... this was IN MY DRIVEWAY. So now I know who was making those tracks around the old Cherokee parked behind the Shop. Ranger seems to pay this big girl no mind. He never barks at her... just ignores her. Just in case she brings a big buck out of the hills, my .30-30 is on standby. The one individual that doesn't like this big old girl, is Maddie, our Akida Mix Pup. She goes wild, then gets scared and runs to the front door to franticly try to get back in the house. She's a funny pup, and showing every indication of growing up into a fine loyal dog. She can not sleep unless she is sleeping on my ankles. Keeps my feet warm. Yup... life is good at Ogre Ranch. Life. Is. Good.
Tuesday, 12-13-05: Theology and Sensitivity: Christians are often painted as being insensitive to others of different beliefs. Over the past say, 10 years, Christians have been pushed from the public view. So much so that you would have to go back to the Roman Empire (Pre Constantine the Great) to find such animosity. Some asshat in California trying to take “One Nation Under God” out of the Pledge of Allegiance... not that there is any definition of the word God. It is not One Nation Under Jesus. Just the generic word “god” with a capitol “G”. Islam believes in a God. The Hindus believe in a God... well, they believe in several Gods, but even for them there is one main God. I do not see how one person would be offended because another person believes that there is a God. Saying one nation under God is no more offensive than the Santa Clause song “He knows when you've been bad or good, so you better be good for goodness sake.” Is that offensive? An admonition to simply be good? Is that wrong? Is that insensitive? Is that not politically correct? Let's just shorten that down. “Be Good.” Two words. Two small words. Be Good. That alone has to be offensive to the Liberal Mindset. Because to Be Good means that you must not be bad. Being bad would include things like teaching elementary school kids about the use of a condom and anal sex... without parental consent or even knowledge. Don't even deny it, you Libs. This was the discussion on NPR recently... your radio station. No, not the one with Al Franken, the other one. Abortions with out parental notification even if the child is under 16. You kids out there are not allowed to smoke or drink or watch a rated R movie or play games with an “M” rating. But you can have all the care free sex you want with no worries about getting pregnant... because if you do get knocked up, they can just stick in an egg beater and then vacuum it all out. No problem. No worries. Mom and Dad don't even have to know. Am I being crude about this? Am I being insensitive? Maybe I am. Maybe anyone who believes that there might be a God... Be it Brahma or Budda or Jesus or Elvis... or just some Intelligent Designer... whatever... maybe they might believe in “Right and Wrong”. Maybe they might think that the violation of children is one of the greatest possible sins anyone could do. But I'm not going to go there. I've spoken my mind about this before. I want to talk about Intelligent Design. ID is the new Creationism but leaving the word “god” out of it because that would be insensitive. ID leaves The Thing with the IQ that put everything together kind of in a “fill in the blank” status because to say “God” would take away from your imagination and automatically refer to something offensive. Its not God, it could be Aliens, and Aliens not theology, but Science Fiction and only a Git would believe in Science Fiction. (Don't think too much about planes, submarines, or cell phones) I love science, and studied it quite a bit before I became a low brow knuckle dragger and starting carrying guns. I was an artist too in that former life. I think I was told to leave that at the Medical Entrance Procession Station before I shipped out to Ft. Benning. Reading about and studying even hard science I came away with the impression that Science did not exclude the possibility of a God or gods. It neither proved it or disproved it. If anything, in my opinion it only explained how He (or She, however you want to believe or not) did it in mechanical and chemical terms. Think of it as Science is the CSI Team tracking down what God did. This is probably a part of the idea of ID. Creationism is no less a theory than Evolution... because Evolution is not Scientific Law and remains only a theory. Just one theory. I've not seen any kangaroos with fins or gills. I've not seen Tuna use opposable thumbs. I've not seen chickens put on lipstick. I've not seen bears ask for toilet paper outside of commercial animations. I've watched nature shows for over 30 years and have yet to see anything like that. In contrast, these nature shows discuss how such things as Gators, Sturgeon, and Sharks have not changed in eons. Either they were evolutionarily perfect early on, or they have not evolved. Maybe they have. Maybe instead sharks biting surfers, they are only trying to communicate that they want a go on the surf board and have become impatient waiting for their tongues and vocal cords to evolve. But as soon as they do, you can bet the Democrats are going be be sending them Voter Registration Cards. Religion in general has been under gleeful attack lately by the Media and by people who have just not thought things through. A lot of people like to say that all these problems in the middle east that have spread around the world... its all because of those dangerous and untrustworthy Muslims and Islam is a Religion of Blood. That could very well be an easy trap to fall in if you are thinking in a very narrow spectrum. Islam has had a lot of bad press lately, true. But so has a lot of other Faiths. Mormon Offshoot Religions with the polygamy thing. Extreme white supremacist Christians up in Northern Idaho. Voodoo worshipers. Catholic Priests. You can look at any religion and find some less than shiny characters. Christians probably have more blood on their hands than the Muslims. When the Muslims started their spread, the did so with very little bloodshed and incorporated other faiths into their own as they went. Christians, countered with swords and slaughtered every man, woman, child and animal... Heck, they didn't even wait till they got outside of France before they started killing. They wiped out a whole city in France just because it was a different flavor of Christianity that is no longer in the world because of them. Let's pick on the French some more... the whole Torch and Pitchfork Mob thing, that pretty much started in France. Witch trials might give Salem a bad name, but in France they slaughtered 40,000 innocent people in one city for fear that the city was taken over by werewolves. All that in the name of God. Christianity vs Christianity is common... Catholics vs Protestants in Northern Ireland, how long has that been going on? Thankfully in the last 5 years it has really slowed down. Mormons vs Everyone Else That Calls Themselves Christians? I don't think anyone has been killed over that one in over a hundred years but the viciousness of the verbal attacks is quite hostile. Maybe it is just me, but I don't think that Jesus would approve of much of anything that has been done over the years in his name by people who claim to follow him. “Cast the first handgrenade?” That wasn't what Jesus was about. Even when he cast the moneychangers out of the temple... he just evicted them from the temple, he didn't burn their families at the stake. He shooed them out and then taught them to simply respect the sanctity of the temple. People who don't believe seem to like to egg on any Faith Based confrontation that they can. Like putting two animals in a pit to let them fight it out. As long as these faiths try to tear each other apart like that, then they are no threat. The Faiths vs the Faithless is a fight that they don't want to have so they avoid it by causing as much infighting as they can. What is wrong with “Under God”? What is wrong with Creationism or Intelligent Design? Nothing is wrong with it... but to the Faithless it brings about the possibility that these peoples of different faiths could start understanding each other... they could possibly start building on common grounds. They would stop fighting each other. You don't have to endorse and sponsor a religion to discuss it in a school social studies class. Just like you don't have to endorse and advocate the slaughter of Jews during WWII in a History class. In most faiths, there is a great deal of common grounds. It is remarkable how similar elements of one faith can tie into another. For example the “Old Indian Religion” as that was called by elder members of two different tribes in northern Wisconsin that I talked too... it had many elements similar to Christianity and Mormonism. Celtic Paganism and Hinduism and Taoism... there are elements that are similar enough to discuss without anyone converting anyone or selling religion to anyone. But studying it and talking about it can build bridges of understanding and appreciation. Carrying this forward, this would end racism. This would end hate. This would put an end to the secular divisions of control that Liberals have been working on for so long... they say that Religion is simply a tool to control the masses. Maybe that was certainly the case in ages past. Maybe it is still a tool to control masses today. But the lack of Religion is also a tool of control. You take away a person's faith and you take away their hope. You take away their spirit. You take away their souls. And if you take their souls... you control them. That is a belief in parts of Voodooism. It's also a part of the modus operandi of Communism and Socialism. What is usually the first thing to happen in a communist revolution? Remember your history lessons, people. You crush the churches and the schools and only allow those that support your position. State sponsored schools to churn out the zombies that you need to control the rest of the population in mass. State sponsored Churches that provide little comfort other than comfort in the system and that it would be a sin to go against the new regime. If you do not believe in a God, then you should not be offended if someone else does. Freedom of Religion was one of the promises of The New World. This does not mean Freedom From Religion. I would like to see a class where there is a mix of Science and Faith where both are discussed and examined using logic and reason, to come up with explanations for nature and natural phenomenon. We have bible stories of God destroying a city. We have archaeological evidence of natural events that wipe out cities... Why can these not be talked about together, and maybe use one event as an example of maybe what happened in another... just an idea. Just a thought. Don't burn me on a cross for it. Even Albert Einstein believed in a God. He said that the more he studied the one, he believed in the other. Maybe he, the guy that put the mathematical framework around the universe as we know it, was just insensitive. I've picked on the French today... because, well, it's gobs of fun. Now I want to pick on the British. The Brits are very fond of feeling superior to Americans because Americans are the new Barbarians. Americans are crude and ugly and fat. Americans are stupid because we can not simply drive through the chunnel to holiday in southern France. As if spending any time in the south of France was the one deciding factor on sophistication. Think you are sophisticated? Have you been to Nice, yes or no? Can you point out on a map of The Continent, where Nice is? Well, Mister Frilly Britches, have you ever been to Denver? Can you point out on a map, which of the squarish states Denver is in? You guys think 400 miles is a long way. I'll drive that far just for a good sandwich. You scoff that less than 1 in 500 Americans have a passport. Well, in America, we don't need a passport. I can hop in my car and drive 2800 miles in one direction and not need a passport... that's far enough for most any eager traveler to thrown in the towel and say “Fuck it, I want to go home now.” What I want to know, is if Americans suck so badly, why is the best selling car in England right now at this very moment, not the Cooper Mini, but the Ford Focus? Why are people who claim to hate America so much, so totally enraptured by it? Japan makes no bones about wanting to be Americans... and that's fine. There are so many Americans that wish they were Japanese... it goes both ways. It must be a real bitch to be so psychologically conflicted as the British are. You want to make a British guy ogle and drool and act like John Cleese? Drive a new Mustang past him. Come on England... you know you love us... give us a hug. Come on now. Give us that nice strong and manly fraternal hug with the requisite three pats on the back. We'll send you a NASCAR T-Shirt, and you can send us naughty pictures of Elizabeth Hurley. I'm just ribbing my readers across the pond... Just got an email from Hertfordshire in the UK this morning informing me of an old odd lever gun in .45ACP. A modified Marlin fed from Uzi magazines. I've never heard of such a thing. Undoubtedly ugly. He guessed the company that made it may have been Cotswold Arms. Anyone know of such a critter? I don't think a box magazine would be the way I would go, but it would make for a very interesting piece.
Boom! Head Shot! I don't know why I think this stuff is funny, but I do. FPS Doug is hilarious. Jeremy is stupid, but some how funny as well. Probably because he is so stupid. I'm not going to link it up... yeah, okay. Here you go. The stupid factor is high. But there is humor there. Do not be surprised to find out that these guys are Canadians. I've not much to say about the death of Richard Pryor, but I will say that I did enjoy a lot of his comedy. Not all of it, but a lot of it. He had a tough life, but he made the best of it... and regardless of his humble beginnings... everyone knows who he was. That's saying something.
FIVE SECRETS OF A PERFECT RELATIONSHIP: I was thinking this morning... I want a .45ACP lever action rifle. Classic lines, like a Marlin .357... but in .45ACP. I've seen custom levers in .50AE, and that's fine and well... but just .45ACP for me, thank you. 16 inch barrel. Thats all I'm asking. 9MM would be nice too, but a .45 would give you some impressive power, and a good quantity of follow up shots if they are needed. Pistol caliber carbines... for some reason I love them. I've got this SIG P229SAS boxed up and ready to ship back to SIG. Damn if I am reluctant to do this. I don't want to send it back! If it was less money, I'd keep it and send SIG a cashiers check. But even a used demo unit of this pistol is almost a grand. This gun is worth every penny... I just don't have enough pennies this time of year. For example one of the reasons I'm short – besides all the obvious reasons... Last night I picked up some Christmas Gifts. New rifles for my 3 oldest boys. .177 caliber repeaters for 2 of them, and the oldest is getting a much more powerful scoped Remington. Air powered, but edging right up to what a .22 will do. We have a .22 that he can shoot, but this one is for just him so he can shoot whenever he wants when he is home at Ogre Ranch. We've got a lot of space and an air gun wont bother anyone. The 2 repeaters are classic “Red Ryders” because its not Christmas unless you shoot your eye out. Same reasons apply. These BB guns are pretty cool. Every boy that doesn't live in a big city should have one. In my opinion. But packing the 3 rifles to the check out counter... all the men in the store were giving my that proud look like “Yeah, that's going to be a damn fine Christmas for some boys right there!” But truth be told... that scoped rifle... it might be for my Oldest, but its also for me. I'm tired of all the cats that have sprung up around Ogre Ranch. One of them put paw prints across my hood. This is unacceptable. If I had a suppressed .22, this wouldn't have been a problem to begin with. Now it's got out of hand. This rifle is potent enough to do the job. Boom! Headshot!
Friday, 12-09-05:
I got a speeding ticket today.
First one in a very long time. 65 miles per hour in a 60 zone... out in
the middle of freaking nowhere. Go to Google Earth and take a look at
“Freaking Nowhere” and you will see my little part of Utah where I got
pulled over. 65... in a 60... ticketed. I'm so extremely bitter now about
the Utah Highway Patrol I could chew horseshoes and spit tacks. No, I don't
care you long time Trooper readers see this and say “Well, you were
speeding.” Yeah, yeah I was. A couple miles back I passed a truck too... I
passed it hitting over 100MPH too. So what. I'm in the middle of freaking no
where! Most people in the USA consider this part of the country to be the
surface of the moon anyways. There should be no speed limits out here
anyways. And even if I was speeding, so what? The conditions were perfectly
clear, traffic save for 1 truck and 1 cruiser was light, and I was out in
the middle of nowhere. Town nearest was 10 miles away. County guys just wave
“howdy” at you if your doing less than 90. State Po-Po? 65 in a 60. At least
this wasn't as bad as the last time I got pulled over... 67 in a 65. But
that time I didn't get a ticket... just a warning. Lucky me. Some good news: FBMG is opening up in just a couple weeks. If you are in Utah, head over to Draper and check them out. Gonzo gun guys there... good friends of mine... place is going to be awesome. Show them some support. Intel corporation, the makers of the famous Pentium family of CPU's, is having a bit of a Sour Grapes fit over here. The “$100 Laptop” is going to be using AMD chips instead of Intel, because they want the “$100 Laptop” to be $100 USD and not $399. Intel chips are pricy and there is little justification for them when the AMD chips are so much cheaper and in many cases much better than the Intel counterpart. Intel snubs the cheap laptop as being simply a gadget. Well, that might be the case... but running Redhat Linux makes it one hell of a little gadget. I don't care if it has the same ability as a mear PDA, because these PDA's now days smoke most of the full desktop computers I've owned and used up till just a few years ago. These cheap laptops are pretty cool in my opinion. Many schools are planning on buying these for young students. I think its an excellent idea, as long as tax payers are not shelling out the coins for it. (But of course they will) As far as being in The Nutcracker Ballet is concerned, it's really not that bad. But for the life of me, this 200+ year old “tradition”, I can't understand why it was so popular. The music is tedious and the “story” is asinine. I hate it, I really do. I can appreciate other ballets, but The Nutcracker? It's just silly.
The gangster on death row. He should be executed promptly. If he is “fighting gangs” then he should let his death illustrate graphically the end of the road for any would be gangster. Sorry Williams, but you reap what you sow. I just read in Guns and Ammo magazine, a review on the SIG P229 SAS. This is the same gun that I just reviewed for Concealed Carry Magazine. I would have to examine the serial numbers, but I think it might be the same exact pistol even. Its embarrassing reviewing a gun like that because you can not help but to write a fluff piece on it... the gun is flawless. Faultless. Fantastic. I loved it. Its spendy, coming in at just shy of a Grand, but like Ferris Bueller says, “If you have the means, I recommend them highly.” Stone Cold. A Tom Selleck movie. Tom is a solid pro second actor. His movies are always great, but are subdued. Stone Cold is a good story, and Tom does a great job. His unknown supporting cast also does a very good job. A little gun play and there is a custom 1911 that Tom carried small of back. Its out on DVD and is a good reason to stop by Block Busters for an evening of diversions. Subtle movie... slow easy pace. A good winter by the fire sort of flick.
Tuesday, 12-06-05: My bros are hanging out at Ft Dix now. Back in the states safe and sound. But they can't actually go home until the 13th, because the military is a model of efficiency and processing paperwork couldn't be possibly done by the unit's admin staff while the troops just went home... because that would be complicated. At least they are no longer being shot at with RPGs. My Bad: It looks like I made a mistake in my review of the Taurus 605 revolver in Concealed Carry Magazine. When I was looking at the price sheet I quoted the price of a different Taurus product and not that of the gun I reviewed. I just read that Microsoft is going to be discontinuing Windows XP 64bit Edition. Of course they are. Because they want you to buy Vista. Just a quick word of advice from someone who has played with Vista... when you buy your next PC, do not buy a bargain machine... buy a beefy computer system. Don't just look at the basic specs... look at the RAM, look at the cache on board the CPU, look at the graphics card. A fat hard drive and a DVD burner are not going to help you with Vista. You need performance and the other items are like shopping for a new car and only looking for power seats and a full sized spare tire. Where I am with Linux. I am not a Linux expert. I'm not an expert in anything. But I've tried out just about every Linux distribution out there, and being the natural born critic that I am (my nickname when I was a toddler was “The Judge”) I develop opinions on everything. Duke Cunningham. Busted for taking bribes. I've not followed this case in any detail, but I still want to comment on it. 2.4 million dollars worth of gifts. Sounds just bloody horrible on the surface. But I think people need to temper their animosity with some understanding of who Cunningham is/was. The man, no matter what he has done, is a true American hero who deserves the utmost respect regardless of charges. He was the only fighter ACE from the US Navy during the Vietnam War. That's one hell of an accomplishment. Just being a Navy fighter pilot is bold enough for me... two words for those who disagree with that: Night Traps. Enough said. Then add to that, the stainless steel nuts to tallyho into an air to air combat engagement. I remember as a young teenager reading about Duke's air engagements. Some were serious turning and burning jet powered knife fights. Fights that are studied by fighter pilots around the world still today. The man has been a hero of mine since I could read, and I would spend hours sitting at my Dad's book cases reading about Duke and guys like Duke and the planes they flew. That's how I learned to read. So a defense contractors says, hey Duke, let us hook you up with those antiques and that condo. I don't care. The man is due. A Rolls? They should have given Duke a Bentley R Turbo. Unlike most other politicians, Duke earned the concessions. Maybe he shouldn't have accepted so many gifts. Maybe they were inappropriate... or maybe the Duke was just caught red handed. At least he didn't stain any young lady's dress in the oval office. Howard Dean. With guys like this leading the Democrats, I don't expect any good news from them for a very long time. I just pray that one day in the far flung future, I will be granted the opportunity to slap that man across the face... that's all I want. One open palmed slap. That's all I'm asking for. This man is as Anti-American as you can get, and I would love to see him take a huge fall. Preferably down a long flight of steps. QUESTION: If people give Bush a hard time for how he says “Nuclear”, how come no one mentions Dean's pronunciation of the word “Idea”? He says it “Idear”. How the hell does a man become a doctor saying “Idear”?
I understand that my brothers are just about to land in New Jersey. They are back in the States. Prayers have been answered. Thank God! Noon: Project X update: No, I'm not telling you what it is, but I've got a couple professional grade photographers onboard now. I'm getting all the players together and this phase is almost done. Moving forward. I still need a couple HTML ninjas and a couple designers/graphic artists. I'm not very impressed with Windows XP Pro 64 bit edition. It's a little faster on this 64 bit machine, however it is unstable, buggy, finding all the proper drivers was a PITA, and 32 bit applications do not always work. For example, Outlook 2003 works, but crashes frequently. Especially when the email I'm trying to read is in html. Thunderbird works, but the spam filtering doesn't. Little things like that. What was especially annoying though was the SATA RAID controller that I needed to just install it. The ASUS motherboard disk that came with this 64 bit motherboard did not actually contain any 64 bit drivers. WTF? There was the SATA RAID controller on the disk, as it should be... but when you go to install it, XP Pro 64's Setup says “Nope, that's not the right one.” Nice. I liked that. That was neat. ASUS's website didn't have anything that I could actually download either. Oh, they had the link to the download. You could click it... but nothing would happen. Not after waiting for over a half hour. Finally got it off another site. No big problems, just a lot of irritations. Just got my HTML editor reinstalled... it seems to be running fine. On another computer here at work, we are running SUSE 10. No problems what so ever. Liked it so much, I installed it on my Linux Box at home. SUSE 10 is a smashing OS, but you do need a decent machine to run it... If you can run Windows XP, then you can run SUSE. If you don't have the hardware for XP, then try Ubuntu Linux. My Linux box is really struggling with SUSE, but I think the issue isn't the RAM or the CPU... I think it's the graphics card. A Radeon 7000 with 64 megs of RAM on it. That's just not enough torque for SUSE. I tried putting in an Nvidia FX 5200 128, but when I booted it, it gave me the GRUB Error 17. Ouch. I'll sort that out later. This box will become a production machine for Project X eventually. Let's see... since my last update... both my wife and I got into auto accidents. No one was injured. Wife crashed her van into some mailboxes after her van lost all traction on some ice. Luckily her van wasn't even damaged. Then I crash the company Jeep... brand new Liberty. Busted the tail light. 2500 dollars worth of damage. Freak! At least no one was injured, thats what was important. Pride will heal over time. I didn't slide on ice. So I have no excuse for my fender bender. I backed into a pole. Yeah, laugh it up. In my defense, it was snowing hard, and the parking lot was white, and the pole was also white. So the pole was basically invisible. But I do not use this as an excuse. This was the first accident either my wife or I have ever had in our 13 years of marriage. Yup, 13. It was our anniversary last night. 13. That might explain a few things. I gave the Bronco some love Saturday. Ran the engine for some time, then since the tires were low on air pressure I drove it down to the filling station where I got all the BFG A/T's at proper pressure. Checked it out. It's doing fine in its retirement. One of these days I'll give it some love or eventually sell it. Seems no one wants it though. Or maybe I still don't really want to part with it. I LOVE my Bronco. Driving Brutus was fun. Not the quickest or the fastest... but there is something about that big old truck that is just cool. Character and Spirit.
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