Spring Break Range Trip

So this week is Spring Break here in Seattle. And so my kids are all home, running amok and doing what kids do.

My son and I have been going to the gym to work out every day and having a ball. He's a healthy kid who likes to run and play soccer, so he spends a lot of time keeping himself fit and eating well. Kinda funny because he has no sweet tooth like me, and it serves him well.

Anyhow, so at the gym today he asks if we could go to the range. Its been while since we went together, so we piled in the car for a few hours around lunch and headed to West Coast Armory's range in Factoria.

This range is awesome, and this fact was compounded by the fact that the LEO bay was empty and they set us up. We dragged in the barriers, setup the bowling pins off we went.

As I've been doing, I like to rent something new for experience on each trip, so we rented the AR-15 again and a Springfield GI 1911 .45 auto. Both were interesting. The former was mostly to give my son an intro to the AR handling and the latter was for me to finally shoot a 1911 platform gun. The Springfield GI is a basic mil-spec .45 and it ran like a dream. I really was expecting more kick, but it wasn't much different than I'm used to with my Glock 26 (for obvious reasons). My son was iffy shooting it the first time, but after the first round, he had no issues. I did have to go over proper grip on the 1911 as a) I think I've gotten lazy teaching him proper grip and b) you need it a bit more with the .45 auto. It did take a few shots for me to get a feel where that .45 was shooting - you really do get a feel for your guns.

For the next hour and a half we shot bowling pins, Zombie targets and I worked on my movement forward and back with my Kel-Tec Sub-2000 rifle (discussed a few posts ago). I'm a damn fine shot on the move, if I do say so myself. One session saw me close on the 8 pins and take them all out with 10 rounds. Bam Bam Bam. Big smiles.

My son liked the AR, but liked the red dot on the Kel-tec more. The AR they have has the basic iron sights found on most low end black rifles of this sort. Nothing spectacular, but certainly serviceable. Of course a red dot would be nice.

One thing I didn't think of was that they let you turn the lights on/off. I had my light mount on there but didn't have the flashlight that goes in it.

Next time I'll remember and do some night zombie shooting.

teh awesomes.

PS. I turn 40 tomorrow. Ugh. Not that I really care. I am in almost the best shape of my life, have zero health problems and so whose complaining...

Carrying a gun?

Interesting. A graphic on how to identify someone carrying a gun. From the early 90's and could be a bit outdated given the updates in carry modes circa 2010.

http://soldiersystems.net/2010/03/29/grey-man-lesson-spottin-a-hidden-handgun/

Range Report!

W00t. Range day!

After all this blabbing about stuff other than shooting, I finally got around to visiting the range this week.

I took my Glock 17 with Advantage Arms kit and my Kel-Tec Sub 2000.

The latter has a new addition in the form of a new Kel-Tec quad rail on the front. I sweetened the deal and mounted both a flashlight and vertical forgrip. Forgive me for the tacticoolness, but I wanted some experience with such setups. The quad rail gives me loads of real estate to fiddle with, but I'm mainly interested in the aforementioned additions and a red dot for the top.

Now the interesting thing about the Sub-2000 is its a folding gun, which is awesome for concealing it in a backpack, storage etc. But it folds onto the top, so putting on a top-mounted red dot requires some thought. I purchased a quick release mounting plate and my goal was to see if it would retain its zero with repeated installation/removals.

So off I went to the range.

The mounting plate worked well enough and puts the red dot slightly above the iron sights (who am I kidding, this is a Kel-Tec and they're plastic ;-0). It took me only a few minutes to get the gun shooting where I wanted it. I put 3 magazines thru it and called it good. I installed and removed the Red Dot a few times, as well as putting it a bit forward on one magazine to see if that would affect it.

Happily, it was pretty dead on at 25 yards. Here is my final target before packing it up:

Thats good enough for me - 10 rounds all in the 10 ring. I'd say it's pretty much zeroed.

I shot 50 or so rounds with the 22 kit as well, but was kinda distracted because I'd noticed something new in the rental room that was begging for a look-see. West Coast Armory is finally starting to flesh out their rental gun selection, which is good because I want to expand my experience without the cost. And better, as a Gold member, I get free rentals. Sweet.

First up was an AR-15 pattern rifle (to be honest, I had too many stars in my eyes to even know who made it) and a few boxes of .223.

First off, I was suprised at how easy AR magazines are to load - so much easier than my Glock magazines (and yes, I have several of the 33 rounders). The basic controls on the AR were familiar, so I pretty much dove right in.

This was my first time shooting a .223 rifle and I was pleasantly suprised at a) how light the recoil was and b) how small those cartridges really are.

Franly, the recoil of the .223 was about the same as the Sub-2000 in 9mm. Yup. The hole is bigger with the latter, but that .223 is really rocking at more than double the speed (the Sub-2000 does roughly 1500 fps with 9mm rounds, give or take).

Wow. Awesome. It was a definite hoot - I really need to add a .223 gun to the safe!

Oh tax return, tax return, wherefore art thou tax return?

A good article on the discussion I've been having with myself for the past few days.

http://www.ornery.org/essays/warwatch/2010-03-21-1.html

More on Healthcare...

Ran across a great piece in Say Uncle today on the healthcare stuff.

Read it here

Well, I agree with the first part:

"One of the issues with the health insurance bill is the hysterics of the opposition to it. It’s not tyranny. It’s not comparable to Nazis. Sure, I don’t like it. But I’m not going to call everyone a bunch of commie symps and throw bricks through windows (real helpful, Mike). I’m going to voice my opposition and vote the bums out. Except that I can’t really do that because my bums opposed the bill. But you get the point. Ratcheted rhetoric is not how you win."

Amen to that. This isn't tyranny. This isn't some communist plot to enslave us all to Lenin's ghost. You may not like it, but some of the voices sound like the war protesters screaming that Bush should be hanged for war crimes. Fanaticism sometimes comes full circle.

As to the part about creating a dependent class, I'm not sure I agree completely. I can certainly agree that some people will willingly become dependents (out of laziness, character flaw etc), and that some people in power plan on abusing those people for their own gain. The question I have though, is are they the majority or a minority? I'll tolerate a few bozos if the majority benefits. That is as good a public policy as you're going to get in an imperfect world.

Government exists to serve the people. There are things we can't do by ourselves and we get together and provide government the power for these select things. Furthermore, as I see it, government also exists to protect our natural rights and arbitrate when one party infringes them for another. Its obviously a contentious issue on when/where government steps in to arbitrate, but I think healthcare is one of those things that we can do better together than we can do apart.

And what of the bill before us? Its a mixed bag, but it does do some things right. Our entrenched mechanism, and this is coming form someone who has 100% of his healthcare provided for by his company, isn't right for many Americans. A healthcare insurance system that is based on your employment, especially in such a transient age, is an anachronism.

Now I understand that there are some who believe our government is completely broken. They claim it can't can't manage anything, nor do anything right, but that is such a poor generalization that its hardly worth repeating. Government does some things right, even as corrupt and broken as ours currently is. And society as a whole often benefits from the positives.

Note that the same people that often argue the government can't do anything right are the first to give the nuke keys to the department of defense...

I personally think we live in a society that has been completely corrupted. Our leaders don't really serve us - they serve their ends and we get the table scraps. The D&C (a book of revelations from Joseph Smith) opines on man's tendency to abuse power thusly:

39 We have learned by sad experience that it is the ^anature and disposition of almost all men, as soon as they get a little ^bauthority, as they suppose, they will immediately begin to exercise ^cunrighteous dominion.

Ain't that the truth.

But there are well meaning, upstanding people in government too. And they do good things on occasion and I celebrate them for it.

Did you notice the dichotomy there? I'm an optimist by nature, but a pessimist by experience. Its hard to reconcile the two, believe me, but in the end I've resolved that the best I can do is take care of my stewardship (my wife, my kids, my job, my community) and hope for the best. I exercise my rights as a citizen as best I can and continue on.

Oh look, I've wasted another good shooty moment blabing about politics.

Healthcare, Bile and Superior Airs

Sigh.

I sure loved reading gun blogs. Back when they were full of shooty goodness.

And then they went all ballistic over healthcare. Blah blah blah.

I mentioned last post about noticing the "superior air" that liberals sometimes are accused of having. I even got a quote recently from someone who said that was one thing that turned him to being conservative. I've seen it, and I don't like it.

However, in all honesty, this isn't a Left v. Right thing. Its just the inevitable part of ingroup/outgroup politics. Its all about demonizing and debasing your opposition. Be it guns vs. gunless, soap vs. pachouli or the mother of all debates: PS3 vs. Xbox . We love being better/smarter/stronger than other people, and we love even more to demonstrate it. Or at least parade why we think so.

"Boy are you dumb to like the PS3."

"Look at those knuckle-draggers with their guns."

"Those Tea-Baggers are sore losers"

Etc. Ad Naseum.

This type of behavior is annoying regardless of where it comes from, especially when it gets fatalistic, drama queeny or just down right uncivil.

Case in point: this week's passage of the Healthcare bill. The left is all smug because they got something done. The right is apoplectic that it means Carl Marx is going to be chairing our death panels.

Feh! The amount of bile I see in the gun blogosphere over this is just like the liberal blogs after Bush was installed in office.

I for one am really looking forward to maybe someday having the same care I had in Canada (and I have great healthcare plan for work). I lived about half my life under both and can unequivocally say that I like Canada's system better. Do we get that with this bill? No. Not even close, but in my opinion, there are some good things in there.

But just because I think that does not mean I'm smarter, stronger or better than you. I have my opinions, experiences, and education behind my statement, but so do you and I'm trying really hard to respect you for that.

Hey, lets just go shooting, shall we?

PS. I'm totally going to go buy a Kel-Tec Su-16B rifle. I've got a serious case of the needs. Maybe I'll sell my SUB-2000 with cool rail to buy it.

A Gun! A Gun!

A gun! You're 43 times more likely to shoot your own family member than a criminal.

This is what I hear from some anti-gun friends of mine. They are utterly convinced that guns are so dangerous that they should all be outlawed.

They're convinced and no amount of data to the contrary will change it. Recently, I've just refused to discuss it and avoid the smarmy air of egoism that comes with it. I've always heard of the liberal superiority complex, and for the first time in my life, I see what they're talking about. She's right, I'm wrong, with a measure of "boy you're stupid" mixed in.

Ugh.

Anyhow today I came across an interesting article that I'm *not* sharing with them. I mean really, why bother with facts when your mind is made up?

Read it here:

http://www.davekopel.com/NRO/2001/The-Fallacy-of-43-to-1.htm

PS. This is one thing that so infuriated them about George Bush - he was stubborn even in his wrongness. LOL. Irony, it isn't just for getting the wrinkles out.

Starbucks

Being mormon, I don't drink coffee.

But I'm sitting in a local Starbucks drinking a Vanilla Creme and eating an overpriced cranberry scone. Why? Because I can. And because I'm supporting them for not caving to The Brady Thugs.

And yes, I have my gun on me. CC'ing of course. I'm not so much for Open Carry.

Last week I was in Southern Utah for some camping/shooting. I drove up from Vegas where I was at a conference and spent 3 days east of St. George camping and shooting on BLM lands. I brought my 9mm Glocks and the 22 conversion kit for my Glock 17. Put over 1000 rounds thru the latter and finally stopped when I had a bizzare issue.

It seems that the 22 shells sometimes don't always go into battery and the Advantage Arms kit sill lets the firing pin (they are still called firing pins on rimfires, no?) impact the cartridge.

Result? A funny boom and a nice hot spray of something or other on my face. Good thing for safety glasses.

The shell blew out just above the rim, a nice bit hole. The bullet did exit the gun, but it was pretty disconcerting, so I stopped shooting the kit until I chat with them. No damage to the gun that I can see.

I have a picture of the shell, so I'll post it.

Other than that, I had a ball. Just me, out in the desert shooting. I built a target stand and shot paper plates all day. Did movement drills, drawing drills, shooting with on-gun lights and flashlights in the hand. I shot and shot and shot.

Turns out, I'm pretty good at drawing and shooting. At 7-15 yards I can it a paper plate 99% of the time. Good enough for me.