by Tom Gaylord, a.k.a. B.B. Pelletier
Before I begin, I want you to know that I’m driving back to Maryland tomorrow to be with by good friend Earl “Mac” McDonald. He left the hospital on Wednesday and will be allowed to stay at home for awhile, and I will be there with him. I’m planning on spending two weeks there, so my blogs will be written on the road. I’m taking a couple things to test, and I will have to dream up some creative ways of filling all the blogs for the next two weeks.
This is a request to you veteran readers to help out the new readers. I know I don’t have to ask you to do this — you already do it, but I want you to know where I am and why I’m not responding as fast as normal. As usual, my wife, Edith, will be monitoring the blog and will help, too.
Today’s report was supposed to be my April Fool’s posting; but when I read it, I didn’t think it was very funny. Apparently, this was something that just had to come out. It read like a Friday blog, so here you go!
Edith showed me a news item about a high school principal who has just suspended all recognition of scholastic achievement. There will be no more valedictorian or salutatorian at her school because of the negative impact it might have on the feelings of those kids who are not recognized. Good for her! Life will start beating up these kids soon enough — there’s no need to begin while they’re still in the tender care of the local school district! And this spirit of generosity has given me cause to reconsider the format and direction of this blog.
For eight years, I’ve been reporting on the performance of various airguns without hesitation. If a certain gun could not shoot a group, I showed that in pictures for everyone to see. If a trigger was heavy or stiff, I reported it and even posted the results of a trigger-pull scale test. Well, no more!
No longer will I hold up the results of my testing for all the world to see and compare. No longer will airgun manufacturers be embarrassed by public testing of the products they make. It just isn’t fair.
What I will do from this point forward is make every attempt to find the good points of every gun I test. For example, there are some spring guns that have heavy cocking, stiff and creepy triggers, and mediocre accuracy. In the past, I might have told you about all of that and shown the targets but left out the fact that these same guns have fashionable wood stocks. Or, for those guns with synthetic stocks and barrel jackets, I have come right out and mentioned that, while downplaying their high velocity. No longer.
Even the most inexpensive guns made to sell for the lowest prices have redeeming values. For example, how great is it that you can buy a gun made of real wood and steel for under $30? Nobody cares that the stock has wood putty filling holes from when it was part of a pallet, or that the metal parts look like they were dragged through a gravel pit behind a tractor! I will now call this a “Hunter finish” and tout the fact that you never need to worry what the elements can do — because it’s already been done!
What about those guns that simply fail to function when I test them? In the past, I retired them quietly and either replaced them with other versions of the same gun or I just held my tongue until a reader asked me where Part 3 of the report was. But I won’t do that anymore. Now, I can say these guns will make wonderful projects for those who want to learn how to work on airguns. Or, in some cases, how to design airguns because some of the guns I’ve tested can never work the way they were originally built.
What we have to understand is that all airgun manufacturers are not alike — just as all children do not have the same potential. For example, a manufacturer may be located in a country where the customs dictate that management is always right — no matter what. So, they keep right on building the same guns in the face of gross market rejection. How is that any different from the kids who like to sit at the back of the class and text on their smart phones during class? Why should they be made to suffer when it’s the accepted practice of the day to communicate continuously without having an original thought? These kids didn’t ask to be born at this time. They didn’t ask for a smart phone — well, maybe they did — but they aren’t responsible for having one if their parents think it’s okay. Are they?
People always focus on the downside of things, like all the fast-food establishments that exist in this country. They’re making all of us fat and ruining the national health. But there’s an upside, too. These establishments provide needed jobs for the growing sector of the population that finishes primary education without having learned anything. And, with all the factories moving offshore, where else are they going to get jobs if not in fast food?
Doing more
I’m not going to just stop making negative comments about airguns. I’m going to ask Pyramyd AIR to take the objective specifications off their website, as well. We don’t need to know things like velocity or a gun’s weight. Let them be happy surprises for the customer. We all agree that seeing a gun come out of a box for the first time is a real treat. Why not go all the way and make the entire shooting experience a delightful journey of discovery?
And those silly warnings in the owner’s manuals. What’s up with that? The fact that a certain airgun can be deadly if handled improperly should be information known only to the maker and to any owner who operates it in that manner. The rest of us don’t need to know.
I can hear the negative comments right now, “Don’t stop telling us about the results of testing these airguns. How will we know which one to choose if we don’t know how any of them perform?”
One way would be to buy them and try them out for yourselves. As I’ve pointed out many times, everyone’s tastes are subjective, so how am I to know what’s best for you? Maybe your opinion of what is accurate differs from mine; and by telling you what I think, I’m inadvertently preventing you from acquiring a gun that would be satisfactory.
What will I write about?
Maybe you think if I stop reporting test results I’ll have nothing to say. Not so! I’ve studied the network media and have determined that if I simply repeat what the manufacturer says about his products there’s an endless supply of material. Besides, there are hundreds of news shows that don’t say anything new, true or informative, yet they make millions off sponsors because people are addicted to watching them. It’s a model that seems to work very well for CNN, and I think it might actually grow our blog readership!
In fact, I think I’ll invite the marketing departments of the various manufacturers to become my new guest bloggers. That way, all the middlemen are eliminated, and they can just tell you what they want you to know.
My advice to consumers is to look to the government. They can tell us what works and what doesn’t. Better yet, they can cut right to the chase and just tell us what to do without giving the rationale. They’re already so good at it! Why don’t we just accept the fact that the government knows what’s best for everyone and stop fighting them? Can’t we all just get along?
BB
You deserve a Pulitzer prize for this report, or at least a Peabody. Unfortunately, that might make people that scribble words in a pathetic attempt at language feel bad in that nobody can understand what the hell they are trying to communicate. So everyone gets a pretty green participation ribbon. Suitable for framing. Don’t worry, the government is paying for it all, it will only cost 4 billion $. The CBO states 11 billion, but whatever.
Naysayers might criticize me for this position. But what if somebody that had never held a productive job in their entire life let their aspirations be limited by the cruelness of reality? They might never have run for the US senate. Then after having a habit of voting “present” on bills and serving no full terms in the US senate, run for US President and win? Who looks foolish now?
While we are at it, maybe the Nobel prize should be abolished. On second thought, the committee has seen fit to nominate luminaries such as Joseph Stalin and General Molotov, as well as awarding Woodrow Wilson (he kept us out of the war), Le Duc Tho (lasting peace in Vietnam), Yasser Arafat (lasting peace in middle east), Jimmy Carter (lasting peace in Korean pininsula), Al Gore (?) and … Barack Obama (?!) Bill Clinton must be fuming. On the other hand they have rightly ignored the accomplishments of show offs Mahatma Gandhi, and the creator of the Periodic Table, Dmitri Mendeleev. So I guess it is a wash.
Ooops,
I forgot Nicola Tesla. But so did the Nobel committee. Rightly so, what did he ever do? Pioneer AC current, and wireless energy transmission? Who’s ever heard of that?
SL,
I will give you just 2 hours to stop! 😀
B.B.
I thought I read somewhere that Mendeleev was a little high-strung. When someone criticized his periodic table and claimed that it was wrong, he committed suicide in despair and did not live to see himself proved right. Not sure if this is true. All the more proof that one needs to be able to take criticism.
Matt61
Mendeleev attempted suicide unsuccessfully as a young man and threatened it during his frequent periods of depression, but he died in the influenza epidemic of the early 20th century as an old man.
Michael
Well… I actually agree with you in a lot of instances BB – especially texting in the back of the room, which I fortunately am too old to remember, cell-phones only came out when I was already in university…. took over by the time I left though…
Then I remember the really crappy school system I came from, which only rewarded a few sports and a few very narrow definitions of academic success. That measured performance in only one way and left behind (they almost without exception barely made it through a year or failed) the two people who scored the best in traditional IQ and aptitude tests in that school. I also remember the varsity class where the prof.s tried to teach us to think in the class instead of just parroting after the course notes, but the people who scored best in class were the ones who had timetable clashes and could only read the previous year’s course notes and the textbook, and they were by far not the people who were most interested in the course, as it was just a filler class for them.
So yes, I agree with your notion, and if that is the actual reason the principal gave, that is a very poor reason. I have just seen the other side of the performance measurement as it currently stands or stood when I was around, and it is broken for everybody but the “average” or “norm”.
If a school system can’t find what a child is good at, or teach a child to perform as best as he can, be it technical, artistic, academic, intuition, social skills – that system – and I have to add the parenting – is perhaps lacking. As a corrolary – you worked hard to make the Fusion, IZH, Hatsan, HW97 etc. shoot properly and sometimes they didn’t work for you sometimes it panned out well in the end. School needs to do the same, but it is not set up for that around the periphery.
My child is now in an alternative type school, because he is quite bright and would be bored stiff in a school like I went to and would rebel against the rules that measure performance in terms of how long a little boy can sit still. He is free to advance as quickly as he wants, a three year old building puzzles at the pace he is doing it is quite startling, and be friends with people his own age, I had to skip a class and was socially quite uneasy.
BB, I’m not much of a drinker but I can’t help but wonder if tonight might be a good night for a nightcap. Perhaps a cherry crdial or a vat of Scotch. Beacase, while I ‘m sure it’s not easy to do. I like YOUR blog the way it is! Hang in there friend.
I am currently rereading the Ashes series by William W. Johnstone because the story is such a close
parallel to our current political climate.I’m reading it in part because I need the reassurance that I’m
not totally alone in my views of this insanity.I’m also reading it in the hopes that there are people like the hero’s in this story who won’t sit back and do nothing when everything is taken from them.
Apathy seems to be the order of the day when certain elements of our society feel it’s their right
to tell all of us how to think,who to like and decide what morals,if any,we should possess.
The tone of the blog today brought this home to me in a strong way and I thank you for putting it in
words and getting it out there for anyone to see.I find this blog to be a haven of like minded people for me and without this and one or two other forums I would feel completely isolated.
The majority’s seeming lack of response to things I find frightening(The vote to accept the U.N. Arms treaty for example) is mind boggling to me.
I really want to thank you Tom and Edith and Josh and all the fine folks at PyramydAir for providing a place where we can learn more about things we are passionate about.I also thank you for making it a place where we can offer an opinion without being referred to as: gun nuts ,repubtards,baby killers etc…
I found a home here many years ago and hope to still be enjoying the people,products and stories here for years to come.
Thank you,
Joe
P.S. This should have been said first and I apologize for not doing so:
All my best wishes for Mac and hopes for a full recovery!
It is about time! I have always thought that many fine airguns were being unfairly held back! It’s not their fault they can’t shoot! Whether they are Springer or PCP or Pumper, they should all have the same opportunity to hit a gnat in the eye at one thousand yards. To point out that they are incapable of doing such is cruel and injust. They should all be treated equally. I have a mind to contact the ACLU.
Have a safe journey and say hi to Mac for me!
My thoughts and prayers are with Mac.
…..And leave out the pictures of all of those naked guns! Or at least cover them up. The other guns might feel inadequate and feel the need to buy beauty products before they’ve fully bloomed in their own right….
/Dave
Very well done BB. Perhaps you can get the government to help with airgun tests. I’m sure the guns would be so safe that they couldn’t be fired. Just like them!
Mike
You REALLY don’t want the government involved. Trust me.
Safe ? That’s a joke ! They would all be defective and dangerous by the time they got done with it. And built by the lowest bidder.
twotalon
Oh yes. My comments about gov’t. help was in jest. 🙂
Mike
If the government got involved in testing airguns you just might see an airgun ban and the liberals calling things like the condor assault rifles because they are black and have features of their definition of an assault rifle. Some of the new offerings from Crosman would certainly be banned for their tactical appearance as well. Never mind most of them are .177 and single shot. They have pistol grips and look like assault rifles.
BB,
Have a safe trip. I am praying for Mac and his family. I know Mac was there for you awhile back and it is great that you can be there for him too. I hope the right doctor figures things out and that Mac can recover in the fashion that you did.
Edith, good luck herding the cats while Tom is gone! Call or e-mail me if you need help with anything while Tom is gone. I am only about an hour away.
David Enoch
David,
Thanks for the offer. When things get out of hand with the cats, I throw a catnip party. The cats eventually pass out on the living room floor, and the house is quiet and peaceful again 🙂
Edith
Best wishes for Mac, and for a safe journey to our wonderful state of Maryland.
We’re very proud of our state legislature and hunky-dory Guvno’r for recently passing some of the most restrictive firearms laws in the country. [endsarcasm]
On a good note, the weather is promising for this weekend and hopefully I’ll be out in my backyard in the western part of the state (we’ve seriously considering seceding from the state, and joining with the eastern panhandle of WV) shooting out the collected winter’s dust from my favorite airguns.
B.B. and Edith, thank you for the many, many mornings in the wee hours here in California with my first mug of coffee to help me start the day off on always the right foot. Like all of us here,I feel, a respected source of truthful discovery and opinion is always welcomed in these most dire times.
Give Mac all our best and a speedy recovery.
Pete Hallock
Santa Maria, CA
This hits close to home.
Recently a very well respected and liked (by his students) high school teacher in my city was fired by the school board for disagreeing with their newly instituted policy.
NO ZEROS!!
Even if a student doesn’t hand in an assignment…or fails to show up for an exam teachers are not supposed to give out zeros because…it may cause the student undue stress!!
They were to be given the lowest possible mark…40% (which is a bare pass up here).
Passed for not doing an assignment!!!
This new policy was being tried at a select number of high schools and this teacher wouldn’t follow the rules and handed out zeros.
The media storm that followed was quite impressive. No parents could be found who agreed with the policy and surprisingly the vast majority of students came to his defense and told the school board that this would in no way prepare them for the work force or university.
Well…the proposal has been put on hold.
Unfortunately the teacher was still let go because the board says he is guilty of ‘insubordination’. (another school board hired him immediately…their win, our loss).
I’d like to know who comes up with these hairbrained ideas.
So if I don’t do the assignment on time and don’t hand it in late, either, I’m pretty sure that puts me up to 80%. Mom, I’m going to Harvard Law!!
The people responsible for this kind of regulations are probably the same ones who think work is spending an afternoon talking about when the next meeting should be held and what the name of their task force should be.
This is ridiculous when this end and if the school system is like that how will our kids learn anything in school? This crap is giving me home school ideas.
J-F
J-F,
Over the years, I’ve worked with young people who were raised and/or educated in an environment where survival of the fittest was condemned as discrimination against those who would not be able to compete in a level playing field. It’s like working with spoiled brats.
I was a personnel director for a number of years and have also been in managerial positions where I had to interview prospective employees. Entitlements aren’t limited to gov’t handouts.
It’s amazing how many people think society owes them a chance even though they repeatedly demonstrate they’re incapable or incompetent. What’s worse is when these people are promoted to managerial positions and hire more people like themselves. The incompetent leading the incompetent.
I think this is one of the reasons so many businesses are experiencing a downturn. When money pours down from the heavens because the economy is robust, even an incompetent person can make money. But when things get a little tough, only those who are smart and know how to work smart will survive.
Edith
I think what I find the most amasing is these people not realizing they’re incompetent (or maybe the level of their incompetence?).
I’m not dumb, I know there is some stuff I’m good at and some other stuff at which I suck, if I need something at which I suck done I’m not gonna hire someone who suck at it as much as I do to do it!
But you also have those incompetent, that KNOW they’re not good at something and will surround themselves with people who can get the job done and they will sometimes listen to what they’re told and will suceed because of those working with/for them.
J-F
Edith,
We certainly saw major incompetents benefit from money raining down from the Heavens about 6 years ago. Unfortunately, Wall Street, Banking, and even the Federal Reserve got what they didn’t deserve because they are the ones who benefited by the “Gold Rule”, namely, those with the gold, make the rules.
But there are many forms of “entitlement”, including executives who produce nothing, and yet expect to be rewarded 100 times more than those who actually do the work.
I’ve never worked in government, but I got really close – I worked in defense for many years. I found it very easy to do well in defense because there was very little competition. On some projects real work didn’t happen for over half a year at a time, so many got paid to do virtually nothing, and when it did all you heard was grumbling and crying. I learned that for a lot (definitely not all), the defense industry is a form of welfare. For those of us who were making the most of the opportunity, it was a wonderful and enriching experience, but for the vast majority, it was almost a retire in place kind of job.
My wife handles all legal issues for her company, along with company lawyers. She deals directly with the courts and with the lawyers. Every week she sees laziness and incompetents on both sides. In fact, while she doesn’t have a law degree, she has actually acted as council and won in court several times. One time she represented a personal friend and beat a professional lawyer.
In my own professional experience, I have witnessed grossly incompetent executives who acted as if it was all about them, even though they were more of an impediment to the companies success than a help, they felt “entitled” to more money than those who actually kept the company floating. They simply felt that a having a title was enough for “entitlement”.
And of course, I’ve probably said more than enough about doctors. I just think that there is probably an equal amount of incompetence and sense of entitlement to go around with people of all stripes.
Victor
Here’s a good one that fits the topic pretty well:
My boss pulled up in his brand new luxury sedan today and I couldn’t help but admire it.
“Nice car,” I said as he got out.
“Well,” he said, noticing my admiring looks, “Work harder, put the hours in, and I’ll have an even better one next year.”
J-F
J-F,
I had a newly promoted boss find out that I made a lot more than him, and suddenly every day my salary became an issue with him, usually starting with some other made up issue. Difference between me and him as that, when the owner hired me the company was on the verge of going out of business because their product was obsolete, and I turned that around in a big way. I was specifically hired to do this because they knew me. My newly promoted boss was a contributing factor to the companies history of failure. I had been asked to be the manager (VP/CTO), but turned it down because I didn’t want to relocate. My new boss was one of those who believed that having a title entitled him to suddenly make more than all employees under them.
My best boss ever drove an old shabby looking car, parked at the far end of the parking lot, had super high standards, but never imposed his standards on any of his employees. However, he was excellent at getting his employees at performing beyond even their own expectations. According to him, his job was purely to make sure that his employees had everything and anything that they needed to do their job as best as possible. He never held a status meeting, but would randomly hold informal chit-chat’s, never making you feel as if you were even being managed. He had the capacity to have faith in his employees, but he also had teeth. He would fire anyone who demonstrated a bad attitude, laziness, or incompetence. But that was rarely an issue for him because he was also a master at hiring good people. I learned so much from that boss, and a lot of insights that I’ve never seen since.
The jerk boss that mentioned was a liar, purely political, had no integrity, and always made you feel the weight of his micro-management. He had no faith in his employees, and made us feel unnecessary stress even subconsciously. He was VERY ambitious.
Victor
The best boss I had was at one of my first jobs, a summer job when I was in school, you can imagine the deception when as I grew older I realized those great bosses where few and far between.
J-F
Edith,
Not saying the old system was completely unfair, but I am sure you have heard of the experiment where they gave teachers papers to grade that were identical except for the names on them. Some consistently out scored other . For example a name like James Thomas Newpenny would always do better than Jim Bob Gump. I know for a fact that the co captain of the football team use to get better grades for my work than I did, but at least I got paid well.
Shaky,
A very famous experiment was done in 1968 by teacher Jane Elliott in which she demonstrated first hand experience with prejudice to her class of all white students by convincing them that people of a certain eye color were superior to those with another eye color. She did this in an all white area. This was famously known as “The Eye of the Storm”. The results were both shocking and yet predictable.
The current ongoing “experiment” today, based on equally false beliefs, is that of the common practice of racism towards blacks, and to a definite but lessor extent, Mexicans and other groups. Of course, many find it oh so very easy to justify their racism because they have “statistics” to back up their claims. Of course, they conveniently choose to never actually consider how easy it is to skew how the data is generated and thus arrive at their convenient conclusion.
Years ago a study was done on the relationship between race and how crimes were prosecuted. For this study a single crime, cocaine possession, was used to examine the difference. In Los Angeles, a
black man was prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, meaning jail time, 90+% of the time, while in Irvine (almost entirely white at that time), a white person arrested for the exact same crime, was shown pity and directed to seek help 90+% of the time, never seeing the inside of a prison.
The same goes for other less serious crimes, like underage drinking. Teenagers of color are some 70% of time more likely to be pulled over and have their care searched. What I find troubling is that so many racist in America also claim to be “Christian”. I don’t know how one can so easily dismiss their hatred of others solely on the basis of race.
I spent a couple years at a certain military base, and I often would hear people around me talk about two things; money, and how minorities (especially blacks) were taking away their money by way of welfare. Often times the comments were simply petty, like why do those people dress like they do, or why can’t they understand that they look …
So one day I decided to ask one person in particular who did this every morning, why aren’t you rich? I told him that he seemed obsessed with money, so why isn’t he rich? He looked at me completely puzzled. I answered for him, telling him, you aren’t rich because you don’t have enough belief in yourself. I told him, you are healthy, educated, reasonable smart, your white, tall, not ugly, etc. Then I asked, how would you feel if your parents grew up in the 50’s and 60’s having lived the “black experience” (that should be obvious) with their very negative, and yet VERY REAL view of reality. What kind of influence do you think your parents would have on you? Furthermore, can you imagine what it’s like not being able to hide your skin color, and yet having to go out in the world every day, experiencing prejudice so often that it somewhat hardens and frustrates you into simply either not caring, or just giving up that America is a place where you’re ever going to be given a fair shake?
The Eye of the Storm demonstrates not only the effects of prejudice and racism, but also how fragile real character can be. Jesus said, “As you treat the lessor of your brother, you treat Me.”.
Victor
Victor,
Remember how the Soviet-bloc used to rate their ice skaters and other Olympic athletes much higher than those from the U.S. and other non-communist countries? I thought it would be so much better if we simply used silhouettes of skaters and not allow the judges to see the actual skaters. This might make for a fairer grading system.
We could do the same with our legal system: Put all defendants behind a screen, give them pseudonyms and modulate their voices so you can’t hear anything but a monotone answer (erasing all accents and jargon that would ordinarily sway a juror). Would we see a more equal sentencing system than we currently do? Maybe.
Edith
Edith,
If only people could change their attitudes like stopping and turning on a dime. In America, after almost 200 years of institutionalized (legalized) racism, which included many dehumanizing and demoralizing forms of treatment of blacks, we still expect that they would all just suddenly “act right, like the rest of us” the instant they got civil rights. Efforts like Affirmative Action, which didn’t really start to take effect until the late 70’s were suddenly diminished by the early 80’s because it was “discriminatory and racist”. And yet whites benefited from another form of “Affirmative Action” for almost 200 years.
I was blessed to grow up entirely among the poorest of the poor, including several poor areas; one almost all black, one predominantly Mexican, and one almost exclusive all white. While it was definitely easier for whites to break out of their environment, they didn’t exactly do it in huge numbers. Poverty often begets poverty, no matter the race, but it ain’t so easy when you’re black. That’s a fact!
The biggest issue that I see is the simple fact that too many seem to work extra hard to justify continued racism. They resort to “statistics” while always conveniently ignoring the big question of WHY. The Eye of the Storm just scratches the surface. There by the grace of God go I.
Victor
Amen.
Edith,
One of my all time favorite songs from the 70’s is “Walk A Mile In My Shoes”, by Joe South.
——————————————————————————–
If I could be you, if you could be me for just one hour
If we could find a way to get inside each other’s mind, mh
If you could see you through my eyes instead of your ego
I believe you’d be surprised to see that you’ve been blind, mh
Walk a mile in my shoes, walk a mile in my shoes
Hey, before you abuse, criticize and accuse
Walk a mile in my shoes
Now your whole world you see around you is just a reflection
And the law of common says you’re gonna reap just what you sow
So unless you’ve lived a life of total perfection
You’d better be careful of every stone that you should throw – yeh-heh
And yet we spend the day throwin’ stones at one another
‘Cause I don’t think or wear my hair the same way you do, mh
Well, I may be common people but I’m your brother
And when you strike out you’re tryin’ to hurt me it’s hurtin’ you
Lord, have mercy
Walk a mile in my shoes, walk a mile in my shoes
Babe, before you abuse, criticize and accuse
Walk a mile in my shoes
And there are people on reservations and out in the ghettos
And brother, there, but for the grace of God, go you and I, yeh-heh
And if I only had wings of a little angel, well
Don’t you know, I’d fly to the top of a mountain and then I’d cry
Walk a mile in my shoes, walk a mile in my shoes
Babe, before you abuse, criticize and accuse
Better walk a mile in my shoes
Try before what you’re doing
Walk a mile in my shoes, walk a mile in my shoes
Oh, before you abuse, criticize and accuse
Walk a mile in my shoes…
——————————————————————————–
Victor
Victor,
I remember reading about the blue vs. brown eye experiment. What I have always wondered about was the lack of empathy by those who have been discriminated against for others who they in turn discriminate against. I have sat at lunch with a group of blacks and heard some pretty bad thing about the Puerto Ricans and Jamaicans moving into their neighborhoods. Where I grew up the teachers did not expect to much out of the kid from blue collar families, and they usually got what they expected .
Religious discrimination and persecution is also something I have a hard time understanding. How do people say one thing and do another? If they really believe.
Shaky,
Unless taught well, people resort to all kinds of counter-productive behavior, including forwarding the very thing that they despise. Kind of like people who grow up in abusive environments passing that on to their kids. Abuse begets abuse, and so it becomes a vicious cycle. What’s really sad is that worst of the worst are often people who discriminate against their own. I had black friends in college who talked about the worst cops that they knew being black. The exact same thing for Mexicans. I once mentioned these things to a historian, and she told me that during the Roman expansion, the harshest agents of the Roman empire where people from conquered areas. They would turn on their own in the worse way. My sister was taking a graduate course at UCLA and told me the same thing. I think it’s a form of cowardice (fear), where those who hate being discriminated against, try to gain acceptance by doing it to others. This reminds me of people with difficult personalities. People with difficult personalities do what they think works for them. Trouble is, they are usually the last ones to realize that what they are doing isn’t working.
Fear is like a disease, fear is a weapon, and fear is a tool. The saddest thing about humanity is that so many of our “leaders” exploit the one thing that continues to reduce our collective consciousness. You would think that at this day and age, that mankind would evolve beyond the need to use fear, but it really hasn’t. But this will continue because of the ego and worldly desires. That’s the bottom line.
It’s the difference between power and force. Force requires justification, while power is about absolute truth, and require no justification. The egotistical, self-serving, man must justify his actions. The truly spiritual man understands what is self-evident and true, without having to convince anyone of anything. If only we really could all love our brothers as we love ourselves.
Victor
shaky,
Don’t get me started on teachers. I’ve had some of the worst, most vindictive teachers on the planet whose only purpose in life was to see how many lives they could mess up. Most of them were in New Jersey. No kidding.
Edith
Edith,
I know exactly the kind of teacher you are talking about. When my son was taking Calculus in high school, he was struggling with his math teacher (not necessarily the material), which really puzzled me because I knew that he really knew his stuff. So I scheduled a teachers conference with her to go over specifics. I was stunned at how petty and vindictive she was. Even worse, she had “justification” for being such a mean-spirited and rotten person (let alone teacher). After I pointed out a couple of examples in which she seemed to be purposely vague and confusing in exam questions, she replied by telling me that her high school and college instructors effectively “beat them up”, so now it’s her turn.
When I was in high school I had an equally idiotic math teacher, who I believe was a Nazi. This was back in the mid-70’s, and he was at least 60 years old, but always wore a crew-cut, combat boots, and damn-near goose-stepped around. Anyways, on the first day of class with this guy, he split the glass up into two groups; the group who sat in the front side of the room were called “geniuses”, and the group that he put in the back were called “the dummies”. There weren’t many non-whites in any of my schools, but for sure if you weren’t white, you sat at the back and were labeled, and thus treated as a “dummy”. Others deemed “less desirable” were boys with long hair, or some other vague qualification. He was abusive towards the “dummies” and never really bothered to teach them anything. In truth, he really didn’t teach much, but he sure bought his rigid, wanna-be militaristic, attitude to class.
I was one of the “dummies” who should have failed his class, but was passed just so that I could graduate and be disposed of. Well, as God’s plan would have it, I ended up majoring in “pure” mathematics, despite being labeled a “dummy”. Within a couple years of college, realizing that I had somewhat of a calling, I decided that I would become a teacher.
About my junior year in college, I went back to talk to this pathetic example of an educator to talk to him about his atrocious attitudes, and treatment half of his students. I asked him if he realized the harm and evil that he was doing? (The concept of evil was very clear to me because my original plan was to become a priest after high school. I sort of stumbled upon the math thing.) Anyways, this person simply dismissed himself and said that he new his “retirement was coming soon enough, so what do I care?”. I happened to catch him months before he finally retired.
In truth, because I lived in a very poor area, our high school really didn’t have competent math instructors. The typical, almost exclusive, career path offered by our high school was either the military or maybe a job in one of the local warehouses, which we had a lot of. IF someone was ambitious enough to want to take something beyond algebra, the district would provide transportation to another school. Our teachers weren’t even qualified to teach something like trigonometry.
I also worked in education back in the late 70’s, early 80’s, where I learned some eye-opening, jaw-dropping, things about school districts. Obviously, they are not all made equal, but the extent in which they implement control over whole communities is downright obscene. Two districts, just a few miles apart, can have entirely different Charters! In a less affluent area the charter might read “To create citizens who are obedient, follow leaders, take direction, behave” (paraphrasing, of course). In a more affluent area the charter will read something like “To prepare and direct students towards higher education, to create independent thinkers, and leaders”, etc.. So anyone who thinks that all things are equal simply doesn’t have a clue. To break out of a certain cycle, you need a little luck, or a lot more effort. It’s knowing what I know, and experiencing what I’ve experienced that makes me very sensitive to these issues.
Victor
Wow. There’s a lot of anger, resentment, apprehension, suppressed fear, and emotional scars showing on this blog today. Yes, I had some tough times in school, sometimes because of, not despite, a teacher. Growing up is tough, period.
But I’ve probably had more than 300 different teachers over the years. Grade school, junior high, high school, college, grad school, and just-for-fun classes. Plus, as a teacher myself for the past 25 years, the son of a man who taught U.S. history for 30 years, the grandson of a man who taught U.S. history for 32 years, and the son and grandson of women who were teachers by training, I have personally known hundreds of other teachers as colleagues, friends, and relatives.
I would say that probably fewer than five percent of all of those hundreds, perhaps even thousands of teachers I’ve known were incompetent, lazy, cruel, or any combination of the three. On the other hand, I would surmise at least 10 percent were extraordinarily talented, caring, energetic, and/or effective in the classroom and made a positive difference in thousands of lives over their careers.
I consider Tom Gaylord to be such a teacher. I have learned more from him by reading this blog over the past years than I could ever quantify or express the extent to which it has enriched my life.
The other 85 or so percent of teachers I’ve known, I believe, are merely competent, and they are hardworking, honest, underpaid, under-appreciated, frequently unjustly vilified folks who are simply trying to do their difficult jobs as best they can, raise their families, and get through life. They are not outstanding, nor are they ineffective.
God bless them all, even those few who are bad teachers. It must be damned tough and unhappy to be them.
Michael
Michael,
Actually, I believe that I was extremely blessed with lots of great teachers, and I’ve mentioned them from time to time. They include coaches, college professors, priests, and bosses. As I’ve mentioned before, they taught me how to be winner. That is something that no one can take away from you.
Victor
Victor,
I’m not talking about school districts and policies. I’m talking about people teaching kids. Kids are vulnerable and told to obey their teachers, their teachers are smart and their teachers know what’s best. That’s how we viewed education when I was in school in the 1950s & 1960s.
When a teacher acts poorly, discriminates against a student, is overtly vindictive or makes remarks that affect a student for years (or most of their life), then it doesn’t matter how many good teachers you have because they often don’t have a countereffect.
If you nurture your garden 5 days a week but pour antifreeze or bleach on it 2 days a week, do you consider yourself a good gardener? I doubt it. And there will be a lasting effect of those 2 days a week.
Likewise, if you have 30 good teachers and 5 bad ones that are destructive and actually affect how the good teachers view you, then you have my attitude. It took me decades to overcome the damage they did…and it’s still not 100% gone.
Edith
Edith,
Unfortunately, the schools I went to were pretty bad. In fact, they were so bad that later in college I would speak to a researcher in education who was able to identify my area as one that didn’t even quality to be ranked, they were so bad. She referred to schools like the ones I went to as “baby sitting outfits, at best”. Again, our teachers weren’t even qualified to teach anything beyond basic algebra, and except for one, all of the math teachers didn’t even have math degrees.
So here’s how I saw that situation, where unqualified teachers for forced to teach math. Because they weren’t qualified, they were very uncomfortable teaching what they didn’t now themselves. That made them very short with the students because they could barely stand being in the class themselves. In some cases, they would put on airs to project superiority, but that really just came across as arrogance and meanness. Again, I actually decided to get a math degree to become a teacher, just because of my horrible experiences in high school.
They had trouble getting good teachers in our area because no one wanted to teach there. In fact, when they built a new middle school closer to where I lived, they populated the school with bad teachers, including many who had been fired from previous teaching jobs. My mother found that out after she saw me go into a state of depression and wanted to know what the heck was going on, because I’m not the kind of person that is easily affected by others. That one teacher who got to me was fired that same year (again), but also beaten up badly by another parent. He was truly evil. His partner in adjoining room told me that he would see to it that I never made it to high school, and yet I was always a good kid.
So why was I able to look past all of that garbage that I was experiencing? Shooting! I had such a rewarding and enriching experience with my wonderful coaches and shooting league, and all of my really cool peers, that I was able to see the big picture, way beyond my neighborhood. The junior marksmanship program that I participated in had a truly profound affect on me that was life-long.
You see, while I lived and went to schools in a very poor area, all of my shooting peers were rich, and all were college bound at birth. While no one from my area had plans to attend college, at tournaments, I’d hear 12 year olds already talking about which colleges and universities had the best programs in fields like engineering and dentistry. So I actually lived in two entirely different universes, each with their own and distinct realities.
In high school, my teachers and councilors made it clear that I was utterly stupid, but at the range, my coaches were constantly telling me that I was a genius, because I was doing so well. My last year I ranked #1 in the league after a years worth of tournaments, and won 3 state championships. I learned a couple things early on that have carried me throughout my life. One – don’t allow an older person to dictate or define who I am or what MY future holds. Two – never judge yourself according to your failures, but instead judge yourself according to your successes, because they demonstrate your true potential.
Again, my experience with my coaches was so profound, that I learned that I was a true winner PERIOD. Decades later, when my nephew earned his NRA Distinguished Expert award, I was asked to write an article about my experiences. All I could think about was my great coaches, and how mature and strong they were as people, so I wrote the article about them, and in particular, how they were “Men Among Men”. Different from coaches and teachers that I had experienced up through high school, my shooting coaches were all accomplished, so they tended to be very positive, and NEVER derived satisfaction in putting us down. They were the complete opposite of almost everything I had experienced outside of the range. They were constantly building us up, and teaching everyone equally. Being negative or condescending was outside of their reality.
I mentioned awhile back that I once said the word “can’t”, and my rifle coach, a former Marine drill instructor, was all over me. He stood over me yelling, “Don’t you EVER say THAT word again! Can’t NEVER did anything for anyone! If I EVER hear you say the world CAN’T in front of me again I’m going to …”.
I made it a conscious choice to live the rest of my life by the standards imposed by my coaches, and my entire shooting experience. That’s why shooting is so important to me. Again, truly profound and lifelong!
Victor
What an awesome story Victor! How grea is it that you were able to go thru that and still suceeded in such a way.
People who take care of kids have a tremendous influence on them either good or bad that will partly dictate how you will live your life.
Do you mind if I share your story with a few (2 or 3) non-gun people I know? I keep trying to convince them that there is more to guns than the (relative) violence in which they’re sometimes used (self defense and hunting where the objective is to kill what you’re aiming at) and your story would perfecly illustrate what I’m trying to make them understand.
You could be a perfect shooting poster boy 😉
J-F
We encounter so many of them it seems that we have to meet a few.
I had one where I just stopped going to her classes, I took my french classes at home with my mother after school and went to her class only for the exams and had no problem passing that year.
I had another one in trade school that actually made me drop out of school, I just couldn’t stand her (and she couldn’t stand me), she had me suspended because I gave a small kiss to my girlfriend at the time (who I’m still with 15 years later), it wasn’t a lenghty kiss just a “good morning sweety” kiss… suspended but not my girlfriend! Just me… that women was the anti-freeze in my garden 😉
You guys ever heard of the test they did by giving a teacher a smart class but telling the teacher they were dumb and a dumb class to a teacher telling them they were smart? The dumb class grades went up and the smart class grades went down.
Some teachers don’t seem to realize how much of an influence they’re having on kids, they’re like parents, they’re with the students so many hours over a week period at a time where we’re easily influenced. The impact some of them are having will sometimes last a lifetime (just look at the stories we’re sharing here some going back a long time).
It’s soooo nice when you get a good one. Learning becomes easy, you don’t have to study (for me anyways) it all just seem to flow and you remember those for a lifetime too. I’m still in contact with some of them thru Facebook and enjoy seeing kids who they’re still teaching to still loving them.
J-F
J-F,
I have a friend who is a professional executive consultant. Companies hire him to fill in executive roles, typically as CTO (Chief Technology Officer), or VP or engineering. He shared a similar experiment in which the best engineers were managed like the worst, and visa-versa. At the end of the experiment, the best engineers were performing like the average, and the worse were performing better than average. The greatest evil in business is micro-management. That’s a definite path towards mediocrity from everyone.
Victor
J-F,
Please, feel free to share my story. This is why I constantly harp on the fundamentals and technique. Shooting, for me at least, is not just about pulling a trigger. It really is like playing a fine instrument. That’s why I never saw any of my guns as “weapons”. I saw them as fine instruments that provided a way for me to measure my performance, both physically and mentally.
But it takes years, lots of practice, and many lessons, to win. Becoming a winner is a process, just as any other form of success. That’s why I like the saying “Success is not a destination, but a process.”. A person who has gone through the process to succeed can do it all over again, if they had to. No one can take that process (i.e., experience) away from them. One could lose all of the “trappings of success”, but that is only a temporary setback for anyone who’s understood the process they went through to get there.
Victor
Speaking of schools, you ought to see what’s going on in schools as recorded by student cell phones. It’s sort of like the footage of dashcams on Russian cars.
Matt61
Well, it looks like we will all have to learn to read between the lines like we do when reading other magazines that review consumer products. When I wrote for a regional motorcycle magazine that depended on advertising for profitability (as most if not all, magazines and papers do), we could not outright criticize a product. We would list the performance or ergonomics and add a qualifier like “spirited acceleration in the quarter mile” or “race track type ergonomics” for the most uncomfortable of crotch rockets. To do otherwise would be the possible loss of revenue. One former editor of a national magazine I knew through numerous press events told me of their total castigation of a new model from one of the big four Japanese manufacturers. Since the magazine did not accept any advertising (the Consumer Reports of motorcycle mags), the manufacturer refused to invite them to any more press introductions or even send them fleet motorcycles for testing and review! That lasted about 3 years I was told.
Fred DPRoNJ
Fred DPRoNJ,
I have been a subscriber to Motorcycle Consumers News for a lot of years , it is expensive but good.
I believe I have heard that story before ,
Yep, Lee Parks, former editor of MCN was telling Dave Searle that it happened under his watch. Lee is a no nonsense type of person who speaks his mind always. He can get away with it because his delivery somehow avoids an insulting tone. I’ve witnessed him saying incredible things to others who just never took offense. However as we all know, writing doesn’t contain physical or audible cues and can be downright insulting if not carefully done. In that case, the manufacturer in question took shall we say, great umbrage, over the trashing of their bike.
Dave Searle was complaining that one of the big four manufactures (forget which one this time) was threatening to without product for testing and Lee told him not to be concerned and related the story in my presence.
Lee is also the fastest rider I’ve ever tried to keep in sight on the road. Super talented, incredibly fast, impossible for me to stay with him back then. I’m way slower now (and 15 years older).
Fred DPRoNJ
that’s “withold product” not “without product”
Sorry.
FredDPRoNJ
I understand older and slower, old bones break easier and heal slower. I have Lee Parks book Total Control and I know he did teach a riding course . Unfortunately it was in California . I never met him, though I did meet and talk to Fred Rau once at a bike show.
B.B.,
Have a safe trip. Will pray for Mac’s recovery.
Pete
+1
Hi BB,
I recently purchased a .177 Benjamin Marauder. It seems to lose a little bit of air pressure if it’s been sitting for 4 or 5 days. It’s not a lot but I’ve noticed that over a four day period or so, that the pressure gauge needle will drop ever so slightly. I assume that if I were to let it sit for several weeks that it would continue to lose pressure. Is it “normal” to lose pressure over such a short period of time?
Thank you,
Doug
Doug,
It is not normal for a PCP to loose air. But, I have one that does the same thing. To me, it’s not worth messing with to fix it. I know mine is leaking the air at the valve behind the fill fitting. Sometimes you can spray a little dishwater soap and water mix and find bubbles where the air is leaking.
David Enoch
Doug,
Sometimes the leaks are so small the engineers at the factory cannot even find them. I know airgun tuners who put up with small leaks, just because they are too hard to detect.
But, put some silicone chamber oils (only!) in with the next fill. Sometimes that will stop the leak.
B.B.
Hi BB,
I do have silicone chamber oil. It didn’t come with any instructions. Where and how does it go in the Marauder? (We’re talking about silicone chamber oil and not pellgun oil correct?)
Doug
Doug,
Put silicone chamber oil (only) into the male quick disconnect nipple on the gun before filling it. The oil will be blown in.
Don’t use Pellgunoil or anything else, as it is petroleum-based and can explode in the presence of compressed air.
B.B.
Hi BB,
The silicone chamber oil that I have was originally recommended for purchase with my TX200. Where and how does the silicone chamber oil go on a TX200?
Thank you,
Doug
Doug…
A drop or two in the transfer port. Don’t overdo it.
twotalon
Doug,
I would not oil your TX200 until you have at least 10,000 shots through it. I have never oiled mine and it has over 10,000 shots.
When you cock the gun the air transfer port is at the back of the sliding compression chamber. When you push the cocking lever forward, the piston stays back, allowing the chamber to fill with air. That hole is where the oil goes.
B.B.
Reminds me that I need to recheck the “Silhouette” pistol since “pumping in” some chamber oil…
Though based on the looks of the “plastic” around the base of the nipple, I don’t think it is a valve seal that leaks.
Get well soon Mac.
Tom and Edith,
We’re all praying for a quick and complete recovery for your friend Mac.
Regards, Jim H.
Mr. B.B., Ms. Edith & the Gang,
Won’t bore ya w/details, suffice it ta say, again, your timing is as perfect as your shootin’. I REALLY needed this blog & comments today. No amount of 2 wheel/shootin’ therapy was helpin’. Knowin’ I ain’t alone in a f.u.b.a.r. world gives me a big ol’ much needed dose of the warm fuzzies! Thanx ya’ll!
Thoughts & prayers ta Mac Daddy. Come home safe Mr. B.B. & Ms. Edith f.u.b.a.r. doesn’t mean what ya think it does. For today only it means puppies, kitties, walks on the beach, rainbows, group hugs, yummy kool-aid for everybody & underwear that fits good!?! Have a great weekend & shoot/ride safe.
Beaz
So that’s Free Underwear, Brownies, Apple pie and Rainbows for all?
Tom,
There are a lot of prayers being said for Mac. Have a safe trip to and from Maryland and say hi to Mac from all of us.
PS Slinging Lead, You read my mind my brother.
Bruce
I just had to keep reading from morbid curiosity.
Man did you hit a nerve with this one!
My daughter is in school right now and my son will enter school in september. I’ve been arguing with the school for as long as my daugther as been in school (4 years now). I’ve rarely seen in the many places where I’ve worked such a bunch of dummies. There’s rarely consequences to bad actions but everyone must receive a prize wether they do good or not, this is ridiculous, everyone on the soccer team gets a medal or a trophy, win or lose! Why should they put the effort in, they’re getting a trophy anyways!
When I went to trade school to become a locksmith they gave little diplomas to student who worked harder and put more effort in their study, when the 3rd one came the gave one to the worst student in the class,
-trying to drill a whole with the drill in reverse and changing the drill 2 times and bits 3 times because of course he can’t be at fault so it must be drill or the bits fault bad-
so I objected, he had already failed a few exams but had finally passed one. Now this was school for adults, we we’re all grown ups and I don’t think we needed diplomas to tell us if we were doing good or not but it was school policy to give struggling students an effort diploma.
My point was that this dim witted guy would go to an interview with his diploma, what would I look like if I went to the same interview without a diploma? If that dumbass got a diploma and was incompetent how bad are the ones that didn’t get a diploma?
Do you know what they told me when I asked why I didn’t get a diploma?
Because I was good and it was easy for me… now that was true, I didn’t study for any of my exams and it was indeed easy for me but how’s that for rewarding mediocrity?
Some teachers and students agreed with me and some didn’t (the girls in the group… they’re more sensitive) but it was the last diploma handed out for the locksmithing course.
J-F
I’m sorry I got carried away and completly forgot about Mac.
I hope everything turns out OK for him, having friends and family close when you’re not feeling good can sometimes be the best of medicine and if not at least it makes the sickeness a little bit more endurable.
Take care Mac.
J-F
J-F,
Schools are definitely a problem. I count myself as lucky to have gone to school when there were still F’s and 0’s given. I see that some of Thor who got more of those bad grades migrated to the more hands on shop courses and found there way from there. One became a well known custom motor cycle painter, another a mechanic, a carpenter, a nurse, a “not so starving” artist and so on… We had a couple of criminals too, but I think we probably would have had those no matter what system was used. As duskwight suggested, each found his or her own place and did well with their innate talents.
/Dave
“Those”….. Thor had nothing to do with it….
My daughter grade started as letters with a + or -, then they got normal grades and this year they started with + or – colors… when she’s getting a yellow+ my daughter is always trying the “it’s almost green-” line.
J-F
Hm, I wonder if they do the same thing in gunsmith school?
Reminds me of my last workplace. If you couldn’t do anything and complained all the time, it meant that you were trying hard. If you finished your work under the deadline without complaining, it was most suspicious. It meant you were lazy and taking advantage of the people who couldn’t get their work done.
Matt61
B.B.
Reading this 1st of April blog all I could say if that was true – Stop this planet! I’m going off it!
We must appoint some day – 182 or 183 days from 04/01 fnd call it a Wise man’s day. That’s where this article belongs.
What I see in that “don’t hurt anyone’s feelings” or “look for the good sides” policy is sheer stupidity. Man grows against gravity. All the achievements we as a specie ever made are made against great adversities. The whole life teaches us – be the best, or be extinct. If achievement is not celebrated out of fear it may hurt the feelings of somebody too lazy or too dim-witted, then what’s the point in making it? Where would be those strong to help the weak? And what would life say – it doesn’t care about anybody’s feelings.
My point is that blade is made with fire and good beating, so is the man. There must be some resistance to work against – or else nobody’s going to make any progress. One who gives rewards for nothing or one who gives no earned reward are equal in the way like a judge letting a known and guilty criminal go free. If someone is born with brains enough only for a shovel, one must have the shovel or evolve and find advantages inside oneself to use them for his own and others’ good. However this man can be an excellent shovelman, a loving father and a good man. There’s nothing wrong with being not very clever or not very strong – but it’s wrong when people are forced to be like the weakest or the least clever.
I don’t think that most of the people that have one leg shorter than the other would complain about not being allowed to win a marathon – it’s just the state of things. But just look what painters, businessmen, poker players or singers they are. Our society must help people to exploit their advantages, not to suppress them and promote mediocrity.
All right, enough phylosophy, I have my new cylinders pressure-tested @ 100 atm. No sweating, no deforming, no troubles at all. This weekend I’m going to assemble everything and test it with CO2, then to test them on my rifle. Pics to follow.
duskwight
Oh, and I just forgot to say – Buddhists say one who visits friends in need brings oneself a good karma.
Please tell Mac I wish him to keep up and get well soon. Friends are priceless and a friend’s hand in the right moment can be a king’s hand that cures.
duskwight
Well put!
Mike
BB,How long do you think it will be before this spills over into the military?
There is an airgun civil liberties union?I didn’t know that.You see you really can learn something new here every day.(snicker,snicker)
Please do tell Mack about all of us who are thinking of him and wishing him well,and praying for him.It could be like a get well card for him.
As for blog subjects;how about trajectory and how to work with this thing we can’t see and still hit every thing from what’s right in front of us and all the way out to kingdom come?How did you do it before the crae(?)computer? -Tin Can Man-
Tin Can Man,
Trajectories before computers? A interesting subject! Something I can write while on the road.
It’s in the book.
B.B.
BB,
Best wishes for Mack, I hope he has a speedy recovery.
No No No you have to be honest and tell the truth about the gun your testing.Your reviews come to the point of interest.And you address it.There has to be somebody out there to do the job you do B.B. My Dad taught me a lot about shooting and I didn’t even know it at the time.He would tell me straight up what I was doing(mostly wrong om my part always) and what I needed to do to correct the problem.The rest was up to me.I would like to make comments at certain times but to tell you the truth people have very interesting things to say so I listen. I usually try to refrain from making statements on blogs or forums because people tend to have different prospectives about things.You just cant interpret what everybody thinks. Everybody has there personalty and we all have something down inside us that keeps always turning us back to the desire we have or was born with(planes ,trains,cars, boats, guns or family and friends and other things).There needs to be somebody out there that trys to tell the truth about what they see.Weather anybody will admit it or not a person will still pickup and learn something from what they experience,read or see and do.If you are trying to be honest about what you say people will hear it in some way. I will say that most things I read here are positive and informing.And its kind of like the TV series ( Cheers ) Its a place were you can come and be yourself.And just saying. Like the recent articles; The Importance of the Artillery Hold and the April fools article Big Bore Springer’s.I had to say something about the Artillery hold because it is so important to help getting a good group from your rifle.And like B.B. says, maybe vendors and other people do need to be invited (maybe they do read the blogs).If I was a smart company owner I would find some way to know what the people/customers want. Then maybe we we would have the option of owning a big bore springer.The .25 cal’s are cool but man give me a .357,9mm,45 or even a 50 caliber springer,I would still love to try one if it was made.See I still had to bring something up about what I like.Believe me there are things that I don’t like about certain products,but I’m not writing a review either.And the last but most important thing is that it is nice for you B.B. to be able to go spend some time with your buddy.Some people wish they could do that and can’t when those times happen.I personally don’t know you or Mac but sounds like you guys are best buddies.So I hope you have the best time.
Gunfun1,
No worries, mate. This blog was all tongue-in-cheek. I have no intention of stopping what I do.
Welcome to the blog.
B.B.
Come on, B.B.! Stop it some more!
You be sure to let all of our positive feelings, wishes, hopes, and prayers flow through you towards Mac.
Victor
Titus….
Did you get that 97k working yet ??
twotalon
Thanks B.B. And keep up the good work.
Trajectory.Almost like a magicians illusion to the trick they perform.Please write the article B.B.
B.B.,
Over at Pyramyd AIR they show a gun available in .177 and (soon) .22 – it’s called the Benjamin NPS Air Rifle. Part numbers are 32040 for .177 and 32050 for .22.
Do you know anything about this gun? It looks, at least, very similar to the Crosman/Remington NPSS. Even the scope mount is the same, or at least appears to be.
Is this the current incarnation of the U.S.-made NPSS?
Thanks!
Dave
Dave,
I have no idea. Crosman doesn’t tell me those things, and I haven’t heard anything.
B.B.
Best of wishes to Mac. B.B. have some good times out there.
I’m glad you didn’t post this for April 1. It scared the hell out of me. Let’s maintain the spot of sanity in the larger world. I know that B.B. is not a fan of the caveman film Quest for Fire. But there’s a relevant scene where the hero (a real shaggy character) is trying to protect the tribe’s one source of fire (since they don’t know how to make it). They have dropped the darned thing in a swamp while fleeing from enemy cavemen and wolves. So our guy digs down into the depths of the animal skull lamp for the faintest flickering ember and he is just blowing like a son-of-a-gun to keep it alive.
I understand that Carl Jr.’s has one of the highest calorie contents or whatever measures fast food ill-health, but I am very partial to their guacamole bacon burger. I find it stimulates the thinking on many subjects. Also I’ve give you something new in the network news. How about Piers Morgan firing an M2 Browning machine gun and an AR-15 on full auto and at a Texas gunstore no less! I thought he would be taking his life in his hands walking in there, but the owner and employees were very civil in assisting him with the firearms, answering his questions, and making their case.
BG_Farmer interesting about the bull barrel on a springer, but if only the first 10 inches or so of barrel does anything for a springer, I don’t expect that a bull configuration will make much of a difference.
Wulfraed, thanks for your expertise in corporate takeovers to illuminate the business about Browning, Winchester and FN. I seem to recall that after a long profitable relationship, Winchester dumped the ultimate inventor of firearms because he dared to ask for a percentage of his product instead of selling all of the rights. So, he went to Europe and revived FN which was a moribund company. So, that would be the Browning FN connection. Winchester played a role indirectly, but I think their direct relation with the FN brand came later.
My IZH 61 looks to be on the fritz again. Why is it that when springers lose their lubrication, they get phenomenally inaccurate, even at five yards? And it’s not even honking like a goose. Well, Mike Melick should be able to set this right and ensure the IZH 61’s threescore centuries and ten.
john, with your expertise in AKs, what do you take to be the best overall/quality and value on the market (not including your own stuff)? The Arsenal? What about the M10 762?
Matt61
I saw Walmart stock their ammo shelves a few days ago. It was around 8pm, and there were cases of ammo scattered all over the isle floor as the employs were opening them up to place on the shelf. Walmart policy does not allow customers to be anywhere near the ammo, unless it’s what you are specifically buying, so they had everyone stand behind the cash-register island, about 15 feet away. I didn’t wait, but came back the next morning with my son and everything was gone again!
Went to another Walmart and they were out of everything but 270 Win. They guy there told us that they restock ammo in the morning because they found that when they try to stock the evening before that lots of ammo simply disappears (goes unaccounted for).
By the way, all Walmarts seem to always have some 270 Win, even when everything else is sold out.
Victor
Meijer seems to have a good stock of .270, .30-06, and a few other oddities… I think even .30-30 is still on the shelves.
Haven’t seen .17HMR, .17HM2, .22 (short/long/long rifle/magnum), .223Rem/5.56, or .308Win/7.62NATO. Not sure of pistol rounds — pretty sure no 9mm, 10mm, .38Spcl, .357Mag, .40S&W, .45ACP. Probably no .380ACP, .32, or .25…
Wulfraed,
I’ve been to 4 Walmarts, and the only thing that they all had was .270 Win. Usually they were complete out of everything else. I a couple cases they also had some shotgun shells. In one case they also had .306. Completely empty otherwise. But at least now I know when two stores restock. We’ve got a good inventory, would like more 9mm.
Victor
Well. How are things going with you and Mac? Hope good.
Gunfun1,
Things are not that good here. Mac is really ill. I will say more when the diagnosis is conclusive.
B.B.
I usually try not to bring up the religion thing.But I believe and will say another prayer for Mac.And I will also say one for all that have ties to him to help them also.
Gunfun1,
You don’t have to avoid the religion thing here. Many readers share your beliefs, as do Edith and I.
Your prayers are appreciated.
B.B.
Thanks B.B. But let us know whats up when you can.