Gun Training in Nasty Weather

Over on gundigest.com, Dave Morelli has an article in which he advocates gun training in bad weather.

I see nothing in the article with which I disagree. The author isn't advocating going out in crappy weather to learn the fundamentals. He's telling you to get out there in sub-optimal conditions to learn what your gun does -- and what you do -- when it's windy, rainy, or cold.

Based on my own experience in shooting practical rifle matches at my club, operating your gun in extreme weather conditions stresses the shooter in ways not experienced when it's 75 and sunny. If it's humid, lenses (both eye glasses and scope lenses when you accidentally breathe on them) get fogged. If it's snowing ice can form on your gun while you're waiting to shoot, rendering it slippery. When it's hot, your sweat gets in your eyes and on the gun.

Or step in a 10" deep puddle of ice water while your waterproof boots are only 8" high, then go on to finish the stage.

In cold weather your clothing limits your movement and makes working fine controls more difficult.

Get the basics down in good weather. Then go see what happens when it's shitty out.

It was about 12 degrees out when this pic of me was taken back in January.

Under stress you will default to the level of your training. If you train easy, you will fail get life gets hard.

"Technical Glitches." Uh huh.

Unless you were under a rock, you know about the following three things:

1. The Chinese stock market dive.
2. "Technical glitches" grounding all United Airlines flights in the US yesterday.
3. "Technical glitches" causing all trading to be halted for several hours on the New York Stock Exchange yesterday.

On Tuesday, this was tweeted by Anonymous:

Unless the network and system admins at UAL and the NYSE are totally incompetent, they have major redundancy in place to prevent shutdowns like this from happening. There's simply too much money at stake to have single points of failure.

Now, was Anonymous responsible? Perhaps it was someone looking to divert attention from the Chinese stock market meltdown. Whatever really happened I doubt that the powers that be would share the truth, for fear of upsetting the apple cart.

My tinfoil hat feels a bit warm. It would be a good time to revisit your emergency preparations.

9/11

Last year I posted about the 12th anniversary of 9/11, and find that what I wrote one year ago still reflects my feelings. Only now, we’ve gone further down the rabbit hole and are facing a new enemy in the form of ISIS.

Unfortunately, after Obama’s dithering of the past few weeks, and last night’s lackluster call to arms, I fear we are no closer to confronting and repulsing this threat. With our wide open southern border and “leaders” who inspire neither fear nor respect by our foes, it is probably only a matter of time before more major attacks happen on our soil.

A pox on everyone in the White House and Congress.

Bread, Circuses, and Vaginas

Well, it’s now official. The Free Shit Army is in control of this country, and as time goes on its numbers will only grow. It’s only a matter of time before this country is Greece on meth.

Last night’s results pretty much confirmed Romney’s statement that about half the country is more interested in receiving government than in any kind of fiscal responsibility.

We have a government that’s made it too easy to not work, and instead live off the public dole. It used to be that if you couldn’t find work in one part of the country you’d move to where the work is. Moreover, there is no longer any shame in being on the dole. Hell, plenty of people revel in it. Instead, the long term unemployed sit on their bums collecting unemployment, then disability, then welfare, and work that Americans used to do is performed by illegal immigrants grateful to have any chance at a better life.

The election also confirmed that if the Republicans ever want to win a national election, opposition to abortion needs to be dropped from the party’s platform. Dems and the mainstream media masterfully injected the issue into an election that should have been about the economic and foreign policy failures of the Obama administration. But GOP candidates can’t help but offer up juicy sound bites like “legitimate rape” to the MSM when asked about abortion. Most people aren’t political wonks and don’t analyze issues in depth.

If you can shout loud enough at women that Republican men are gonna be all up in their vaginas, the GOP will lose. Like it or not, that drove enough women into voting for big government Democrats to help clinch Obama’s second term.

Likewise, dump the institutional opposition to gay marriage. Why in the hell is this being pushed as a Federal issue to begin with? While gays may be a minority, they are very vocal, over-represented in the media, and have a lot of straight people who agree with them on this issue.

It didn’t help things that the GOP further fucked itself by pandering to Latinos by not enforcing immigration laws. Yeah, Latinos are social conservatives who will vote on those lines. How did that work out?

Compounding all this is a media that with one hand feeds us meaningless pap to distract us from the real issues, and then with the other hand fails to cover the real issues. People are so concerned with bullshit like American Idol that even if they are informed of scandals like Fast and Furious or the Benghazi cover up, they soon lose interest. Forget about justice for our murdered Border Patrol agents, several hundred murdered Mexicans, and the Americans killed in Libya while Obama and his cabinet denied them help in real time.

Welcome to the United Socialist States of America.

Hurricane Sandy Updates

FYI, I will be posting Hurricane Sandy updates via Twitter.

https://twitter.com/davemarkowitz

Waiting for Sandy

Last night over on Survival Preps I put up a post about my last minute preparations for Hurricane Sandy. There's not much more to be done but wait.

Stay safe, people.

Echoes of 1979

History doesn't always repeat itself, but it frequently echoes.

Back when it seemed inevitable that Obama would win the 2008 election, I commented to several people I know that Jimmy Carter, Part II would be a best case scenario. It's looking more like 1979 than ever but even though I think Romney has a decent chance of winning, I don't believe he'll be as good a president as Ronald Reagan.

During the past four years we've seen significant inflation, energy shortages, and a worldwide decrease in national prestige. (Yes, it started under Bush, just like for Carter it started under the previous presidents. But it accelerated under both.)

On top of that we've seen Obama exhibiting weakness towards radical Muslims, and ever worse, outright antipathy towards Israel. At least Carter met with the Israeli prime minister and saved his anti-Israel vitriol until after he left office. Instead, Obama snubbed the Israeli PM at a time when Israel is in far more peril, due to the Iranian nuclear program. If we are serious about preventing a second Holocaust, it must be stopped.

Now, on the anniversary of 9/11, radical Muslims -- probably with ties to Iran -- have attacked two American embassies in Arab countries. This time four Americans are dead, including an ambassador. If you believe that two such attacks in different countries on 9/11 are coincidental, I have a bridge for sale.

Note that the proximate reason the radicals have free reign in Libya and Egypt is American and Western European intervention in the "Arab Spring." Mubarak and Qaddafi were totalitarian scum, but they were secular totalitarian scum, with whom we could deal. As usual, Western attempts at nation building, in the form of regime change, have resulted in outcomes that the proponents didn't foresee because of their rose colored glassed. Now we're dealing with savage religious zealots and the only way we can deal with them is to kill them, or forever be plagued by them.

And what was Obama's response to these attacks on American sovereignty? A "strong condemnation" polluted with an apology, AN APOLOGY!?!, for an American who exercised his First Amendment rights. The US government should never apologize to anyone for allowing an American citizen to voice his opinion, as offensive as it might be.

The film which allegedly precipitated these attacks has been seen by hardly anyone, let alone the savage mobs which carried them out. But the fact that Obama saw the need to apologize for it demonstrates his own anti-American worldview.

Imagine the sorry state this country would have been in had Carter been reelected in 1980. Now imagine what this country will look like in 2016 if Obama gets reelected.

Scary indeed.

"Occupy Philadelphia" Occupies the Comcast Center

Today the "Occupy Philadelphia"commies decided to try to occupy the Comcast Center at 1701 JFK Blvd. in Philadelphia. It's the tallest building in Philly, and probably the largest symbol of "evil greedy corporations" in the city.

A coworker of mine got caught up when they tried to bum rush the building. He's fine but a few of them managed to get in before building security and police blocked the doors.

They are shown in the pics below sitting on the floor up against the glass wall. Police and security are now preventing anyone without an employee ID from entering.

As of 14:00, we can still get out of the building via the underground concourse to Suburban Station, and via the Arch St. exit.

Click the pictures to view them larger.

Oh, by the way, I asked my coworker and he said they smelled pretty bad.

Update at 16:30: Nine protesters were arrested after they were asked to leave but refused.

Edit 11/2/11: Welcome to the many new readers who've come here from Arfcom, Pagunblog.com, and elsewhere! Please take a look around and read awhile.

Dammit

Yesterday I was driving on I-76 when I needed to hit the brakes because some idjit decided to pull into my lane ahead of me.  As I did something felt like it popped and the pedal went almost all the way to the floor.  At first I thought, “Dumb ABS” but then realized something was amiss.  Aside from having to push the brake pedal all the way in, the parking brake now won’t go off.

So after getting the kids off to school I took the truck up to the service station at the end of my street.  I wonder what this is going to cost to fix.

One very nice thing about having a 14 year old vehicle is that I have no car payments.  On the other hand, I had to have some suspension work done on it back in the Fall.  It may be time to start looking for a new set of wheels.

Crap.

ETA at 16:30:

Well, there goes another $1600. It needed a new brake booster, a seal, brake lines to the rear brakes (which required dropping the gas tank), and brake fluid flush.  While the gas tank was off I also had them swap out the fuel pump since it has about 120K on it.

New Home WiFi

This past week and a half has been a real PITA at Chez Markowitz.  All of us, except my younger daughter, came down with some form of sinus/bronchial crud.  I missed two and a half days of work last week, a half day this week, and still have congestion and a cough.  So, when Judith called me up Monday afternoon to let me know she couldn't get online at home, and that one of my UPSes was beeping, I was not too happy.

Something caused one of our breakers to trip.  After getting the UPS back online I found that the SMC 802.11n WiFi router which I've been using as an access point for the past couple of years was dead.  No lights, no nothin'.  So, after getting a bite to eat I took a trip down to Microcenter.

I looked over the various WiFi routers and access points they had on hand and wound up getting a Cisco-Linksys WRT54GL.  I could've gotten it cheaper at Amazon or NewEgg but didn't want to wait several days for it to arrive, since we all use wireless access daily.

I chose the WRT-54GL for a couple of reasons.  First, it has a very good reputation for reliability.  Second, there are several projects which are dedicated to providing open source firmware which extends the box's functionality.  E.g., dd-wrt, OpenWRT, and Tomato.  As explained below I'm using it only as a switch and a WAP for the time being but this might change in the future.  (Note: If you're interested in putting 3rd-party firmware on a Linksys router, make sure you buy the WRT54GL.)

Why an 802.11g router instead of a new 802.11n router?  Even with the 802.11n SMC, I had to keep it in g/n mode, since we have a few g-only devices.  E.g., Judith's iPod Touch, my Droid, and an Apple iBook.  In g/n mode I wasn't seeing any better performance than with it in n-only mode.  Also, I the Linksys's Fast Ethernet ports are not a handicap for my needs, as they are plenty fast to handle my Internet connection.  Internet speed tests give results about the same as before.  We don't do any major file transfer between systems on the LAN.  I just don't need Gig-E now.

One advantage of the SMC box was that you could put it into bridge mode, which disabled the routing functions.  My router is an SMCD3G DOCSIS 3.0 cable modem/gateway, so I don't need the WiFi box to do routing.  The WRT-54GL does not support this, so instead of connecting it to my SMCD3G via the WAN port, it's connected using a LAN port.  The DHCP server is turned off on the Linksys so there's no conflict with the SMC's.

After using the WRT-54GL for a few days it seems like the WiFi signal coverage is a bit more uniform than the dead SMC gave me.  So much for 802.11n as a range extender.  Aside from wireless protocol, antenna design and transmit power play a big role in the range of one's WiFi device.

My home webserver, showebox.davemarkowitz.net, is plugged into the Linksys box.  The web server has the same publicly-routable IP it's always had, while the Linksys has a private IP on the same subnet as the SMC's private LAN interface.  There's no problem with running more than one network on the same wire.

Finally, along with the WiFi router, I bought a new APC UPS Monday night.  My old Back UPS 650 was due for a replacement.  This time I got a 1000 VA APC box, which will provide backup power to shoebox.davemarkowitz.net and the Linksys.  I have another Back UPS 650 powering the SMCD3G, my Arris eMTA, and our cordless phone base unit.  I can wait awhile before I'll need to replace that one.

Grumble, grumble

The weather for the past few days here in the Philadelphia area has been pretty crappy.  Rain, fog, some wind, but not too cold.  This morning as I was driving my daughters to preschool care I passed the bus stopfor the middle schoolers at the end of my street.  There were only about 1/3rd the regular number of kids standing on the corner.   The rest of them were waiting for their parents in their SUVs.

{Curmudgeon}

When I was in junior high I waited out for the bus no matter what the weather was.  In high school I walked to school in the rain or snow.  We had these things called RAINCOATS and UMBRELLAS.  We even had WINTER COATS.  We got to experience being cold and wet.  It made us appreciate being warm and dry.  It also made us more capable of dealing with adverse circumstances.

Nowadays, it's the end of the world if Junior gets wet or has to shiver a bit.  No wonder we're turning into a nation of pussies.

Bah!

{/Curmudgeon}

Remembering September 11, 2001

There really isn't anything I can say this year that I haven't said in past years.  Please just take some time today to remember those we lost eight years ago.

Grumble, Cough, Hack, Spit

Blah.

Saturday evening I started developing a sore throat and thought it was probably due to the huge amount of tree pollen that's been blowing around. Yesterday I woke up with a cough and all day I had a nasty taste in my mouth, which was only ameliorated with some 18 year old Elijah Craig Bourbon, neat.

This morning I woke up with no voice, so I called in sick. Aside from the persistent drip, coughing, and hacking, I feel mostly OK. Hopefully I'll be able to go into work tomorrow. Last Friday I received a couple of DOCSIS 3.0 cable modem gateways for evaluation and I'd like to get working on that.

Edit:

So much for it being allergies. About an hour after I posted this it started getting worse. I definitely have something.

Good News About My Roof

The roofing contractor called me and they'll be out first thing tomorrow.  We're scheduled to have good weather for the next few days so this is a good time to get it fixed.  It'll take quite a load off my mind when it gets squared away.

Whew

Looks like the roof repairs my house needs aren't going to be too bad.  The contractor who came out to look at it yesterday called me today with an estimate: $427.  That's less than the deductable on our homeowner's insurance.  This contractor before previously installed our gutters and soffets, and IIRC the new windows we got in 2005, so I put down a deposit to accept their offer.

Hopefully, their scheduling manager will call me back tomorrow so we can work out when they'll do the job.

Working From Home Today

Today I get to hang out at home and wait for an insurance adjuster to inspect some water damage we have on our roof.  It looks like during one of the recent rainstorms with high winds we had water blow in through our attic fan, soaking the roof decking, which is now delaminating.  We found the damage last Wednesday but today was the first day an adjuster could come out.  I'm just hoping it's covered and we can get a roofer out ASAP.

Since I was going to be home today, we also scheduled an appoint for an exterminator.  We have a contract with a pest control company to come out every six months or so to keep the bugs in check.  The tech who services our account is a great guy and if I'm home during an appointment we always wind up shooting the breeze for a bit.

One thing he mentioned today was that he's seeing a lot more husbands home during his visits.  Not surprising, considering that men have borne the brunt of the job losses in this recession.

Edit: Shit.

According to the adjuster there is an exclusion in our policy for the particular kind of damage we had.  I've called a roofer to come out so I can get an estimate to get it fixed.  Looks like it'll require a sheet of plywood and one or two bundles of shingles.  I am considering having the attic fan removed to prevent a recurrence, but that'll drive up our utility bills during the summer.

CA Judges Order Massive Prisoner Release

In California?  Might want to pick up some extra ammo.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. —  A special panel of federal judges tentatively ruled Monday that California must release tens of thousands of inmates to relieve overcrowding.

...

"There are simply too many prisoners for the existing capacity," they wrote. "Evidence offered at trial was overwhelmingly to the effect that overcrowding is the primary cause of the unconstitutional conditions that have been found to exist in the California prisons."

The three judges suggested a target prison population of between 100,800 and 121,000 inmates — down from the current level of about 158,000. More inmates live in conservation camps, community correctional facilities and private prisons in other states.

The proposed targets would require the state to reduce the prison population by between 36,200 and 57,000 inmates. Attorneys representing inmates had sought a reduction of about 52,000 inmates.

...

Link.

Here's hoping that they pick non-violent offenders to release.  Of course, if we got rid of The War on (Some) Drugs, it's unlikely the prisons would be so overcrowded to begin with.

And this is why we make backups

I keep confidential data on my MacBook Pro inside of a 4GB TrueCrypt volume.  This morning after getting into the office, I launched TrueCrypt, attempted to open the volume, and got a file not found error.

Thinking that I may have accidentally dragged it into a different folder, using Spotlight I ran a search for the volume's name on the entire hard disk.  It's gone, nowhere to be found.

{Insert sinking feeling here.}

I do have a couple backup copies of the file, the oldest dating to no older than Sunday night.   So, while I've lost some data, I haven't lost much.

My backup regimen includes using Time Machine several times a week when I use Rohan at my desk at home, and a file sync every Thursday night using Cronosync.  Time Machine backs up to a LaCie 320 GB FireWire drive, while Cronosync backs up to a 160 GB portable disk from Otherworld Computing.  Periodically, I also copy the TrueCrypt volume to a flash drive that I always keep in my pocket.

I've been considering a fourth, online backup and this may put me over the edge.  I'm leaning towards Amazon's S3 service using Jungledisk.  Both my external hard disks are located at home, which means (a) I cannot access them from work, and (b) I'm SOL if the house burns down.  Online backup means I'll be able to access my files from the office or anywhere with an Internet connection.

Poison Ivy, Again

It's Monday and I'm sitting at home today after a nice weekend away with SWMBO, waiting for my 11:45 AM doctor's appointment.

It seems that sometime last week I either got too near some poison ivy, or brushed against something that was contaminated. I've got a patch of contact dermatitis on the back of my left hand. Since I'm left handed this especially sucks. It's gotten a bit worse each day since Thursday, even though I've been scrubbing the heck out of it with Zanfel. The Zanfel and hydrocortisone ointment is keeping the itching under control but I don't want the rash to spread any further. Time to go get a prednisone shot, and maybe oral prednisone. The last time I had this I put on 13 pounds (~5.9 Kg) from the steroids.

Frack!

Checking In

I haven't been posting much here lately, though I have posted some over at the Survival and Emergency Preparedness Blog. Time to drop in here with some comments. This will be a bit rambling.

Not much interesting on the work front, except that last week I got my biannual CPR/AED refresher training. (I get this training because I am a floor captain.) This time they also included a section on choking. As someone who has personally had the Heimlich maneuver performed on himself (when I was a kid), I thought this was a great idea. I would like to see first aid training added as well.

I had a bit of a nibble for some legal work a couple weeks ago, but the matter apparently got resolved without my intervention.

Last week well and truly sucked. Judith and both the girls got sick. Alexandra had to stay home all week. I was feeling a bit under the weather a couple days, myself. Everyone is feeling much better now, thankfully.

The weekend had its own share of problems. Gory content follows.

While cutting the container off some flowers I was planting out front, I managed to perform an avulsion on my right index finger. I.e., I cut myself and removed all the skin from a spot on top of the last joint of the finger. So I now have a 1/4" hole where I can see what's supposed to be covered by skin. This was the result of getting careless with a very sharp knife, a Victorinox Explorer Swiss Army Knife I picked up last month, on which I had touched up the already sharp blade with a Spyderco Sharpmaker. I felt just a bit a pressure as it sliced through -- no pain. It's a very clean cut and no dirt got in it. Any dirt that might have gotten into it would probably have been flushed out by the copious amounts of blood, anyway.

I stopped the bleeding with pressure and elevation, and kept it bandaged with gauze pads for a day and half until I felt comfortable covering it with just a Band Aid. For the first couple days I cleaned the wound and surrounding skin with a benzalkonium chloride antiseptic towelette each time I changed the dressing. I also put triple antibiotic ointment on the Band Aid before I wrap it around my finger. I let the wound air for awhile each day and it appears to be healing. So far there are no signs of infection, and it doesn't hurt unless I apply pressure to the wound. I haven't done anything this stupid with a knife in about 25 years. At least I'll get a nifty new scar out of the experience. ;)

Sunday I was supposed to get together with a friend from TRP to do some shooting, which would've been very therapeutic. I wanted to wring out my stainless Ruger Mini-14GB, on which I've replaced the rear sight and put it back into the factory stock. I also wanted to try a 1944 Underwood M1 Carbine and a Polish TT-33 Tokarev pistol, both of which I bought last year but have yet to fire. Unfortunately, when we got to the range we discovered that it was closed until 13:00 due to an archery event that was being held. Insert pic of banging head against wall here.

Monday night I had to clean corrosion from the battery terminals on my truck, because I had a few incidents when it wouldn't start until I jiggled the negative cable. Not a big deal and it gave me a chance to get my hands dirty. ;) To protect my finger with the cut, I bought a box of finger cots. These look like extra-small sized rubbers, and go over a bandaged finger to keep it clean and dry. I'm using them when I shower, do dishes, or anything else which might result in contamination of the wound. For a few bucks, they are an excellent addition to one's home first aid kit. In an emergency you can use duct tape over the bandage, but the finger cots are much more convenient.

This coming weekend we'll be driving down to my uncle's in Arlington, VA for Passover. We're planning to take the truck, in which I had a new Yaesu FT-7800R ham rig installed a couple weeks ago. I am using the same Diamond MR77 mag mount antenna I used with my VX-5RS handy talkie, but the difference in Rx between the two radios is dramatic. As expected, the FT-7800R is a much better receiver, and the controls are much easier to use. I have it programmed with about 230 repeaters located in PA. I've created a repeater list for the trip to VA and need to get that uploaded before Saturday.