All in the Family featured the curmudgeonly Archie Bunker. Archie was television’s most famous grouch, blunt, blustering, straightforward and untouched by the PC crowd. He was the archetype of the conservative male. Michael desprately tried to reeducate him, but he persisted in his breviloquence.



Looking back at the last 40 years, we realize: ARCHIE WAS RIGHT!

4/28/2008

Archie on Democrats

The sound quality is poor, but the point is just as true as it was 30 years ago.

4/26/2008

Reading List

I've found myself wanting to get in on the upcoming book discussion at Vox's. Even though I know that I'd enjoy it, its just not going to happen. My reading list is exhaustive already. I'm reading the equivalent of 12 to 14 books a day as it is. Notice I said equivalent, not 12 to 14 different books.

Here is RJ's Top Ten List:

Goodnight Moon
ABC's
My First Baby Games
Rewards for Little Ones
Wait for Elmo
Red Fish Blue Fish
All Things Bright and Beautiful
A Boy's First Book of Manors
Noah's Crew Came Two by Two
Jonah's Story

These aren't in any particular order. He brings books to daddy and momma and we read them. Some times we read them over and over, and he loves it. My reading list isn't what it used to be, but I love it just the same.

On a slightly related note RJ loves to "play" whatever daddy is playing. This includes reloading (I so wish I would have taken some pictures) and "dishes". I found myself getting mad at him today for messing up the dishes. I was trying to clean up the kitchen and my "helper" was undoing every bit of progress I was making. I gave RJ the "daddy voice" and a stern "no". He walked off, wounded, looking like he wanted to cry. He came back and raised his hands in the pick me up signal. So I did. That was two hours ago. The dishes still aren't done and they won't be, unless he takes a nap. Taking care of the house isn't more important than taking care of the people who live in it.

Right now we're playing "computer". I so wish he'd give up this game, its taking a toll on my printer, and LCD flat screen.

4/21/2008

Who Are You Voting For?

I know its a personal decision and all but who are you voting for this "most important election of our life time"?TM Its an unusually hard decision this year since all the candidates are equally well qualified and posses indistinguishable moral, ethical, economic and policy goals for this country. America is going to Hell in a hand basket and each one of them has the perfect plan to finish the job. Lest you think me too cynical I've come across this little voters guide that will help you navigate the carefully crafted nuances of this election season, and choose the man or women or man of color, that will come closest to matching your political point of view.

Our 2008 Presidential Candidates
From left to right: Obama, McCain, Hillery.

Vote for your favorite stooge.

4/16/2008

Rafting 2008

April is half over and that means that June is just around the corner. We're looking at either the 3rd or 4th weekend in June as our rafting date, and we need to make a decision on what level of crazy, bone crushing, water filling your lungs fun we want to have.

One thought was to do a trip that newbies and experienced rafters could enjoy without making the difficulty level too hard. Then if we have a bunch of hard core rafting lunatics (and we know who we are) we might run a second trip on a different day.

I'm looking for a indication either in the comments or via email, phone etc of who wants to go and what dates they can make it. Regardless of which trip we take, it looks like most of the day long (about 4 to 6 hrs) trips are running a little over $100/person. If we have a large enough group, they normally offer discounts. After we figure out who's going and a date, we can work out the other details.

4/14/2008

Happy Tax Day

I hope each and every one of you is taking the time today to trot down to the post office and mail off that tax check. I hope you managed things in such a way that you kept every last cent you could without having to pay them a penalty for holding on to your money.

Since it's tax day please remember the other duty that good Americans have; go out and buy yourself a new gun today. Just don't take the gun to the post office, they hate competition.

4/07/2008

Working Towards the 1K Goal

I've blogged about my goal of a 1K kill. Today I took a significant step towards making the gaol a reality. The first picture is what a target (32 inches wide by 20 inches tall) looks like to the naked eye at 1039 yards (distance measured with a Swarovski range finder), its inside the little circle at the bottom of the arrow.

Here's the same target using the 12x power on the camera. Props to Bill (and others) for suggesting I buy a Canon PowerShot).

Todays shooting irons were all specialty handguns built on Remington XP actions. I shot a 7mm Dakota, a 6mm-284 and a 6.5mm-284. Optics were mostly by Leupold in various Mark IV configurations and one Schmidt and Bender (I nearly had an orgasm typing that) with a ART reticle. If your wondering about a appropriate belated birthday gift for your host, the PM II with ART would be a good choice. Its this scope (5x25, last scope on the page) with this reticle. The best group of the day was a 13 inch group, using the 7mm Dakota off a bipod on a portable bench. Wind conditions while I shot the group were less than 10 mph and 1/4 quartering value. If it wasn't for that far left shot I would have had a 9in group.

There were lots of dogs out today. I chose not to take a shot at one. There are three reasons for that, the first is I was training for a 1000 yard handgun comp coming up this spring, second I want to take my 1K dog with my gun, and third a spring snow storm blew in while I was shooting, the temp dropped at least 20 degrees and the winds were gusting over 20mph. The dogs went underground, so even if I was tempted there was no opportunity.

4/02/2008

Opening Can of Worms

After spending big bucks on several match grade chambers/barrels for my 45 ACP I'm coming to the conclusion that the match grade chamber, in and of itself, produces no noticeable improvement in accuracy. Now the match grade barrel does seam to improve accuracy once you get out past 25 yards but I have no evidence that the tighter tolerances in the chamber improves performance.

Keep in mind I'm talking about the 45 ACP only. I believe in tight chambers for top notch accuracy in riffles.

Thoughts?