Time

Went on my Fourth(?) Annual "Holy-$&@% am I out of shape" ride today.  This typically involves a loop or two of my favorite chunk of single track down the river a bit.

Things have changed in the last couple years...

I haven't really rode the Island for well over a year.  Not too long before the deployment I dumped my park bike pretty hard and bruised/broke a rib (never bothered getting it checked, just sucked it up... not the best option...) so I didn't get out much before leaving last summer.

The Island is constantly evolving.  I don't think it's an "official" trail of any sort, simply a few miles of track cut into a publicly owned island on the river.  There's a core of riders that keep it clean, and have been slowly building up log stacks and now lengths of boardwalk over some of the wetter places (both better for the environment and a new challenge, notice the narrow width and general unevenness.)  The one pictured above was not the biggest, or longest, or steepest, but you don't see it until you're pretty much on it.

My shoulders still hate me, but I'm just taking that as a sign I need to ride more.

Advice from the trail...

Best way to get these bastards off? If you're unfamiliar, they even stick to skin.

And of course, I just took the socks out of the packaging just before the ride... oops.

Kilt Pin

Still remember how to make stuff. Like a brass kilt pin for next month.

Home

Again.  Vacations never last long enough, even if you give up and spend too much time in the cabin because summer decided to finally show up (90+ temps and 90+% humidity sucks after a month of like 50 and dry...)

(This was actually the "offloading" photo... but no reception at the cabin.)

It was nice to get up north away from everything and get the boats out on the lake.  Even better to be there after the "weekend" when everybody else on the lake went home.

Only real downside was the heat advisories, serious thunderstorms, and flash and areal-flood warnings.  I was actually a bit nervous this morning and thought we might have been stuck.  There was a bucket loader working right up on the road at the end of the driveway, but it was fixing the new intersection on the other side of the road where it had washed out overnight.  Regardless, the lake had come up almost half a foot overnight, and it was a good thing we dragged the kayaks further up the hill last night, otherwise we might have had to start the motor boat and go searching for them.

M&P Shield Safety Notice

ALL M&P Shield™ firearms manufactured before August 19, 2013.
Smith & Wesson has identified a condition where the trigger bar pin could damage the lower trigger in certain M&P Shields in a way that may affect the functionality of the drop safety feature of the firearm, potentially allowing the pistol to discharge if it is dropped.Any unintended discharge of a firearm has the potential to cause injury, and we ask that you STOP USING YOUR PISTOL IMMEDIATELY UNTIL IT HAS BEEN INSPECTED AND, IF THE CONDITION IS FOUND, REPAIRED.

Check your guns and get them fixed if you need too.

MHIEH&BRPG

Er, Monster Hunter International Employee Handbook and Role Playing Game is up on Amazon.  Having had my copy for a little over a month, I can say it's well worth it for the fluff as well as the actual game part. Some cool background in there.

Whoops

I really need to get back on the wagon with this thing, huh?

So over the weekend, some hi-jinx occurred on the local County Sheriff's facebook page. Some people realize they have a surplus "Peacekeeper."  Numerous butthurt comments ensued, and the Chief Deputy went on a rant about it (the Sheriff was on vacation... cat's away, mice will play, etc.)  It was a pretty good rant though, so click through the break and laugh at the hippie butthurt.

Play Ball!!

Gonna suck going back to work this week.

Yum

Some days you just have to light a fire and spoil yourself.

J-Frames

Caleb posted about why he tends to default to his the other day, and it made me think about why I have been doing the same lately. Depending on clothing, since I've been back I have been mostly bouncing between the LCP and the 442.

VZ Grips for the win!

My holster taste is a bit different than his, I mostly use a custom Kydex rig from White Dog Holsters (as seen on his site here, review to come;) but I've been wearing my Crossbreed SuperTuck a bit this week (the leather is more comfortable when I start to sweat.)  I also tend to drop a reload in my pocket in a quick-strip of some sort (I forget who makes it and I'm in public at the moment.)  Not because I'm super-fast reload guy, but I figure it's better to have the option and it's not much weight.

As I've mentioned in the past (I think,) VZ Grips makes a great product, as seen on both my J-Frame and my 1911.  I love how G10 feels, it looks great, and takes plenty of abuse without coming apart or scaring up and looking like garbage.  I can carry it all day on my sweaty self, and even with the minimal texture on the above gun, still have tons of control.  Plus it looks tons better than the factory black rubber.

In my quiet medium-size town I've never really felt that under-gunned with it either (I can think of one time I may have, if I wasn't carrying my M&P that day, but that's another post.)  Given the political climate of this city, I could probably carry it empty and still have the desired effect (I doubt many bad guys around here would expect their mark to be armed at all.)  However if it came down to it,  I do tend to shoot the little thing pretty well, the hammerless frame lets me get a crazy-high grip with a lower bore axis than any auto, even the LCP, and the Apex J-Frame kit is the best $26 I've ever spent on gun stuff.

Then again, maybe I'm just a tacticool hipster, I am wearing low-top Chuck Taylors today...

Relaxing Afternoon

O'so Barrel Aged Imperial Black Scotch and live music.

Gun Food...

Noticed while at Fleet today, a distinct lack of 5.56/.223 'cheap' ammo (lots of soft-tip Hornady, etc) but a decent amount of 7.62x39 Wolf, etc cheap Comm-block ammos.  I've also got a bit of a surplus of it around here, not so much in regards to AR food (a good amount of loaded mags, but not a comfortable amount for plinking, etc.)

Looks like I'll be busting out the AKs for anything in the near future.  Unfortunately I'm not sure where my AK gear has ended up.  Have a half-dozen steel mags, but not sure where my chest rig ended up.  Time to start poking around and see what I can find/scrounge up.  As an aside, if any vendors of quality AK gear (hard or soft) want to kick-start some blogging efforts, let me know!(Could really go for some open topped MOLLE single mag pouches, especially in tan (have a cheap plate carrier currently serving no purpose.))