Sorry...

For the long absence from my blog. It's been a rough couple of weeks. I found out in early March that my grandfather had passed away. The funeral was on the 16th in Atlanta. I worked until the 14th in TX, before flying to the funeral. I was scheduled to be home in Indiana for the weekend of the 21st and 22nd. I ended up driving from GA to IN after the funeral with my parents.

I was in Evansville until the 24th, when I flew back to TX to resume work. 1500 hrs on the 25th and I was told that I was laid off as of the 27th at 1700 hrs. 1705, I was on the road heading back to IN again.

I've been trying to find a job, and spending lots of my time doing housework and home improvement stuff at the girlfriend's place. She's an accountant, and is obviously very very busy. I promise more stuff in the near future (and I may be going back to work on the ambulance, so maybe some EMS stories?)

--Jim

San Antonio Blog Meet Aftermath!

While I was at the blogmeet yesterday, I made reference to this cartoon, although apparently no one else who was there had ever seen it. I'm posting it so that they can enjoy it.

Now that everyone has read that and had a good chuckle, I should come clean and say that I have at least one of each (Glock and 1911) and like them both, probably equally.

Like I mentioned on Friday, I drove down to the blogmeet the night before, and met up with SpeakerTweaker for dinner at Biff Buzby's Burgers, which actually had a car show going on, even though it was the middle of February (gotta love Texas). The GPS unit I had indicated that there was a Dunkin Donuts in the area, so I planned on going there for breakfast.

I got up early Saturday AM, and headed for DD's, only to find out that it was no longer a DD, but was instead a local place. Ended up going directly to the range, and got there at about 8:30, even though the range didn't open until 9AM. Tweaker showed up between 5 and 10 minutes later, and Murphy was just a little bit after him. Before the range opened just after 9AM, there were at least 15 cars waiting to use the range.

We decided to hit the pistol range first, and settled up with the range. We had two lanes, and a total of 10 pistols (after 10% showed up.) Many stories were shared, much shootie goodness was enjoyed by all, and the range was packed. There was a CHL class going on, at least one police officer practice on the range, and numerous parent with children around. In addition, there were some people being introduced to shooting for the first time.

The total pistol collection that was evident on site:

• Kimber TLE II/RL
• XD45 Service
• Glock 19
• Ruger 22/45 Mk. 3
• Ruger Single Six
• CZ-52
• CZ-85
• Glock 22
• NAA Mini in .22mag
• Colt Lightweight Commander

And at a guess approximately 1000 rounds were fired through the various pistols throughout the course of the day. Both Speaktweater and Murphy got a kick out the .22LR rounds I'd brought, that have next to no recoil (they won't function a semi-auto).

After we finished on the pistol range, we moved over to the rifle range where we were shooting at 50 yards. Between the four of us, there were five rifles and a 9mm carbine.

• Sig 556
• AR-15 (M4gery)
• Bushmaster Gas Piston Carbine (AR-15)
• Mosin-Nagant
  
• Henry .22LR
• Kel-Tec Sub 2000

We had an exceptionally good time, considering that neither of the AR-15s on site was previously sighted in. We fixed that with Tweaters, but somehow I managed to forget the instructions for zeroing my EOtech, so it still shoots a little high and to the left. The grouping was nice though :)

At one point we were approached by a guy asking what the fascination with AR-15's is, since they "are made just for killing people." I jumped in with the argument that I know bunches of people who hunt with them, but what I really should have said was that us owning our AR-15's protects his right to own his deer rifle. Wasn't quick enough on the thought processes though. I was however quick enough to point out that there are more accessories for the AR-15 family of rifles than there are for any other gun platform out there.

It was a mighty good time, unfortunately it had to end far far too soon. 10% ducked out when his wife sent him a text message from the car saying "it's time to go." It was after 1PM before I realized how late it was getting, and that I had a long drive ahead of me, so I bid a fond farewell to Murphy and Tweaker, although they decided to pack it in about the same time.


After leaving the range, I headed back to the College Station / Franklin area, by way of Double Shot Liquor and Guns, located in Schulenburg TX. The shop seemed to have an awesome selection of liquor on sale, and a back room with several dozen firearms, and they have a drive through. How cool is that! Amongst the other stuff they had in the back room, Double Shot had a GSG-5 and at least one AR-15, which is always nice to see. The staff was very pleasant, and gave me a free coolie for beverage cans. Definitely a place to check out, although their selection for firearms was certainly not the greatest.

I also stopped off at Champion Firearms in College Station, and picked me up a new Surefire X300 for my pistols! All in all, a wonderful day, and the only way to make it better would have been to have more people join us. Unfortunately, it turns out that Sabra could've made it, but realized she wouldn't know how to meet up with anyone. Next time we'll have to make some signs up for the tables we are shooting at.

Muphy shares his thoughts up here.

10% has his views and report over here.

Last, but definitely not least, SpeakerTweaker writes out his experiences.

Thanks guys, for an awesome day!

Pictures will be put up as soon as I get them from Tweaker (I managed to forget I had my camera...boo hiss.)

San Antonio Blogmeet Update

Tomorrow is the day.

Go see Tweaker and let him know that you're coming...

that is... if you are in fact planning on showing up.

I'm driving down tonight.

Teaching People to Shoot Update

Update to my post over here, and on the main page of the blog.

By way of Captain and a Crew of One we find that Mulligan over at Do Over is keeping up with this list of people willing to introduce new people to the shooting sports. I left my contact info asking to be added to the roster.

UPDATE: I've been added.

--Jim

San Antonio Blogmeet

A bunch of the bloggers from the central / southern Texas areas are meeting at the Braken Rifle and Pistol Recreational Range just to the North East of San Antonio. The group is meeting at 0900 on Saturday 02-07-2009, but I'm driving down the night before.

From what I'm gathering, it looks like I'm going to have to pay for each gun that I want to shoot. I've never been billed for a range that way, so it'll be interesting to see. I've offered to the host of the meet to bring up to 7 different firearms, as seen in the pictures below.


I'm planning on bringing the following:

• Bushmaster AR-15, 5.56mm
  
• Henry .22LR Lever Gun, .22LR
  
• Ruger 22/45 Mark III, .22LR
  
• Ruger Single Six, .22 LR
• Glock 19 with CT grips, 9mm
• Springfield XD45 Service, .45ACP
• Kimber Custom TLE II/ RL with CT grips, .45ACP
  

And I laid the rest of my supplies in today for the blogmeet. I visited Champion Firearms in College Station and picked up the following:

• 200 rounds .45 ACP
• 100 rounds 9x19
• 200 rounds .223 Rem
• 50 rounds 7.62x25
• 40 rounds 7.62x54R

Also picked up a Serpa holster for XD45, a package of snap caps, and a set of Radians Electronic Muffs. I'll post a review of the new muffs after I get a chance to try them out at the blog meet.

Unfortunately, Champion was SOLD OUT of .22LR ammo. As a gun shop, how do you sell out of ammo for a .22? I headed over to Gander Mtn and picked up 1000 rounds of .22LR for the Henry and Ruger pistols.

Anyway, if you live in the San Antonio area, or want to make the trip, you're more then welcome to join everyone who's going to be there. Just for the record, I have never met any of the guys who are meeting up before.