Nevada Changes CCW Laws For Gun Blogger Rendezvous!
Well, no, not really, but they DID add reciprocity with eight other states. It sure did come at a convenient time, though, and it's a big step in the right direction I'd say. Actually, here's the straight story, taken verbatim from the Reno Gazette-Journal.
Beginning Oct. 1, the state of Nevada will recognize permits from eight other states that allow people to carry concealed weapons, the Nevada Department of Public Safety announced.
Those states are Alaska, Arkansas, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, Tennessee and Utah.
The 2007 Nevada Legislature passed a law that allowed concealed carry permits from other states to be used in Nevada. The Department of Public Safety, with the help of the Nevada Sheriffs and Chiefs Association, reviewed the laws from other states. It found 16 other states that had an electronic database accessible 24 hours a day that identifies valid permit holders. Of those 16, only eight had concealed carry permit laws that were as stringent or more stringent than Nevada, the Department of Public Safety said.
It will review the list of approved states every year, the Department of Public Safety said.
Here's the same article on the Reno Gazette-Journal's own website, if you'd like to read the original.
I don't see Washington on the list, but maybe one of these days......
We've got some great news about the upcoming Gun Blogger Rendezvous!
Thanks to the efforts of Sebastian at Snowflakes in Hell, we will be having a very special "NRA Happy Hour" event at the Gun Blogger Rendezvous, and best of all, Glen Caroline, the Director of NRA Grassroots Division and Ashley Varner, of the NRA-ILA Public Affairs Division, will be there "showing the flag" for the NRA. This will be a fantastic opportunity for the gun bloggers to meet and share ideas with the folks from the NRA in a small and informal setting.
For you folks planning to attend, give some thought to what questions you would ask, and what suggestions you might have to help the NRA be even more effective. We’re very pleased to have them come by and spend some time with us!
If you were thinking about attending, IT'S STILL NOT TOO LATE to get in on the fun. Contact the Circus Circus Hotel IMMEDIATELY and you may still be able to get in on the group discounted room rates. (If not, the rooms are still very reasonably priced.)
To book your accommodations, telephone Circus Circus reservations at 1-800-648-5010 and give them the group code of
IGUN07
You also need to register for the Rendezvous. The registration form is HERE in a PDF file. Download the Registration form, print 'er out, write out a check, and mail it in! Since any profit from the Rendezvous will be going to Project Valour-IT, there is also a place on the registration form where you can make a donation to them, along with your registration.
You don't have to be a gun blogger, or even a blogger to attend. If you read the gun and military blogs, are interested in the content found on those blogs, and you would like to meet some of those bloggers in person, you too are welcome to attend!
Time is running out, so get your reservations and registration in today!
Yesterday morning as I was sitting at the computer I heard music out in the driveway. No, not the usual "BOOMP - THUDDA - THUDDA" crap, real music, the melodious sounds of a Triumph Daytona 500, just restored to a late sixties era street scrambler/street legal dirt track racer configuration.
My friend Nick had just finished it up and rode it over to show it off. I took it for a short ride across the pasture, out to the main road, and back to the house by road. The road back is a narrow one lane paved strip of asphalt, maybe 15 feet wide and with barbed wire fences on both sides, so I didn't go much over 50, or thereabouts, but it sure was a nice running and riding bike!
Nick and the pristine Daytona (yes, click to enlarge, by all means!)
Note the Bell 500 helmet and appropriate era goggles!
It even starts on the first kick!
I have to admit, the new high -tech bikes just don't seem to speak to me, even though they are fast and handle well. A mid to late sixties Triumph, Norton, or BSA, however, and it's a different story.
I guess it's either something you understand, or you never will........
Every year the three gun clubs on Whidbey Island, the Oak Harbor Sportsmen, The Central Whidbey Sportsmen, and the Homes Harbor Rod & Gun Club, have an inter-club match for bragging rights for the year. Each club fields a four man team. Each year a different club hosts the match, and the host usually picks a match format that favors the type of handgun shooting done in their club. Usually the host club ends up the winner!
This year's host was Holmes Harbor, and they shoot a lot of long distance silhouette and target matches. Central Whidbey and Oak Harbor pretty much are action pistol clubs, and never shoot this sort of match at all. Needless to say, Holmes Harbor had a big advantage, but our Central Whidbey team was not going to go down without a fight! We had Evil Al, who's always one of our best shooters regardless of the type of match, Big Joe, who has done some bullseye shooting in the past and is an excellent shooter, Lou G. who has also done some long distance hand-gunning and has his very own Thompson Contender. Ah yes, but it's a FOUR man team! Filling in the 'Four Spot' was yours truly! (Boy, they must have been desperate!) I had never even fired a Thompson Contender, nor had I even tried to hit anything with a handgun beyond 50 yards! 100 yards is a REALLY long ways away, hard enough off a sand bag, but no, this had to be shot unsupported. Once again, Mr. C. is in WAY over his head!
The week before the match I got a chance to shoot maybe a dozen rounds through Lou's Contender just to see what it shot like. Since I am somewhat used to shooting from a modified 'Taco' hold, it didn't feel entirely strange, although having a sight with magnification was going to take some getting used to! At first I had the magnification turned up too high, and I couldn't even hold it steady enough to find the dang target at all! After turning it down to 3x, it was a lot better, but still challenging.
The Thompson Contender with the 10" .357 Magnum barrel.
Even reloading it was something new to me, as you have to pull the trigger guard down to release the latch, then it breaks open like a shotgun.
Evil Al shooting with Big Joe spotting, and an Oak Harbor shooter in the background.
We were allowed to have a spotter watching our shots and reporting where each shot had hit. That gave me a chance to make adjustments from shot to shot, and learn to shoot the pistol in the match as I went along, sort of.......
Mr. C. on the line, with Al spotting.
Joe was shooting extremely well, and Al was also doing a good job. Lou was shooting some decent shots. At 50 yards I actually was one point above Al's total, but as the targets were set farther out, reality set in! The gang from Holmes Harbor, however, were already starting to run away with it.
.......I just have to pretend that I'm shooting REALLY tiny bowling pins a long ways away!
At 75 yards Joe continued to shoot well, and so did Al. Lou had some problems at that distance, and I managed to improve a bit over my score at 50 yards! After the second round Holmes Harbor had pulled so far ahead that they almost could have skipped the final distance! Oak Harbor was doing their best, but they were solidly in third.
The final distance was 100 yards. My goal was to try to keep as many as possible on the paper, and hope for a few lucky scoring shots. This was clearly way beyond any distance where I had much confidence of even hitting the target, but I managed to only 'lose' two or three, and the rest were on the paper. WOOO HOOO! I was amazed! Joe and Al again shot decent scores, and Lou had sorted out the problems that had plagued m at 75 yards, and shot decently too.
When the team scores were added up, to no one's surprise Holmes Harbor had won it all by a big margin. Central Whidbey had turned in a solid performance beating out Oak Harbor. Last year Oak Harbor had won the Club Challenge. I had scored well enough to place 7th. out of the 12 shooters. More importantly, I had a whole bunch of fun trying out a new facet of handgun competition.
After the match we all headed to the Holmes Harbor clubhouse for burgers, baked beans, salad and refreshments. Over lunch we all discussed the match and decided that for next year we would incorporate three different events, with each event similar to matches shot at one of the individual clubs. Maybe targets at 50 yards, falling plates, a steel challenge or Glock GSSF stage, hard to say this early, but it sounds like it could be three times as much fun, and really close competition, too!
I can hardly wait until next year!
Hope I can make the team........
Thanks to KeeWee for the great photos, and for providing moral support for the CWSA team!
Here's the basic schedule of events for the upcoming Rendezvous:
Thursday: A number of bloggers will be arriving during the day on Thursday. Some of the attendees will be having dinner together at one of the local restaurants.
Thursday evening the hospitality room will be open from approx. 6pm. until whenever.
Friday: Everyone not already in town arrives sometime on Friday. Friday morning groups of bloggers will head out for breakfast together.
After breakfast Friday morning is open for sight-seeing, hitting the liquor store, buying munchies, gambling, whatever anyone wants to do.
2pm. through approx 4pm. is tentatively set for conference/meeting with some NRA folks (if we can get it arranged) in the Hospitality room.
After the session various groups of bloggers will probably get together and head out for dinner.
At 6pm will be the Show & Tell/soapbox/discussion session until maybe 7:30? Whenever it winds down, then social hour begins in earnest, and will probably go into the wee small hours for the hard core among us!
Saturday: Saturday morning we will probably get breakfast together, then car pool it out to the range, about 20 miles out of town. Range time from approx. 10am. through approximately 3pm. Then back to town to get ready for the banquet.
Attendees not interested in going out to the range will probably go shopping, gambling, sight-seeing, and just generally taking it easy!
The Banquet, fun raiser raffle, and drawing for door prizes will be at 6pm in one of the Mandalay Banquet rooms. After dinner we will head back to the hospitality room for more socializing, until whenever.
Sunday: Sunday morning some will meet again for breakfast, and start heading home.
Some folks are staying Sunday night, so there may be some other activities on Sunday, including a possible range trip, or whatever they feel like doing.
There will be lots to do, and yet plenty of flexibility for activities not on the schedule. There will be something for everyone, and if it's like last year, it's over WAY too quickly
Things are cookin' right along on the Gun Blogger Rendezvous front. Someone left a comment that they were buying a couple of hundred dollars worth of Boomershoot items to bring to the Rendezvous as prizes. Although they left the comment anonymously, since Joe Huffman, the brains and brawn behind the Boomershoot Festival will be coming to the Rendezvous, I suspect Joe had something to do with it. It's looking like there will be a lot of really neat prizes, and some great items, including the Hi-Point pistol, in the fund raiser raffle at the banquet.
The Show & Tell session on Friday night is going to be expanded a bit to include a "Soap Box" session where anyone there can have the floor to discuss anything they feel relevant to our interests. Just like the Hyde Park Soap Box Sessions in London, though ,we reserve the right to agree, disagree, join in, and/or heckle, as we like! All in good fun, of course!
One of our blogger attendees (who will remain unnamed for the time being), is trying to arrange for a major rep. from a "Really Big Shooting Association" (also unnamed for the time being) to attend at least part of the Rendezvous, to speak to us, listen to us, and answer our questions. If, and that's still a big "IF", this comes together, we will set up a special session for this, most likely after lunch on Friday.
Keep your fingers crossed on this, as this could prove to be a highlight of the Rendezvous.
If you haven't got your reservations and registration in for the Rendezvous, there is still time, but not much! The hotel is doing their best to hold it open for us for the special rates, so CALL THEM TODAY AND MAKE YOUR ROOM RESERVATIONS! If you miss the discount deadline, you can still book a room and attend the Rendezvous, but it will cost a little bit more for your room. Mind you, the room rates at the Circus Circus are very reasonable as hotels go anyway, but why not save a few bucks if you can! The Registration for the Rendezvous itself also has to be sent in right away so I can tell the hotel how many dinners we will need, and how large of a dining room.
Don't spend the next year wishing you had attended this year's Rondy! Get off your "smallish Horse like animal" and get your reservations made with the Circus Circus, and your Rondy Registration sent in.
Blogger has now released what may just turn out to be the ultimate time-waster of the entire Internet! This site will display continuous pictures as they are being uploaded to blogger. You can adjust the speed of the slide show, or step through them one at a time. You can even back up to previous pictures. It's fascinating seeing just what is being uploaded to the Blogspot blogs.
Thanks to the efforts of Uncle at Say Uncle, David Hardy has donated four copies of his outstanding documentary "In Search of the Second Amendment" to the Gun Blogger Rendezvous for prizes and for helping to raise money for Project Valour-IT.
We really appreciate David's generosity, and Uncle for helping to arrange the donation. If you are unfamiliar with the documentary, check out the documentary's website for a lot more information.
From the website:
"The TRUE story of the American right to arms is told by some of the greatest names in American constitutional law -- professors at Yale, UCLA, Fordham, George Washington University, George Mason University, and other institutions, as well as by lifelong scholars of the Second Amendment, such as Steve Halbrook, Dave Kopel, and Don Kates. "
If you aren't going to be at the Rendezvous, you may still want to consider buying yourself a copy, or maybe two copies, one for yourself, and one for your local library, club, or school. All the information to buy your own copy is on the website.
Coming to the Gun Blogger Rendezvous in Reno and winning a copy would probably be a lot more fun than just ordering one online, though........
Charlie Brown, head of MKS Supply and Hi-Point Firearms, has generously donated a Hi-Point pistol to be raffled off at the Gun Blogger Rendezvous in order to raise money for Project Valour-IT.
The Hi-Points are American made, and have a lifetime guarantee. I have had a Hi-Point 9mm. Carbine for several years, and have found it to be not only reliable, but great fun to shoot, particularly when you are on a tight budget.
Thanks, Charlie! We, and Project Valour-IT, greatly appreciate your generosity!
If you have visited KeeWee's blog lately, you know she's in the process of shaking off a cold. That, of course, means I'm going to get it too, and yesterday (Saturday) morning it was becoming apparent that the cold bug had found me, too. There was a CWSA Steel Challenge match on in Coupeville, and KeeWee wisely decided to stay home and recuperate. Since I was just coming down with the cold, I decided to go shoot the match anyway, as I clearly needed the practice.
I decided to stick to the Rimfire Open and Rimfire Limited (Iron Sight) classes. The game plan was to try to shoot as error free as possible, even if it meant shooting slightly slower. Since it was five relays at each of two stages, if I shot four clean runs, then push a bit harder on the fifth run, as it was the throw-away if I messed it up.
As I was unloading I realized that I had forgotten my regular iron sighted High Standard that I usually use for steel challenge shooting. I did, however, have my iron sight bowling pin high Standard, but it had a barrel weight on it, which is not allowed for steel challenge. Fortunately I had the right Allen wrench in the tool box, so off came the barrel weight and I was good to go.
The two stages resembled the standard "Speed Option" and "Showdown", but also had some different rules and procedures. Normally on Speed Option you shoot the four plates in any sequence, then shoot the stop plate.
It doesn't show in the illustration, but from the shooting box the left most round plate appears to the left of the stop plate .
This time you had to shoot the right most two plates first, then the right most plate, and then you could either shoot the plate just to the right of the stop plate for a three second reduction from your score on that run, or skip it and shoot the stop plate with no penalty. Since it's pretty hard to NOT shoot the "Option" plate in three seconds or less, everyone shot it, and had the three seconds deducted from their score. When I shot this stage with my limited gun, it went fairly well, although it was hard to not shoot the option plate the first time you passed over it and skip to the left plate, then back to the option plate, and then the stop plate.
The second stage we shot was called "Showdown", and again it was based on the standard Steel Challenge Showdown, but with some different rules.
A fun stage!
Normally with Showdown you shoot all the plates in any order you like, as long as you shoot the center stop plate last. You shoot two relays from one shooter's box, then two relays from the other shooter's box, and the fifth relay from the box of your choice.
This time the procedure from Steel Challenge "Outer Limits" was added to the rules for this stage, where if you were shooting from the left box you had to shoot the two left plates first, then the right plates and the stop plate last. If you were shooting from the right box, you had to shoot the two right plates first, then the two left plates and the stop plate last. That's how I shoot it anyway, so the rule change had no effect on me. For a shooter who shoots better going left to right, or right to left, it could make a difference, I suppose. It's a fun stage, and it almost becomes two different stages when you shoot it from the two positions.
As is often the case, Evil Al convincingly walked away with the Rimfire Open class, and Jim P. once again won the Rimfire Limited class. I wasn't TOO far behind in second place in both classes. As the match was wrapping up, my cold was taking it's toll of my energy, and I was starting to drag! We loaded up all the match stuff, target stands, and so forth, and hauled it back to the storage shed. After the range was cleared, Lou G. and I spent a little time with his Thompson Contender, so I would have had at least shot it once before next weekend's Inter-Club Challenge match. Lou started me out with the .22LR barrel, and a pie plate at 25 yards with a one inch circle drawn on it. I dry fired it a couple of times to get a feel for the trigger (a lot heavier than I expected). We chambered a round and I took a shot at the plate. First shot, maybe 1/4" off of dead center in the 1" circle! "What's hard about that?" I said, trying to keep a straight face!
I shot a few more rounds, both at 25 and 50 yards, then we switched it over to the .357 Magnum barrel. The scope was a bit better, and the gun a LOT louder, but pretty much the same. By now I was exhausted, the little cold bugs taking their toll on my energy.
We packed it in, and I made a short side trip to Wally World to buy a big bag of cat food and to restock on Diet cola, then home and to bed.
Here's a scary one. Granted, there are some questions unanswered here, but basically the rifle bullet bounces back from whatever it hit, and appears to hit the ground in front and to the left of the shooter, then bounces up and knocks his hearing protectors off his head. If you have your sound up you can hear the bullet in the air on it's way back to the shooter.
Thanks to Carnaby for coming up with another fine and challenging match, and for hosting it for us! Everyone had fun, and targets were perforated with great enthusiasm!
If you missed out on this match, head on over to Ahab's place and get in on the e-Postal handgun match now underway!
Mr. Completely's new slogan? (Shirt seen at World Steel Challenge Championships)
First off, I should probably get the name of the match correct, at least once! It is officially call ed the "Glock Northwest Regional Classic XIV". It is actually quite a big match, drawing Glock shooters from several states. I don't know the actual number of competitors, but it was probably somewhere around 200.
With a 5.5 lb. trigger, short sight radius, and total unfamiliarity with Glocks and how to shoot them, I didn't hold out much hope of any sponsorship calls from Glock! In fact, with the little bit I did shoot the Glock Model 17 9mm. two days before the match, I was genuinely concerned about not being able to even hit the farther out targets at all, let alone hit them accurately.
I have never been one to let not knowing what I was doing prevent me from participating, I decided to shoot the match, enjoy myself, and not worry about the final results.
Did I enjoy myself? YUP! Sure did! I shot the whole match twice, in two different classes in fact. I entered the "Civilian" class, which is sort of a stock gun or limited class, and shot that first. They also had a class called "Competition" which apparently allows somewhat more "Race-gunnish" Glocks, but without optics. Whatever the differences, the "Competition" class times were noticeably faster. Shot that one, too.
All of the scoring is done by laptop computer, and the results are then posted on the Glock Sport Shooting Federation's website. Now that the results are posted, I was able to cruise through the scores and see how it came out. In the "Civilian" class I ended up 51st. out of 73 entries, and 10th Senior. Not too bad!
Interestingly enough, penalty points for lack of accuracy moved me way down the list, even though my times weren't bad at all. In fact, my time on two of the stages was faster than the class winner's times. I wondered at the time why the RO kept showing me my time on the timer!
In the "Competition" class I ended up 44th. out of 51 shooters. Again it was penalty points for lousy accuracy that moved me so far down the list, as my times were reasonable, I just was shooting with marginal accuracy. I guess that's to be expected shooting something as different as the Glock for the first time.
John D., who talked me into shooting the match, shot very well, finishing in 19th. place and 3rd. Senior in the "Civilian" class, and scoring well in a couple of the other classes, too. Debbie K., who I often see at the KRRC Fun Steel Matches, also shot very well, finishing 40th. and 3rd. Lady.
Yup, the shirt slogan "Speed is everything - Accuracy will come" sums it up, at least, I HOPE that accuracy will come.
It certainly is a lot better than being known as Mr. "Can't hit S*** With a Glock" Completely!
I can see some "Glock-Smithing" in the near future, getting something set up for next year. In fact, maybe it's about time to start on a sequel to the Econo Race Gun series. Maybe tune up the Model 17 a bit for the civilian class and the Competition class, and turn the Model 22 into a full race open class gun? Could probably get some improvement by working a bit on loads, too....
I got a phone call a couple of mornings ago from Evil Al. It seems the Inter-Club Challenge match is coming up in a couple of weeks, and he's putting together the team. Al asked me if I'd like to be on the team.
The Holmes Harbor Rod & Gun Club, The Oak Harbor Club, and Central Whidbey Sportsmen each year have a handgun club challenge match. It's hosted at a different club each year. The host club sets the rules, and usually picks a match type that fits well with the type of shooting they are best at. The Holmes Harbor Rod & Gun club is this year's host, and they shoot a lot of silhouette matches out to 100 yards. To no one's surprise, this year's match will be a target shoot, 10 shots at 50 yards, 10 shots at 75 yards, and 10 shots at 100 yards. They have a number of members with scoped up Thompson Contenders, perfect for the match.
At Central Whidbey, on the other hand, we are primarily action shooters, shooting Steel Challenge, falling plates, bowling pins, and so forth. As near as we can tell, we only have two Contenders in our club with scopes. The rules restrict it to centerfire only, so I can't shoot my High Standard Race Gun. I've never even fired a Contender before, but Lou G. will share his .357 Contender with me. Next week we'll get together and give it a try.
"Cross hairs on target - pull trigger - reload - repeat" how hard can it be?
We're doomed!
On the bright side, I DO get a free lunch out of the deal!!
An additional event has been added for this year's Gun Blogger Rendezvous. At 6pm. on Friday night, October 12th. in the Rendezvous Hospitality Room we will be having a "Gun Stuff Show & Tell" session. (There's probably a much more clever name for it, but you get the point.)
Larry Weeks, from Brownell's (you DO have a Brownell's Catalog, don't you?) will be bringing along a number of cool items to fondle and drool upon. He will be bringing a sample of Brownell's new AR-15 magazines which they are manufacturing right here in the good old U.S. of A. Larry will also have the inside story on a number of new things, including some info on gun lubricants, neat tools, and more.
Uncle, from Say Uncle will be bringing along a KT68 6.8SPC upper from Ko-Tonics for us to see, too. On Saturday (Range Day) we will get a chance to see it in action, and possibly even shoot it, too!
For those of you planning to attend, drop me an email or leave a comment if you have something cool for "Show & Tell" and I'll get that into this post, too.
After "Show & Tell" the plan is to spend the rest of the night, or until the last one of us fades out, munching munchie stuff and drinking cool refreshments of various types, while discussing anything and everything, and listening to Og The Neanderpundit's storytelling, as only he can do it!
If you missed last year's Rendezvous, you missed a great time, and this year's Rondy is shaping up to be even better!
Clearly the blogosphere's social event of the year...............
We're back from the big regional Glock match, and I think I can safely state that a Glock sponsorship is not likely in the near future! The weather was beautiful, the match well run and RO'ed, and I had a ton of fun shooting it. The truth is that shooting fast with minimal accuracy is way more fun than going slowly and being accurate, although with iron (well, OK, plastic) sights, slowing down didn't seem to improve my accuracy much! I can also see that to shoot a Glock accurately you need to spend a lot of time shooting it to get the trigger figured out.
The first stage was a conventional six plate steel plate rack, shooting the six plates four times against the clock. All scores were counted, and no "Throw-aways" like you get with a Steel Challenge match. I wasn't very fast, but it was pretty much "one shot - one plate".
The Falling Plate Stage, "Glock The Plates".
The next stage was four cardboard "Tombstone" D-1 targets, and three steel "Pepper Poppers". You shot this stage three times. On each run you had to shoot each cardboard target twice, then knock over one of the poppers. On your second run you again shot each cardboard target twice, then knock over one of the still standing popper. On the third run you shot each cardboard target twice, then knocked over the last popper. To my amazement, I hit every popper! This was the most fun of all the stages as you could "Double-Tap" the cardboard targets.
My favorite stage "GLOCK'M"
Here's a short video of Mr. C. Having great fun on this stage:
Mr. Completely, sprayin' and prayin' Video
Accuracy was nothing to write home about, but I was keeping them on the target at least, even if they were all over it! That's a cool thing about cardboard targets over steel. It you miss a steel target, everyone knows you missed, but with cardboard, no one knows except the scorers, and then only when they inspect the target!
Shooting the last stage. SIGH........
The final stage was also using the cardboard d-1 targets, but the distance was quite a bit greater, and my lack of much accuracy cost me some penalty points for some misses. Since this was my first time shooting a Glock, or any double-action gun for that matter, I wasn't too worried about how I would do, I just wanted to shoot the match and see how it went. Unfortunately the match was over far too soon. As I was visiting with one of the RO's at the last stage, I commented as to how the match was over far too soon. He asked my which model Glock I was shooting, and when I told him it was a model 17, he said I could also enter the "Comp" class in addition to the "Civilian" class I had just completed. He didn't know for sure what the differences were in the classes, and I didn't much care if I could shoot the match again! I walked up to the sign-up, paid another entry fee and headed to the first stage to do it all again! COOL!
The second time around the stages I shot a little bit better as I was getting more familiar with the long travel, heavy trigger. Had just as much fun, or even more, than the first time. If I would have had enough ammo and entry fees, and if they would have let me, I would have kept shooting until dark!
After I was done shooting we had chili dogs for lunch and got a chance to visit with some of the other shooters, and also swap stories with John D., our friend who talked me into giving this a try.
After the match we drove North to Port Townsend and caught the Car Ferry back to Whidbey Island. Port Townsend was having a sail boat gathering, and KeeWee got a bunch of great pictures of the sailboats as we were pulling out of Port Townsend on the ferry. She's also got some more on the Glock match over there.
Once back on to Whidbey Island it was a thirty minute drive home. A nap was definitely in order.......
Came across this Nerd Quiz over at Ride Fast - Shoot Straight, and i had to give it a try. One thing that I don't like about most of those quizzes, though, is that they don't give you the correct answers after you take the test so you can see which ones you missed.
Overall, I scored as follows:
3% scored higher (more nerdy), 1% scored the same, and 96% scored lower (less nerdy).
KeeWee and I are off to attend the neighbor's son's wedding South of Seattle today. After the reception we're driving back North to Silverdale to spend the night, and cruise Kitsap Mall while we're in the area. Tomorrow morning it's over to Kitsap Rifle and Revolver Club's range for a big regional Glock 'Steel Challenge-ish' match. I've had a chance to shoot the Glock a bit, and I think the gun needs a little work, and I need a LOT of work..............
I understand there will be a couple of side matches available, something along the lines of an IPSC stage, but with steel targets. Movement - definitely not my strong point!! Maybe one of the side matches will be something more like a Steel Challenge stage, with REALLY big targets, really close!!
This will be an interesting weekend, to say the least!
Quite a while back I mentioned that Fred Thompson would make an excellent president. He has now entered the presidential race, and here's a video of his announcement.
Guiliani now maintains that being in this country illegally isn't illegal! Romney? I don't think so. There are a couple of other Republicans out there that sound pretty good, but they have no chance whatever of getting the nomination. The Democrats have Hillary and Obama, and either one is a nightmare in the making, in my opinion.
Give Fred's speech a listen, and see if it doesn't resonate with you, too......
Get your reservations and registration in ASAP, as in TODAY, so you get the best hotel rates. The rates go up in about a week. Our special group rate is even lower than the Military Rate!
You don't have to be a Gun Blogger, or even a Blogger, for that matter, to attend. If you are a shooting sports enthusiast (gun nut?), if you READ gun blogs or Mil Blogs, or anything along those lines, you are most welcome to attend.
Who might you meet there? Here's an updated partial list of some of the folks planning to attend. If you are planning on attending, please leave a comment and I'll get you added to the list.
There are also some other bloggers of note that are planning on attending if they can. It's looking like a "Who's Who" of gun blogging! Very cool.........
If you are planning on attending, or are going to try to be there, leave a comment and I'll get you on the next update of the list.
Time is running short to get your reservations in for this year's Reno Gun Blogger Rendezvous and still get the special reduced room rates. If you miss the deadline, coming up in a little over a week, you can still register and attend, but you miss out on the special Circus Circus room group rates.
To help get the word out, we contacted a small advertising agency in Hibbing, Minnesota, and asked them to put together a short video promoting the Rendezvous. It's just off of Highway 61, and has a reputation for doing great work. I think they did a fine job!
So go to the Gun Blogger Site, as everything you need to know about reserving your room and registering for the Rondy is there. This is going to be the Gun Blogger's event of the year, and you don't want to miss out, and you DON'T have to be a blogger to attend, just someone interested in shooting sports, 2nd. amendment issues, and so forth. If you are reading this post, you probably are already someone who would enjoy the Rendezvous.
Come to Reno and The Gun Blogger Rendezvous, don't think twice, just get your registration and reservations in NOW, you don't want to miss out!
The latest e-Postal match is up, hosted by Ahab, on his blog, "Call Me Ahab". This month is a handgun and rifle, "Two Gun" match called "Safari" , and it looks like a lot of fun! Shooting rhinos, and you don't even have to go to Africa! Go down load your targets and get your entries submitted.
Don't wait until the very last minute and end up missing the match, like I almost did last month!!
This Saturday KeeWee and I are headed to our neighbor's son's wedding down South of Seattle. After the reception the plan is to drive back North to Silverdale and crash for the night in a motel. There's a big mall there, so KeeWee's going to get to log some 'Mall Time' Saturday evening after dinner.
Sunday morning it's only a short drive to the Kitsap Rifle and Revolver Club'sGlock Sport Shooting Foundation two day match. It turns out, that putting a Glock decal on my 1911 isn't quite good enough, as the require you to actually be shooting a Glock.
When I had first head about the match I misunderstood and thought it was only on Saturday, so I was out of luck. It turns out that you can shoot the entire match on either Saturday or Sunday, so I could give it a try, after all. Except, for not having a Glock to shoot, of course! John D. over at KRRC offered me the use of one of his Glocks, but they were models that shoot rather expensive ammo, so I decided to see if I could track down a 9mm. Glock, since I'm set up for reloading 9mm. by the bucket full.
I asked everyone I knew if they knew of any Glocks that might be available, or for sale, and I followed a number of leads with no luck. Lou G. had mentioned that he thought one of the CWSA members had a Glock for sale, but he didn't know for sure if he had it anymore. A couple of phone calls later, we agreed to meet at Lou's place, as Lou was interested in my Nickel S&W Model 29 .44 Magnum. To make a long story short, I now no longer own the Model 29, and I now own two Glocks, a 9mm. model 17 and a .40 caliber model 22. As we were finishing up our horse trading, I happened to mention to the Glock guy that I was looking for an EMF Great Western revolver in .45LC. It turned out that he had one of those too, and we ended up doing some further dealing. He asked if I was interested in some leather for the cowboy revolver, but all he had was left handed. I just happen to be left handed too, so I now have a very nice belt with two holsters on it, one on the left hip, and one cross-draw!
But back to the Glocks! I took the 9mm. out to the Holmes Harbor range to give it a try. It felt kinda cheesy in my hand, but to me, all plastic guns just don't have the same solid feel of an all steel pistol. The trigger is really strange, heavy and a rather long pull. I had a terrible time hitting anything with it at first, but as I got used to the trigger, it improved a bit. Not a lot, but a little better, anyways. I tried my regular 9mm. bowling pin 147 grain loads that I use in the Taurus Econo Race gun, and they fed and shot just fine. I tried some lighter loads with 115 grain bullets, but they weren't hot enough to cycle the gun. They might be just fine with a lighter spring, but not hot enough for a stock setup. This afternoon I loaded up some more 155 grainers but with a bit more powder, and I'll give them a try tomorrow sometime. I tried some Remington 115 grain FMJ from a 250 round bulk pack, and they were the most accurate. I also tried some Remington 115 grain hollow points, and accuracy fell of noticeably. Strange!
This is going to be an interesting weekend, first the wedding, then shooting a regional level match with perhaps the strangest feeling gun I've ever shot! No worries! I've got two days to figure it out!
Ahab, the guy sitting in the left seat over at "What Would John Wayne Do?" has moved his blog to a different server and address. The new blog layout looks great, and his blog is always a good read.
Go check it out! Say "HI" from Mr. Completely if you've never been to his blog before..........
Once again it's been a busy weekend, with a CWSA Rimfire Hanging Plates match on Saturday, and a Bowling Pin Shoot on Sunday. The Weather was perfect both days, with scattered clouds in the morning, and clearing off and sunny in the afternoons.
Hanging Plate matches aren't quite the pressure cooker that pin shoots are, as you aren't shooting head to head, but are taking turns shooting at the plates. Although you are required to get six shots off in six seconds, that seems downright leisurely compared to pin shooting or falling plate matches. KeeWee shot perhaps her best score ever in the Optical Sight class, good enough for third place. We all had a good time, and no one really worried too much about scores.
Sunday was the CWSA Bowling Pin Shoot, and those ARE adrenalin laden matches. It's two tables out of three, head to head, and loser is out! No Second chance to redeem yourself. The first round match ups are determined by shooting four tables of pins against the clock. Your slowest time is discarded, and the remaining three are totaled to determine your first round opponent. The fastest against number two, number three against number four, and so forth. No easy first round match ups!
In Centerfire Optical Sight and Centerfire Iron sight I got eliminated in the first round. Things were not looking good, as my qualifying times had been right near the top in every class, but that meant I was matched with someone really fast, usually "Evil Al". The third class up was Revolver, and both Evil Al and Tony (the two fast guys) had both had problems in qualifying, and I ended up with fast time, although it was far slower than they usually shoot. Once again Al knocked me out in the first round, although I was close enough that if he had made any mistakes I might have had a chance. He didn't make any mistakes. Score so far: Three classes, three first round eliminations. Next up was Big Bore Revolver, where everything had to be a .44 or larger. The class also limited you to only six shots per table, so speed was still important, but accuracy was really important, too. Unfortunately we only had two shooters in the class today, Al and I. We decided to shoot 3 out of 5, instead of 2 out of 3, just for the fun of it. Al's .44 Magnum loads were a little light and they weren't getting the pins solidly off the table. My .480 Ruger loads were getting the pins emphatically off the table, and I ended up doing a little better than Al, mostly because of the loads, rather than shooting skills. At least I wasn't "Two and Out" as the trend had been so far!
Next on the schedule was to change over to the bowling pin tops for the two rimfire pistol classes, Rimfire Optic, and Rimfire iron sight. With the relatively small turnout, we only had two shooters in Rimfire Iron sight, Randy N. and I. Randy and I have had some really close matches in the past, and today was no exception. Today was my day, as I got a couple of fortunate rolls and managed to squeak by for a narrow win.
In Rimfire Optic sight qualifying I was clearly having problems hitting anything with my regular long barreled High Standard. I wasn't shooting accurately, and I wasn't shooting fast, either. If you are really accurate, you can get by being a little slow, and if you are really shooting fast, you can tolerate a little inaccuracy, but I couldn't find either speed or accuracy. I ended up matched against Al in the first round, and once again he dusted me off pretty good! I had also entered my S&W 422. For some reason it seemed to be working better than usual! I won my first round match up, and then ended up back up against Al, the same Al who had just blown my doors off when I was shooting my "Fast" gun, but now I was using my "Slow" gun.
One of the things that makes pin shooting so much fun is the unpredictability of the pins. Once they've been shot up a bit, you never know what they are going to do. If you hit them exactly center mass, they usually go off the table, but if you are off just the smallest amount, they might just tip over, or jump sideways and knock over another pin, or go spinning across the table giving you a moving target to chase! Sometimes you will end up with pins tipped over and lying all over the table, one giant mess, often called a "Train Wreck" for obvious reasons.
I figured all I could do was try to shoot as cleanly as I could, try to not beat myself, and if Al had a good run, I was toast! If Al had a bad run, anything could happen. On the first table Al got a trainwreck, and I was able to win the table. To my amazement, the second table went almost the same, and Al got a second crop of pin tops that just wouldn't cooperate. I had managed to eliminate Al with my slow gun, after he had wiped me out solidly when I was shooting the fast gun! That's what makes pin shooting so much fun, you just never know what's going to happen!
Meanwhile, KeeWee had been cruising along with solid shooting, and came up against Rainy. KeeWee and Rainy both shoot just about the same, and one week one will beat the other, and the next week they will trade places. Their matches are usually really close. This was KeeWee's week to shine, as in the semi-final round the two of them met again. KeeWee won the first table. The video below is their second table to decide who moves on to the finals.
This is what club shooting is all about, two evenly matched shooters each giving it their all. KeeWee put this round solidly in the win column.
That put KeeWee and I in the finals.
KeeWee: "Don't forget who does the cooking........"
Mr. C. "Don't forget who does your gunsmithing....."
KeeWee: "Fair enough....."
I shot the best I could shoot, and she shot well too, but I managed to sneak away with the win. We ended up first and second, how cool is that!
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