Election years are always expensive…

So the election is around the corner. Because Im a survivalist, I have to be prepared for possible outcomes that will affect me. So…there’s is a vendor in the midwest right now who just sold a metric buttload of Magpul Glock magazines to some rude survivalist dude in Montana. I asked him how  they were selling. He said they’d sold over 100,000 in the last month. I don’t believe that, but I do believe that by this time next week his remaining inventory of 800 mags will gone.

It has been 12 years, or three Presidential election cycles, since the Clinton Assault Weapons Ban expired. If you had bought one magazine (your choice of flavors..AR, AK, Glock, whatever) every month since then you wold have a gross (thats 12 dozen, or 144) magazines for your favorite boomtoy. But many people didn’t do that. In fact, many people just shrugged their shoulders and did nothing to hedge their bets. Those people are now on the phone to CDNN listening to a recorded voice say “..you are caller number..85..in queue..”.

Assuming that youve been into preparedness/guns since that time, there is no excuse for you to not have your lifetime of magazines. In fact, the sunset of the AW ban was your ‘second chance’…your Jimmy Stewart “Wonderful Life” moment…to relive your magazine/gun buying past. Did you make the most of it?

So why did I buy more mags? A few reasons..first, while I have what I think I’ll need for the rest of my life I am a big fan of overkill. Second, these are mostly for resale at exploitative  prices to whiners who will say “You’re price gouging! That magazine only cost you ten dollars!”. And I will say, “Yes it did, the other $90 is for you expecting me to cover your twelve years of cluelessness.” And, finally, I just like having them. It’s a giver of warm-fuzzies…like food in the freezer, gas in the cans, money in the bank, and Jennifer Lawrence’s panties on my bedpost.

All is not entirely lost….once the election is done, the laws won’t really change until after the inauguration. Thus, you have about a two month window to really kick it into high gear…as millions of other people try to do the same. Perhaps with the new administration they won’t get around to ‘the gun issue’ for a little while, or at all, but You. Dont. Know.

And this is important: Any new ban will not be like the old one. Do you really think they’ll put in a sunset clause? Or an exemption for specific named guns? Do you really think they’ll simply copy the 1994 ban and run it up the flagpole again without changing it to suit their goals? Don’t be silly!

Yup, you’re going to spend a couple hundred dollars on magazines. Here’s something to help you put that in perspective:

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Twenty years ago.

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Today

You young whippersnappers may not remember it, but there was a time that you would think you’d stumbled onto gold if you found a guy selling a used Glock 33-round happystick for less than $125. Today, you can buy three of them for that price…more if you shop around carefully. I’ve a tall .50 can full of ones (Glock-made) that I paid $20/@ years ago.

And if I’m wrong….if a Republican-controlled Senate and House hamstrings the new President and no new laws are enacted (what are the odds??) then what? Was it a waste of money? Nope. You still have something you want, and can use. Plus, and this is just my personal take on it, another ban will happen. If it doesn’t happen this administration, it’ll happen in another. But…like hurricanes and earthquakes, we may not know when but we know it will happen.

Oh, and not to jinx things, but I will bet that sometime between now and the inauguration, there will be a high-profile mass-shooting to reinforce the whole “we must ban them’ message. I hope I’m wrong, but I dont think I will be.

Suggested reading: Mag Speculating.

Signs of the times

It seems like every election year CostCo trots out the PanicPak.

20161022_120000 20161022_120014So that is, ostensibly, $40 for 3 days worth of food for 4 people. Or, put another way, $10 for a 3-day supply for one person. Sounds like a bargain, I suppose, but there’s not a shred of meat on that list of food (“chicken-flavored” = TVP or non-meat ingredients), and most of it is soups/stews. I like the notion of ones-stop-shopping, but, honestly, I’d grab a 5-gallon bucket from Home Depot and load it up with some bottled water, instant oatmeal, Cup O Soup, some cans of chicken or tuna, and a few other long-term goodies and call it  a day. I mean, c’mon, its only three days….I’ve eaten leftover pizza for 2-3 days at a pop and never felt at a loss….and it was only $10.

In a crisis, I probably wouldn’t be working on the 3-meal-a-day paradigm anyway. Sure, it depends on your activity level – hanging looters and manning barricades requires more calories than just huddling in a fallout shelter – but I’m most likely to do two meals a day and leave it at that. but, of course, your mileage may vary.

For someone who wants a turnkey solution this sort of thing might be nice but when the apocalypse gets hear I don’t want to be the last real meal in my belly to be cheesy broccoli soup or some such nonsense. It’ll be freeze dried porkchops, mashed potatoes, corn, apple pie and some sugary beverage.

Because you suck. And we hate you.

My life, broadly speaking, is a swirling cesspool of despair and hopelessness from which no ray of hope can ever escape. BUT…once in a very rare while, Fortuna, perhaps feeling sorry for me, will discreetly put her finger on the scale and tip it in my direction. It doesn’t happen often, but it happens often enough, like the occasional royal flush, to make me stay in the game. Case in point, todays totally unexpected surprise:

20161023_124815Yes, there is a small patch of wear from where the previous owner had an HK carry handle mounted on the gun, but this is an otherwise unfired, genuine, honest-to-Crom, HK-91 in the box, circa 1981.

A longtime friend of mine came by an announced he was thinning out his collection and gave this thing (and it’s bayonet) to me. I’ve had very few pleasant surprises in my life but this was one of them. I know, I know…most of you are still bouncing the word ‘gave’ around in your head. Yes, gave. As in “Here is an astronomically expensive gun that most people would have sex with a Cuisinart in order to possess. Take it, it’s yours. Free of charge.”

For those not in the know, these things were banned from import back in the 80’s. Of course, that immediately raised their value and they now trade somewhere in the range of what a decent used pickup truck costs.

Being a fatalist, I am terrified. If something this good happens to me, there has to be something equally bad out there waiting in the wings to balance the scales.

For those who havent figured it out yet, this posts title refers to the ‘unooficial’ motto of HK.

TWD and hunting season

This is highly amusing: Anti-Hillary ‘Walking Dead’ Posters Surface in Los Angeles
negan_webThis is what happens when you mix popular culture with politics. And , for some reason, it just tickles me silly.

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Hunting season opened today. Me and an acquaintance will be going out tomorrow to do our part to keep ourselves at the top of the food chain. I’m starting to think that the only reason I like hunting season is because it gives me the opportunity to try new gear and show it off.

While I was out picking up my Bambi tag, I checked the supply of .22 ammo at the Sportsmans Warehouse. To my surprise, there were several bricks of Federal on the shelf. Hmm. They were apparently in some sort of gyno-friendly promotional mode because the box was pink. Dude…if you’re stupid enough to pass up buying a brick of .22 because the box is pink, well, I’m not. So, that was a sorta bonus.

Movie – The Accountant

I’ll keep the spoilage to a minimum. Ben Affleck plays an autistic/Asperger-y accountant whose upbringing by his military dad included lots of hand-to-hand to keep dad’s son from being a victim. Fast forward twenty years and the obsessive-compulsive kid is now an accountant to the mob, terrorists, and other undersireables.

The gunplay in this movie was pretty good, and there’s some Barrett lovin’. This movie also features Jon Bernthal, last seen in “Sicario”, as basically the same character he played on The Walking Dead. There’s some nice pistol work, a little bit of small-unit stuff, and a whole lot of CQB-gun-to-the-head action.

The rest of the story you can go see. And, actually, it’s not bad.. sort of “Rain Man” meets “Bourne Identity”. But, what I found interesting was the the level of preparedness the main character engaged in. Hidden away at a storage unit was his Airstream trailer, loaded with cash, gold, rare paintings, weapons, and everything he’d need to pull up roots and GTFO before the heat landed on him. As he tells another character, he can abandon his life and be on he road “in twelve minutes”.

If you’ve ever wondered what a decent ‘bug out trailer’ would be like, this is a nice example. It sits in his stroage unit, loaded up and ready to go, just waiting for the twelve minutes he needs to grab it and it’s life-altering cargo.

Anyway, enjoyable movie, some really nice plot twists, good action, and not a drop of useless romance or love interest. Oh, and local lad JK Simmons does a really nice job as the multi-layered treasury agent.

 

 

 

Recharge and redouble

Mission fatigue sets in from time to time. Let’s face it, getting ready for the zombie apocalypse (or whatever flavor of KoolAid you prefer) starts to wear you down after a while. Sometimes you’re too busy worrying about getting tickets to the ballgame, to worry about getting more freezedrieds into the bunker. And then more life occurs and you push the preps further down the priority list. The kids need shoes, so that new GLock can wait a month. The car needs tires, so the generator can wait. And, eventually, you suddenly look up and realize that three weeks have gone by without you doing anything survival-related and -surprise!- you’re just fine. So then you start to lose momentum…yeah, you meant to go to Costco for more canned beef this weekend, but you wanted to go geocaching instead. But you can always go next weekend, right? The end of the world won’t really happen tomorrow. You’ve got plenty of time. And then you wind up never getting those cans from Costco. Or the batteries from Walmart. Or the case of .223 from Cabela’s. Or the filled gas cans from Conoco.

And then, one morning, you get a phone call waking you up at 6am and it’s your family member on the other side of the country and the first words out of his mouth when you answer the phone are “Are you watching the news?”

And that, my friend, is when it alllllll catches up to you.

I wish I wasn’t speaking from experience, but I am… Look, my identity is predicated on being some sort of super-secret-squirrel survivalist. It is, literally, my only claim to fame. And with all that, even *I* let my foot way off the gas sometimes and just drop the ball on keeping up on preps and maintenance.

What fixes it? What refocuses my efforts? What makes me sit up, cancel Thrusday movie night, take the phone off the hook, and Get Real Serious Right Now? Good question. For me, its either a close call or reading something that inspires me. At the moment, I bought a new copy of “One Second After” to replace the copy I loaned out and never got back. After reading that I find it virtually impossible not to grab a clipboard and make sure things are topped off and shopping lists planned.

You need to find your impetus if you suffer from these motivational lapses like I do. For some people, it’s watching the news. For others it might be reliving a previous experience that made an impression. Or it could be as simple as watching some homeless wretch on the street eating out of a dumpster. But…find something that motivates you and gets you back on the path. When life decides to suddenly go sideways, all those “I meant to” statements will be worth less than nothing.

Now, back to reconciling my spreadsheet inventory of stored food with the actual physical inventory…………..

Nope, still here

Just been massively busy with a metric buttload of ‘real world’ stuff. But…I’ve got a few posts brewing.

It’s worth pointing out that fall is offically here, hunting season is around the corner, the election looms large like an iceberg, and we’re all going to be screwed no matter what.

But other than that…

And one bright spot – new Walking Dead in a week or two. Let’s hope they don’t screw it up.

Regularly scheduled brain droppings will continue in a day or two. Just gotta get caught up on some real-world stuff.

Fear The Walking Dead – Season Finale

You know, I’ll be the first to admit that the major character that killed off was definitely one that I’m happy is gone. The bad news it isn’t either one of the insanely annoying chicks.

And as the election season approaches with politcal rhetoric about illegal immigration (and remember kids, there’s a difference between immigration and illegal immigration) we have what appears to be a Texas border militia group making an appearance.

I’m still having mixed feelings about this show, but it is satisfying to watch the character start to turn into pragmatists and lose the we-have-to-save-everybody attitude. It’s also interesting, and I think this was a brilliant move, to set the majority of the series in a non-US venue. It allowed for plenty of different characters, lifestyles, and scenarios that were fresh and interesting.

Anything worth observing? Well, seriously, everyone needs a damn bugout bag packed so that when you have to beat feet out of your refuge you can leave with more than a Beretta 84 and a couple gallons of water. Binoculars are worth the weight. Wear your seatbelt. Don’t believe in people selling miracles. Always check your six. Two-man rule. Static positions aren’t going to last forever.

The regular Walking Dead series has been losing my interest lately, at least this series has a few fresh ideas. So, yeah, I’ll tune in but until they kill off those annoying women I’m gonna root for the zombies.

 

But keep this one. I like her…..

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