In typical fashion, Montana pretty much skipped spring and dove straight into summer. Summer means time to do some outdoorsy things like shoot, fish, shoot, hike, shoot, hunt, and maybe shoot some more.

Unfortunately, I am busier than I care to be. I’ve three jobs/business concerns going on and an educational obligation that takes time. But I really, really want to just spend an entire day being lazy at the range and shooting rifles.

Midterm elections are coming up and I was discussing them with someone. We both agreed that the notion that the midterm elections will be a weathervane on national mood. I wonder if political polsters and pundits will have learned their lesson from the last election. I am of the opinion that the people in the last election who went to the polls quietly and avoided/lied to pollsters will be out in even larger numbers. My track record for political predictions is pretty awful, but I think the left whines about their ‘resistance’ but isn’t as motivated to actually get out there and vote as the right. We shall see.

I watched Trump’s speech the other day on pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal. While watching that, I also watched a monitor showing live market and metals prices. A few twitches here and there but no real big changes. Either no one was surprised by his actions, or no one really thinks it was a bad idea.

This has been an utterly fascinating presidency so far. There are things I don’t like about Trump but it’s hard to disagree that he really does make stuff happen. He’s not my ideal president, but he’s a lot closer to it than that entitled harpie he ran against.

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Talking about politics is a guaranteed way for me to get frustrated. Swithcing gears…

You see Hawaii is having a little episode at the moment? Here’s a question that I never knew the answer to until recently. Lets say you own a piece of beachfront property in Hawaii. A flow of lava rolls across your property to the sea. As it rolls into the sea it cools and, bsically, becomes new land. Who owns that land? First person to go file a claim or stick a flag in it? Nope. As it turns out, it belongs to the state. I suppose I should have expected that given Hawaii’s fabulously left-leaning policies.

Volcanoes are fascinating players in disaster planning…while you know where the volcano is sitting, you usually don’t know when it’s going to go off. Oh, sure, there are signs but sometimes they go off like a nuke and no one was really expecting it. The Yellowstone supervolcano is always a topic of conversation and speculation when you talk about this sort of thing. I suppose if there’s a volcano anywhere in the continental US that’s likely to go, it’ll be there.

Other than a full tank of gas and a map showing three alternate routes, I’m not sure how you’d best prepare for a volcano. Staying put is probably out of the question. I suppose splitting up your supplies and being ready to completely abandon your location on a few hours notice is all you can do.