Tag Archives: guns

And then it just lowballed from there…. Pt II

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Buy some AK mags so I can keep buying guns I dont need!

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:::Making the bed::::
Phone: !beep!
:::Text message:::
“Mossberg 590 12 ga with extended tube. extendable stock. interested?”

Dammit.

Why does this happen a) right after I get paid and b) when I have to be somewhere in 15 minutes?

Short version: someone bubbatized a 590A1 with some cheapo M4-style stock and a coat of spraypaint. But..for $135 I can just rattlecan the whole thing.

Need to contact the guys at Choate and see what they have for a replacement stock/forend.

And I was just recovering from the Ruger last week.

But…then it got worse. I somehow managed to say yes to a NIB Glock 32 for …. $300.

Double dammit.

I’ll keep the 590A1 for a stash gun, but the Glock is getting swapped out for the first Glock 9mm I can find.

It never stops

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In, of all places, the bloody shower….

:::ring:::
:::ring:::
:::ring:::
::rii…”What!?”

“Want a Rugger 556?”
“How much?”
“[price]”
“Dammit.”

I had about fifteen minutes before I had to be somewhere but that was enough time to go to the bank, grab cash, head to the store, and literally walk in the door, hand the guy the money, say “thanks”, grab the box, and walk out. Total time on target: less than 60 seconds.[1]

So, yeah, this happened:

But for $450 it’d be pretty hard to pass up. I’ll function fire it this weekend and then put it back in the box and probably stick it in the rafters or something as a beyond-tertiary backup AR.

The Ruger 556 has a slight ‘bargain’ feel to it with it’s milled front sight tower, but I’d take it over a Palmetto, Delton, Core, or other lower-end AR for the same money. And, yes, that’s green cerakote finish..Model #8504.

 

1 = Yes, there was no paperwork on this transaction. He simply moves it from his license to my license so there’s no real paperwork like a 4473 or anything for me to deal with. I’ll log it into my my book and then write a 4473 to get it off my books to me as a personal gun.

SMH…. gotta learn to say no

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Text message from local coin/gunshop:

“Hey, a couple shotguns just came in. 20 ga double barrel and Win 1200 in 12 ga”

*sigh* Okay, I’ll try to be resolute.

“Whatcha got?”
“Stevens 20 ga. double barrel but it has a small ding in the barrel. Yours for a hundred bucks.”
“Useless. Lemme see the Winchester. Hmm…..Whaddya want for it?”
“$125”
“Dammit.”

Now, I have no need for a Winchester 1200..the cheapest pump shotgun Winchester ever made…and I’m actually not a fan of that rotating bolt lockup either. But…for the price…it’ll go in the closet until I find someone who wants a duck gun or something and I can make fifty bucks off it. Or, I can break it apart, grease it up, and stick it in Deep Storage as a pentary level backup shotgun.

One of these days, I really hope I learn to say no to these sorts of deals.

Watergun: Penultimate step

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I was rummaging through some junk last night and, to my surprise, found a plastic bag full of assorted P35 parts:Thats a lot of mainsprings. But…there are also two complete Type-A sights. As I mentioned, the Watergun needs a sight spring and screw. Well, not anymore, it doesn’t.

So that’s really about it for parts replacement. All thats really left is to get it coated with something. Since I had the parts on hand, my basis remains unchanged.

I’m thinking either a light shade of OD green or ‘coyote’ (which we used to just call ‘desert’ back in the day). And then maybe some nice laminate grips.

While I’ve established that the gun functions, I need to shoot it and see how accurate it is.

An example of the ‘loaner’ or ‘disposable’ gun

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Tam very nicely linked back to this post and opined in her blog:

But say you wind up with a friend or family member who suddenly finds themselves in a life circumstance where they realize that they need a better way to protect themselves than 911? A crazy ex, a stalker, a neighbor making threats, or just one of those violent criminal incidents that happens close enough to home to be a wake-up call…

If you’re the “gun person” in your family or social circle, this has probably happened to you at least once already. Lately, seeing the occasional sub-$300 fire sale prices on Smith & Wesson Shields and SD9s, I’ve more than once thought about buying one to set aside for just this sort of occasion. “In case of crisis, remove unfired-in-box gat from safe.”

And no sooner had that post hit the light of day than my vehicle decided that it’s alternator had had enough of this mortal coil (get it? ‘Coil’?) and shuffled off to wherever dead car parts go. As a result, my vehicle very inconveniently puttered to a stop. In front of the homeless shelter.

Joy.

So, I called a buddy of mine to come help me push it off the road because I really didn’t want to ask the whiskey-for-breakfast crowd for a hand. My mood was already several orders of magnitude into the red zone and it wouldn’t have taken much to release some pressure in an unprofessional manner. So my buddy shows up and asks how long till the tow truck arrives. “Two hours”, I reply. He looks over at the homeless milling around aimlessly, goes back to his truck, and pulls a beater Beretta 96 out from under the seat. “Wanna borrow this until the tow truck gets here?”, he asks. I thanked him and told him me and my G19 were just fine. But…here’s the big takeaway from that: because he had what amounted to a ‘disposable’ or ‘beater’ or ‘truck gun’ available he was able to offer it to someone else. And a scenario like that is precisely why we have extras, and extras on top of extras – because someday a friend, family member, or other person you care about might be in a bad position and in this way you can offer them assistance. And thats not just guns, guys…. that could be food, ammo, batteries, money, or any host of other things that, when you don’t have it and really need it, are really important.

This is a big distinction from charity. Charity is generalized giving out of some sense of moral or religious imperative or duty. I generally don’t suffer from this particular quality, so my generosity is a bit more selfish – I give to those that add a value to my life, or I give for the satisfaction I get from the act of giving. It may seem like that’s a difference with no distinction, but I see a distinction. I suppose the greatest distinction, for me, is that charity often comes across as an obligation and I am extremely opposed to obligations being forced upon me rather than they being voluntarily assumed.

On a side note, I had my Bag Of Tricks with me as well as my mountain bike sitting in the back of the vehicle so I could very easily have left the area and made it back to base with minimal inconvenience…if I was willing to just abandon the vehicle, which was not called for at that point.

Must. Not. Buy.

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Ok, Crom as my witness I am done buying Ruger P95DC’s. I unexpectedly won not one but two auctions last week. That’s a pretty hard punch to the wallet to roll with. So….no more. Done. Finito. Inventory says I’ve got.. well…a bunch. Since my policy is usually to never sell a gun except to purchase another one, I suppose I should remove some of the P89 and P95 non-decocker variants to make room for the two on the way.

In my defense, though, the last one I purchased for $200 plus shipping was virtually untouched, with box and docs:

For a pistol platform that is a tertiary level of backup, I really might have gone overboard. But…a quality, reliable, inexpensive, and somewhat semi-disposable handgun is really not a bad thing to have squirreled away for that Rainy Decade. And, quite honestly, for $200 I cannot fathom a better handgun choice….certainly it is leaps and bounds a better choice than any -arov handgun, and it certainly beats, IMHO, a HiPoint. Remember, guys – after the end of the world there will be no award handed out for the person who managed to make it through the apocalypse with the cheapest gear. Yeah, you could go through Katrina with a Mosin-Nagant and a Makarov…. but why would you? Anyone whose aspirations exceed working as a WalMart greeter can come up with better materiels than that.

If someone I cared about showed up on my doorstep with not much more than the clothes on their back, I like to think I’d be able to gear them up in a manner that would not embarrass or shame me.Guns such as this one allow me to do just that. On the other hand, I have, literally, no people I  am close to who do not already have enough guns in their own stashes to do this sort of thing. But Fate is a fickle and unpredictable thing…so you never know.

Is this a likelihood? Probably not. But I feel better when I have extra guns in the safe, and (normally) I can afford to pick them up every once in a while. And, like the stash of freeze drieds, a couple of these will get packaged for the Deep Sleep and wind up at the Beta Site. Since these stupid things are, relatively, so cheap it isn’t like there’s a tremendous opportunity cost.

Overkill? Meh…maybe. But I think differently about these sorts of things than most humans. I tend to overthink things. For example, if I have a friend or relative that I visit out of state, I can afford to stash one of these there for my use while I’m there and not have to deal with the hassle of flying with a pistol.

My reckoning says I’ve about 25 years left on my meter, and if I were unable to buy any more guns after tomorrow I think I’d be pretty okay…not happy…but okay.

The good news for you? You guys will no longer be bidding against me on GunBroker for these things.

Magazines

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There’s a ratio of magazine:gun that makes me feel comfortable. For a pistol that I plan on shooting and having as an integral part of my long-term plans, I like to have a ratio of at least 20:1. For rifles, thats more like 40:1. That’s not an unattainable goal and, in my opinion, it’s a realistic quantity of magazines if you operate under the guide of “will what I have right now last me the rest of my life if I can’t get any more?”

Having acquired recently two Ruger PC9 carbines that take P-series magazines, my ratio of mags:guns took a bit of a hit. So…off to GunBroker……

Once in a blue moon I can find someone selling a bunch of Ruger mags as a single lot. (Which is how this absurd collection of P-series pistols got started.) I just happen to stumble across someone selling a fistful of law-enforcement restricted P-series mags and, since the guns aren’t exactly terribly popular, managed to nail them down for $100 for the lot…or $12.50@. Good deal for gen-u-ine Ruger mags.

Although it’s not something we usually think about, mags are a consumable. They are disposable. They have a limited usage life compared to the pistol. The person who says “Oh, I’ve got five mags for Beretta 92…I’m all set!” is a short-sighted, ignorant, and unimaginative fool. I’ve covered this elsewhere so I won’t rehash it here, but it’s really hard to have too many spare mags.

Anyway, these will get distributed amongs the pistols, and a couple pistol mag pouches will be set aside for the carbines. And, unless a smoking deal comes along, I think I’ll be pretty much done on this particular front.

 

Making room

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I’ve another Ruger P95DC coming in and, honestly, I need to make some room for it in my wallet and gun safe by retiring out one of the other Rugers. So…if you want a Ruger P89 that was owned and shot by yours truly, there’s an auction up on GunBroker as we speak. Condition is good, with some bluing wear and some scuffing and whatnot around the triggerguard where some idiot put a wire hang tag on it. But, I’ve shot this thing and it’s as reliable a sunrise. I’ve taken it apart, cleaned and oiled everything, function checked it, and generally made sure it would be ready for that big day when all that stands between you making history and you becoming history is a reliable 9mm pistol.

Go. Bid. And know that your selfless actions will translate into a greater good for..well…me.