October 2010 Archives

I wasn't planning on shooting this match, but it just so happened that our Sunday plans changed at about 9 am.

The match directors for this match had come back from some National somethingorother match, and wanted some revenge, so they put this match on with some stages from that match.

Ug.

I hadn't fired a pistol in a few months until last week, and most of that ended up being practice getting used to the recoil again. To top it off, I decided to shoot a different division, Limited 10. So I was extremely rusty, in a different division, and the stages were extra hard. It made for some ugly results, for sure.

I ran the gun empty constantly. I was slow on my reloads. I had trouble making tight shots. I had trouble making long shots. I shot a bunch of no shoots. I wasn't smooth on the course. I pretty much did everything but get disqualified.

On the bright side, the weather was nice, there was a small turnout so there was more time shooting and less time waiting, and I did manage to shoot one stage well.

I needed the practice and was glad I got to shoot it.

I read about this CNBC expose on the Remington 700 over at The Firearm Blog, so I decided to watch it tonight.

I was going to write up what I thought of it, but Steve already nailed it.

So, on to my biggest issue ...

Let's review Jeff Cooper's rules

1. All guns are always loaded.
   
2. Never let the muzzle cover anything you are not willing to destroy.
   
3. Keep your finger off the trigger till your sights are on the target.
   
4. Identify your target, and what is behind it.

And now the NRA's rules:

1. ALWAYS keep the gun pointed in a safe direction
2. ALWAYS keep your finger off the trigger until ready to shoot
3. ALWAYS keep the gun unloaded until ready to use
   

Whichever set you think best, if someone is hurt or killed as was the boy in the program, the rules were violated. I don't mean to throw recriminations on the poor family, but we should all take that accident to heart.

CNBC's expert did bring up some good points, if you point the muzzle down bullets can ricochet, if you point it up falling bullets can still be deadly. These are good points, and not to excuse any alleged poor design, but if there were people hurt by ricochets or falling bullets, they were not documented on the show, and the main incident was avoidable.

When I was younger, I used to go on caffeine fueled "death marches" all the time as part of my job. Burning the midnight oil was standard practice in releasing software those days, at least at the places I worked at, and frequently the release of the product was merely an afterthought. So, as the last guy in the chain, I'd be the one stuck with getting this into its deliverable state in the wee hours of the morning. In a way, I kind of liked it. I felt needed, and respected as the guy who could get it done. Management appreciated it, usually.

Eventually I worked my out of those jobs into gigs with more regular hours, until I took my current job which in a lot of ways is a regression back to those old days.

I was up until about 5 am this morning, and I'm starting to get that "I'm too damned old for this shit" feeling. It's not as easy, or fun, as it used to be. It's not really appreciated anymore, it's more expected. Everyone's tired and bitchy. The negatives go on and on.

Personally, my sleep pattern is going to be all screwed up for days now. I used to be able to reset with just a good nights sleep, but now that I'm older I tend to wake up in the middle of the night and not be able to get back to sleep the night after one of these things.

The Rangers won their first post-season series!

I'm not a huge baseball fan, but I grew up watching the Rangers on TV and at the old ballpark. I hadn't watched a Rangers' game in quite a while, but I started watching them this summer, and I kept thinking they'd figure out a way to blow their lead in the division, but they didn't.

After they lost games 3 and 4 of the ALDS, I thought they might be done for, but they clawed out a win.

Before yesterday I hadn't fired a pistol in 2+ months. I think the last time I shot was the match in July.

So, I headed up to the range after work with my Hi-Power and 300 rounds of ammo. I didn't really have any plans to work on anything, just wanted to knock the rust off.

Tom Givens likes to say that shooting is a perishable skill. I never doubted him and yesterday proved it. I will say that if you know what a good sight picture looks like, what a good grip is, what a good trigger pull is, etc. that knowledge helps a lot. My first shot went right dead center into the plate I was aiming at. My next 9 shots were all over the low left side of the plate, and off it. What happened? Flinching.

It had been so long since I fired a pistol that I developed a flinch in response to the recoil in one shot! I had to force myself not to blink and watch for the front sight to rise.

The hammer and sear on my Hi-Power are kind of fubar'd at the moment. If you pull the trigger too slowly the hammer has a tendency to not fall or have a delayed fall. That really made me flinch. After 100 rounds or so the proper trigger pull for this gun came back to me and I was able to keep all my shots on the plate. I don't think I'll be shooting this gun again until I get it off to a gunsmith though.

I need to make sure I'm practicing at least once a month, dryfire is great for your trigger pull, but this proved to me that I need some exposure to real recoil and noise.

I have a lot of respect for the moms out there. Especially moms of n children, where n > 1.

The missus had herself a women's retreat this weekend. (She says there wasn't any pillow fights, but I don't believe her.) So, I had to pretend to be a responsible parent this weekend.

I don't have any great stories about what we did or anything like that. We didn't have plans, or a car to go anywhere, so we watched movies, played games, that kind of thing.

When you finally get everyone to sleep, you're like, man, I could go for a beer or 12. But you can't have too much fun because the little dynamos wake up at 6 am ready for breakfast. That's the worst part.

You know what I love about this time of year? I can wear jeans and pack a full sized gun again!