Here’s an idea:
On September 11, 2011, mark the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks by eating pork and shooting all your guns. Take pictures and video, then send them to the website Bacon and Boomsticks!
Personally, it will be bacon for breakfast while I smoke a Boston butt and some pork ribs.
Then I will shoot in the afternoon.
Give it a look.
My followers on Twitter can attest that my movie watching habits can be strange, especially when it comes to movies like Tombstone or Blazing Saddles. All I can say is, if you think my Twitter feed gets strange, you should be at my house when the movie is on.
We were watching Saving Private Ryan last night, and my son (he prefers to be called the Dauphin) was in rare form.
I should explain that his career goal is to become a military historian. I think it all started when we visited a lot of the museums and memorials in the Washington DC area a couple of years ago. In any case, it fits his personality, because he has always been interested the history of battles and wars, not just the what happened, but the why. He just started high school, but he already knows where he’s going and what he plans to study.
He started going on about the M1 Carbine again, and how the ammunition for it was merely an illusion, an urban legend, meant to scare the Nazis. Like Patton’s inflated tanks in England before D-Day.
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More Dauphinisms:
The bazooka was devised as a way to let German tank crews know where the best American troops were located.
“Here, stand up. You be a Panzer tank. Now, I’ll be a bazooka team.” He tapped me lightly on the shoulder, then he said, quietly, “Hey, Panzer, we’re over here! Here we are!”
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When Jeremy Davies came on the screen as the translator Corporal Upham, he said, “You know why Faraday is so nervous? He’s worried that Benjamin Linus is going to show up.”
He once pointed out that John Locke was mayor of Tombstone, Arizona, in 1881, pointing at the screen and saying “Damn you, JJ Abrams.”
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His name for the Sherman tank: The Suckie.
It has nothing to do with his Southern heritage.
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He promises to develop his own translation of the Edith Piaf song playing on the Victrola. I can’t wait.
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His college plans – research the best American History professors in Georgia, and get his BA with them.
Masters at Oxford. Research in Moscow, Paris, and Tokyo.
PhD at Georgetown.
“If you’re going to get a PhD in American Military History, go where it’s all kept.”
He eventually wants to be Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. At least he doesn’t aim low.
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The current Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution is Dr. Wayne Clough. As a fellow graduate of Georgia Tech, I plan to write and ask for a short visit with him, when our family returns to DC next summer. It never hurts to ask.
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Since he will be 44 at the centennial of World War II, he is planning to be at the centennial events at Pearl Harbor, Stalingrad, Normandy, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki. I would love to be there with him.
I hope they’ll let me take my Mosin Nagant to Stalingrad. That would make one hell of a rifle match. The Vasilly Zaitsev Prize.
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When he shot an AR-15 for the first time a couple of weeks ago, he fell in love. He’s as much the reason I want to build one as my own desire.
I pointed out that after high school, the US Government would give him one to shoot as much as he wanted. All he had to do was sign up for at least 2 years’ service. He wasn’t keen on that idea.
I have since broached the idea of ROTC in college. That way, he would come out as a Reserve Officer, and get first hand knowledge of military operations.
Plus, as an officer with a US History degree who wanted to be a military historian, he would probably be invited to speak with a lot of the real players in American military history.
He’s considering it.
My recent post on my gun wish list has inspired quite a bit of discussion around the watercooler and around the campfire. Naturally, people have share their own wish lists with me, and some have told me about guns they’ve shot and that they think I should own.
My son’s major contribution, beyond his total disdain for the .30Cal M1 Carbine round, has mostly been in the form of “Hey, but what about this gun? Wouldn’t that be neat to have?”
The problem, of course, is that a 14 year old has little concept of the limits of a household budget, beyond his own wheeler-dealing of used video games at the local Gamestop. I try to explain that I don’t have enough money to own and buy ammo for all the guns he thinks are neat.
But I have to admit that, budget aside, it turns out that I do have another list in my head of guns I would like to own if money were no object.
You will note there are no old curios on my list, no Mambus, no Walkers. Yes, I think my Mosin Nagant is neat to shoot, but if I hadn’t gotten such a good deal on mine, I doubt if I would own one.
So, in the spirit of GoalSettingTM I present my list of Guns I Would Love To Own When I Win The Lottery.
1. FNH PS90
With a 50 round magazine, fully ambidextrous controls, and super badass appearance, this tops my list.
2. Kriss Vector
I got to shoot one of these at the Lucky Gunner Blogger Shoot in May.
A full auto, suppressed, .45ACP machine gun that uses Glock magazines. Because of how the internals work, the action itself helps reduce recoil, so that it is really one sweet shooting machine.
Here’s a video I shot of John at No Lawyers Only Guns And Money shooting one. Enjoy.
3. Barrett M107A1
This is the semi-auto version.
For all the utility of easily concealable machine guns, I may need a nice stand-off weapon, for those times when I want to keep the threat at least 1,000 meters away.
4. Glock 18
This Glock 18 belonged to Saddam Hussein. It now resides in George W. Bush’s office in Crawford, Texas.
What can I say? May as well.
Here’s a video of me shooting one at the Blogger Shoot. It went too fast.
Look for more of this list from time to time.
Of course, I welcome your additions to the list. I have an open mind, and when I win the lottery, I don’t want to miss one.
Fill Yer Hands 