Month: March 2010

Don’t judge too quickly

/ hsoi

A friend just showed me these Ameriquest Mortgage commercials, made around the theme “don’t judge too quickly”:

The premise is simple, all the situations are innocent, but if you walked into the situation at just the right time the impression you receive could be rather different than the reality of the situation.

When it comes to self-defense situations, there are some situations that are cut and dry. For instance, if someone is attacking me, it’s clear cut that I’ll be involved. If someone is attacking my wife or children, it’s clear cut that I will become involved. But what about some other situations?

For instance, you’re at the gas station or a convenience store and a scumbag comes in and holds up the place. What do you do? Do you get involved? That’s far less clear cut. Some would say yes they would get involved, but what are the legal implications? What are the liabilities? Is it worth dying over?

In the above situations, things look as they seem. But in the spirit of “don’t judge too quickly”, what if you happen upon a situation in progress? For instance, you pull up to the convenience store just as people are running out and someone yells “stop that man!”. Your gut reaction likely is the yeller is the victim and the person running away is the robber. But can you be sure of that? Maybe the yeller is an accomplice or the scumbag herself trying to distract you… maybe that person running away was just an innocent bystander trying to get the hell out of there. Should you get involved, especially if you don’t know the whole story? should you not judge too quickly?

I’m not sure what the answers are here, in terms of giving out a specific “do this” recipe. If you do need a guideline, think about “what maximizes beer and TV time“. The only thing I can say is you must think about these things ahead of time. When the time comes is not a time to make a decision, especially because your chance of making a wrong decision is high. Figure out your boundaries ahead of time, make your mistakes while it’s safe. Then if the situation ever does present itself, you better your chances of success. Everyone’s lines are drawn in different places, just be sure you know where yours are drawn.

And this is why we want to carry in national parks

/ hsoi / 6 Comments

Just read the article.

SEQUOIA NATIONAL FOREST, California — Not far from Yosemite’s waterfalls and in the middle of California’s redwood forests, Mexican drug gangs are quietly commandeering U.S. public land to grow millions of marijuana plants and using smuggled immigrants to cultivate them.

Pot has been grown on public lands for decades, but Mexican traffickers have taken it to a whole new level: using armed guards and trip wires to safeguard sprawling plots that in some cases contain tens of thousands of plants offering a potential yield of more than 30 tons of pot a year.

So you’re out for a backwoods hike. You stumble into a marijuana field… and the growers won’t take kindly to that.

Many of the plots are encircled with crude explosives and are patrolled by guards armed with AK-47s who survey the perimeter from the ground and from perches high in the trees.

Of course, we knew this. But there are those that think parks are safe havens. Folks, they are no more special than anywhere else. Bad people will lurk about. Erecting artificial barriers that only keep law-abiding citizens in a submissive and weakened state (and thus embolden the bad guys)…. please, I’m still waiting for someone to show me the logic in that line of thought.

And… we’re down again

/ hsoi

Just when I thought I’d be getting back in the swing…. 2 are down.

Youngest was ill with something last week but seems to be over it now. Around 3 AM his morning Daughter wakes me up.

“Daddy?”

“Huh… Yes?”

“Tummy….”

and proceeds to throw up on the side of my bed.

Joy.

And now Wife seems to have it.

Oldest and I remain on the hitlist….

Thankfully it just seems to be annoying for a few days, worst at the onset then once you throw up you’re on the road to recovery.

I can’t wait for my turn! 🙂

Werner Carry System

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

One thing that I had seen before but didn’t pay much attention to was the Werner Carry System. Reason being I just wasn’t sure about the Hip Grip. Would it hold securely? I don’t need it falling off my belt and sliding down my pant leg.

However, after this past weekend’s snub classes, I’m going to give it a try. It seems ideal for my needs in many ways. While I didn’t get to fondle a gun with this specific setup, a guy did have a snub with a T-Grip on it and I got to hold that. That made quite a difference in the feel. Plus this guy was very familiar with the setup so I was able to ask him a lot of questions and he was most helpful and detailed in his answers.

You see, the current Pachmayr Compac grips I have are great grips in terms of filling my hand, having a lot of tacky-ness, room for my pinky, and absorbing recoil. They’re not too huge for the gun either, but yes they are a bit on the big side and affect concealability. But with something like the T-Grip, it helps to fill the grip out in my hand. Couple that with the T-Grips (and given my concerns have been alleviated, all except for trying it myself) and I’m ready to give this a try as I think it will solve a lot of things.

I will start off without the Hogue grip and see how that goes. I’ll add that in later on.

T-Grip and Hip Grips are ordered. I’ll write more when the arrive and I can try it all out.

AAR – Snub Training with Claude Werner

/ hsoi / 10 Comments

February 27-28, 2010 weekend, KR Training hosted a guest instructor. Claude Werner, one of the top snub revolver guys in the nation (IDPA Master-level shooter, 5 years as the chief instructor at the Rogers Shooting School, and someone that’s carried a snub for about 30 years), came and taught two classes specifically on the snub revolver.  This is my After Action Report (AAR) on the two days of snub-specific training.

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