Tam Raffle Update…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
Quick update as I get ready to head to the airport.  At least another 20 donations thus far last night and this morning. And I’m stupid… Carteach is donating an ISSC .22 (Glock like) trainer, NOT a Glock 22… That’s on me for the error.  And John had graciously added a Ruger P94 plus mags and holster to the mix, and we also have PMAGS and another knife being added to the mix.  Kathy Jackson is also putting in some of her books, and there’s probably somebody else I’m forgetting. 

For all that have emailed me confirmations, I’m NOT ignoring y’all, its just that we’ve got that many, and trying to answer, get them in spreadsheet, collate etc. is whipping our butts right now.  We are going to do a mail merge, confirmation email back to everyone later this week confirming the amount, the raffle and/or raffles you want to participate in.

Again, THANK YOU!!!  Can’t say that often enough!!!

Veterans Day…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
As you enjoy your holiday please take a moment to reflect on the tremendous sacrifices that Sailors, Marines, Soldiers, and Airmen have made for our country and freedoms – especially those that have endured life-changing injuries or lost their lives. 

Without them, we would not have the Country we do…

Update for Tam’s Raffle…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
Update #3, as of 1630 CST, donations have exceeded $2850 and we have three more prizes, Jack (an engraver) has donated either engraving for the Hand Cannon or Knife; we also have a $100 gift certificate from Amazon, and a Sightmark Tactical Red Dot.

We will get an email response out to those who have donated later this week to confirm we have received your donation and confirm which raffle or raffles you wish to participate in.

Again, all I can say is thank you for your support.
r,
Old NFO

Edit- McThag is also auctioning off a Spikes Tactical lower to the highest bidder to benefit Tam-  Link is HERE.  Angus is good folks, and digging deep to put this up!  

Edit 2- Brigid is donating a Gerber Applegate Fairbairn Combat Folding Knife.

Update on the Raffle for Tam

Posted on by March 6, 2013

As of now, 1100 local CST over $1400 has been donated to the the Diamondback raffle, and Carteach has graciously donated a Glock 22 to the pool.  Another gent has donated both in cash and a $50 Cabelas gift certificate.  Phlegmmy has also donated a guns and roses necklace to the pool.

The “plan” if you want to call it that, after talking to Jay G, is that we will not upgrade the goal, but we will run the raffle until Thanksgiving and do the drawings then.  If you want to participate in multiple drawings, post it to Jay G or myself with the splits you want.  Jenn has graciously (after a little arm twisting or alcohol or the promise of same) agreed to assist us with databasing the entries and collating them.  She and Michael have also volunteered to do the drawing for us as an impartial third party. 

All I can say is THANK YOU for your generosity!!!  

Random Stuff…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
You know you’re back down South when you go to the Country Club to play golf and the parking lot is full of pickup trucks and SUVs and there is NOT a single Mercedes or BMW in sight… 🙂

And another instance was watching an auto parts dealer come in at 0700 and open the store for one guy to come get a part for his wife’s car… and not being grouchy about it…

In other news…

It’s that time of year…

If you’re traveling with “stuff” that potentially get ‘disappeared’ at the airport, you need to be careful; especially late at night.  Myself and a couple of others had a ‘situation’ this past weekend at IAD with “missing” bags at 2300 on a Sunday night.

Three sets of golf clubs and two high dollar mountain bikes didn’t come out of the oversized luggage chute, even though we’d gotten our regular suitcases.

We were all waiting for appx an hour (IAD can be S.L.O.W).  Myself and the two hubbys went over to the baggage claim office and low and behold, ALL of our bags had been scanned in at the airport.

It was the usual drill of fill out the paperwork, etc… BUT I was pissed and decided to press the issue, so I told the baggage lady I wanted a police officer to respond, and I wanted to file a stolen articles report.  She was trying to dissuade me when the other two guys chimed in and agreed.  She asked us to wait and disappeared into the back room, and suddenly we had the ‘supervisor’ trying to calm us down.  Meanwhile, one of the guys had  called the airport police and had them responding…

When the supervisor heard that, HE disappeared and we heard radios start squawking in the back room.  The officer showed up,  and he wanted to know if we’d actually checked both oversized luggage areas (yes), had we been waiting without going anywhere else (yes, we’d all been standing at the carousel and oversized the whole time), then he started asking the supervisor questions…

We walked back down to the oversized luggage, the supervisor and the police officer confirmed with the two wives that nothing had happened (and asked if I’d been there the whole time too) then they disappeared into the bowels of the airport and about 10 minutes later, ‘mysteriously’ all five oversized bags popped out…

All our bags had been on a single luggage cart, sitting in the storage area… Now THIS is where it gets interesting, none of us were on the same flight!!!

Was somebody planning on stealing our stuff???  Possible, since both golf clubs and bikes are easily pawned, and normally they are not ‘registered’ per se, so it’s hard to prove whom they belong to…

And talking to LEOs I know, they said it’s “typical” for golf clubs and bikes to start showing up in pawn shops as folks try to get money for Christmas presents.

And last but not least, if you’re a road warrior and you’re not in TSA Pre-check, it IS worth the effort.  Don’t get the porn scanner, don’t have to take off shoes, belts, jackets, empty the bag, etc.  And even if you don’t select on a particular day, you  go through a special screening area that actually has POLITE TSA folks.

Raffle for Tam…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
Okay, it seems some folks are raffling some things to help raise $$ for Tam, so we’ll pile on to that…

First, one of my Diamondbacks, blued in .38 with a 4 inch barrel. It’s NOT a new gun, one of my shooters.  It came back from Cylinder & Slide about 4 months ago, so it’s perfectly functional.

And Michael from The Holster Site,  has generously agreed to make a custom holster (either in the waistband or on the waistband) in your choice of finish.

Hit the PayPal link at Tam’s site and enter “Diamondback” on the receipt, e-mail a copy of the receipt to oldnfo (at) gmail.com and you will be entered into a drawing for each $25 you send to Tam. We would like to raise at least $1500 so your chance will be one in 60 to win the pistol and holster.

I’m on travel right now, so I don’t have a picture handy, but I‘ll get a set of pics up on Sunday night.

You MUST be qualified to own this pistol, and it will be shipped from my FFL to the winner’s FFL.

And edited to add a second place prize of a hand cannon designed, built and donated by Joe Spear, Jackalope Rifle Co.

And one more edit, the Atomic Nerds just donated a $200 gift certificate to Brownells.  So the second person will get their choice and the third person will get what is left. 

Tam…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
For those who follow Tam over at View From the Porch, she has a ‘bit’ of an issue… She details it HERE.

I consider Tam a friend, and she is in need, so if you have a few spare $$, she could use the help. She’s ‘technically’ unemployed, which means no insurance, and is now facing a cancer issue. You can hit her Paypal and it will accept credit donations also.

Thank you in advance.
r,
Old NFO

Happy Birthday…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
Happy Birthday to the Marines! One more year added to the tradition, and hoping like hell we get a lot more… But depending on how bad sequestration gets, the Marines ‘may’ go the way of the dodo… At what point do we say enough??? Enough to the lack of equipment, enough to the lack of support from higher, and OPTEMPO/PERSTEMPO that violates all common sense??? Thankfully the Marines continue to get good folks who are willing to do the hard job, and take pride in their work!

Hand Salute!

Ready Two… Carry on Marines!

Meh…

Posted on by March 6, 2013
There are days it just doesn’t pay to fall out of bed in the morning…

And THIS has been one of them…

First, it’s the pawn shop with the decent rifle and ‘probably’ fake bayonet… Give the guy an honest offer, and what do we get back?

Oh I checked with my wife, she’s an ‘expert’ on M-1s and we want “this” much… Too bad the rifle was an 03 A3…

Second was a stop at Academy Sports (Spit)…  Looking at a little AR type 22 trainer, and I get told you’re out of state and we can’t sell it to you!  WTF???

Sigh… I’ll defer to Lawdog (post to come) on THAT particular set of comments, but suffice to say I will NEVER darken their doorstep again…

And ammo?  Good frikking luck… Talking to a guy at a REAL gun store, he said by 0800 yesterday morning most of the ammo sites were SOLD OUT!!!

And the gun store owner said yesterday was the BEST day he’d ever done for sales (and of course sold the ONE AR 22 he had)…

On the bright side, we have this…

 
Duct tape in colors… Dibs on the Navy Blue!

24 Interludes of Life…

Posted on by March 6, 2013

A few things to think about…

1. Don’t go for looks, they can deceive. Don’t go for wealth even that fades away. Go for someone who makes you smile.

2. There are moments in life when you really miss someone that you want to pick them up from your dreams and hug them. Hope you dream of that someone.

3. Dream what you want to dream, go where you want to go, be what you want to be, because you have only one life and one chance to do all the things you want in life.

4. May you have…Enough happiness to make you sweet
Enough trials to make you strong
Enough sorrow to keep you human
Enough hope to make you happy
And enough money to keep you comfortable.

5. When one door of happiness closes, another opens. But we often took so long at the closed door, that we don’t see the one which has been opened for us.

6. The best kind of friend is the one you could sit on a porch, swing with, never saying a word and then walk away feeling like that was the best conversation you’ve had.

7. It’s true that we don’t know what we’ve got until we lose it, but it’s also true that we don’t know what we’ve been missing until it arrives.

8. Always put yourself in other’s shoes. If you feel that it hurts you, it probably does hurt the person too.

9. A careless word may kindle a strife;
A cruel word may wreck a life
A timely word may level stress
A lovely word may heal and bless.

10. The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves and not to twist them with our own image, otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.

11. The happiest people don’t necessarily have the best of everything, they just make the most of everything that comes along the way.

12. Maybe God wants us to meet a few wrong people before meeting the right one so that when we finally meet the right person, we should know how to be grateful for that gift.

13. It takes a minute to have a crush on someone, an hour to like someone and a day to love someone, but it takes a lifetime to forget someone.

14. Happiness lies for those who cry, those who hurt, those who have searched and those who have tried. For only they can appreciate the importance of people who have touched their lives.

15. Love is when you take away the feeling, the passion, the romance and find out you still care for that person.

16. A sad thing about life is that when you meet someone who means a lot to you only to find out in the end that it was never bound to be and you just have to let go.

17. Love starts with a smile, develops with a kiss and ends with a tear.

18. Love comes to those who still hope even though they’ve been disappointed, to those who still believe even though they’ve been betrayed, need to love those who still love, even though they’ve been hurt before.

19. It hurts to love someone, and not to be loved in return but what is most painful is to love someone and never finds the courage to let the person know how you feel.

20. The brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past. You can’t go on well in life until you let go of your past failures and heartaches.

21. Never say goodbye when you still want to try;
Never give up when you still feel you can take it;
Never say you don’t love that person anymore when you can’t let go.

22. Giving someone all your love is never an assurance that they’ll love you back. Don’t expect love in return, just wait for it to grow in their hearts but if it doesn’t, be content it grew in yours.

23. There are things you love to hear but you would never hear it from the person whom you would like to hear it from, but don’t be deaf to hear it from the person who says it with his heart.

24. When you were born, you were crying and everyone around you was smiling. Live your life to the fullest so that when you die, you’re smiling and everyone around you is crying.