*Giggle* *Snort*

Ok, this news snippet struck me as funny, so I thought I'd share.  Just to wet your whistle - here's the opening line:

The Maine Warden Service says a woman from Greenfield Township - you can't make this up - used a bull to prevent a possible theft.

Something tells me that those would-be thieves are still trying to get their britches clean!

One Less Credit Card

 This may be old news, but after reading about GE Capital ceasing to lend to gun shops, I've cancelled my GE credit card.  Not that the cancellation of one, barely use card will make a difference; however, they've made it clear that they don't want to profit from my kind of purchases so I may as well oblige them.

Now, General Electric is free to financially back - or snub - whomever they choose; though I do think that a major corporation should be swayed less by emotion than by economics.  It's rather short sighted of them to think that all those gun stores are going to take their balls and go home just because GE doesn't want to give them an allowance.  There are plenty of financial institutions that would like to get a bigger piece of the booming gun industry - it's one of the few healthy sectors of the economy.  Case in point, who wouldn't want to lend money to Cabela's right now? 

I think this:

 GE is based in Fairfield, Conn., and many of the GE's employees live around Newtown, and several have children in the Sandy Hook elementary school, where the shootings took place. Peter Lanza, the father of Sandy Hook gunman Adam Lanza, is an executive at GE Capital.

is the whole reason behind GE Capital losing their collective grip on economic sanity.  At what point are the people in charge too closely involved in an incident to make a rational decision as to what benefits the company vs what simply assuages their need to do 'something'?  What next, are they going to stop lending money to Presto?

Progress

Yesterday Gambler managed to load in under an hour and today he walked right on.  Yay!  There's still some work to do, tomorrow we'll try loading without Freedom in the trailer, then we'll move on to loading with the trailer away from the indoor let out.  Honestly, I'm anticipating some stupid with that part.  Right now there aren't any distractions and there's no where for him to go (circumstances which rarely prevail) and there's nothing quite like fresh grass and lots of space to make loading a low priority in a horse's brain.  Here's hoping progress continues apace, trail season's upon us.

Loading Battle

Last year my one horse, Gambler, went from okay at trailer loading to "WTF is that thing - I ain't getting in that box - screw you!"  The very last time we loaded it was with a blind fold just so I could get the bugger home.  I'm not overly proud of that moment, but it got him in the trailer.  Sad thing is, I have no idea what flipped the switch.  No traumatic incidents, no undue stress or injuries with loading, just stopped getting in. *shrug*  That will remain one of life's little mysteries. 

Unfortunately, after that last incident, it got cold, the trailer was put up for the winter and I never got back around to working with him on the issue.  Bad pony owner, boo! >:(  Now it's spring and I avoided dealing with it... until yesterday.  Oh boy did I set myself up for some frustration!

Now Gambler's one of those horses that just doesn't do force.  Sure, you could try using brute force but you're only going to end up tired, pissed off and have an utterly fried horse without being one step closer to your goal.  Someone in his past did something to his little horsey brain so it equates any sort of forceful correction with "Run away!  Run away!"  I'd like to find that person.

So, with the trailer backed just inside the overhead door to my indoor 'arena' (30' x 30' hard-pack dirt) I prepared myself for a battle... of patience, hunger and irrational fear.  See, he's not getting grain unless he gets in that trailer.  So, eventually, he's gonna get hungry enough to get over himself and get in; it's just a matter of how long 'eventually' is and whether my patience can last until then.

Yesterday sucked.  7pm to 10:30pm and he ended up going to bed hungry (still got hay) and I went to bed frustrated.  I now have a greater appreciation for my other horse, Freedom, who walked right on the trailer and who I can just smack on the rump when he's being and ass.  Horse 1 Human 0.

Today sucked less.  5:00pm - 7:30pm.  2 1/2 hrs of pressure & release to get him on the damn trailer but in the end he loaded and stood quietly.  Seriously, once he was on it was like, "Okay, now what? Oh look, GRAIN!"  Horse 1 Human 1.

&$%#ing Horse.

Windows

Dear Sir(s),

Those clear glass things on the side of a building are called windows.  Windows allow inside people to see out and outside people to see in.  Some windows even open.  So, next time you decide to relieve yourself on a building with first floor windows, don't be shocked when one of those magical portals open and you're informed that those bricks are not, indeed, a urinal and no one wants to see your manly bits.

Sincerely,

The Woman Behind the Windows



 

Home Again

Had a lovely time visiting with the sister in (surprisingly!) sunny Seattle.  It only rained the night I flew in and the evening I left.  Otherwise, it was either partly cloudy or out right sunny.  Everyone said I must have brought it with me - I just kept thinking, 'have you ever seen Ohio in winter?' 

We spent the majority of Saturday downtown Seattle.  We bummed around Pike's Market and saw the sunset from the top of the Space Needle.  It felt like everyone in Seattle was outdoors soaking up the sun.  We saw this guy when we were sitting in the park by Pike's Market.  He's rather blinding on a bright, sunny day.
 
 Concealed Carry was unobstructed, even downtown, it was so nice not to see 'no weapons' signs.  The only place I left the airweight in the car was when we visited the Space Needle.  While I didn't find anything saying I couldn't carry, there was a security guard checking all bags.  Mind you, I'm not sure what he was looking for as I could've been carrying a 1911 and he'd have missed it in my 'purse'.  I "borrowed" Heath's Crossfire & he *might* not be getting it back.  If I'd have realized it earlier in the trip, I would've gone to Tactical Tailor's retail location in Lakewood and gotten him a replacement - or me a new one ;-)

In general, it was nice to get to kick back with my sister again.  I've missed being able to hang out with her - even calls are tricky with the time difference.  We spent a lot of time watching favorite movies and bringing up old inside jokes.  Wish I could say I could make the trip again soon, but that's a helluva distance.

The flights, overall, were interesting but uneventful.  I had window seats on all 4 flights, didn't have anyone in the middle seat on 3 of them and scored a row to myself on the last one.  On the Red-Eye home (Seattle - Chicago) there were 6+ babies, but I had new, noise-cancelling earbuds so I didn't hear a thing. :-D 

Checking the gun through Cleveland was easy; TSA didn't even bother to open the case.  Checking it back through Seattle was more amusing.  I swear the counter agent thought it was going to come through the case and hold her hostage, the TSA guy couldn't grasp how to work the case clasps and didn't touch the gun or speed-loaders but made a point to check inside the ammo box - beats me why.

I do wish there was a more standardized pick-up procedure for firearms.  When Heath & I flew into Houston, we had to go to the baggage claim office and show our claim ticket.  In Seattle, I assumed it would be similar but they just waived me off to the over-sized luggage with minimal scrutiny.  In Cleveland, the case came in with the standard luggage and I just walked off with it.  I guess it shouldn't matter - it'd just be nice to know what to expect. 

Always fun to go visiting but it sure felt nice to get home!

Flying Out

I'm on my way to see my sister in Washington State!  I'll be taking advantage of their CCW reciprocity but all I have for plane travel is a rifle case. No use wasting that extra space so I packed some extra things along (they're going to charge me $25 either way, so why not?)

Yes, those are Legos in with an airweight.  We just divvied up our childhood collection and I'm taking her all the extra pieces (the actual sets will have to be shipped).

So tell me, what's the oddest thing you've packed with your checked firearm?

Cornbread

At the NE Blogmeet I promised someone my cornbread recipe and promptly lost the piece of paper their info was scribbled on.  So, here it is for everyone.  Now, this is more like corn-cake than cornbread - diabetics beware!

Ingredients:
1c flour
1/2c corn meal
3t baking powder
1/2t salt
1c sugar (rate back to 1/2c for more traditional cornbread)
1c milk
1 egg
1T melted shortening

Combine all dry ingredients (best if run through a sifter).  Whisk together milk and egg and add to the dry ingredients then add the melted shortening.  Pour into a greased, 9x13ish baking pan or muffin tins.  Do not fill more than 1/3 from the top of your pan / tins otherwise things get messy.  Bake at 375 for 30min (tins) or ~1hr (pan). 

Congressional Response

Here's the first response from my round of phone calls earlier this month:

I found that rather encouraging!

Fruitful Weekend

Spent the better part of Sunday turning these:

Into:

 


Every year we get Navel oranges and Tangelos from our local FFA's fundraiser.  Much to my shame, last year the majority ended up as fuzzy green/ blue balls of squish.  So this year I was determined not to waste them.  The Tangelos turned into juice and I suprêmed the Navels for canning.  I'm not sure what I'll do with canned oranges, but now I have 3 years to figure something out.  I do know that most of the orange juice is headed for the freezer just as soon as I find my ice cube trays, I'm rather sick of oranges.  

Tomorrow I'll throw the remains to my neighbor's chickens, they'll enjoy the treat.

Schadenfreude and Honesty

As it's been mentioned around the blog-o-sphere, New York forgot to exempt their own police officers from their most recent gun banning extravaganza.  I'm sure they'll pencil in that exemption before the ban comes into effect, but it is amusing to watch them gawp about while trying to save face.  Something funny has to come of something so farcical.

One telling quote that I found via Weer'd in an abc article about the snafu is this:

State Senator Eric Adams, a former NYPD Captain, told us he's going to push for an amendment next week to exempt police officers from the high-capacity magazine ban. In his words, "You can't give more ammo to the criminals"

Wait... it's like he's saying that he knows criminals aren't going to follow the ban.  So, tell me Senator Eric Adams, if you already knew that criminals were going to ignore the new restrictions, what was the point?  Sounds like an arbitrary way to make criminals out of honest men. 

A Spark of Light in the Darkness

We need more stories like this!

The 5-0 vote of the board Wednesday night to allow handgun training for four custodians to be able to tote weapons at the K-12 campus at the Williams County school came after last month's deadly shooting rampage at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut.
School officials say that having armed personnel - believed to be the first for any school system in Ohio - is designed to thwart incidents of violence and prevent what happened in Newtown, Conn., from occurring here

With all the gun-ban doom and gloom hanging over our heads, it's encouraging to see a school embrace the idea of arming staff.  This story is even more heartening since it's relatively close to home. 

From the details given, it looks like they're going about it the right way; it's voluntary and they're providing the training.  Kudos to the Williams County Schools.

I Did It

I actually called my representatives in Congress.  I don't know if it did any good, I wasn't eloquent and I forgot half of the things I wanted to say, but there's one more slash mark in the "does not support gun control" column. So maybe it'll count for something.