Caleb's Rap / Handgun

My son made a rap video with some friends.  

So, I took the gun in today to a gunsmith. This gun looks brand new, like it hasn't been fired very many times, but I still don't trust it, it belonged to someone else and who knows. I'm not going to have the thing blowing up in my face and paying a dear price for my ignorance on guns and whether they really are in good enough shape to fire and not have any problems with it.

So, I took the whole thing in there - carrying case with gun, 2 clips - one of them loaded - and all. The guy opens the case, looks at it, starts messing with it, inserts the empty clip, looks at it again: This gun is in new condition, there is nothing wrong with it. If there IS something wrong, the worst it's going to do is jam/misfire, but it's not going to blow up in your face and you don't have to worry about it. Take it to the range, run some rounds through it and make sure it runs them okay. If not, you can send it to Smith & Wesson and they will fix it for free. Oh, and I freely admitted up front that I don't know much about guns.

I have heard the comments in these gun stores from customers making derogatory comments about people who own guns but don't know how to use them or talking about people that don't own guns and how stupid they are. And they knew - what - exactly - the first time THEY picked up a gun? When I picked the gun up at the pawn shop the other day, a man was standing there checking out a gun they had for sale and making extremely derogatory remarks about people who are uneducated about such.

Well, I won't ask his forgiveness, I think it's dumb to speak about people that way who are trying to learn, but are starting from scratch. I know enough not to point the thing at anyone even if I "know" it isn't loaded. I now know how to unload the thing and clear the chamber of the round that is in it in both the shotgun and the 40 caliber. I am still stuck at the clean and lubricate part, but that's because I haven't tried yet. I don't need to clean it until after I shoot it, I am reading. Unless it hasn't been cleaned in a while. It isn't rocket science, frankly, but since it is a thing that can and is designed to kill animals or people, one much exercise extreme caution, obviously.

I also do not leave either of them loaded. The shotgun has shells in that holding tube on the bottom, but there is not a shell sitting in the chamber. Okay, so it's sort of loaded. It doesn't take much to get a shell from that tube into the chamber, we have all heard the "chink - clink" sound a shotgun makes when you pull that thing back and then move it forward again. Pulling it back both ejects the shell in the chamber and gets a shell from the tube read to put into the chamber, pushing it forward loads the fresh shell into the chamber. This may seem like basic, elementary stuff to gun enthusiasts, again, I freely admit my lack-of-knowledge. I'm in no hurry, I just take my time, examine the things and then figure out how it works without accidentally shooting it.

As for the handgun, the loaded magazine is not in the gun. It is in the carrying case. It takes all of a second to push the thing in there and get a round in the chamber, ready to fire.

Whatever. I'm happy to learn and will be happy to take the courses to learn even more. On that note, I am going to look up Shooter's World and see when I can get in the next weekend classes.

Friday is almost here and the end of the work week. I am ready for this week to be over and would really be ready for the 9 days off in a row if - it would have worked out.  As it stands, it appears I may be the next week off instead.  I need some time off right now, that's all I can say about it.

ben

Thursday 8/4/2011

Church last night. Prophetic training. Totally out of that realm, I plan on getting my mind, soul and heart back into it. I haven't engaged in such in well over 7 years and it was like starting over. But it was cool.

Rained cats and dogs last night, but mostly dogs, thankfully, as I don't really like cats. More to the point, I won't have to water my plants for a while as the ground is saturated, a good thing.

I have had a couple of replies to my most recent ad for a travel trailer or RV in "decent" condition. Meaning everything works. If the carpet is trashed, no problem, but the propane lines and water lines should be in tact and the holding tanks should be without leaks, amongst other things. Oh, and definitely the electricity should work throughout the trailer. One lady had hers listed at $1,300 in fair condition (which, if it really IS in fair condition, it would work). She then contacted me and offered it for $1,000.00. I rejected that offer and offered $700 plus free delivery, of which she accepted.

But I haven't even seen the thing yet, so I am not committing to buying it until I do. If it IS in okay condition, I could sell the other one for $500 and only be out $200 on the deal.

The other offer was for an "older RV", of which I have not contacted the individual yet because.......I got that email this morning and it isn't even 6:00 am yet! Lol, I don't go calling people this early in the morning excepting contractors to whom I am making deliveries because, at this time of year, they are already on the job site, working away and trying to get as much done before the afternoon heat hits.

Oh, Caleb: he produced a rap and it's posted on his Facebook page. Crazy kid. This rap, however, isn't about killing people, taking and selling drugs and having sex with everyone you see, it's actually about God. I dunno, it was pretty cool, actually. He had a friend in the video with him who was - smiling too much. Sorry, you don't really smile much doing rap, even if it IS about God.

I figured out the S&W40VE - my new 40 caliber handgun. As I said before, I am new to the world of guns. I have fired some off before, but I didn't load or unload them, just fired them and gave them back to their owners. I sat there and played with the thing - unloaded of course - until I got the hang of it. Not that much to it, but now I have to figure out how to take it apart, clean it, lubricate it and put it back together again.

I was thinking just follow the manual's instructions, which I might try, but I might also just take a course in it. Who knows. I bought some kind of ammo that is for use for target practice - I have no idea what the difference between that ammo and the "personal protection" version is, but I want to take thing to a shooting range and fire off a couple dozen rounds to get used to it, that and my 12 gauge shotgun while I'm at it.

I'm done. Time to get on the clock and get to work.

G'day.

ben

New Company Policy - CSA 2010

Today, something that I figured would happen, did.
I didn't know exactly WHAT they were going to implement, but I figured that they would make some kind of rule or policy concerning commercial drivers within our company relating to the CSA regulations that have come about that make a warning as bad as getting an actual ticket.

The company is having every driver read and sign a document. The document lists infractions and what is going to happen to you. Basically, if you get pulled over and are giving a ticket or a warning, you will be issued a written warning by the company and you take a day off without pay. If it happens a second time, you get another written warning and you are docked another day's pay. If it happens a third time within 12 consecutive months, bye bye, baby, you are history.

This is a side-effect of the new regulations that I knew was going to happen when I started examining these new regulations last year: companies will have no choice but to get rid of drivers that get too many warnings because, enough drivers getting too many warnings and the government can now come in and actually shut that company's commercial vehicle operations down.

I stated in this blog last year that a lot of drivers are going to lose their careers over this new regulatory BS and I am standing behind that statement. This isn't reckless drivers that have a lot of accidents or even tickets, either. I haven't been in an at-fault trucking accident since 1985. I haven't had any kind of ticket in about 12 years now. Many other commercial vehicle drivers are the same. But, the FMCSA has "determined" that these new rules will help identify "unsafe" drivers and target the companies that employ them.

It's a total load of BS. When America starts running out of truck drivers who have been forced out of the occupation because of this junk - give it a few years before a crisis starts rising up for truck driver shortages, you'll see it in the news - then and only then will this become a public issue with scrutiny to identify that the side-effects of these regulations are going to get "rid" of otherwise excellent drivers who post no threat to the motoring public on the highways and byways of America. (finishing this in the morning).

Here's the biggest problem: DOT (Department of Transportation) officers out on the roads. There are a large number of them in any given state that have as their main duty the directive to pull over commercial vehicles, all day long, do inspections and write fix-it tickets or hand out warnings.

The problem is the "god-like" attitude that many of these individuals exhibit and the fact that they will find something wrong with your truck, regardless of how good a condition it is in. Case in point was a driving who was driving a brand new truck that just came off the dealer's parking lot. Mr. Dot decided to PUT THE TRUCK OUT OF SERVICE, not just hand out warnings, after he pulled the truck over. The driver balked at this "official" and asked for that as supervisor be sent out, who, when presented with the facts, did an over-ride on the officer's "judgement" and let the truck and driver go without any warnings.

That was an extreme example, but it isn't that far off, at least where I live in Arizona, where these DOT officers are hanging out in their pickup trucks and randomly pulling over big rigs and - handing out warnings or tickets.

My take? If I get pulled over again and am handed a bogus warning, I am demanding a supervisor. I don't care if I have to wait 3 hours. The truck I drive is in excellent condition. We keep it that way on purpose: to ward off these officers that seem to take joy in giving grief to truck drivers.

The fact of the matter is, however and as already stated, there is going to be fallout with these new regulations that may or may not have been intended. I have no idea what the intentions of those people that crafted these regulations were: to get rid of drivers/shut down trucking companies or REALLY make the roadways safer to travel with trucks on them?

Let me tell you something, to make the roadways safer, it is far often more true than not that it's people driving cars and pickup trucks that are messing with trucks on the roadways. Cutting trucks off and slamming on their brakes in front of them; doing all kinds of idiotic, stupid moves that, in my case, sometimes makes me mad because the move that that person just did almost got THEM killed.

I could write incident after incident where someone - usually texting or talking on a cellphone and paying NO attention to the driving that should be their number one priority - just makes moves in traffic without even looking, apparently. I have almost run into several of them because they inserted their vehicle directly in front of mine without any forewarning or signals being used, totally out of the blue, you have a car that's going 15 mph slower than you are and you are both trying to not run into the car AND not jack knife the truck at the same time.

Whether my statements here actually come true remains to be seen in reality. But mark my words: it might take a couple of years, maybe less, but this situation is going to implode upon itself when drivers who have had successful, 10, 20, 30 plus years are suddenly finding themselves unemployed and unemployable in the field of commercial driving because of these new regulations.

ben