Isn’t dry fire training a great option for winters like these, when the range is an iced over highway away, and ammo is still so hard to find anyway? Too many people don’t value the usefulness of dry firing. I imagine this is due to most people’s understand of the definition of “dry firing,” the inability of the shooter to judge if they are practicing correctly, or the spreading of the syndrome I have recently termed, “Dry Fire Training Boredom.” To combat all three of these issues, and probably a few others, Laserlyte now offers a new training target option, Plinking Cans.
So you have a friend who wants to get their first gun. Maybe they grew up around firearms, maybe they want to start hunting, maybe they want to get into competition shooting, maybe they want to get their concealed carry permit, but regardless they have turned to you. What do you do? Getting someone new to the shooting community properly introduced to the responsibility of being a safe and considerate gun owner is fairly straight forward, but it’s also important to ensure that your friend is getting the proper education so that they can help us set the example of responsible gun ownership.Continue reading →
Don’t take my word for it though. Talk to anyone whose spent a significant amount of time in any high desert terrain, and they’ll tell you about all the strange things they’ve seen.
I grew up in the Mojave desert in Southern California, in a little town you’ve never heard of. Sure, it was in LA County, and when people ask that’s where I say I’m from, because explaining that I’m from a town called Lake Los Angeles, which has no lake and is 2 hours from LA causes most people’s eyes to glaze over. But my backyard was 500 miles of desert, and one of my favorite childhood activities was to simply go out in the desert with my friends and explore.
Sitting under a juniper tree in the early morning waiting for coyotes to come in, you can feel the oldness of the desert around you. Sounds carry for miles, and looking out at the land in front of you causes you to realize that this place was here long before we were, and will be here long before we’re gone.
One of my favorite books is The Lonesome Gods, which is likely Louis L’Amour’s best novel. Set in the California high desert, it evokes a sense of mystery and wonder at the supernatural nature of life in the desert; of things that were once grand and may yet be again. It is hard to capture in words what it is that stirs me about the high desert, and mere pictures can’t do it justice. But there are good things, terrible things, mysterious things, and things best left undisturbed in these places. Spend time under the stars in the high desert and you’ll understand.
I made a tactical error at SHOT Show this year. Anyone who has been to any trade show will understand and probably cringe when I tell them. You see, I packed shoes I hadn’t worn before. A really cute pair of flats I snagged on sale that went really well with my new business outfits. Of course, within the first two hours I had cuts on the back of my heels, and by the end of the first day… Well, you can imagine.Continue reading →
Last week it was announced that Senoia GA, the city that is home to the production of The Walking Dead, is giving up the .40 S&W for 9mm. The Senoia Police Department has made a deal with Glock, in which trade-ins will be bought back for $300 and 16 new 9mm pistols will also be purchased. What could possibly make these cops opt for less stopping power, especially since new guns were not in their budget for this year?
The main reason the Senoia Police Chief Jason Edens told the Times-Herold for the change, was availability. Senoia as well as other citys’ departments are being forced to wait over six months for their orders of training and duty ammo. Edens also mentioned that the price tag on 9mm rounds was considerably less than on the .40. But the switch isn’t only about the rounds. Glock’s Gen 4 has some appeal as well. Chief Edens mentioned the higher round count of the Glock 17, as well as the interchangable backstraps which added to their interest in making the change.
What I found most interesting about this announcment was the Chief’s statement, “we want to build a firearms program that concentrates on precision and accuracy with the shots, as opposed to just having a big chunk of lead.” I realize that there are shooters who are highly proficient with their .40 S&W pistols, and I mean them no disrespect. However, no matter how many long-time shooters I’ve met who are die-hard .40 carriers, none have ever convinced me that two or three accurate shots with a 9mm were better than one well placed .40 cal round, and a questionable follow up shot. Like it or not I believe, the times they are a’changing… The Senoia police are making a big statement with this change in caliber, even if their only intention was to get their officers a few new guns.
I know Caleb put a post up the other day encouraging everyone to donate to my campaign for the NRA Women’s Programs, but I wanted to give Gun Nuts readers a little more in-depth look at why I decided to start this movement.
One of my group members and an instructor during the pistol portion of the Women’s Wilderness Escape.
It all started in September, when I had the chance to fly out to the Whittington Center for the NRA Women’s Wilderness Escape; what I experienced there was life-changing.
The women that attended this event were not the ones you see in photos on Facebook or writing articles for blogs. They were real, and from all different walks of life, with all different levels of experience. Each had her own, unique reason for attending the event – my roommate was even a vegetarian corporate lawyer who had recently moved from New York City (seriously, I can’t make this stuff up). She absolutely embodied what these programs are about. At the beginning of the week she was afraid of guns, skeptical of gun owners, and, well, it was amazing she was even there. By the end of the week, she was trying to decide whether to shoot precision rifle or 3-Gun and was killing the Cafe’s wi-fi with me watching YouTube videos of Jerry Miculek.
That’s the effect these programs can have. That’s the difference you can make by donating just a little bit to my campaign. This isn’t about me shooting Bianchi Cup in a mini kilt, this is about all the women who want to shoot Bianchi Cup in a mini kilt and don’t know it yet.
Some time ago I wrote a bit about The Danger of Fists in response to some of the nonsense that I saw in media coverage of the Zimmerman incident. In that article I claimed that law enforcement training treats an officer being “mounted” as a lethal force event. Here’s an example of just such an event:
The man in the tie was an off-duty Kansas City firefighter who apparently got a bit drunk at a wedding and ended up assaulting a cabbie. The officer in the video was working security for the hotel while in uniform, not an uncommon practice in jurisdictions where sworn officers have police authority 24/7. When you see police officers at a university football game, they’re working in exactly the same capacity. The officer attempts to make an arrest, and ends up in a fight with the firefighter.
Note how quickly the situation goes from the officer appearing to have the upper hand to the officer having his head forced against the pavement and taking blows. The officer sustained multiple serious injuries, including a broken eye socket, a fractured cheekbone, a cut above his left eye that required two stitches and loss of feeling in the left side of his face. All sustained from just a few blows from an untrained attacker in a couple of short seconds.
Had the assault gone on any longer the officer could have been killed or suffered permanently debilitating injuries just from the punches. The officer fired in self defense, killing his attacker. The shooting was “no-billed” by a grand jury, meaning it was presented for review by a grand jury and they found no cause for criminal charges. That’s the equivalent of ruling this to be a “good shoot”, meaning a justified use of lethal force.
The officer has been off the job since the incident and according to one news report I saw quoted online has required multiple facial reconstruction surgeries. From a few punches delivered in a couple of seconds. Of course, it doesn’t even need to be a couple of punches delivered from a side-mount position:
One sucker punch was enough to cause the victim fatal brain damage. To repeat what I said in the original Fists writeup, fists and feet have been responsible for more killings than rifles and shotguns combined according to the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report.
Woke up at 4:30am central time this morning to catch my first of two flights. Leg one would take me from my home base in the Dakotas to a short layover in Denver, then on to Salt Lake City. SLC isn’t my final stop though, as I write this I’m waiting for the other members of our party to show up before we saddle up and drive to Ely in Nevada.
I said goodbye to my wife and the dog, and headed out the door. The flights were uneventful, and now I’m enjoying a cup of mediocre airport coffee and putting my thoughts into electroncs.
I’ve never really hunted coyotes before. I’ve shot them, but the tactics and strategy of hunting an elusive predator have never been something I’ve really gotten in to. In fact, this will be only my second official and organized hunt ever. It’s a strange thing – I’ve spent my entire life around guns, and I have enough skill that if you asked me to pick up a strange pistol and hit a target 50 yards away, I can with relative ease. But hunting? This is a whole new world to me. I play at the country boy, and while my youth was spent in the great expanses of the Mojave Desert, my adult life has been marked by far more 5-star hotels than camping trips. Luckily, we won’t be doing any of that “camping” business, but I still feel much further from my comfort zone mentally than I do before any match.
A passing observation as I people watch in SLC: I should have worn my flat billed cap. I would have fit in quite well with all the extreme-sport looking guys with ski bags and snowboards who’ve come here to commune with the mountain gods. That’s a thing that no matter how outdoors acclimated I become you’ll never see me doing: ski. Michael Schumaker drove F1 cars for ages and never got a scratch. He goes skiing once and almost dies.
I hope you’ll enjoy this more introspective look at what is to me, a new side of the shooting sports. I bought a camouflage jacket yesterday, designed specifically for hunting. It’s a very nice jacket. I’ll be updating this series as I go on. At the end of the day, despite everything else I do, I am a writer at heart. This is a chance to share a new experience for me in the way I know best.
Bianchi Cup is one of my favorite matches of the year. It has the prestige and fanfare that any National Championship should, along with an excellent prize table, a chance to spend time with some good friends, and an excuse to buy a new dress for the awards ceremony.
This year, I decided that instead of shooting my snakeskin M&P or an AAC-branded Nighthawk or anything else as over-the-top as the match itself, I’d take some of my own advice. I have long told shooters who are interested in the action pistol sports and trying to decide what to get as their first competition gun to buy a Glock 34, a few mags, and a Blade-Tech holster. Nothing fancy, but all of it good, quality gear.Continue reading →
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Isn’t dry fire training a great option for winters like these, when the range is an iced over highway away, and ammo is still so hard to find anyway? Too many people don’t value the usefulness of dry firing. I imagine this is due to most people’s understand of the definition of “dry firing,” the inability of the shooter to judge if they are practicing correctly, or the spreading of the syndrome I have recently termed, “Dry Fire Training Boredom.” To combat all three of these issues, and probably a few others, Laserlyte now offers a new training target option, Plinking Cans.
