Going to have to make adjustments in my life...

   Going to the range on Saturday cost me ten dollars for my day and target, and I only fired fifty rounds.  Time to do some serious looking into local ranges, cause I can't afford ten dollars every time I need to break away from my electronic time wasters.   I need many more breaks from the monitors of computer and cable. Don't we all?

   My target from Saturday looks a bit wild, but seriously, I started standing at fifty yards. Those are the upper right ten shots. Then I did some major sight corrections on the rear sight, moving it far left and down then I ended up left of the target still high shooting prone without sling.  So I then adjusted a bit back and shot from the bench with sling and was close enough for the day.  I intend to refine the sights, prone with sling, at twenty-five yards, soon.

    Now that brings up my OCD, obsessive compulsive disorder,  my Stevens model 414 Armory is a beautiful old target rifle, but for me to shoot it where I am aiming the front sight is far right and the rear sight is cranked far left. Which does put my shot on target, but I don't think I am that crooked, the rear sight must have been placed wrong when it was set up.  That makes me think I should put an adjustable sight on the receiver, but then I would feel the loss of the 'cool' in the original purchase that makes me so happy, even now. Constant struggle, luckily, I am so frugal that if it isn't broken, it isn't getting fixed. Unless the Lottery slams my way.  And we are betting that won't happen soon.

I am often shy in public, for good reason...

   Seems that Donal Trump and a young Bush made video history trashing the fairer sex - all they did was not respect the kind of women they dreamed all women would be in their fantasies - maybe not the women's fantasies... Then NBC decided that they would wait until they needed something to disrupt Trump, like a blackmailer for future benefit.  Somehow the tape, saved from Secretary Hillary Clinton's destruction of all that excess bad vibes records missed the tape against Donald. This is why I am so happy that I am much more Earl than my fool fantasies.

   I remember telling lies about sex in high school, and hearing some even better (impossible) ones from other guys that had even less of a clue than I did. See, we didn't have sex education, we had health classes which highlighted health not happiness.  It was better to be shy than shamed.

   I am not qualified to discuss sex and those strange things people lump with sex that don't seem to produce more humans.  I have opinions, but I remember being told by another soldier that I really had no idea what fool or terrible things were being taught to my son in his school.  But I was always sure if he wanted my opinion on something he would ask.  I have a broad reading of many things, and for sure I blame the Hefner Playboy Philosophy for much that was wrong with my era in America. Not that I read beyond the point of noticing that giving women the liberty to be free of moral and community restrictions allowed them to be better exploited by the power structure, normally male.

   Then the government goodness loosened the divorce laws, increased the male penalties for not having a successful marriage and supported women in their solitary liberation from having to partner with a man for survival, the government cares for all the helpless doesn't it?

   What can I say, marriage is a government program regulated to benefit the community and like most government programs not as good as what it took over.  Where families and community were responsible for maintaining the marriage, not the heartless government. Regulate until you control it to death.  I seem to have missed my point about being shy... will get back to it one day.  I respect women, enough that I seldom talk with them, they and men are not on the same frequency and it is very difficult to have a meaningful exchange of ideas.  I am always happy to find the exceptions to that generality of mine, and will then blurt out something that will cause them to wonder at who I really am, as it doesn't seem I fit their expectation.

   Aren't I happy I am so shy? Yes, I am...

No, I am not going to listen to what the Democrats want me to hear from Trump's vulgar mouth...

   I am sure his smut isn't better than my own, and I don't use that language anymore, and can't remember when I was fool enough to publish it to the innocent.  I am sure that he, Donald, doesn't want me to think that he is nonredeemable, he must know that as a Christian I know everyone is flawed, all have been redeemed, and must accept Jesus as their savior for forgiveness...  so, only the godless communists and others need to find the LORD, quick! Because the End is near.  There it is on the internet, so it must be true.

    I went to see the foot doctor on Thursday morning, and it didn't go as nicely as the televised shows and commercials on cable... but then this is reality. A couple of weight bearing x-rays taken, and an appointment scheduled for the 1st of December.  So off I went to the YMCA, and my coach was doing nothing so I complained about not having a strength test since the first one... mistake on my part. The devious fellow made an instant appointment, told me to get in gym clothes and come back and I would take the test... ha, ha, ha...   So I was back in about ten minutes, and we went to the machines he wanted me to work.  He would tell me what my high was six months ago, and I would set what I thought I could do eight times in good form.  If I wasn't straining on the last two reps, he would think I was cheating myself and add ten to twenty pounds for what I should have done, in his mind not mine. Then he ran me a complete new program after plugging in the new maximums. Ugh! Have I a new stress in my life? Yes, I do. So for the last two workouts I have added very few sets, not changed the weights up much, although I have lowered some in my least favorite exercises, and then added sets and did more reps.  Interesting, being pumped up instead of plumped up.

   Conversations of olde men:  Sitting between sets or exercises or while walking something off, there are conversations.  About five Vietnam Vets (American) are my fellows talking about wars and wonders, two of them were end of WWII and Korea and then RVN to retire, and two are just into the Southeast Asia mess and then out to better things, and then I am the youngster - RVN to Gulf War I.
Now the challenge is to remember I came to work out, not socialize with my compadres, what we talk about is always more interesting than sweating or straining against gravity. Not more interesting than yoga pants and smiles from the heart. But we aren't long distracted by beauty, since we want to wring out our lives to hang out with folks that appreciate where we were when we were young, handsome and so foolish -- but always doing our best.  Not all the tales are of success, often a flub or fluke or just fool hardy - but not to be repeated, not by us. Names of people now long gone on, or gone to parts unknown, men we remembered because they mattered  in our lives. Olde men talking, the common term is 'war stories' but you won't get them if you aren't part of the group, trusted. Some times a youngster will listen a bit and then ask a question, looking for an answer they can understand, and the answer will come back depending on the perception of the old man as to what they can understand and what they will do with it.  So often, it is just a lie, tease or less than truth -- no harm intended. The answer isn't in an answer, it was in the story and the triggers going off in the listener's mind. Most minds aren't ready for the stories we tell. So they don't get out in public much.

   Time does fly when having fun, suddenly it will be time to get ready to leave, and I still haven't done my normal ten miles on bicycle, ah, I will do something later.... yeah, maybe so.

  Now to be perfectly honest, I haven't read Hillary's speeches to the FatCats of Banking and Business, but then I am fair and balanced except when I get up to walk or move. Then my eyesight and awareness might be in conflict with the realities of gravity and foot placement.  Am I not so happy that my voters' pamphlet has arrived and the ballots come out on 25 October.  Yes, I am, but I still must hope the contenders clean up, ask forgiveness and respect the voters' choices. We should all work to become better than we knew possible, just like straining against gravity, it will only make us better at living. 

Just because I can I want to make a point...

   Community policing does not mean putting police in charge of the folks and talking to them, it should mean that a well regulated militia is the security of a Free State... yes, I borrowed those words.  In communities where neighbors take care of each other - it happens, sure they may call for the law when it gets beyond the ability of the neighbors, we call for medical assistance and fire but the first people to see the need start taking action.

   Part of the current weakness in American values and virtues is the idea that only the government can handle the problems. But it can't, you really need the people and not just for votes and taxes.  They must be more than subjects of the ruling elite, their bankers and barkers.

Pictures of a near past...

   Photos are history, and we do spend a lot of time taking them and sharing them and then suddenly forgetting about them...
    But they do capture a moment, when you were young and beautiful, and your smile had real teeth. Do they capture your joy, your love, your quietness in the dark?  Maybe not, but then you are quick to change as the time moves right along.
   As I do repetitious exercise my mind is moving much faster than any of my muscles and I can go from thought to thought faster than the speed of light. Honest, I have measured it, NOT. Just seems so.
    When is it going to be normal to see Appleseeds on the evening news? Not any time soon, the safety record is nice, the problems with marksmanship can be measured in inches, converted to minutes of angle and on your rifle into clicks of your sight adjustment. We don't even measure if the heritage of Liberty and standing your ground gets through to the shooter, we just want to set an example of change that can improve your ability with a rifle, and your interest on how we got to the America of today, from the Colonies of yesteryear. 
     Still finishing A Race to Remember: the Peter Norman story interesting how current culture ruins a great story and lives. Seems to happen everywhere that God is forgotten or denied.

  Next objective on my plate seems to be in Idaho, a Known Distance Appleseed, the Shoot Boss expects his crew to shoot, and I like to see if I can handle my 1903A3 the way it should be treated. I tried to buy six hundred more rounds from CPM, but my credit cards don't seem to work on their software, no purchase made, although I have plenty for the preparation and the shooting on the Appleseed, ammunition remains a sound investment before the End of the World as we knew it.

   

Struggling with Microsoft... badly...

   After my last update one of my software programs had disappeared, so I had to work with MS and find a way to find my pictures downloaded from my camera. Ugh! Bill Gates created a company that hates me, if Apple products weren't so dear.

What did I learn while teaching Sunday school, by Tuesday...

   It does seem that the software hates me, it didn't even save the three paragraphs I had written when my finger bumped one of the marvelous fast keys on the more better super sexy keyboard. I went away to a glass of warm milk, and a few solid hours of sleep.

      Again:

   So teaching on Sunday the subject got around to cursive, and all the children tell me that they all write cursive which I thought was fine. Then we went into when they use it, and I demonstrated my signature. Then I attempted to write a sentence, to see if I still could and found it painfully slow...
do you remember that cursive was a faster smoother way to place in ink, words and ideas upon paper?  Not without use it isn't.

  So I started looking for some proper paper to send a hand written letter off to Juan Williams of The Five.  One would think I could just email, but really, does anyone not against Hillary save emails from strangers?  As I wandered the little storage areas of my oldest desk, I found a file folder full of print outs from 1996 through about 2001, not everything sent through my computer, but the favorites and best and the last evidence I have of doing something besides checking in on Facebook. Even pre blogging period stuff.

   As I read through the mail, some from my sisters, mother and me, I noticed real people and emotions and cares and support and stuff that is so different from today. The first thing I noticed the format was of the weekly letters we wrote for snail mail. And that as my list of people to be bothered by my missives grew the receiver addresses grew ponderous - pretty vain to think that many would like to receive my thoughts. I had to hand write my aunt, like I had my parents, until they all got computers. But we didn't change the format, care nor the content as we reached out.  But then maybe we had been weeks or months between messages in the days of boat and rail delivery of mail. One set of my grand parents lived and worked in South America. Boat mail for years and years.

   Very rich, and since my mother is in Heaven the memory even better.  How would that be to one day have my great grand children read and understand more about how she felt about the time after my father past away? So I watched a Chinese movie, titled Home Coming, subtitled just for me. The plot was of the father turned in by his daughter to the authorities - yes, that did happen. He was found guilty and sent to the Northwest to re-education and work camps. While there he wrote letters to his wife, that were on any scrap of paper he could find in the dark and kept secret. Finally some many years later a letter was sent telling her that he was returning on the fifth. She would go down on the fifth and hold a sign with his name waiting, each month. When he showed up, she didn't recognize him. So he pretended to be a neighbor that would read letters from this big box full of letters. Very sad, but very powerful story.

Anyway, back to what I was writing about:

I posted on Facebook this statement:
      "Oh, that was fun, looking for some writing paper and finding a fat folder of emails from ago. Mother, sisters and my exchanges from when we still wrote like it was just the different type of writing and conversation on our loves and lives. Real treasures there for me, since life isn't the same."

reply: "We are all the poorer for the loss of intimately personal correspondence."
reply: "Too true, we pretend not to have time. It seems to be the best way to capture time and the people in their era."
reply: "Imagine if we didn't have the correspondence of our forebears. All we would have, as an understanding of their motivations is the record of their actions."
reply: " We find we may not share their fears nor their values." 

Which prompted this posting from a Fb friend:
  "To my friends, family, and loved ones: Please, write each other. Send a letter to someone you know. Talk about things that are intimately personal. Connect with one another." 

   I do need to get prepared to write that letter. Yes, there is email, telephone and all kinds of almost face to face, but if you don't put it on paper only the heartless NSA will have an idea of what was sent when... and that isn't your heart's history.