Sitting In The Moonlight On Our Half Finished Deck

Last night about bedtime, Sheila called me out onto our half finished deck. She just wanted to spend a few minutes sitting in the moonlight before we went to bed. It was a very quiet, sweet and pleasurable moment.

Most of our time and treasure of late has been going into upgrading the tiny, sagging, in places failing deck out our back door. Our tiny little cottage was previously owned by a fastidious professional engineer who was a single man and ordered his house without too much thought of company. The deck he built was so small you really couldn't relax on it without either blocking traffic out the back door or getting so close to the edge that you might fall off.

We have a family friend who is a great contractor. He quoted us a very fair price to do the work with the understanding he would work it in around his other obligations. So right now, we have a half finished deck, an in the process of renovation lower level paver patio that is actually a large mud-hole from the AC drainage and a backyard so full of building materials and deck and patio items that it's not really worth the trouble to try to mow. The lower level patio is being done by another guy, a local odd job handyman. We gave up on doing it ourselves after a couple of evenings where got about five blocks per evening set. While we are very anxious to just have the project over so that we can completely enjoy it, last night we had enough done to enjoy a nice moment before bedtime. And, anticipation does increase enjoyment when you finally reach your goal, which hopefully will be soon.

When Life Hands You Lemons ... Make Good Lemonade

We had a very annoying accident last week. Hit and run driver took out the right rear quarter panel of my beloved Sonata. I won't have it back until sometime after July 4th. I actually miss my car.

Right now, I am driving a 2013 Toyota Camry that looks just the one in the picture. (I guess I should say that my insurance company is treating me very nicely.) It is a very nice car that reminds me a lot of what expensive American cars used to feel like. The ride is very quiet. The feel is solid. However, the suspension is mushy and while the acceleration leaves a bit to be desired, it is really quiet acceptable for a large sedan. It's just not nearly as good as my Hyundai with the same size engine and fuel economy ratings.

The six way power seats are better than my Hyundai's. They are solid and very comfortable. However, the touch screen LCD sound system, while full of features, does not work nearly as well as the less expensive and less complicated system on my Hyundai. It apparently does not recognize voice dialing from my cell phone. In my Hyundai, all I have to do is hit the button and tell it who I want to call. It does the rest. The Toyota actually makes you dial the number either on the phone or on the touch screen. The controls for the sound system are very busy and complicated. And, it does not have satellite radio, a standard feature on all Sonatas.

The Camry is a solid feeling, predictable, perfectly acceptable sedan. But, my Sonata feels and looks younger and sportier. The Camry's performance is perfectly adequate for what it is. The Sonata is fun to drive. Not a sports car exactly but certainly no slouch on the freeway. The Camry feels heavy. The Sonata feels light. The controls on the Camry are if anything over-engineered. The controls on the Sonata are well thought out and intuitive. Bottom line, glad to have the Camry right now but also glad I don't have to keep it.

July 5, 2012 - I will give the Camry back to the dealership today and pick up my repaired Sonata. I had a chance to take it on a road trip yesterday and found it to be perfectly acceptable as a road car, quiet, comfortable and convenient in almost all respects. The fuel economy is about 10% less on the road than my Sonata, the Camry averaging a little under 30 mpg. while my Sonata almost always averages 32-33 mpg. on the road. I did notice that acceleration improved a bit after the car had limbered up a bit. But take note, the torque curve (or now the computer settings) on the Camry require that you really put your foot down to get crisp performance where the Sonata is crisper in the mid throttle range. Bottom line, the Sonata would probably be about ten to twenty percent quicker than the Camry but because of the throttle/computer settings, the Sonata FEELS a lot quicker. Bottom line, the Camry I had was a good car. Solid, comfortable, heavy/expensive feeling and very quiet. But, sexy it ain't either inside or out. And, the Sonata is.

Bill and Tom Go To the Gun Range

I had lunch with my old friend Tom from Claremore today. After a more than ample meal out our usual hole in the wall Mexican place up on Admiral, I asked Tom what he was doing for the next hour or so. He replied that he had a little time. So, we we down the street to the new 2A Shooting Center.

The 2a Shooting Center is a brand new, state of the art, indoor range that is attracting a lot of business. Every time I go, the lanes are busy. The prices are moderate, the service is excellent and the facilities as safe as you can make a gun range.

I had my new .22 rifle/carbine in the trunk of my car. It is a Mossberg 702. This gun is made in Brazil for Mossberg International and at a hundred bucks it is a steal. It has a fiberglass composite stock and an aluminum receiver so it weighs nearly nothing. But, the barrel and action are steel and it is quite accurate.

I had intended to go the range after lunch and zero the scope on it. So, I did just that and Tom and I took turns going through a couple of hundred rounds with it. Here are some pics. The first is me at fifty yards shooting offhand. The next is Tom shooting at fifty yards offhand. The next is Tom showing off shooting at the numbers under the targets from bench rest at 50 yds. The last is me firing offhand, rapid fire at 50 yds.

Tom tells me that he hadn't fired a long gun in years before today. I had fired exactly 200 rounds in the past week and that was all that I had fired for years. But, after putting a clip or two through the little carbine, we were both firing about as well we did in the military forty years ago, bad eyes, aching joints and all.

I guess we are from a different age. My dad taught me how to shoot. He used to stand me at attention in front of him and make me go through manual of arms until I could toss my Daisey around like a member of the Old Guard. He started me on cork pop guns, brought me up through BB guns and when I was old enough bought me a .22. He made me go through the same safety and marksmanship rituals that he had learned in the Army. I'll bet Tom's dad taught him to shoot too. And, back then just about everybody in our generation did some time in the military. And, I guess that was our post grad training in marksmanship.

At any rate, learning to shoot, owning a gun and being proficient with it was a rite of passage for our generation. Something every boy expected to do as he grew into manhood. And, it was pleasant to sit around with an old friend, punch a couple of hundred holes in a piece of paper and prove that we still had one of the skills of our youth.

And yes, there are some larger holes there that obviously could not have been made with a .22. They are 9mm holes made with my little "pocket" pistol. The best I can say about that is that I still can't hit squat with a gun that small.




July 2, 2012 - The Nazi Zombies had a bad day at the gun range today. 100 shots fired at medium combat range, either 95 or 96 hits. Started out using laser sights and when I figured out where I was aiming wrong, just used the iron sights. Only lost a small piece of my thumbnail to the vicious recoil on my teeny tiny little 9mm.

Viva el Cristo Rey!

It is 4:15 AM on Saturday morning.  I have been awake for over an hour.  I often wake in the middle of night but can usually coax myself back to sleep for another few hours.  Not this time. Last night, Sheila and I had dinner in the neighborhood and then did something we haven't done for a long time.  We went to a movie.  For the most part, Hollywood has quit producing anything I want to see.  So called stars like Adam Sandler and Will Ferrel give me a major pain in the *ss and I would pay NOT to see them ever again.  Most so called movies of late are so infantile, so out of touch with reality and so laced with PC propaganda that they are an insult. Too often, they mistake video game like special effects for drama, pornography for art and tired political cliche's for ideas. They are little movies made by little people with little minds.

This movie is different.  Based upon actual events in Mexico during the 1920's and 1930's, the dialogue is thoughtful and at times inspiring, the cinematography lush and the acting superb.  Aside from Andy Garcia, Eva Longoria and Peter O'Toole, the rest of the actors are Mexicans we anglos have never heard of.  But, taken together, this is one of the the best movies ever made and certainly one you will never forget.

The facts this movie is based upon are undeniable.  The President of Mexico at the time of these events was a communist who ruled by revolution.  He brutally suppressed the church.  There was an uprising by Christians.  America intervened to protect its oil interests but not the people of  Mexico and the compromise agreement they brokered did not end the persecution.  And to America's eternal shame, we apparently sold the regime airplanes that were used against the Cristero soldiers.  Some reports allege that the US military actually provided air support against the Cristeros.  Here are some photos from the real historical events:

 

So, what is the lesson to be learned from the sacrifice of our long dead Christian brothers to the South?  There are certain historical facts that recur with mathematical certainty.  When the secular left gains sufficient political power, it will do everything in its power to eradicate the influence of Christianity be it Catholic or Evangelical because they cannot coexist peacefully.  The hollowness and utter absurdity of the secular left's ideology is first exposed and then condemned by free Christian thought.  Consequently, the only way the secular left can maintain power is to eradicate religious freedom.  This eradication of religious freedom inevitably involves the use of force.  Persecution and bloodshed inevitably follow.  History has proven this time and again in dozens of little known wars in Latin America, all over Eastern Europe during the Cold War and in especially in Russia where the "official" church was an arm of the KGB. And, if this is the factual lesson, what is the moral application of it?  I will let a clip from the movie answer: