JAB

I didn't go to the show but we did go to Crossville for the 127 'yard sale' this weekend. I managed to pick up three boxes of Hot Shot 7.62 Nagant ammo for 12 bucks a piece. I haven't tried firing any, yet, but the boxes are in pretty good shape and the brass is all bright and clean so I foresee no problems and at about half the retail prices I have seen - plus being able to buy in person rather than having to fool with ordering online - I'll take it. Funny, it sounds like I made a better gun-related score at the much maligned yard sale than most made at the gun show. On another note, I saw several old guns that might have been a good deal had I been interested in such (as in muzzle-loading, percussion cap shotguns that were supposedly Civil War era.) I also looked at a hammered double barrel the guy said was made in the 1800s. He said it would shoot and he'd take $125 for it but I didn't want to chance it and really don't want to sink money into that sort of thing even if it did work. I saw some 'newer' long guns (mostly 1950s and 1960s vintage), too, but the owners were all too proud of them for my tastes (as in a few Stevens and Savage single shot shotguns for $125 or more.)

A wise person once said (posted) in another thread - very recently in fact (bolding for emphasis is mine):

If the shooting is a valid, self-defense shooting then there should be nothing for the perp to testify about. If it is ruled a valid, self-defense shooting then TN law goes pretty far in protecting the defender from a civil suit (although not far enough - and, of course, this example happened in Florida.) If it is not a valid, self-defense shooting (or if a local DA decides to railroad the defender for one reason or another) then I'm not sure it would really matter if the perp was around to testify or not. Further, unless you are going to execute the assailant after he is down, there is no guarantee that a 9mm, .45 or anything else is going to kill the would-be perp.

It seems that others were correct in that the would-be robber had a .25 and we don't know what the would-be victim had. That said, folks can obviously make all the 'mousegun' comments they want but, at the end of the day, the assailant stopped his activity and the honest citizen walked away unharmed. Therefore, whether he had a .44 or a .22, the would-be victim did his job and his gun did its job, regardless of caliber. The purpose of a self-defense shooting is to stop someone from attacking you/your loved ones not to kill the would-be assailant. Whether or not the assailant dies - as long as he stops his attack - is moot for the purposes of self defense.

It wasn't the last time I was in there but that has been a couple of months ago. On another note, have you been there, before? If not, I'd recommend the calzone and be sure to get it fried. Be warned, though, you'll probably never want a baked calzone, again. Oh, and there is a strong chance that if you tackle one of them alone you'll have leftovers.

But the way I have heard, "serious bodily injury" defined - at least in my HCP class - was "injury of a type that could result in death." In other words, it would be defense against death (immediate) or serious bodily injury (something you could or even would likely die of, later.) I am not saying that definition is correct, just that such is the description I was given.

Here is a link to another article written by the same authors as the one at the link I posted, above. Scientific Evidence for

Not to put words in his keyboard but I think what TGO David was saying is that bullets fired from handguns do not generate enough energy to significantly contribute, in a direct manner, to incapacitation of an assailant through hydrostatic shock. I think that some folks are confusing what I would call 'stopping ability' - a more general term - with 'stopping power', which is a specific term meaning that a projectile is capable of generating enough physical damage via hydrostatic shock (aka hydraulic shock) to create trama that is separate and remote from both the permanent and temporary stretch cavities created by the projectile passing through tissue or the tissue directly crushed/torn/destroyed by the projectile as it passes through. Yes, dead is stopped but that refers to what I am terming stopping ability, not stopping power - and there is a difference. The presence of a firearm scaring an assailant into crapping his pants, assuming the fetal position and crying for his mommy is also stopping ability but has nothing to do with the energy level of the round fired, i.e. stopping power. Handguns certainly have stopping ability. If we didn't believe that then I doubt any of us (including TGO David) would go through the trouble of carrying one. In fact, I have expressed in the other thread about this same article that I believe a .380 or even a .32 can have plenty of stopping ability in that they are capable of causing incapacitating wounds or death (although some debate just how 'capable') or even their mere presence might cause an assailant to change their mind. That doesn't mean they have stopping power. Now, I don't know that I entirely agree with TGO David's assessment as I would say something like a full-size .44 Magnum or bigger probably is capable of generating at least low levels of true stopping power. With handguns in calibers commonly carried for self defense, however, there is certainly room for doubt. In fact, there is apparently still some debate even within the medical community as to whether or not significant hydrostatic shock effects exist with any small arm, handguns or long guns. This is despite long standing evidence in support of such a phenomenon, at least regarding rifles (see the link I will provide at the end of my post.) The question here is whether or not such effects are present at any significant level with handgun wounds or is hydrostatic shock, as produced by handguns, truly just a myth. Until I started doing a little research earlier today I would have expressed the opinion that TGO David is right and that 'stopping power' in handguns - or at least in commonly carried SD calibers - is a myth. After having done some reading on the subject, however, now I am not so completely convinced. If handguns really are capable of generating 'stopping power', at all, I would still agree with TGO David that the difference in true stopping power levels in handguns between a 9mm, .40 caliber or a .45 would likely be so insignificant as to be 'mythical'. Now, that doesn't mean that a bigger and/or faster bullet isn't capable of doing more direct, physical damage (although that won't always be the case - and that is where shot placement comes in) nor does it mean that, if the result of the increase in energy is deeper penetration (to a point) then there might not be a greater chance of incapacitation. That would be more of an indirect result, however (more energy pushes the bullet deeper so that greater penetration is the direct cause of incapacitation while more energy - by virtue of contributing to greater penetration - would be an indirect cause.) Of course, I am no physicist nor am I am ballistic expert or medical doctor. However, I am pretty good at finding information written by people who are 'experts' (when I'm not too lazy to look.) I was able to find this recent paper supporting the existence of remote wounding effects of hydrostatic shock (i.e. "stopping power"), which was published in Neurology, February 2011 - Volume 68 - Issue 2 - pp E596-E597. The link provided is to the abstract on the Cornell University Library website. While they argue that the idea of hydrostatic shock is not a myth, it seems to me that most of the research and evidence upon which they base their assertion relates more to rifles than to handguns. Still, the article is interesting to read and I plan to keep trying to find scholarly articles or papers which either directly support or deny the idea that such a phenomenon exists in handgun shootings. Click on the 'PDF only' link on the right to read the entire paper. [1102.1642] History and evidence regarding hydrostatic shock

I saw Megadeth at the Bijou in Knoxville back in the '90s. It was a great show and I enjoyed it despite the fact that it was in the summer and this was a year or two before the Bijou got air conditioning. My buddy and I came outside after the show and started shivering in the 86 degree temps because it felt cold to us after the heat inside during the show. That was back when Mustane was still his old, abrasive self. Remember, the Bijou is a pretty 'intimate' venue I remember during one break between songs when Mustane was talking about something (I honestly don't even remember what) someone in the audience who wanted to hear a specific song called out to ask that he play whichever song it was and Mustane's response was to look directly at the person with a look of rage on his face and growl loudly into the microphone (and, yes, this exact quote I do remember), "Shut up, a**hole, I'm talking!" I saw Metallica at Thompson-Bowling around the same, general time on the tour that later saw Hetfield get burned by the pyrotechnics (he got burned while they were playing 'One' but I think that was actually the tour in support of the Black album.) Also a great show but even then they seemed to lack the passion that Mustane had. Of course, it might have just seemed that way due to the very different venues. To be truthful, though, I really stopped being a big Metallica fan when they got involved in the whole Napster lawsuit. I'm not even saying that the early days of Napster were right or wrong but here was a band that got where they were largely because of bootlegging - they even allowed people to openly record at their concerts earlier in their careers in order to get the 'word of mouth' advertising that bootlegging provided - and now that they were making money they were suing over that very thing? Hypocrisy in it's purest form, IMO. Of course, it didn't help that the music they made subsequent to that was mostly crap. The Black album and, to a lesser extent, Load were okay albums but (aside from the possibly exception of 'Wherever I May Roam') neither was a very good Metallica album. "Fade to Black" was their greatest song, Master of Puppets was their best album and, as far as I am concerned, ....and Justice for All was the last real Metallica album before the corporate bodysnatchers began taking over. I've heard that Death Magnetic is more like the real Metallica but haven't had a chance to listen to it and haven't been able to bring myself to buy it to find out. As for Slayer, I really like their music. Personally, I think they have some of the best riffs in the genre and talk about a band staying true to their roots! As far as the 'hate Jesus' stuff, maybe some of it does come from a dislike of Christianity but I once read an interview with them where they talked about some of their darker, even satanic-seeming songs and they stated that their intent was that people view those songs as the musical version of horror movies - intentionally disturbing and not intended to be taken seriously or at face value. Further, that isn't 'all' they have done. They've had war protest songs (War Ensemble), anti-gang violence songs (Expendable Youth) and more. They even had one song (Silent Scream) that seems to be an anti-abortion song.

Well, I can see the claim they are making. That claim is that allowing hog hunting encourages the illegal transport and release of hogs by folks who want to release them specifically to hunt. The problem is, as with many laws, the people enacting these regulations show a complete and total lack of basic, common sense. It is kind of like the complete lack of common sense regarding gun laws, in general. Gun laws don't prevent crime because a person who is willing to rob a bank or commit a murder isn't going to care whether or not the gun (or knife or bomb or...) he or she uses to commit the crime is illegal. Likewise, people who were already illegally releasing hogs aren't going to give a tinker's damn that it is now illegal to hunt them after illegally releasing them. They will continue with their illegal activity, find ways to not get caught and be more or less unhindered by the law. Legal, law-abiding hunters, however, will be hindered - punished, really - by the new regulations. I can even see that they are probably correct in that traditional hunting models don't work as a sole or even main method in controlling hog populations. So what? Just because you allow hunting doesn't mean that you can't still employ other methods and using hunting as one of the methods can't hurt. After all, a dead hog is a hog that is no longer in the wild, no longer in the population, no longer breeding and no longer using resources so I would think that any and all sensible means - including hunting - would be included in the eradication strategy. I said above that I am not a big time hunter and that is true. I don't see nearly as many rabbits as I once did so I don't want to hunt the relatively few that are left. I don't like the taste of squirrel and don't want to kill them just for the sake of killing, not to mention that I don't see very many of them around where I live anymore, either and when I do I kind of like seeing them in the trees. Turkey hunting is a whole, 'nother sport, I think. I was considering looking into hog hunting but I guess that is out, now. I do a little, (admittedly half-hearted) deer hunting but have never bagged one - probably partly because I refuse to hunt on public land and the private land where I can legally hunt is becoming increasingly scarce. Chances are that I would be more involved in hunting if the rules in this state made more sense and didn't seem designed to cause hunters to unwittingly commit a crime. The new hog regs are just one more example of what I am talking about. Then, as GunTroll points out, they can't seem to figure out that high on the list of reasons the number of hunters is dwindling is the TWRA and their overly restrictive, often asinine regulations.

Unfortunately the mega-yardsale is getting that way. It used to be (even as recently as ten years or so back) mostly just folks with stuff they wanted to sell but, like most 'flea markets' is unfortunately turning into people trying to make a living by ordering the Chinese junk you are talking about in bulk and reselling it. Hopefully there will still be some old-time 'yardsale' deals, though. Usually I look for rods and reels. I like the old Mitchell reels (as in back when they were all metal) - not just collecting but actually using them - and I have found some good deals on them at the 127 yardsale. We're planning on hitting part of it this year (the part around Crossville, in fact) so I hope it hasn't all been replaced by stuff I could find at the Dollar Tree. I'll be with my wife and some of her family, though, so I don't know if I will make it to the gun show.

To my knowledge I have never even seen a wild pig/hog in 'real life' - only on television. I am not a big-time hunter in the first place and have never actively hunted hogs (though you can be danged sure I would shoot one if the opportunity arose) so my point of view is not based on being a dedicated hog hunter or anything. Still, t his is one of the stupidest things I have ever heard in my life. Once, again, instead of punishing people who break the law - in this case, people who would import/release hogs into the wild - the law abiding citizen gets punished through the creation of new laws which will not only be ineffective but which also fail to address the original issue. What the heck difference does it make if someone is legally hunting other game, has the opportunity to eliminate a member of a nuisance species that has been targeted for elimination and does so? What the heck difference does it make if people are legally hunting hogs? Maybe the folks who make the rules should assist law enforcement with ways to put a little more effort into stopping the release of hogs into the wild and a little less into screwing a legal hunter for shooting a member of a nuisance species whenever he or she has an opportunity to do so. Essentially, by more or less eliminating hog hunting, they have declared hogs to be a nuisance species targeted for eradication and turned them into a de facto protected species all with the same, dumbass law. Also, it is pretty ridiculous to expect Farmer Brown to file paperwork and so on just to be able to legally allow people to help him eradicate a nuisance species from his own, damned property. He should be able to get all the assistance he wants and, as long as he is not actively releasing hogs or running a hog-hunting business, it is none of the government's damned business who or how many people he has providing such assistance. I have to wonder how many people will continue to kill hogs and simply subscribe to the three 'S' principle or maybe a variation that would go SPS - shoot, process and shut the f*** up. I am neither advocating nor condemning such an approach - simply wondering if otherwise law-abiding folks won't be pushed to it out of frustration with the new regs. Will LE be wasting time running around arresting or fining Mr. Hunter for simply eliminating that member of a nuisance species that is targeted for eradication, anway? Time that they could be using to investigate/stop the illegal release of hogs in the first place?

One good thing about that cesspool is all the different types of food you can get. We only spent the one evening/night there but for lunch we walked about two blocks from the hotel straight up the street in one direction and had Peruvian food at a little hole in the wall Peruvian restaurant. Do you know how many opportunities I have had to eat Peruvian in my life? One - in New York. For dinner, we walked less than half a block down the street from the hotel in the other direction and ate at a neighborhood 'pub' i also a hole in the wall - that served really good Irish/British pub fare, along with some other options.

This. Exactly this - especially the part I 'bolded'. It's like saying, "I firmly believe that people have the right to eat ice cream but a recent incident has convinced me that we should ban dairy cows."

That's what I was thinking, too, but here was a man who had cleaned many a turtle, before, telling me that was the way to go. You can imagine how annoyed I was when I found out that wasn't a method he had ever used but just what some stupid book he had suggested.

That is pretty cool. IF I ever decided I wanted a Judge, the Circuit Judge would be the one. I have always been a little intrigued by the idea of a revolving long gun - ever since I first saw one in a museum when I was a kid. I picked up a Circuit Judge at a gun show a few months back and I have to say that it shoulders well and the fiber optic sights seemed very clear. ETA for clarity: In the latter statement, 'picked up' means I literally picked one up to look at it, not the somewhat common vernacular meaning 'I got one'. I didn't buy it.

I have the Maverick Security 88 with the 20 inch barrel. If you have the 18.5 inch version of the Security 88 I think it has a 5 round tube. With the twenty inch version - which also comes with a factory extended mag tube, I get an extra couple of rounds over the 18.5 inch (mine holds seven 2 3/4 inchers in the tube.) Being a 'security' model, iirc, mine didn't come with a capacity limiter (short wooden dowel, etc.) inside the mag tube but if yours is a Security 88 and you can't get five in the mag tube then I'd double check for that. Maverick calls the 18.5 inch version a 'six shot' model and the 20 inch version an 'eight shot' model but that is with one in the chamber and the mag tube full, I believe (I store mine in 'cruiser mode' so there isn't one in the chamber.) Unless I am mistaken, Il Duce is correct about the availability (or lack thereof) of tube extensions. I have a light on mine. I see Jonnin's point but in my case, it would light up the entirety of any room in the house so I'd see if there were multiple assailants. To me, being able to clearly see my target before ripping it up with buckshot is worth the risk. I also have a simple sling on mine. It isn't so I can carry it on a recon mission. It is so I don't have to lay the shotgun down if I need both hands for something else. It is just a simple, lightweight sling and it doesn't get in the way so I figure 'why not'? I agree with others about pistol-grip only shotguns. I personally don't like the feel of full buttstock plus pistol grip, either. They just feel awkward, to me. I have considered putting a thumbhole stock on mine (Mossberg sells a polymer thumbhole stock on their website and the Mossberg 500 buttstocks will fit Mavericks.) I don't have any type of extra ammo holder on my Maverick. I have the slip-on sleeve type on my single-shot shotguns to make fun shooting with them more convenient but with the HD shotgun I figure that if 7 rounds of 12 gauge buckshot backed up by the .357 I keep by the bed don't handle the problem then I need to move to a less dangerous neighborhood. Maybe somewhere in Kabul. Finally - just because it became such a big point of discussion - unless you have rifle sights or similar on your shotgun then, no, you do not aim a shotgun. Instead, a shotgun is pointed with the front bead used as a pointing reference. That is, of course, different from just orienting the muzzle in the general direction of the target but still it is not true 'aiming'.

I have caught them from our private pond when fishing for catfish. The ones I have actually pulled out have pretty much swallowed hook and all and have been when I was using my heavier 'catfish' rod/reel. They make for a fun 'fight' and can really bend a rod. Man, are they pissed when they come out of the water - hissing and snapping like some latter-day dinosaur. We want them out of our pond - especially the big ones - because the pond is small. Being there isn't room for a lot of fish, we don't need big snappers wiping them out. I tried to cook one, once. My grandfather in law (who used to catch/clean them for his mom to cook when he was a kid) said the easiest way to do it would be to boil the whole thing and then remove the shell, guts, etc. Well, getting the shell off was pretty easy but the darned thing smelled so horrible when boiling that we couldn't eat the meat - the thought turned our stomachs. I managed to choke down a bite or two and it didn't taste bad but that smell kept coming back to me and I just couldn't do any more. I asked my grandfather in law how they stood to eat the meat after smelling that smell when he was a kid and he replied, "Oh, that's not the way we did it. That's the way that was recommended in a book I looked it up in. I always cut the edges of the shell with an axe, cleaned the turtle, cut the meat out of the shell then mom cooked it." Just the other night I was giving him a hard time about telling me how some book said to do it rather than telling me the way he knew to do it. I tried, again, not long afterward. I wanted to keep the shell so I used my Dremel with a cutoff wheel to cut the back and belly portions of the shell apart. It worked well (I still have the back part) but there was just enough of that 'turtle boiling with guts inside' smell that I couldn't bring myself to cook it. It has been a few years, now, so I'm thinking I might be about ready to try, again.

Congratulations. Been wanting one for 16 years, huh? Wow - you've been wanting that pistol since around the time that some teens who are getting their driver's license this year were born*. Glad you finally got one. *Sorry - I had to throw that time comparison in there because I realized earlier this year that there are now people of legal drinking age who hadn't even been born yet when I graduated high school.

11PM. Just now logged on for the first time since much earlier today.

Ha! You know, though, I bet there have been a lot more people throughout history shot by drunken pirates than by Tennessee HCP holders.

Great shooting! Really? I can't believe we have to take a test and pay $115 plus class fees to excercise a natural right. I also can't believe that the state figures that being able to shoot a static, paper target translates to being 'qualified' to act in self defense. Yep, I used my S&W .22A for my class. I am not the world's greatest shot nor did I make one, single hole but I did well enough that the instructor said, "Don't bother counting the holes - you clearly passed." For me, it was about not spending any more $$$ than necessary on ammo for something that shouldn't cost an honest citizen any $$$ in the first place. That isn't meant to take anything away from luvmyberetta's shooting skills nor is it meant to suggest that he shouldn't have used his .45 if that is what he wanted to do. Hey, my mom qualified with a 9mm and my wife with a snubnosed .357 (loaded with .38s) because they felt more familiar with those (I offered to let each of them use the same .22 I used.) That target is very impressive and I have no problem saying that he is obviously a better shot than me. It just sticks in my craw when someone criticizes someone else's choice of firearm to use for qualifying. Besides, I believe the 'qualifying' part is more intended to make sure that the applicant knows which part of the gun to aim at the target and which part to hold in his/her hand than it is to see who can shoot a hair off of a gnat's ass at 25 yards. And you know what, to heck with it - I'm not ashamed of my qualifying target although it is nowhere near as 'impressive' as luvmyberetta's. In the end, it got me the exact, same carry permit, after all:

So, the guy didn't really even have a gun, no one was ever in danger, the whole thing was a non-event and still this sparked a possible, new ordinance? Geez, for all we know this guy could be an anti who wanted to cause a commotion and get still more ineffective, irrational and unnecessary gun laws passed.

So, if he puts people to work then it is okay if his business does pollute the drinking water and cause cancer? I'm not saying it will but is he providing proof that it won't or simply saying, "You people shouldn't be bitchin' about this stuff 'cause I'm creatin' jobs," as if the other issues don't matter? I mean, I realize the economy is bad but still I would think that concerns over your family being made sick by the drinking water or increased risk of cancer for an entire community would be a valid concern vs. 125 or so jobs. My grandfather in law was the assistant head of the department in charge of strip mine regulation and reclamation for the Tennessee Department of Conversation before the work was more or less turned over to the Fed under Alexander (whose good buddy and campaign treasurer was coal-company lawyer Fred Thompson.) I don't know about deep mining such as this guy is talking about but I do know that some (not all but some) of the strip miners would, apparently, try to get away with anything they could no matter how much it harmed the environment, drinking water or anything else for folks living in the surrounding areas.

Oh, I forgot to mention that I did make a cane/walking stick to take on the trip. The reason I made one for it is that the other canes I made that I carry a lot have brass hames for the handles and I wasn't sure how well that would go over taking them on a cruise ship. The one I made had a cherry handle on an oak shaft. Even going through security to get on the ship - and remember, I was in a harbor in New York - no one batted and eye, although they did x-ray it to make sure there was nothing concealed inside or, I guess, to make sure it wasn't a 'loaded' or 'weighted' cane. I carried it in New York City, Boston, Bar Harbor (Maine), on Cadillac Mountain (in the Acadia National Park in Maine) and even in St. John's, New Brunswick and Hallifax, Nova Scotia (both in Canada) and no one ever even commented other than things along the lines of, "That's a nice cane." Unfortunately, there was a weak spot in the wood on the cherry and the handle has since broken so I'll have to make another handle for it. It was plenty sturdy to hold up throughout the trip, though. I have a knee that bothers me, sometimes, after a lot of walking so I really do sometimes carry a cane in case I need it for a little extra support but I'm pretty sure that in the right circumstance it could have ruined a potential assailants day, as well. This is what it looked like: Of course, I am 40 and sometimes really do walk with a slight limp (because of the knee.) Also, when I carry one I actually use it even if my knee isn't bothering me so that it doesn't just look like I am carrying a big stick down the street. Someone who is 22 might draw a little more attention carrying a cane.