MacGyver

I had a brisket on the smoker the other evening and went out to check the firebox about 11:30. Had one literally brush up against my leg as it walked through the fence coming to see what time dinner was happening. I didn’t hear it because the grass was wet and it was raining. It really surprised me by how brazen it was - or maybe it was just drawn to the brisket like everyone else. It wasn’t the least bit concerned with me. In fact, it stood up on its hind legs sort of looking at the smoker and then at me for a minute or two. I went in and eventually it moved on. I’m just thankful my dog didn’t get ahold of it.

Those work great.

Do you have someone you trust you can talk to about it? I have two people who I literally trust my life to. They both told me the same thing your doctor did. “Moderna if you have a choice, whatever you can get if you don’t. Don’t give it another thought cycle.” I got it within 24 hours of it being available to me. I’m quite low risk - but I deal with risk for a living. It has contributed to killing one out of every 500 people in America at this point. I’ve got people I need to take care of. You can walk into any Publix in the state and get the first Moderna shot in the time it takes to get a loaf of bread and a gallon of milk. Feel free to PM if you’ve got questions.

Back before Turkeys became the thing for Thanksgiving, raccoons were a popular Thanksgiving treat. Herbert Hoover “pardoned” one headed for the table at the White House in 1926. Word is she repaid him by biting him and briefly putting him in the hospital later on.

I’d watch it. I remember being in school a long time ago - an instructor teaching trapping told us that a raccoon would keep a man alive for a week. I remember laughing at that. When we snared one after being in the field for several days it may as well have been a Michelin starred feast. I guarantee if you found any of my peers from that class today - 20ish years later - they’d all tell you the same thing.

Have you got cats or dogs? If that answer is no - or they can be kept inside - I'd probably go for a #220 conibear trap with something really smelly like canned catfood as a bait. That'll take possums and raccoons. A #110 is probably okay for a possum, but not big enough for a raccoon. If you've never set a 220 - using a setting tool is worth it to reduce risk to yourself. All that said - the wolf urine should work fine on a temporary basis.

The seasonal flu and SARS-2-CoV are completely different viruses. The vaccine for one will not affect the other. They’re studying whether they can combine vaccines into one shot - like the MMR or the Tdap vaccine.

Will do. Let me know if y’all need anything.

Y’all will be in my prayers. Even when it’s something routine - it can still be really scary.

Mike is exactly right. There’s an enormous shortage right now for several reasons - but mostly because we’re in the midst of a surge. The state’s policy is also unclear. You’ve likely seen it reported this week that the state is trying to restrict access to people who are vaccinated but get breakthrough cases to try to reserve the supplies we do have for sicker, unvaccinated folks. Ethics aside, that policy is causing a lot of confusion at the individual provider level. But it’s mostly a supply chain issue. We all thought it was the machines or zombies that were going to get us. Turns out it’s supply chains.

Man, prayers for that. Hopefully they get the monoclonal antibodies with no delay.

That’s really disappointing. Not terribly surprising this day and age - but disappointing for sure. Let us know how it shoots.

I’ve killed a bunch with a Ruger 22/45 over the years. Two different setups. Historically I enjoyed hunting with a set of crimson trace grips zeroed at 25 meters. That’s fun as long as the sun isn’t too bright. My preferred setup is with a RMR up top. Suppressed, it’s not even that critical that you hit it the first time. It’s a great skill to develop that will feed you in a survival situation. There’s a reason that my 22/45 is always in my ruck. Tossing a golf ball out a ways and shooting it on the move is great for developing the skill.

Not MPC - but kind of related - a leaflet from the same era: The top photo is of my grandad at Pearl sometime around late 1943.

Asus wouldn’t exist if Dell hadn’t offshored production in a series of steps that I’m sure made complete sense to their management at the time. Now you can buy an Asus laptop for a lot less than a similarly spec’d Dell. Everything has a cost.

A chip foundry is a 10-15 billion dollar investment - and at best 5 years before you fab your first chips. Some of us have argued for years about the national security issues associated with offshoring it. The problem is - for Dell or whoever - the decision to offshore makes total business sense (or at least it did.) If you want to move it back here - you’re going to need deep pocketed investors, knowledge that we’ve big chunks of, and years. And you still need chips in the meantime. There really aren’t many easy answers. It’ll take government level investment - and there are a whole lot of folks who aren’t really interested in seeing the government spend money on much.

As wonky as it is, I hope that old rifle put meat on someone’s table for a lot of years.

I don't think you'll have much to worry about in terms of the optic itself, but if it's going to be stored in the heat or the cold - I'd choose lithium batteries over alkaline.

A site like armslist is necessarily about the money. Bandwidth and server infrastructure isn’t cheap. Organizations do some stupid stuff sometimes - but rarely do the purposefully blow the whole thing up. I have no idea what their finances look like - but I’d be willing to bet they’re not great. I’d also be willing to bet if there was any other way to make ends meet they’d take it. Not a lot of big companies are willing to do advertising on gun sites these days. Those that do are often filtered through aggregators where surprisingly little money actually flows to the site. There’s a second scenario - which is they’ve figured out that there’s a smaller group of people who are quite willing to pay for the services they provide and they actually make more money with fewer customers and less heartache. Regardless, if a service is worth something, it’s worth paying something for. Support the things you care about - whether it’s a community like TGO (where benefactors literally keep the lights on) or it’s your local newspaper or the nonprofit down the street.

I'm so thankful your daughter was able to be released. Despite still needing oxygen - I'm convinced recovery happens better at home than in a hospital. With everything you've been through lately - I'm glad you haven't had a breakthrough infection.

Long story, short. I survived.

I learned not too long ago that ticks generally need to be attached more than 48 hours to transmit most tick-borne illnesses - Lyme disease, etc. So long as you're pretty careful about checking yourself after you come out of the woods and take a shower - you really don't have much to worry about. I wish I had learned this sooner than I did - I would have spent a lot less time thinking about it.

I find running braid helpful because I can feel light bites better. I find a lot of trout to act sort of like crappie - where they take the bait and hold it for a minute before they decide wheat they're going to do with it. I'm sure a better fisherman might be able to do just fine without it. The 6# Suffix Ghost is a great line though. It's super thin, strong, and pretty easy to see under lights at night.

I'd guess you're either oversprung or something is dragging enough to make it not cycle on the amount of gas you've got from 2 1/2's. Does it run better with more lubricant? If I couldn't find evidence of a part rubbing where it shouldn't - I think I'd oil the heck out of it and run it dirty for a few hundred rounds. Let the oil and the abrasive from the fouling polish whatever needs polishing. It could certainly be oversprung. If a replacement spring were cheap enough, I might buy one and take a coil or two off.

Not typically. If I do, it's to a 6'6" Light/Fast St. Croix on a 2500 size reel. I'm still generally running light braid and light leader to get good casting distance from the tiny stuff. You can have a whole lot of fun fishing that stretch on an ultralight rig. The last few times I've fished it, it's been on a 7' Panfish rod with a 1000 size reel running 6# suffix ghost and 2# or 4# fluorocarbon up front as a leader. You've got to really dial down your drag - but even small fish are a lot of fun. There are some big trout coming out of there. TWRA has done a good job managing our various fisheries over the last few years - we're really starting to see some trophies come out of some of our streams.