I think the zombie Fonzie has officially jumped the zombie shark...

Hornady is now selling their light-for-caliber, underpenetrating FTX bullet with a green, rather than red, rubber tip as the "Z-Max" anti-zombie load.

This is the single dumbest PR move from an ammo company since Winchester decided to name their new hollowpoints "Black Talon" instead of the "Blossoming Petal Home Protection Bullet". Seriously, how long would Glasers have been on the market if they'd been dubbed the "Explode In Your Guts For Messy Flesh Wounds Bullet" rather than the tranquil-sounding "Safety Slug"?

At least some hypothetical future workplace shooter can get a slam-dunk insanity plea by using this stuff and then claiming he thought his coworkers were trying to devour his brains.

Scenic America.

Behold Cadillac Ranch, 20th Century America's answer to Stonehenge and the pyramids. A monument that answers the existential question "Why?" with a definitive "Uh, just because."

Phlegmmy, Goddess of Tchotchkes, and I stopped there on the homeward leg of the vacation and got a picture of Chewie the Purse Wookie with the cars as a backdrop.

Days of Pique.

Is it just me, or does that guy look like he's trying to get the ref to give the cop a yellow card? He's writhing more theatrically than a Spanish soccer player; I didn't put up that much of a fuss after dragging the splintered end of my tibia fifty yards down Peachtree Road. I especially like the part where he moves his foot from up by the front wheel and wedges it under the rear tire, just before kicking the scoot over and getting a hickory shampoo.

I had no idea until yesterday that the NYC protesters were holding their protest-cum-rave on private property. That changes my opinion considerably. You kids get off my lawn or I'll have the police turn loose the hounds on you. (Does the park not have a sprinkler system?)

What the iPod just played:

Wow, I hadn't heard that one since it was new.

On a side note, I stopped in the local Evildrome Boozearama (appropriately yclept "21st Amendment") and Garbage's "Only Happy When It Rains" was playing on the radio in the store. I be-bopped along down the aisle, singing "I'm only happy eatin' brains..." before exclaiming "Wow! I haven't heard this song in years. Practically since it was new!"

The counterchick said "Yeah, they just announced that this one was 'from the vault'..."

"You shut up! I was damn' near thirty when this song came out!"

View through the windshield, part two:

Westbound on I-40 through Arkansas at sunset was downright apocalyptic, what with them burning stubble off the fields along the highway. The above photo shows a particularly spectacular smoke cloud from a burning field in the distance. Either that, or the ChiComs nuked Wynne, Arkansas.

Coming home down the same section of interstate in the pre-dawn mists, I was particularly worried, because there were deer crossing signs everywhere, and I didn't want to wind up with Bambi's mom in the cockpit of my little Nazi roller skate with me.

There was a little municipal airport just north of the freeway whose runway paralleled I-40 about as close as an access road. You just know the Cessna and AgCat jockeys who fly out of there refer to the interstate as "Runway Four-Zero".

View through the windshield, part one:

Eastbound on I-30, a couple dozen miles west of Texarkana, what appears to be a giant walking dragline looms on the horizon.

It seems to be a popular subject for photos, too...

They raise 'em tough in Texas...

Seen at a highway rest stop between Amarillo and Itchy Paw Falls:

The Right To Work.

If you are breathing and have the ability to stack two rocks one upon the other, you can work. If you can find some other person who prefers their rocks in a rather more vertical orientation than found in nature, and convince them to trade some nuts and berries for your time and effort, you've got yourself a job. (Granted, the government claims it has a right to some of your nuts and berries in return for allegedly protecting you from sabertooth tigers, but that's a rant for another day...)

But this bit of D.C. sausagemaking that Joel points out gives me the creeping willies. When you think about it, the right to say whether a person is allowed to hold a job or not is perilously close to having the right to tell them whether or not they can exist. Where have I read something like that before? Oh, yeah...

"And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name." -Revelation 13:17

Because I believe in going Godwin early and often, might I suggest that, rather than having special cards for all of us employable citizens to carry around in wallets already overcrowded with driver's licenses, social security cards, and toter's permits, why don't we get the graphic designers to work on some snazzy and eye-catching little patch that all the unemployables have to wear so that we know who they are?

What the iPod just played:

As earworms go, I've been stuck with worse.

However, I had no idea that the video was so wonderfully bizarre...
.

It's like living in a William Gibson novel...

Apparently some guy in Seattle has stitched hisself up a superhero costume, collected a team of sidekicks, and runs around downtown spraying people he considers "bad guys" with OC.

It's a thousand wonders he didn't get his ass shot.

I'm chalking this up as further evidence that we're living in Bob Heinlein's "Crazy Years".

The times, they are a changin'...

You're going to find this hard to believe, kids, but when that movie was made, it was illegal to drive faster than 55mph anywhere in the USA. It's true; you can go ask your mom if you don't believe me. It was a thing called the "National Maximum Speed Limit", and it created more criminals and scofflaws than the tax code and marijuana prohibition put together. With all the nattering about energy saving lately, I'm surprised the idea hasn't surfaced again.

Anyhow, nowadays I keep the cruise control set at 69.5 KIAS (78 mph actual, according to the GPS) and I don't even turn it off when passing cops in the median, as an honest "Clip-clop-clip-clop... Oh, mister troll, don't eat me! My brother is coming along behind me and he's much faster!" beats a guilty-looking braking-induced dip of the front bumper any day of the week. And it's gotta be a slow day at the Krispy Kreme for a cop to write you for less than ten over on the interstate.

And speaking of cops in the greensward, what is going on in Tennessee? Either west Tennessee is a radically different place from east TN, or y'all have broken the state since I left. I passed 25 cop cars in the median between Memphis and Nashville, and except for three old 'black & tan' Crown Vics, they were all hulking, brooding black unmarked Tahoes with window tint that would get you or I a ticket were we to apply it to our cars. I drove back and forth from K-ville to Oleg's crib in Nash Vegas more than a dozen times and I don't think I saw that many cop cars, total.

Passing a couple-three of those parked up cheek-by-jowl every few miles gives one a creepy "police state" feeling, let me tell you. I'm sure it's to save me from the scourge of interstate dope smuggling or something, but I'd rather the kid next door lit a spliff every now and again than have to buy the po-po the latest fashion in "interdiction cars" every few years.

Overheard in the Kitchen:

Me: "What day is today? Thursday?"

RX: "Yes, Tamara, this is Thursday. But only until noon, and then it's last Tuesday."

Me: "Hey, I'm still a little disoriented from my vacation. You know, 'If this is Tuesday, then I must be in Amarillo.'"

RX: "No, you're not an armadillo. What kind of vacation was this? 'And if it's Wednesday, I'm a stoat!'"

Me: "This is going on the internet..."

The covers of this book were too damn close together.

"At last they rode over the downs and took the East Road, and then Merry and Pippin rode on to Buckland and already they were singing again as they went. But Sam turned to Bywater, and so came back up the Hill, as day was ending once more. And he went on, and there was yellow light, and fire within; and the evening meal was ready, and he was expected. And Rose drew him in, and set him in his chair, and put little Elanor upon his lap.

He drew a deep breath. 'Well, I'm back,' he said."

Homeward bound.

Like rolling the string back onto the spool, I find myself in a room in the same Little Rock motel I was in this time last week, pecking out yet another post on a dinky Eee keyboard.

It's dark outside, I can hear a jet on short final overhead, and the TeeVee is making noise just because I'm not ready for silence at the moment. (Apparently I unplug from the net for a few days and you people let the Iranians get all out of control again. Can't have nothin' nice...)

Well, time to go check out and get eastbound and down...
.

Overheard on the phone...

While passing through Amarillo, the phone rang. It was Shootin' Buddy...

SB: "Are you still in Texas?"

Me: "Yup."

SB: "Is everybody wearing funny hats and pointy elf boots?"

Me: "Nope."

SB: "Then how can you tell you're in Texas?"

Me: "There're Texas flags everywhere."

SB: "But that could just mean you're in a steak house in Wisconsin."

Overheard at the range...

Arriving at the range on the morning of the second day of shooting, MattG, OldNFO, aepilot Jim, and I stopped up at the car on the long rifle range to inspect the damage inflicted on the previous day. OldNFO started to pop the hood latch...

ON: "Hang on, I just want to see what happened under here..." *raises hood*

Me: (in good ol' mechanic drawl) "Well there's your problem. Motor's got holes all in it."

(Actually, it didn't. Until later that day.)

Refrigerate after opening...

One thing I've always wondered about is how much less perishable rifle skills seem when compared to pistol skills. I get to shoot rifles past fifty yards maybe once or twice a year, and even if I'm no longer the rifle shot I was when shooting 3-position smallbore in college, I can usually manage to avoid beclowning myself.

Go a couple months without going to the pistol range, however, and I might as well take one of those remedial courses where the instructor gets up in front of the class and begins by identifying the end from which the bullet emerges. (Thankfully, I got in plenty of range time over the last month or two, plus that ToddG class was still fresh in my head, so I didn't look like an idjit shooting in front of people this weekend.)

The sun has riz, the sun has set...

...and we still ain't out of Texas yet.

Not that we were hurrying or anything. I got some neat-o pics in Boise City and Amarillo today, but they'll have to wait until I have something better than the Eee with which to post them.

My stocks of 9mm and deuce-deuce are notably depleted. Fortunately the Indy 1500 is coming up on the 23rd, which should make a splendid weekend for a Blogmeet!
.

Range Notes:

• While the little 4" fixed-sight 22/45 is no target pistol, it's perfectly capable of hitting an 8" steel plate at 10ish yards... Edge on. ;)


• Note to Self: Shooting up a car at 375 yards with a .308 FN SCAR is big, dirty fun.


• Note to Self: The SCAR has a reciprocating charging handle, dummy.


• I was really hoping I wouldn't like that FN .45 ACP pistol of Jennifer's. Oops. I wonder if they're still on sale anyplace?

Look! Gun content!

It isn't my gun content, though, because the cylinder turns backwards...

I've always had a soft spot for the .32-20, and Bobbi's Colt is much purtier than my old Smith in the same caliber. (And the photo is teh awesome.)

Miles and miles of miles and miles...

Riding out to the range with OldNFO, aepilot Jim, and MattG, I felt the urge to pull out my camera and snap a picture.

"What are you taking a picture of out here, Tam?" came the question.

"Oh, nothing..."

I'd have used a panoramic camera, but you can just use the cut and paste function in your photo editor on the above pic to get a sense of the 360-panorama. Agoraphobes need not apply.