The Perfect is Enemy of the Good

Talk about one bad-apple spoiling the whole Yoga-barrel.  Avoid perfection and Utopian thinking - renounce it entirely, because it really is the Road to Hell.  Beware the un-obtainable, 'perfect spiritual insight and tranquility,' because there's almost no better example and truth-in-advertising of the Zen saying, "If You Meet the Buddha on the Road, Kill Him!" - especially if this nondescript little bespectacled guy is your Yoga-teacher.  Kill him before he kills you and hundreds-of-thousands of others. 
A German historian has come out with a book about how Heinrich Himmmler and the SS in Nazi Germany recommended Yoga to its members, including death camp guards, believing that the practice of would enrich their 'mind, bodies and spirits' - and also convinced it was a way to 'internally arm' people and prepare them for battles...
Apparently Yoga was big in Weimar Germany especially among the progressives and "forward thinking" types, and if you wanted to be an Ãœbermensch this was one ticket to that elite social-status.  It also resonateed nicely with the famous moustachioed guy who was a vegetarian and animal-rights advocate.
Perfection is rubbish, a fig-leaf and a dullard's fantasy - be a Human, dammit.  Humans are awesome and amazing - and if you STILL need to have sex with a Neanderthal there's always Liberal Chicks at the #OWS camp...

Mag pouch(es) with light(s)

In response to Will's urging, indeed it they do-does double duty.

ee cummings

DW Drang at The Clue Meter on a riff about the old coots linked to The Brussels Journal article "The “Great War” and Tyranny: E. E. Cummings and John Dos Passos on the Destruction of Order 1914-18", which tagged a note in my flippant RAM, of old work and reading done long past, of the brilliant ee cummings - and a quote I quite liked, something he wrote that leap about most strenuously and athletically with language and words so I had to search the Interwebz for it all over again:

“when man determined to destroy
himself he picked the was
of shall and finding only why
smashed it into because.” 

That just stuck with me, like a bit of toothpick that lodged between the molars of my mind. The rest of the Journal article is worth reading to find out how Kafka-esque cummings was, before Kafka was even published, let alone in English... 

The Enormous Room provides one of the earliest accounts, outside of the French Revolution and the final half-century of Czarist Russia, of political arrest and incarceration. Like the recorders of étatist persecution in those other milieux, Cummings knows with instantaneous conviction that spying on private opinion signifies the advent of a totalitarian order the ideological rigidity and intolerance of which motivate a program of investigation and punishment.

Neat stuff.

The plum trees are poppin'

We've been enjoying some exceptional weather lately, and the finches are hopping from branch to branch to eat the tiny buds that sprout.

Today I went pants-less, with flip-flops on my feet.

I am the greatest.

But I put it up small, because I have enormous humility.

I see Zombies

And Zombie-stuff...everywhere.  A not-hollow point for instance.

Just another damn wall-anchor.

Range Day

It was cool and dark in the morning. That gave-way to breezy and cold where the valley narrows-down and the wind funnels through.  The clouds cleared out and it warmed-up by the time the Match was over.

Pretty big turn-out.

I shot a 391-2x - not great, just couldn't get any love back from the targets.

A little shower make-over

Hooked-up the new shower-head with diverter-knob fixture, drilled the tile, and screwed the hand-held-holder to the wall.
You can have it both ways, just not at the same time.

Two is One

Backup-backup-backup...

My Funny Valentineses ♥

My buddy David at True Blue Sam tagged me with the Liebe-herze Bloggenmemester, and set down the rules:

1. Copy and paste the award on our blog. ♥ -check.
2. Link back to the blogger who gave us the award. ♥ -check
3. Pick our five favorite blogs with less than 200 followers,
        Wait - huh?  How do I tell that??  Is it a Facebook thing?
and leave a comment on their blog to let them know they have received the award.
4. Hope that the five blogs chosen will keep spreading the love and pass it on to five more blogs.  ♥

Ok then... Not knowing which way to turn I'll just go ahead and nominate the five blog-Tabs I have open:
Engineering Johnson -  Hey pal, if you're off the plane long enough to get over the jet-lag.
Red at Self-sufficient Slacker - My condolences and you need a new rear sight.
My pals Phil and David (and MadRocketScientist) at Random Nuclear Strikes
Kurt's Trainwreck in Maxwell
and the future kickass generation of our sport, Molly at the Molly Minute...
TAG! 
Uh ok, So Molly's site doesn't do comments...so Rick! Traction Control!, it's Liebster, baby! He shouldn't be too put-out about coming in second to Molly.

Shooting Across-the-Course: Targets.

A friend asked about how my Practice (Matches are the same) went the weekend before last, and how many shots are fired in a match.

I belong to a CMP-chartered club and we follow the standard Service-Rifle course of fire, and to answer his question it's 10 mainly, then twenty in slow-prone. 

You start off with five sighters (usually from prone to ensure you're on-target).  The total match shot-count is 55-shots including sighters, with a possible Match total-score of 500-points.  Last time I shot a 414 with 3 X's (not six).

For the offhand stage where you stand shooting unsupported (no sling-support allowed), it's 10 shots in 10 minutes, on the 200-yard target.  Take your time and breathe.

The 200-yard target is about 40"x40" with center-black being 13-inches in diameter that includes the 9-10-and-X and rings at 13-inches, 7-inches, and 3-inches respectively.  I need to practice my off-hand shooting the most.

Rapid-Seated is exactly what it sounds like.  You get 10 shots in 60-seconds, with a magazine change, so: two shots and then eight shots - also on the 200-yard target.  Here is where you have to adjust and tighten your sling for best rigidity.

This is a fun stage, but you get rocked around a bit by all the muzzle blast (even with a tight sling) from the other shooters taking place around you, and sometimes it's hard to keep your group together between magazine changes as the point of impact can change, and mainly you tend to over-hurry.

Rapid prone is similar but you get 70-seconds for your two-and-eight, and you shoot on the reduced 300-yard target that has the black-center still 13-inches but includes the 8-9-10-X rings, and it's only 25-inches from the edges. The X-ring is 2-inches.

Rapid prone tends to be more stable since you're prone but there exists the same problem with POI change during the mag-change.  The real trick is to slow the hell down and not get all your shots off so/too fast - ten-seconds a shot is time to breathe and get your sight-picture.

Then you shoot Slow-Prone with 20-shots in 20-minutes, on a further reduced 20-inch target, with the same 13-inch black that now includes the 7-ring.  The X-ring is 1-3/4". 

After twenty minutes your elbows and biceps are sore, I can tell you that!


So, the black area that you see remains constant, and you have the same (crappy) sight picture throughout.

It's a bitch, but sometimes the weather is nice: