7/6/10

That was a totally wasted long weekend. First off, as I mentioned Friday, my back was killing me. I took off early and went home. Saturday morning I texted John to see what his plans were and was told he was going to remove the gas tank from his 1200. I agreed that breakfast at Mimi’s was a good idea and suggested he swing by and pick me up. This he did. We ate then went to Lowe’s and bought a chop saw blade and some “Agent Orange” hand cleaner. At the shop, I removed the oil pressure gauge from Nadine and tried to remove the water temp sender while John removed his gas tank. There was way more gas in there than we expected. Somehow, ahem, the gas got “spilled” on the ground in front of the shop. Soon thereafter it somehow, ahem, caught fire. Of course we didn't expect the multiple-decades old gasoline to burn, yet burn it did. It wouldn't have been so bad but for the massive black cloud it emitted. Oops. We got the fire under control and out before management showed up to ask questions. We sheepishly told him about the fire and he laughed it off. Whew. After that we looked at the water temp sender as a team and concluded, “It’s stuck.” I wound up breaking my promise to Jeff Sloan and cut the sender’s capillary tube. The alcohol spewed out and evaporated immediately. Oops. I got the gauge out of the dash as well as most of the switchgear. Oh, I did manage to get one knob to come off with the pip but the rest broke. Oh well. At some point during the day, John replaced the chop saw wheel and cut off the ends of a 510 rear suspension cross member then sized it up under his car. We think it is going to work. Eventually John got tired of watching me hobble around looking like a question mark and we left. He dropped me off at the house where, since mom wasn't home, I showed him the lever gun, the Auto 5, and the Mossberg pump shotgun. I said I might take the lever gun to the range later but I think we both knew that was wishful thinking. He went home and I wasted the rest of the day. Sunday I crawled out of bed around 1230 h and began watching the “Star Wars” marathon on Spike TV. At 0030 h Monday morning I realized I'd been watching TV for twelve hours and went to bed. As much as I rail against George “Captain Plot-Hole” Lucas, I still sat through almost all of the movies back to back. My eyes were a bit sore from the almost continuous rolling, but I made it through, almost. I did give up right about the time the heroes were captured by the Ewoks. I'd seen the rest so many times before that I felt I could give it a miss this time. Oh, yes, my back was still killing me all day Sunday, thanks for asking. Monday my back felt a little better. Gregg called about 0930 h and said he’d call when he was headed my way. He wanted to test fit a 14” wheel with 185/60-14 tires on Lil' Wiggly and we have a set available for that porpoise. I cleaned up and got ready to go outside for the first time in forty-eight hours. By 1500 h I decided that my back felt good enough to go out so I went to fill up the tank on Ms. Clio at the very least. I brought the lever gun and 100 rounds of ammo as well, just in case. I went to the Mobil station near the shop, filled up, and went through the car wash. Gregg called as I was doing this and said he wasn't coming my way and that he’d just buy 185/60-14 tires for the 14” rims he has and will make them fit if he has to. No test fitting of the stuff we have after all. I stopped by the shop and ran the .45 caliber mop through the barrel of the lever gun to knock out the dust bunnies and then headed to Whiskey Flats to go shoost. They gave me no flack about a carbine rifle on the pistol range, being a pistol caliber and all, so I went in and shot. I sent the target out to 20 yards and loaded up five rounds. The gun felt great, little to no kick, as I expected, and was reasonably accurate. In fact, the gun is way more accurate than I am. The limit is my eyesight. I never shot it closer than seven yards because... well, what’s the point? Use a pistol at that range. At seven yards I could put all five bullets in a hole the size of a quarter every time. At ten yards and greater the pattern spread a bit due to (tee hee, I said doo doo) me not being able to see what the hell I was doing. They never patterned greater than six inches, which I will admit is a pretty shitty sounding spread, but they were all in a line just a few degrees off vertical. Side to side spread, which I will also admit means very little to nothing, was no more than an inch. All in all, I do like my new gun. If I could see better the gun could probably put all shots in the quarter sized hole all the way out to twenty five yards. Even “shooting blind” like I was, my 25 yard pattern was no worse than my fifteen yard. When I was out of ammo, I swept up and went out to pay. I shouldn't have but I bought the only box of .45 Colt ammo they had, 20 rounds for... well, I don't want to say how much they were because they were way too expensive. From the shoosting range I went for a hoon out FM5 and then bought tacos for dinner. And that is about all there is to say about this Fourth of July long weekend. Oh, except to wish my brother a Happy Sixtieth Birthday yesterday. Yep, I've got a sibling who is sixty. I'm sure that freaks John out to no end. [ Dude, my Mom's not even that old... - SM ]