Monday, July 4, 2011

Happy Independence Day and Random Thoughts #14

Happy Independence Day, folks.

Most folks call it the Fourth of July, others call it Independence Day. I call it both, depending on who I talk to and which name I remember at the time.

July 4, 1776, America came into existence. Before that, we were just a British colony called something that's probably been lost to history, just like the names of so many of the folks who fought and died during that time. For the longest time, I have been fascinated with things from that era of American History. Mostly how folks lived and the firearms. I'd love to own something from that time period, be it a simple coin or a Brown Bess Musket or even a book. Sadly those things are extremely hard to find and when they do come on the market, they are outrageously expensive and usually bought by folks with more money than I'll ever see.

So, have a Happy and safe Independence Day, everybody.

Rather than splitting this into two seperate posts, I've decided to make this a two for one deal.

I recently took a trip to Lubbock Texas, home of the shop where I bought my treasured Mossberg 500 bullpup shotgun. Well, this was a family trip so I couldn't really stop by and chat with the guys at the shop, though I did stop by and purchase a few things. What did I buy, you ask. Well, I bought some paracord (which is a pain in the neck to untangle, by the way.) and two Mosin-Nagant ammo pouches with oil bottles. One bottle was just covered in cosmoline. For those of you who don't know what cosmoline is, it's a really nasty substance that's basically military grade petroleum jelly. It's a pain to clean off of guns, but it protects it like nothing else on the planet. It's also one of the nastiest things I have ever had to clean off of anything I own. Anyway, I bought the items and went about my merry way. I remembered that there was a surplus shop I knew of from an discussion forum I frequent (Unfortunately, the site is down for server issues, but it'll be back up in a few days.). I walked in and talked to the owner, who was also a member of the same forum. Small world, huh ?

I talked with him for a bit, introduced myself and told him my screen name for the forum. I bought a MOLLE pouch from him to add to my survival kit and it was priced very nicely. I will definitely be making a return trip to that shop the next time I'm in Lubbock. I also stopped off at a comic book shop and bought some books there. I last bought a comic book almost 15 years ago and I mentioned that to the owner. He smiled and told me, "Welcome Back".

Well, that'll do it for this edition of Random Thoughts.

As always, this is 12-Gauge Chimp signing off.