Moral-Flexibility.Net

I haven’t used Ebay for years, way back around ’99 or so I used it a bit to assemble a small collection of Canadian World War I items (with the intent of building a small shadow-box project as a small memorial – that project is still pending).

I returned to Ebay looking for a few components for the SKS Project and as luck would have it I not only found exactly the parts I was looking for, but for less than they would have cost me new. It’s a little ironic, as my timing must have been perfect for once, I’ve not seen those type of items listed since.

Sadly I have discovered that there are a great number of zombie movies listed on Ebay, and for considerably less than what I’ve been paying (even with exchange and shipping factored in) locally. I’ve placed my first order for these (Oh you know they’ll appear online shortly after their arrival!), and we’ll see what headaches I experience receiving them (aside from the lack of instant gratification).

-Sigh-

I know this is just what Lisa was hoping for, yet more zombie movies on my jealously guarded “zombie DVD shelf”.

Today I ran to the store before heading in to work, a quick run for cigarettes and milk (and I forgot the milk AGAIN), and as I was leaving the store with two packs of cigarettes in one hand and fumbling my wallet into my hip pocket while trying not to drop the change in my fist I was accosted by three teenagers out front of the store.

“I’ll take a cigarette” said what I presumed to be the mouthpiece of the group, blocking the path to my car.

“You’re going to have to.” was my instant response (stupid sarcastic preconditioning).

Now we stood there for a moment staring at each other. I finished getting my wallet and change into their appropriate pockets, and then calmly placed the two packs of cigarettes into my jacket pocket. I remember a number of thoughts flashing through my head in the few moments as we stood there “This is a bad idea, there are three of them“, “Fer Chissakes it’s still light out“, “Go on, I need to vent a little, just twitch you muppet” and things in a similar tone.

He then stepped aside, and I automatically told him “Have a nice day”, smiled and got into my car without further incident. The small melodrama having played itself out, life resumed and I found myself running slightly behind schedule (again).

Recently the firearms community was startled into action with the release of a letter that stated the federal government intended to prohibit the Ruger Mini-14 rifle.

..The Government of Canada is committed to introducing legislation to prohibit the Ruger Mini-14 at the earliest opportunity during this session of parliament. The criterion for prohibiting firearms is whether they are reasonable for use in Canada for hunting or sporting purposes..
Dated: Jan 27, 2005 (released by MP Gary Breitkruez)

Much heated discussion and some letter writing followed (Yes, even I broke down and wrote a letter), and in the end the government stated that there were no “immediate” plans to ban this rifle.

…Justice Minister Irwin Cotler said yesterday that a letter he wrote to a gun owner announcing plans to ban the Ruger Mini 14 semi-automatic rifle during the current session of Parliament was a mistake…

..An aide to Mr. Cotler said the government has no plans to ban the rifle during this session of Parliament, and Mr. Cotler signed the letter “in error.”..

Oh goody… as long as there are no “immediate” plans.

I am a member of the Canadian Shooting Sports Association, but just prior to this latest bruhaha had decided to plunk down a few extra dollars, and join the National Firearms Association as well (the more people defending my rights the better, no?). I had more than a few reservations about this however.

You see, despite the fact that I don’t post as regularly over at CanadianGunNutz.com I still read the forums religously. About every 3 months or so the “NFA debate” will begin, in which people will accuse this organization of failing to maintain any sort of transperancy in its financial activities, and questionable activities in general. Of course, as with all debates these claims are refuted by proponents of the organization and we return to square one.

Most of these accusations centered around the President of the NFA, Jim Hinter. Now glacing through the CGN politics section I see that Mr. Hinter has just resigned his position. The next little while should be interesting… particularly since I am now a member of this organization.

Can’t anything work simply?

Took a trip to the range today with Tony and Mike. Dragged an assortment of firearms along, but most pressing on the list was the in-progress SKS-D project rifle (pictured right).

I must say that I was suitable impressed with the modifications made so far. The williams firesight was a vast improvement, and luckily is at exactly the right height. The rear aperature was excellent and once the windage was adjusted the rifle was dead easy to shoot, and as accurate as it’s yet been. Still lighter than either the AR or certainly the M14, and with the rubber buttpad properly installed comfortable to shoot.

Overall I’m very pleased. I can’t wait for the scout mount and optics to arrive so I can put the rifle through its paces properly. Hopefully I’ll have finished my “zombie targets” for it’s maiden range trip.

Assorted introductions to the varied rifles and handguns with Tony and Mike, both the AR15 and M14 being big hits along with the handguns (I neglected to bring more than a single box of 9mm, so our time was limited with the pistols sadly).

Ah…with the exception of the cold (and me forgetting my gloves again) a perfect day…

This review has been moved. Click here to be taken to its new location.

Goal: To create an inexpensive “tactical” rifle using the Norinco SKS-D as a starting point. Visualized was a cheap, reliable rifle mounting a reflex sight in a scout configuration. As the scout mount replaces the existing rear leaf sight, a replacement rear peep sight was required to ensure that some sighting system remained available to the user should the optics be damaged or otherwise fail. A series of minor asthetic and ergonomic changes were planned in order to create a more comfortable rifle overall.

Stay tuned, this entry will be updated as the modifications are made.

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“Alone in the Dark” (2005) directed by Ewe Boll.
Starring Christian Slater, Tara Reid, Stephen Dorff, Frank C. Turner and Mathew Walker .

Overview: Ewe Boll is truly a magician, he can take a normal run of the mill script and turn it into complete crap, over and over again. Yes, after his zombie epic House of the Dead Boll has returned to bludgeon us with this incoherent inaction movie.

Summary: The movie begins with a long, slightly confusing voiceover (even the narrator sounded befuddled), explaining that an advanced race of people had expired thousands of years ago after openning a door to a evil world. Their ju-ju was sought by a secret government organization called 713 (presumably denoting the acceptable number of casualties in any encounter with the paranormal) which was formed to fight supernatural activities (despite this they are armed with conventional weapons, and dodgeball uniforms).

Edward Carnby (Slater) is a PI (Uh, thats Paranormal Investigator) who has been freelance since leaving 713, and has been tracking down artifacts belonging to this long extinct civilization (we’re assuming he got a golden parachute when he left, otherwise we’re not sure how he pays for these activities). While transporting an artifact back to Vancouver (Um, yeah…it was filmed there, and based on the plethora of street signs, licence plates and “tactical” maps we can assume it takes place there) to show to his girlfriend Aline Cardac (Reid).

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I have been a father now for just over two months. Our daughter remains a constant source of amazement for me, how something so little can grow so fast and change so much in such a short period of time.

I am smitten of course, I can’t look at Jill without feeling all kinds of paternal pride (I will spare you the asertions that she is the smartest, healthiest and most beautiful baby on the planet).

I still feel that I am in shock, at least a little, with this. My mind has trouble with the concept that I am a “father”, that this is my “daughter”. Don’t get me wrong, I know these things, but they run so contrary to my temporizing nature that it’s difficult to come to terms with sometimes. Of course all doubts fade whenever I hold her, whenever I hover over her crib…and especially whenever she emits 145 decibels of infact scream.

I can’t help thinking that my time spent working in a hospital has been a big help, after all I was already used to being thrown up on, and having to work around human waste. Who knew that would come in handy?

Well there was the crash, then there was the effort spent trying to force my backups (which were a mere week old this time) to work, then the fun and excitement of hunting for a new hosting service (this domain expires in 13 days, and I thought maybe before handing my current host some more cash I’d hunt around a bit for a more stable option.

It takes a lot of energy to rebuild a website, restore backups and then contemplate writing new entires to replace those that were lost. Frankly, I don’t have that kind of energy these days. I had of course, in the aftermath of this most recent crash, considered shutting down the blog altogether (I’ve considered this before as you’ll recall).

But on reflection I like the blog, and I guess I’ll keep it online for just one more year to see how it works out. I swear, however, that I am going to download the backups more often. It’s just TOO MUCH EFFORT to rebuild this thing every time the host shitcans.