Life in 3D

He’s dead, Jim

This is one target that won’t be threatening anyone ever again.

My grouping does kinda suck on this one, but since it has been about 10 years since I shot this Browning and I was doing it from ranges of 10-30 feet, I’m not to disappointed in my performance.  Besides, have you ever seen the sights on a 1976 Browning?  It looks like this:

Not exactly a huge front sight to work with, and the rear sight is a dovetail design.  I love this pistol, but I’m going to be saving my pennies and getting a P229 as soon as I can for a defensive gun.  Maybe I can order a new slide for this one with more modern sights?  That would be a nice thing.

So, since I couldn’t make it to the NRA convention, I went shooting instead.

57%

When I was a kid, about 3 or 4, I ended up in an oxygen tent at the local hospital and almost died.  I had a severe asthma attack that came out of nowhere, kicked my ass, and then seemingly disappeared, or at least that’s the way I remember it. I never had an inhaler and I would go for two or three mile runs when I was in high school.  Anyway, for years I went along blissfully ignorant of my situation.  I mean, I knew I had asthma when I was a KID and all that, but that was YEEEEAAARS ago and I don’t have to worry about it now, right?

Well, part of the reason, I will guess, that it wasn’t bothering me was because for most of the last 20 some years I’ve been living at sea level or not much higher than that.  Lots of oxygen down there and it made it easy for me to run, work out and generally get along in life.  Now though, I am in New Mexico at an altitude of 5,653 feet.  About 5,603 feet higher than I have been used to for quite a while.  When we first moved back here I got Bronchitis, a wonderful inflammation of the lungs that makes you hack up mucus and generally feel like you are trying to breath through a straw.  So, since I now had insurance (first time in about 4 years) I went to the doctor and after poking, prodding, and having me blow into machines they gave me antibiotics and a rescue inhaler.

A rescue inhaler??

Yep, one of the tests they did measured my blood oxygen.  I was sitting around 87% – normal is 95% or higher.  And so with that they zeroed in on my old asthma and my allergies as a possible cause.  Well, I figured the reason I couldn’t breath MUST be because of allergies.  I was allergic to the whole state when I was a kid so I was sure that was still the case.

So, off I went to seen an allergist and during my visit the poked me with needles to see what I was allergic to and also did a couple of tests to see how my lungs were working out and the results were not as good as I hoped.  My lungs are working at about 57% of what they should be doing, which explains why my workouts have sucked, my running has been even more atrocious than even I expected.  Yep, I just don’t get enough air up here.

Plus, New Mexico hates me.  I am allergic to almost everything that grows here; Tumbleweeds, Cottonwood Trees, weeds in general, dogs (my parents have dogs), and even Ash – I’m allergic to a tree that I want to make into a freaking BOW for craps sake!!!  The only bright point there is it seems I am also allergic to soybeans.  Yep, guess there are no more tofu burgers in my future, or soy milk, or anything but real milk and real meat!

So, the solution is that I am now on Symbicort and that seems to be helping.  Also, workout is now going to be much more consistent plus, I am going to walk to and from work as much as possible until I am back to a point where running is again feasible.  From there I plan to get in the best shape I have ever been; I plan to be back to running three miles a day and benching 260; I plan to be able to do a day of heavy work and feel good, not worn out.

I may have asthma, but that doesn’t mean that it’s going to have me.

My New Pen Pal

Have you ever read something that so moved you that you felt compelled to contact the author and let them know how much their writing meant to you?  Well, I got that feeling just the other day after stopping by Breda’s Blog and seeing what she had to say about Eric Heyl.

Now, to say that Eric Heyl is a sexist jerk is probably putting a happy face on this waste of human flesh, but still I decided to contact him and let him know what I thought of this particular article he wrote:

After reading your article all I can say is this:  You’re an idiot and know nothing about women, shooting or concealed carry and are also a perfect example of why your profession is referred to as the Lame Stream Media.

I supposed I could have used facts to show that women shooters are the fastest growing segment of the shooting world, and that firearms can be obtained in any color of the rainbow or that you can colorize it yourself using Duracoat, but I said to myself “Self (which is how I talk to myself) all these wonderful facts will be lost on him because A) he is a misogynistic douche bag and B) look at that dead thing on his upper lip!!!”  So I kept it simple for him, which I thought was best.

Surprise, surprise!!  He responded:

It pains me to have lost the respect of someone who works tirelessly to advance humanity by designing lumpy green ninja-looking creatures. But I do thank you for taking time to share your thoughts.

The “lumpy green ninja-looking creature” he refers to is this.

Ninja-boy here is a character I did as a freshman in undergrad for an animation project, he’s about eight years old now and I use him as a gravitar and kind of a mascot.  I also love how in the email he implies that somehow he is working to advance humanity and attempts to shoot me down with that.  I never said anything about advancing humanity to him, so I guess he is projecting – maybe he should have his therapist explain what that is to him.  Also, since he seemed confused about his status with me, I replied:

Actually,  you have that wrong (as in most things you do) – you never had my respect in the first place.

I was considering becoming a columnist and writing ignorant, misogynistic pieces about topics that I had no knowledge at all but since you have that market covered I decided to be an animator instead.  At least with my field we admit that what we create is a fantasy from our minds.

And again, he wrote back!  We are well on our way to being regular chatty Cathys!

Delightful. I’m certain you’ll soon have the lumpy green ninja-looking creature market cornered. Thanks again, my hostile animator friend.

Hostile??  Hmmmm…. he must be projecting again, I don’t think I wrote one hostile word at all.  Sarcastic sure, but hostile?  Nahhhh.

I’m considering writing back to him just to point out one other fact that he has missed (hey, so far he has missed almost every fact that has come his way so at least he’s batting 1000 there) – Ninja-boy is YELLOW, not green.  You would think he would be very familiar with the color yellow since it’s the kind of journalism he practices every day.

My Boy