Something new! I couldn't stick a fast GPU in that i7 camera system so through a series of things at work I ended up spending $200 to get an almost complete gaming rig. It's used obviously, and the GPU is from 2014 but it runs everything I play at max resolution and detail level! The GPU currently goes for $350 used because everything is expensive now and the damn crypto miners are gobbling up every new GPU they can find, so really I got a screaming deal on a.... 6+ year old computer. Damn, when did used computers turn into used cars?

I'm really digging all the options on this new PC. You can see here it running in normal mode, not overclocked or anything and I'm tweaking the fan settings. Right there between minute 5 and 6 you can see I dialed back one of the chassis fans, no reason to have it running when temps are low. Less power but also no noise. I'm not able to hear it, but I'm wondering if it will show up on calls as background noise which is why I'm trying to minimize as much as possible.

Here it is running a system benchmark for a few minutes. Temps go up, fans spin up... then spin down when not needed. Slick.

I traded a case of 200 BHA 168gr 308 rounds that I've had sitting in the cache for 15 years (?) and will never fire for 282 rounds of Hornady TAP 75gr 223 that I'll fire in the Ruger the next few sessions I'm out. So trading something I won't use for something I will.... yet I feel sad about it. WTF is up with that?

Let's get the gun crap out of the way first, since it's always around. First up, I tried another case idea for the badger and this time I think I've got a winner. It's some sort of keyboard (musical, not computer) case and it's stiff enough to hold it's shape but soft enough to give a little and not be a giant brick. The rifle and a bunch of junk fit in it very well, and while I won't put all the stuff in there it looks good on camera. :)

What's really needed is some sort of foam insert that keeps everything in place, but what I'll likely end up doing is just wrapping the rifle sections in old towels and putting it in there without all the accessories beyond a box of ammo. That way it's protected but there is no foam to get crushed or fight with should I change my mind about what goes in there. Now I really want a 2nd badger, one to put in the case and leave in the van and one to actually shoot in the yard. Two different zeros, HV ammo without the can for the van, SD ammo with the can for the yard. They're cheap enough... and I have a 2nd removable pin... and I wouldn't need an optic on the van one necessarily so.... yea. Good thing they're not in stock anywhere. :)

With Jason picking up the 1301 and me getting the KS7, there had suddenly been a lot of focus on shotguns that wasn't there prior. The KS7 is a toy (dangerous toy, but still a toy) and my trusty M500 is my 'working' gun for anything that isn't a game (the Browning O/U is the clays/upland gun obviously).

Anyway, I've wanted to get a 590 magpul edition for a while, the ghost ring sight setup is pretty good on those. However, after patterning some 00 buck and getting a feel for actually using a bead equipped shotgun more I'm finding that the bead is 'good enough'. These 18.5" cylinder bore guns put out really really nice patterns with the Federal Flight control loads (which we've got some from Tim as surplus from the prison), out to about 25 yards at most. Knowing it's a 25 yard gun, the sights are only really needed for slugs. Am I going to put slugs on the gun? Probably not, so the sights I've been lusting after are losing their appeal.

With the sights less important all of a sudden, my current beater M500 will suffice. I do still love that magpul furniture, but that's easy enough to add... sorta. Magpul changed the forend around 2014 apparently to only work with the 590/590A1. There are enough differences in the 'action tube' length on the 500s that it's likely causing confusion for the casual. With the 6"-ish action tube you can't just drop one of their forends on, you have to first swap the 6" for the 7".... unless you get tricky.

Hogue makes a long action tube nut that lets you run 590 style forends on your short tube 500. It works perfectly except that the long forends are expecting to pass the OD of the tube through the center, not the OD of the nut that goes over the tube. So basically the tunnel is 1mm too narrow. With some careful work with the dremel and a sanding disk you can open it up and it works. It's ugly as all get out, but no one can see inside the tube once it's installed so it kinda doesn't matter.

Once it's all said and done, I now have a magpul equipped M500. Perfect.

I forgot to take a before picture, but the important functional difference is the LOP change. With my short arms I want a short stock, and the magpul without any spacers in it is 1" shorter than even the youth stock I had on prior. It may be too short now, but I've got 2" worth of spacers to play with and get it right over time.

Playing around with the eTrade Power Trade app, and although it makes me look like I'm on Billions it's not that useful for a casual. I'm still doing the thing where every time Hiers sends me a link to some stupid shit he thinks someone should buy, I put that much money into an index fund. It's allowing me to dollar cost average in some of the savings I've got on hand into the market. Dumb, but better than nothing.

Did a thermal scan of the house and barns, no hot spots of note and nothing sketchy showing up in any of the electrical. The woman keeps saying that Lugnut isn't fat, he's just hairy. This scan shows.... there is a lot of meat under that hair. He's fat.

Made some potato gnocchi last night, and it turned out edible. Not bad for a first attempt. The woman thinks I over-worked the dough which is why they're sorta denser than they should be and that's totally believable. I had no idea how long/much to kneed it, I didn't take the class when she did, so it was just my best guess. Still turned out edible.

Also made some brownies, but substituted out half the vanilla extract for peppermint extract. Mint chip brownies! Also had to use half chicken eggs since I ran out of quail eggs. That was the goal though, use up the last of the quail eggs for the season.

The last, and possibly the most interesting/crazy thing here is that I built a little fake guitar board to practice finger exercises on. Why? Well... I ordered a guitar kit. I've watched some youtube videos on learning the guitar, thought about it for a bit and decided that I need a hobby I can practice that doesn't cost much and isn't centered around violence. No idea if I can actually learn, but I never thought I could learn to type and that turned out OK.

Last month I talked to the guitar people I knew at work to see if anyone had an entry level guitar sitting around in a closet and the answer was no. All the real guitar people dump that entry level thing once they start buying fancy stuff. I guess it makes sense, it's not like an entry level gun that's still a gun.

Eric (new FNG in the CPOC group) has guitars on the wall in the background of his zoom sessions so I asked him to help me pick a noob acoustic guitar (don't want all that electronic complication). I ended up with the lowest level Fender that comes in a kit with everything you need. Amazon of course, for $160 with tax. I just looked and the $20 coupon I used to order isn't an option any more so I actually saved actual money by ordering on Friday! Lucky me.

So much fun setting fan activation temps. :)

Shot the day and night match yesterday, so two full matches in one day. Tired! Did fairly well in the day, impossible to say at night. They were supposed to reclass all the people using lights not approved by the rules but they didn't so those of us using only hand held lights per IDPA rules were running against people using weapon mounted lights (and one guy with full NV gear).

Some more data about my times and day vs. night. Won't go into the details, other than a screw up on one stage cost me 10 seconds on 1 target when I accidentally hit the mag release with the flashlight and dropped the mag right as the spinning target was doing it's thing. I couldn't reload fast enough to catch that drop target before it was gone. Oops.

Guy at work was trying to sell his dad's old deck boards for $50. I offered $1 per usable 12' board but he said that some woman had beaten me to it and already said she would take them so I figured... meh. I didn't want to work on the woman's barn floor project anyway. Well... few days later he emails me back saying that she bailed on them and if I come and took them right that day they would be free. His dad was tired of looking at them. I zipped over and loaded them up. His dad had pulled all the nails and stacked them on the curb, easy to load and go. Win for me! Except now I have to work on the barn project at some point with no excuse for not having materials.

Got the woman's pumpkins today, small ones for the goats and such. Had to take the obligatory 'woman hiding with pumpkins in the field' photo, but sadly the pumpkin patch we normally go to is gone so we had to go to one of the lame city lots.

I'm not going to spend all sorts of money on guitar crap... I say. But, then I get tired of laying it around and was going to build a stand.... but then the guy at work I'm talking to about all this pointed out a stand is $12 on amazon. OK, for $12 I'll get a nice one with padding and not just a POS I make out of scrap lumber and leftover van carpet.

Today we went to a coffee shop in Holly Springs, sat outside and had snacks and coffee. The coffee was good, we got a bag of the beans for home, but the snack and waiting to be served left me feeling it was an expensive indulgence that wasn't worth it.