We finally got to Dix Park and the woman got to see the trolls. They're not obvious except for the first one, you have to wander around and find them. Eventually we found a map... and eventually noticed the little circles someone had drawn on it showing the locations.

After the trolls we went to Crofton's Pretzels which is a quasi-famous pretzel place. They were pretty good. I had a pretzel dog, the woman had just a regular pretzel. The dog was OK, the regular pretzel was in the top two pretzels I've ever had. We would go back again for sure.

Went to Boxyard with Will and Rachel (the chef) and we tried the korean BBQ place. Expensive, but actually tasty. I wasn't disappointed. And yes, that's a Korean BBQ burrito bowl.

While there they had a pumpkin patch so we used it for photos. Pretty good pictures of us, even if we do look old.

This morning I had the kid take a picture of me in the ring to use on my FIRE camp intro slide.

They have a template we follow for the intro slides and I did all the needful but in the 'non-fire' skills I actually put the stuff I do. Likely to be offputting to the pearl clutching members of the community, but maybe there is someone that will think I'm special.

Everyone enjoying their new blankets for the season. Apparently when they get old they don't grow in their coats as well so they get cold.

Moved the Fiesta over to the in-laws garage. Kinda worried about it over there for some reason but the van is leaking again and I need to get it out of the rain and try to seal it up. Easier doing that if the fiesta isn't getting rained on in it's place.

Two upgrades to the G34 based on the class feedback. I'm not ready to get a new pistol yet and all that's involved with that so instead I put that cut down backstrap back on and upgraded the optic. Hopefully the extra plastic up high will force the gun down without so much effort on my part and obviously the larger optic window will make tracking the dot and finding it again much easier.

Everything came together just fine, no stripped or broken screws this time. Will hopefully get out to zero it tomorrow.

The SCS has been moved down to the G21. I didn't know it would fit but it does. The MOS depth and screws are the same, it's just that the cut is a little wider. Looks good enough, and now I have a dot on the 45.

For the FIRE thing next month they're doing a Power Point party instead of a traditional intro. Everyone fills in some template slides and they'll run them on the screen during dinner. I think. Anyway, for the 'other stuff' part of the last slide I decided to not hold back. No hiding who I actually am. Probably going to freak out some pearl clutching libs, but I guess it's better to try to attract the like minded vs. trying to hide from the enemy.

Green Ops shooting class yesterday.. and when I got there I thought I was in the wrong place. It started at 8:30am, I got there at 8am and there was no one there. Then at 8:15am... still no one. Was there a road closure I missed that was holding everyone else up?

By 8:30am one car rolled up. The instructor. Turns out I was the only student. He could have canceled obviously but chose not to. I basically ended up with a 7+ hour private lesson. We worked on all my issues exclusively so it was a very productive day.

The thing that bothered me the most was that when I tried his random Walther with a larger dot window I was able to shoot faster at 8 yards getting all alphas with it than I was able to just blindly fire the G34 into the berm. His claim is that yes, my gear really is holding me back. I'm now chasing a few hundredths so the little things are starting to matter.

I find that both shocking and disappointing at the same time.

The first draft of my story is officially complete. 167k words in 50-ish chapters. Some chapter numbers are empty (unneeded stuff that was deleted) and others have 7a and 7b style labeling since I had to insert things for pacing. Now, we move on to editing.

Last night I went to a 'writers salon', basically a gathering at someone's house for writers to socialize and (optionally) read some of their work. It was all people from the Sunday group so I knew everyone but it's the first time I've heard any of what people have been writing. They're all... a lot better than I expected. Makes my stuff seem lame.

Lugnut isn't doing well. His patella keeps popping out of joint which I imagine is painful and keeps him from being able to walk, sit or stand. The vet has been out twice so far while we figured out what's wrong. The last time the woman was at work so the vet taught me to reset his joint. Ick. You can feel it's out of joint and then with a little pressure it pops right back in with a snap. Ick.

Dinner at Figulina for our 19th anniversary. I'm normally pretty adamant about not paying for Italian food since it's so easy to do at home but in this case they specialize in pasta and not quasi-Italian stuff (chicken parm). I had the double sided ravioli which was pretty damn good. The dough is two separate types with two separate fillings they form together into single ravioli of two types. It works, and not sure I could duplicate the technique.

Hey look, a legit double feed in the G34. Starting to malfunction more as of late, but the round count on the springs indicate it's due for service so it's not too surprising.

The pick for this month was one of the cheap ones I got in a multi-pack just to give the woman more colors to pick from. A few weeks in and I noticed that everything is getting covered in this gold colored dust as the pick slowly disintegrates. Then, catastrophic failure. So much for the cheap pick.

Match today, and I walked out after stage 3. Started out OK, got really slow and then screwed up stage 3 really bad. Two no-shoots, some misses... it was garbage. All strong hand only but still, I practice that. All this dryfire is NOT paying off. If anything I'm getting slower because I'm more aware of what I should be doing and not just doing stuff.

Also, I really didn't want to be there today. Weather was perfect (overcast and cool, no sun in your eyes or anything), squads were smaller, etc.

I caught a blade through the basket the other day and while nothing bad happened, it was about 1" away from really bad things happening. While I wait for the real liner to be made (ordered already) I put this together out of tape and that high density foam from Sean. It's ugly, but it works for now.

Made the strawberry yogurt pound cake for the FIRE book club brunch thing and it was the best part about the FIRE book club meeting. Nothing wrong with the people, just more delusional FIRE people who aren't interested in history as a guide.

Used some scrap to make a quick amp stand. No reason the amp can't sit right on the ground I just thought this would protect it from careless vacuuming a bit.

Too much swords, golf, guitar and shooting and my wrist gave out in protest. Actually went to the doctor and got x-rays and everything and got this brace to wear for two weeks.

I am not getting skunked on the sweet potato harvest this year. Dug up a few as a sample and we turned them into hash. Very tasty.

Wow, check out the new image on the Mogotone web site. That's me!

Rotated the tires on the van today, they're way overdue.

On my TO DO list for the last six months was to install this soap dispenser in the laundry room sink. It came with the new kitchen faucet but the woman didn't want it in the kitchen and I didn't want to just toss it so I put it here. Now it will probably sit empty for another six months but whatever, that's not my job.

Odd stove pipe malfunction at the range the other day. Can't say I've seen one like that since the Grendel days.

Dad went in for surgery on Monday, having the arteries in his legs opened up. They were 90losed with plaque which was making it painful when he did anything since the muscles were starved for blood and oxygen. Only minor complications from the surgery and everything should be good to go after a few weeks recovery.

Since H2O didn't have a normal match this month I found the indoor one at On Point and got signed up. It was a pretty simple match, they can't do much with two tiny and one mid sized bays but it was high stress. New location, new rules, new people, etc. Watching the cool kids on the squad run the first stage I was pretty sure I was going to be in the top 1/3 of the field. I felt I could beat everyone on the squad but maybe the really good shooters were on one of the others. Turns out...

Nope, I was the best shooter. The guy in second wasn't in our squad, nor the third, fourth or fifth. Who knew that practice and rounds down range would beat out fancy battle belts and race guns? Oh right, everyone knows that.

Practicing with the amp every day, learning that I like the 'bright' inputs over the 'normal' by a wide margin. Wanted to see what the actual electrical difference is and since I have the schematic...

It's one capacitor change. That's surprisingly simple.

Noodle died; a very very old chicken. She stopped being able to walk a few days ago but was still alert and eating/drinking if you put the food right next to her. Then one morning, just gone.

After class on Thursday I stayed behind (and skipped small sword) and did some free sparing with the German guy. We didn't have the shelter and it was trying to rain so we were using foams for class and sparing as to not rust the swords. I mentioned the extra sparing and asked on the discord if anyone else did that. The head of the program scolded me (privately) saying we're not allowed to do that yet and to not ask about it publicly. Others in our class have done the same, wonder if he scolded them as well?

The instructor for my class said that the guild has "Friday Night Fights" where anyone who wants to can just show up and fight. It's supposed to be for the different disciplines to get together and try things against people fighting in different styles.

I did it and while there were no other broadsword guys there it still turned out OK. Some random chick was there (out with an injury but hanging out to be social) and recorded some of the action. Here are three vids, the first two are me against someone more skilled than me (but he's a sword & buckler fighter primarily so the single sword was not his jam) and then the third is his instructor. You can see the instructor is clearly toying with me, but that's better than just crushing me outright.

There was also a German chick who I fought with these funky leather wrapped saber like things that looked like some sort of Star Trek weapon. Different footwork, different attacks and defense... I did not do well and got burnt out quick because I forgot to breathe. Doh.

Dad finally made it to Alaska, on a cruise but at least he's been there. His 80th birthday was day 5 of the cruise.

That amp class was earlier this weekend, two days of heads down fiddling, soldering and debugging a 1950s Tweed Deluxe amp. The cabinet was built but otherwise we started with a bare chassis and added in the physical connectors, knobs, etc...

Then built this primitive double sided trace-free circuit board.

After that passed inspection it got time to get serious about wiring everything together. The instructions were just 'follow the schematic' but really we used this pictogram thing that was even to scale so you could use it to estimate wire lengths.

Long story short, even after having my board looked at at least five times before testing, it failed.

Turned out I used 100K OHM resistors in two places I should have used 100 OHM and then stuck the 100Ks where the 100s went. It's odd since I was verifying all the color codes, and another student did something similar, which makes me think they were mixed up in the box. The first of three was right and that's probably the one I checked and then for the other two I just assumed they were the same thing in the same spot in the box. Guess not.

Trying to de-solder the mess from between those caps was hard enough and there was no way I could get the new ones in since the board was now made of a 'sandwich' of two pieces keeping the back insulated. Instead I had to use the official method of just hacking the crap out of it and soldering the recycled resistors to the 'leg' that was cut off from before. I'm surprised it works and expect it to be the first thing to fail:

The final assembly after hacking those two resistor setups.

And it's done, I now have a hand built by me tube amp.

The woman isn't wrong saying it's ugly, but that's how they looked in 1955 and that's how they're recreated today. They make dozens of different materials to cover the box in but we weren't given a choice for the class. I could get it recovered and may at some point, probably when those hacks fail and I have to take it apart anyway.

At the in-laws place here putting the patio furniture together and I cleaned up the cable box in the laundry room. Now that stupid wifi AP won't fall out every time you open it and the mini PC I'm using to store my backups and stream their TV service from is nicely tucked up out of the way. They won't even know it's there.

The truck got all moldy inside yet again so I pulled everything out, shampooed the carpets and sterilized the seats/dash/etc. There was a lot of moisture in the carpets, must have been from when we were driving it in the rain and it never got a chance to dry out because even if the doors leak it's parked in the carport.

While cleaning the truck I finally got around to ordering the random bits to fix a few small issues. One of the license plate lights was broken (the housing) and it was cheaper to get these LED replacements vs. buying an OEM bulb holder. The LEDs are way too bright, but as you can see they work. I swapped them both since it came in the kit.

Also broken was one of the door lights. Again, the LED units were cheaper than an OEM style filament bulb holder so I went that way again. These are super bright as well, but in this case it's OK.

Came as a two pack again so both sides got upgraded for less than the price of one old school part.

Those 15 round G43x mags from PSA that didn't work right.. they made a revision three apparently. New springs and followers and PSA will send them out free as warranty repairs so I got a set to freshen those mags. Haven't tested them yet but the follower sticks up way further in the front now and does lock the slide open when empty every time I manually try (vs. the 50 0x0p+0t best with the old springs/followers). Leaving them loaded until I can get to the range.

The woman picked up a really nice construction screw at the fairgrounds while visiting the pony show. Her car has no spare and we know it's 6+ hours for the tow truck so I just collected a bunch of stuff and headed over. Ended up just using the tire plug kit and that worked well enough to get her to a tire shop. Discount was closed so she went to Firestone and they charged her $35 to fix the tire. Maybe it's because it was on the car, I always take the flats to discount as just the wheel off the car so they can't do the stupid clumsy sales pitch about replacing all the tires, brakes, etc. Firestone did try to sell her a new set of tires while she waited.

The camera laptop runs hot and the inboard fan is doing it's thing and keeping it below 85C, that's still pretty warm in the CPU package area. I reused the old external fan I had to add to the little compact PC but it didn't seem to help:

$20 from Amazon and I got this laptop cooler tray. It's just a bunch of fans and some dorky LEDs but it does push air into every vent in the bottom of the laptop. So far the max temp has been 75C under hard load so it seems to be doing it's thing.

Adding timer based drills into my HEMA stuff. Move left/right with proper footwork and when the random beep goes off, attack and back out under guard.

I updated everything on the web server VM and it put a new ssl.conf file in which tried to start a default https server on top of my secure server which made apache bomb out. Removing that unnecessary conf put in by the yum update did the trick.

At Panera to write and I should be working on my book but I've just not been journaling much as of late so I thought I would throw ten minutes at it and put something down.

With the sip club hacks I'm able to get free food over time even though I'm not really buying much other than my free drink and sometimes a discounted bagel. I had a 'reward' for a free entree which I thought I could use to just get a bowl of soup. I picked the soup, then it said "pick the second item" (the soup is part of the 'pick two' thing) and then it told me to pick a free side. You can't see the discount until you try to check out and since you can back out at that point I figured I would try and see which item it gave me for free. Turns out, it did all of them. So my bowl of soup turned into a tuna sandwich too which I've been craving for weeks now.

Did more frozen burrito prep the other day. All frozen stuff is getting so bad that even I can't enjoy it any more. So, lots of home made stuff is in my future.

Setup a test area for thrusting. Now that the new season has started in the sword guild they're offering beginner side sword again. I'll add that on, it's right after Thursday advanced beginner broadsword (which I now am qualified to take). I wasn't going to add a third hour of stuff... but it's right there and I keep getting stabbed by people who are taking small sword so I should learn the tricks and counters for board sword sparing.

Last weekend I took a "high risk" pistol class from Green Ops, same people as the carbine class of last month. Sean actually came, I didn't even know he was signed up. Anyway, it was a bunch of work with no-shoot targets and such. Just like the match a few weeks back I started out super strong and then faded to nothing. Can't figure out why I can't maintain my performance level long enough to complete a match, class, etc. Just getting old, or is it something else?

Went to the hospital with dad last Monday, he was getting the veins in his legs checked. The put a camera in through his wrist and drive it down to his legs. Gross. Turns out his leg arteries are 800locked which is why he's having all the pain and trouble. When he's back from the Alaska cruse they're going to operate and put some stints in to keep them open. It's apparently too late to roto-rooter the plaque out.

There is a goth nightclub called "Chapel of Bones" that during the day is a... coffee shop. They're trying to get several book clubs and a writing group setup to meet there, presumably to drive business to an odd location during the day. I've gone twice now, first time I was the only one there and the second there were three people writing but no one other than me at the central 'social' table. The interior is just as odd as you would expect:

Moving PCs around, rebuilding new VMs.... I'm back in IT apparently.

New PC at the in-laws FV house, can RDP in to it to watch TV and the VM is accessible for remote syncing of http data. All seems to be working so far.

All backups from the mac and web3 are going to the new offsite.

I don't have any images from the club yet, but this last weekend I volunteered at the Raleigh Open, a 150+ person sword fighting tournament the club puts on. Broadsword and saber one day, long sword for two plus some oddball stuff. I helped with registration and ran a few rings as the 'ring boss'. Basically getting the fighters marked with the right colors for each match and making sure they're ready to go when it's their turn. Sorta like running the tablet at a IDPA match without the score keeping.

A huge event and I was dead tired after being on my feet 12+ hours a day, but it was worth it. Probably. Next year I'll compete, so there is that.

I got an adjustable bed frame and keeping my head elevated is making me snore a lot less so the woman is happy. I kept feeling that the bed was slipping and un-adjusting itself over the course of the night so I made this little brace out of scrap wood to stop that. Honestly I don't think it's actually slipping, the brace wasn't super tight in there when I installed it and it's still not really tight so either the bed isn't changing or the tiny amount of pressure from the brace is keeping it in place. I suspect the former.

My sword arrived. It's a little anti-climactic because it's exactly the same model as the good loaner swords in the guild armory but this one is mine. Kinda want to figure out how to paint/powder coat/something the basket to personalize it.

The woman's parents officially bought that house. They did a remote close and Kristen went to the local lawyer office and did about 5 minutes worth of paperwork. It's easier buying a house than buying a car, at least from a paperwork perspective. A dozen signatures at most and no annoying up-sell of useless warranties or overpriced oil changes.

Before the signing we had some time to kill so we went to Brecotea which is this new strange Asian bakery sorta place. Their food selection is... odd but very good. They have a huge display case with dozens of things and you just put them on a tray and they heat them for you. The two things we tried were excellent and worth the money. We'll be back for sure.

There are strange but less strange choices so the woman can bring her parents here for a snack when they're visiting.

Garden is cranking away, I'm actually getting a few blackberries before the birds get them. Tons of tomatoes so we made salsa, which I ate all of with one bag of chips, and some tacos and quesadillas. No shame.

Actually writing this on Saturday morning, and in an interesting way. I'm currently on a virtual writing group call, just four people sitting on zoom writing with the sound off. It's like Panera, we're shutting up and writing, but with some accountability of having other people doing the same thing at the same time. No idea if it will work but here we are trying it.

They had several drones up at the IDPA match last weekend taking footage for a promo video and I signed the release so they could film me. Got access to the raw footage of my run. It's not a very good run, I was so hot and tired by this stage and you can see it in how slow I'm moving, but it's cool to see from the muzzle end. First two targets were long shots on steel with no-shoots partially blocking them so any low/left action would result in expensive penalties. Didn't happen. Whew.

Monday at swords I got my ass kicked by the tall asian guy, like 2-8. He's got reach, speed and skill on me so I'm just getting whacked over and over again. Sometimes I don't even get a chance to move, he just flicks in a shot and hits me in the head. Sigh.

Thursday, squared off against him again but this time with steel. We both have and wore all the armor bits and used club loaner swords. I didn't fair any better, got resoundingly trounced again but at least the first steel bout is behind me.

Got the Fiesta inspected for tags and when I went to take the truck in the alternator died. Happened as I rolled down the driveway so it wasn't a bad spot to get stuck. Replacing it is trivial as it turns out. The entire job was 30 minutes (with a long break in the middle while I went for the part) but there were no surprises. Nothing seized, nothing rusted, the belt tensioner wasn't stuck, didn't even drop any bolts. Easier than an oil change.

With the battery disconnected over night while I figured out exactly where to source the part from it lost it's 'ready' status so when I took it in to get inspected it failed. Sigh. Have to drive it around for a bit to get all the systems to self check. I did see that we had driven it about 900 miles this year so with a few short trips and a range session on Sunday it should be ready and still under 1k miles for the year. Not sure why that's a goal, but it is.

Just caught sight of myself on camera on the other screen, I look pretty intense when writing.

In 2015 (according to the label on the box) I got a $500 REI gift card from Marchi for some deal or another we did. Will got one too. I couldn't figure out which nifty jacket or whatever I would use so instead I found a pair of shoes I liked and bought three pair. I just took the third pair out of the box and am wearing them. They're brand new 8 year out of 'style' shoes. The rubber is a little funky because of age and something coming out of the material but otherwise they seem OK. Lotta tread vs. the second pair.

I went to a networking type event with John at a co-working space in Cary and parking in the area sucks. I mean of course it has to, it's a new area with all new buildings and very expensive and hip so of course it lacks things like parking, sound proofing, bathrooms, you know, all the stuff that might make a place easy to access and be inviting. Hip as shit though.

All that said, there are exactly four parking spots by the building open and two are cripple spots. I roll up into the alley side where the parking is and.... presto. One was open. It's right in front of the door, that's some McGarrett level parking right there.

The woman says I like this comic strip just a little too much. She could be right, it's my style of humor.

The nostalgia of what this is does not live up to the reality of what this is. It was, even by my standards... not good.

The straps on my rifle bag always annoy me. I use them once a year and the rest of the time they just catch on things, snag things, etc. I was going to remove them but instead used some of Sean's "ranger bands" (ie cut up inner tube scraps) to hold the lose ends down and used some zip ties to deal with the extra strap on the other end. Now they're neatly tucked away and the bag is far less unwieldy now. Going to take it to carbine class on Friday... going to bring my cart to carry the tent and such so I won't have to carry this as a backpack.

Camping trip with John was mildly successful. My food ideas worked out perfectly though. I pre-cooked the chicken and diced up the veggies, brought a little container of the sauce and some oil/water mix to cook the noodles in and we had real stir fry right at camp. It came together fast, from setup to eating in 15 minutes. I was pretty happy about that.

We only did one hike, that was enough. Says 8 miles or so but the watch recorded more based on steps (12 miles). Lots of elevation change and tiny plodding steps up the mountain. I'm surprised I made it.

The most success on the trip though was a butt explosion emergency on the trail. I thought I was safe, made it 3 miles in before my guts decided to revolt. I found a spot off to the side, managed to do the needful and clean up using the 'dude wipes' and some paper towels just as planned. Had another Ziploc to carry the waste paper out. Not 100% 'leave no trace' since the poop was scattered around but it's the best I could do.

On the way home I ran into this license checkpoint in VA just a few miles down from the trail head. No idea what they were really looking for. The woman says it's ICE looking for migrants (which is liberal speak for illegals) but they were all sheriffs vehicles with no feds in sight and no one being detained. Could have just been trolling for license tickets? They didn't ask about insurance and didn't check the tags on the van, but I was also out of state so maybe they figured it wasn't worth the hassle.

I've been using all my writing time for the story and no updating much here even with lots going on.

The most important bits are that I did a 'jam session' with (travel) John. He's the guy with the Asian wife who travel half the year. He's been playing keyboard, guitar and singing for 50-ish years. The session went.... OK. He's really blunt/rude and critical of everything I did wrong. He's not wrong, I do have issues with timing and such but there are more constructive ways to say it.

I finally got a hitch basket to hold a box on the back of the van. This will let me keep all the cooking gear, stove, fuel, etc outside and not have to move it around to setup the bed space. Plus if we're going to get rid of the truck at some point being able to carry a little extra chicken chow or a bail or two of emergency hay would be handy. The basket was cheap, the box wasn't too bad, but I did run into a problem. The exhaust points directly into the carrier.

Online there are photos of melted luggage, melted tarps, etc from the exhaust cooking whatever is there. I toyed with one solution of putting a heat shield there; easy enough to bend up a piece of Home Depot aluminum plate and bolt it on. Jason suggested instead I get an exhaust tip extension and run the outlet below the level of the carrier. The other idea was to get a 4" hitch riser but with that on I wouldn't be able to open the van doors with the carrier on even if it was empty.

The extension seemed OK but they looked dumb. Instead I took it to a custom muffler shop and had them remove the original and put a curved outlet in place. Won't fall off like the bolt on extension and doesn't look dumb. They could have made it maybe 2" longer but as it is it should work.

Moving the truck around and washing it I noticed the fender rot is getting much worse on the bed. I knocked the rusted parts off and hit the rest with the 'rust reformer' spray. At some point it's going to be a real problem, but today is not that day.

Also on the fix-it front we replaced the kitchen faucet. It had apparently leaked just a little inside, enough to rust out the mount and freeze it in place. When you went to swivel the faucet it would just spin the mount in the hole rather than moving the faucet like it was supposed to. It was a total bitch to get out of there as everything was rusted and seized in place, but it's done now. New one has.... plastic parts so they won't rust but at some point in the next 10 years it's going to crack and fail. At least it will be easier to remove to throw away.

Internet is down, has been for about 3 hours now. Tethering works with mint now so I was able to get some emails out via the laptop instead of trying to type on the tiny screen.

After the class and a few days of drills, the G34 hit the 50k round mark. I thought at this point I would retire it and switch to the Gen5 G34, but I traded that in. I also thought I might switch to the CZ9c, but I traded that in as well. So, in light of not finding anything else to try I'll just be running this a bit longer. Maybe at 75k I'll replace it. They don't make the G34 any longer so whatever it is it won't be any new Gen6 G34 since that won't exist.

Book club John invited a bunch of us to dinner. He hosted us at Lucky 32 rather than at his house because of a variety of dietary restriction (quasi-vegans and whatever). It was unique, he wanted his friend groups to meet and claimed that 'everyone had a story'. That appeared to be true, everyone was fairly unique having taken different paths in life that all lead to success. A fun time.

What wasn't fun was the food. Lucky32 used to be pretty good, but tonight... not so much. Not pictured is the cold cucumber soup that was gritty and served in a hot bowl so it wasn't quite chilled. The catfish wasn't cooked very well (mushy inside and out) and the flourless chocolate cake was unpleasantly warm and served with a spoon. A spoon? Who eats cake with a spoon?

Maybe I'm a pretentious douche still, or maybe their quality has just gone down. Even the service was sub-par with everyone having to ask for drink refills.

I had ordered a 'used' battery off Amazon for the UPS that died, it was a screaming deal for $15 and who returns a battery? No one, I don't even think they allow that so I could only assume it was an open/damaged box. Whatever it was they delayed the shipment twice and then canceled it.

Not wanting to pay the crazy price for the proprietary sized under capacity battery that fit inside the UPS (which was clearly designed 1/8" too narrow just to not fit the standard batteries) I just got the next size up and planned to run leads outside the box. Turns out, with just a hole drilled in the side the leads reach. That took 10 seconds to do.

The edge of the PRS is starting to really hurt my arm. It cuts in to my bicep and has bruised it. Getting it reshaped isn't a viable option (I've asked two places now) so I just put some tape on the edge. Maybe that will be good enough.

Survived the Tim Herron 2-day class in West Virginia. Scary Motel 8, but the class was OK. I say only "OK" because I think I've maxed out on what I can do with the level of effort I'm willing to put in. Could I get even faster even at 'my age'? Yes. Am I willing to put in 10x the effort and get 1.1x the results? Realistically not.

Now I am going to make my practice more purposeful, I did that today at the range trying some of the drills from class on the timer along with a few I made up (but still on the timer). I won't be able to do them with other people there obviously because the timer will pick up all the other gunfire but I can still do the motions even if I can't record the results.

The sample USPSA stage video from the class. I ran it twice, once under strict IDPA rules just because I thought it would free my mind up to do the new stuff not worrying about what I was doing target wise and then a second (faster smoother) run using USPSA rules but still running 10 rounds in the mags.

And a few days later he posted the class photo:

My jalapeno plant had 1 large pepper on it and a few tiny starts so I picked the one so it would have enough resources to maybe grow the others. Now it has 6 starts on it. Impressive little plant.

Got this at Lidl today, and it's potent.

Took the two 100oz silver bars in to a local metal shop and sold them. .92 of spot but no IRS paperwork so that's worth it. The purge continues.

The 10 G17 mags I've been using in everything since 2017 are pretty worn out. Even with new springs and followers they're getting tired. I have at least 100 G17 mags so zero reason I shouldn't break out the set of poop brown mags I collected to be the 'next 10'. Baseplates are painted and numbered 0-9 and ready for class this weekend.