Nor’easter and more

The last two days have been exciting around here. What I thought would be a little rain and wind from the remnants of Tropical Storm Ida turned into the worst Nor’easter I have ever experienced. As I write this the storm is still not quite over. But at least the high winds, heavy rain, and flooding are done. It seems there were two systems, one offshore, that came together to create an unexpected, at least by me, nor’easter. Winds in the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay reached 70 mph with flooding 7-8 feet above mean tides. Large parts of Portsmouth and Norfolk were under 3 or more feet of water. As of last night, 174,000 residents were without power. The Virginia Emergency Management Services likened the storm to a Category 1 hurricane.

In Chesapeake where we live, winds hit 50 mph but thankfully there was little damage and streets near us were not flooded. But large parts of Chesapeake were flooded, making travel anywhere almost impossible. This morning the winds are still pretty substantial but the rains have died down. It will probably be Saturday before we see any sunshine. I only took a few photos and a short video of the storm because I wasn’t dumb enough to wander far from the house. All in all it will be a storm to remember and I am thankful that we got off without anyone hurt or any substantial damage.

The only other news for now is that I was able to get to the range to try my new scope on my m4 carbine. I had a really hard time getting the scope zeroed as my first shots were so far off I could not see where they were hitting. It turns out they were very low and to the right. But after about 60 rounds I finally had the scope zeroed. It shoots about 2 MOA at 100 yards right now but I think if I get to the range again I can tweak it a little better. That is it for now.

 

Summer hanging on

I am still waiting for Fall weather to arrive. Aside from a few seasonal days the weather has mostly been in the 70’s during the day. The leaves have started to turn a little but it will be a while before Fall arrives in her full glory. I bought some pumpkins and gourds to decorate the front porch and am waiting for Halloween. One good think about Halloween is that there are a lot of horror movies on TV.

I have been back to the range to shoot my M4 carbine and my red dot sight is acting weird. I am unable to zero it properly and I think it may be broken. I took it off and using only the iron sights I shot the best groupings I have ever shot. I guess there must have been a reason I was an expert marksman in the Army. Anyway, I had ordered a NcStar 3×9 40 tactical scope with built-in laser and it arrived yesterday. I have mounted it on my M4 and cannot wait to try it out.

In other news, our new pastor seems to be doing very well. We were very fortunate to have found him. I hope he will be the foundation upon which our church will start to grow. I managed to hurt my back by doing absolutely nothing and it has taken the better part of a week for it to get better. Everything seems to take longer to heal when you are older.

I got my flu shot a week or so ago but I do not plan on getting an H1N1 shot. The swine flu seems to hit younger people harder and the nurse who gave my my normal flu shot said people who lived in the 70’s may have a partial immunity. Since there is also a shortage of the vaccine I will let others who are more needy receive theirs first.

That is all.

 

Guns and church

I got to shoot my new Saiga rifle and I am in love with it. My son Jason and I went to the range in Pungo and shot both the Saiga and my M4 carbine. Jason really enjoyed firing the Saiga. It has quite a kick and a big muzzle flash and ejects the spent cartridges a country mile. Very impressive. And on top of all that it is pretty accurate with just the iron sights. I went by myself later that week and fired the Saiga myself. I still love my M4 but it now has a rival.

The one big gripe I have with all the ranges around here is that they won’t let you rapid fire. You are supposed to only fire a round every 4 seconds. That is not much fun. They will also not let you draw and fire from your holster, which is important to practice for self-defense purposes. Well I found a range that will let you do both things. The range is is in Wakefield and is run by the 4H. It is a private range and I have submitted the paperwork to become a member. You are your own range safety officer and can do whatever you want as long as it is safe. I am looking forward to being able to shoot there.

Our church had our annual bazaar and semi-annual Brunswick stew event recently. As usual I spent 7 hours preparing 380 quarts of stew for sale. It is a lot of hard work but the event and sale raises a lot of money for our church. Speaking of cooking, I am going to prepare a cheeseburger pie for supper tonight. The recipe is from our church cookbook and it sounds delicious. I will find out tonight. That’s it for now.

 

Trying to better myself

I have always been interested in politics and since retirement I have become involved in state politics. Now that Bush is out of office and Obama is in, politics has taken on a new meaning. During the last few years of Bush’s administration he started to act like a liberal Democrat and now we have a far-left Democrat in office. Between the two of them our country has started down the road to fiscal irresponsibility, bigger government, erosion of the Constitution and a disturbing trend towards socialism and a welfare state.
In order to be better informed and make wise choices about who I vote for and what policies and practices I will support, I have started to read more about economics, history, and politics. For a few years now I have watched lectures from the Teaching Company about philosophy, history, economics, science, mathematics and political history. Right now I am watching a lecture series on the history of conservatism.
As for reading, I have been reading quite a few books lately. Some of the titles are:

• The Five Thousand Year Leap by W. Cleon Skousen
• Common Sense by Thomas Paine
• Liberty & Tyranny by Mark Levin
• Arguing with Idiots by Glenn Beck
• Rights of Man by Thomas Paine
• The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith

I get into a lot of debates on Twitter, Facebook, and FriendFeed and I need to be better educated and informed in order to present a persuasive argument in support of my beliefs. I am truly concerned about the future of our country and I intend to do everything I can to prevent our country from heading in the wrong direction.

I am off the soap box for now. There are a lot of other things going on but I will save them for another day.

 

Summer is almost over

Fall is two days away and I am looking forward to the change of season. Fall is probably my favorite season. Pleasant weather coupled with the changing of the leaves and Halloween are at the top of the list of what makes Fall great.
Not much exciting happening around here. Most of my time has been spent shooting, Twittering, reading, and shooting video with my new camera. I have found that I enjoy shooting video as much as I do taking still shots. I bought some video editing software and have been adding titles and stitching together multiple snippets of video.
I really think our new minister is working out well. I have enjoyed his sermons and at the last ministers cabinet he had some great ideas for outreach and ministry that I think will help our church to grow. He has been emailing me with videos that he wants to use during Sunday services and his choices have been excellent.
I went to a gun show in Hampton yesterday and even though I hadn’t planned on it I bought a rifle. It was not an expensive one though because I really have to watch our finances a lot closer now that Teresa and I are both retired. The rifle is a Saiga 7.62X39mm modified version of an AK-47. The rifle is manufactured by the world famous Izhmash armory of Russia. I called my son Jason yesterday and invited him to go shoot my new rifle next weekend. Should be a lot of fun.
That’s all folks. Off to church in a bit.

 

Flying, shooting and eating

It has been a busy time since my last entry here. Yesterday we had a family picnic at Red Wing park in Virginia Beach. We had a nice time except things didn’t seem the same without our mother there.

On Saturday I went to the Military Aviation Museum in Pungo to listen to Col. Darryll Welch give a talk on his career as an aviator during WWII. He was a fighter ace who flew in the Mediterranean against the Germans. He flew the P-38 Lightning, which was a twin tailed, twin engine fighter. He is 91 years old and his stories of his war experience were enthralling. After his talk there was a flight demonstration of a Curtiss P-40 Warhawk fighter. I took a lot of photos and video, one of which I will post here.

I went shooting again at the C2 range in  Pungo. This time I took my Mossberg 590 shotgun with me. After 35 rounds of 00 buck shot I have a bruised shoulder and a lot of targets full of holes. That shotgun has a big kick and a lot of firepower. I had a set of night sights put on my Glock by the gunsmith at Bob’s Gun Shop.

My truck is back from the shop. It cost a lot of money but she is running fine now. I hope she will keep running for a while until I can buy another truck or car. I am thinking of buying something at auction.

This coming weekend I will be heading to Washington by bus with 40 other persons to attend the 9/12 rally. This is part of the effort by Glenn Beck of Foxnews to send a message to our government about our concerns with the direction our government is headed. There will be hundreds of thousands of other patriots in attendance and it should be one of the biggest protests in recent history. I am excited about being a part of history in the making. I just hope that President Obama will get the message we are trying to convey instead of belittling and dismissing us as he has in the past.

 

My truck is in the shop

My Ford Ranger pick-up truck, which I have been driving forever, had to be towed to a garage for repairs. I have had the truck for about 12 years and it has been very good to me, requiring only minor repairs and maintenance.

The clutch has finally gone, and there are several other minor problems that need to be addressed. Together I am looking at a repair bill of over $1,000. Considering that I have not made a car payment in 12 years I consider myself way ahead in the game.

People who have owned vehicles for a long time develop a relationship with them, and I am no  different. I am eventually going to have to sell her (see I told you you develop a relationship) and she will be missed and much appreciated. But for now I look forward to getting her back as I have been without wheels since we got back from vacation in Hawaii.

In other news, we had a beautiful installation service for our new pastor, Marty Phillips. As a church elder I was asked by Marty to help perform communion for him, a real honor. The church was filled with Marty’s family and friends and it was a beautiful service. We are very lucky to have Marty as our new pastor and I look for great things to come for our church with Marty  as our spiritual leader.

That’s it for now.

 

Back from Hawaii

Just a short post to say that we are back from our vacation on the Big Island, Hawaii. Hawaii is more beautiful than anything I have ever seen and even more beautiful than I expected. I am in the process of developing over 300 photos and 15 videos that I shot while there.

I found it amazing how much the climate, geography, and flora change from one region of the island to the other. From rain forest to cattle country to hot, dry land, the landscape was constantly changing. The water of the Pacific ocean was so warm and clear compared to the Atlantic. There was not a place on the island that was not beautiful in it’s own way. I found it impossible to take a bad photo on the island.

The people of the island were among the friendliest I have ever met. No one seemed to be in a hurry and they were always outgoing and eager to share their love of the island with you. The two B&B’s we stayed at were beautiful. Our hosts were friendly and gracious and the accommodations were comfortable. Even without air-conditioning we were always comfortable. There was none of the oppressive humidity that makes summers here in Virginia miserable sometimes.

Teresa really wants to move to Hawaii and I almost feel the same way. It would be a great place to live out the rest of our days. I will have much more to say about Hawaii in future posts but I will leave you with a couple of photos for now.

 

Vacation & Hurricane Felecia

With just 3 days until we fly to Hawaii there is an unanticipated and unwanted complication to our trip named Hurricane Felicia. I first heard of Felicia a few days ago and was not too worried at first. Yesterday the track of Felicia took it directly over the Big Island as a TS of unknown strength. This morning it looks like it will have dissipated to a depression before it arrives. I am still worried that our flight may be delayed a day but we are hoping for the best. It will also mean that we will have a lot more rain and clouds than we would have liked. But come hell or high water we are going to go and make the best of it.

All our preparations are almost done. The dog sitter for Max came yesterday. She will pay Max a visit in the morning and the evening. She will also get or mail, paper, take out the trash, water the plants, etc. I still wish we could take Max with us but that is not practical. A little shopping today for travel essentials, a check with the TSA website to see what new travel restrictions may be in place, and a check on the projected status of our flight to Hawaii will occupy my day.

I have done everything I can think of to prepare for the trip and I just hope the  flight goes quickly and without problems and we can arrive at Hawaii safely and start enjoying ourselves. We both really need a relaxing, enjoyable vacation. There are so many places in the world  I want to visit but at my age there are some places I know I will never be able to visit.

I will be taking my laptop with me to post updates to Twitter and Facebook as well as upload photos. I may even make an entry or two here. Now I am going to go pray that Hurricane Felecia goes away and does not interfere with our plans.  Wish us luck and say a prayer for us.

 

This and That

Lets see if I can remember what has happened since my last posting here. I know that I bought a new camera for our trip to Hawaii. I gave Teresa my old Panasonic so she can take pictures and videos. She only had a film camera and she needed a digital camera. I bought a newer model Panasonic Lumix, similar to the one I gave to Teresa except that it has 10 megapixel resolution, 12x zoom, and does video in 720p HD.

I have been to the range a couple of times to shoot both my Glock and my M4 carbine. I am resisting the temptation to buy another rifle. I really want a rifle in 7.62×39mm or .308 caliber. I am looking at a Romanian WASR-10 in 7.62×39mm or a Saiga in .308. I was able to see both models at Bob’s Gun Shop in Norfolk. I really have better things to do with my money so I may wait until Christmas to buy one.

Teresa’s Dad is staying with us for a few days while his wife is on a Caribbean cruise. He didn’t think he would enjoy being on the cruise so he is staying with us now and his son Paul later. He has played the guitar all his life and is very talented. He entertained us last night with songs including Beatles songs. I recorded a couple of the songs with my new camera and am posting them to YouTube.

Still looking forward to our Hawaii vacation. The flight over there will not be much fun but it will be worth it. I think this may be our best vacation yet. There are so many things I want to see and do there. I plan on taking lots of pictures and video which is why I bought another memory card for my camera. I don’t want to run out of storage space.

That’s it for now.