Old Pa

Except left-handed.

I've always thought a good reason (and there aren't many) for having children is to buy them knives and guns for their future (way future) use. Having missed out on that, I am pleased to admit that for the past twenty years, the spaniels have bought their Old Pa some pretty nice firearms (since Jenny got me the S&W 629 Classic Hunter with unfluted cylinder) for Christmas and my birthdays. And upon their final departures, the Pa has purchased spaniel commemoratives in their honor (Jenny's was a S&W Model 60 with 3" heavy barrel in .357RemMag). After all, my girls have all been pistols; how better to remember them and keep them with me in the woods?

The second from the bottom Model 10 would work well, but the slicer of preference is my Henckels 5 Star 10.5" gratton edge slicer.

There's a big Model 1, but no Model 17. All available reverse edges are sharpened as they should be. The Combat Companion model was never officially catalogued, but is a handy little sucker. No buyer's remorse.

1993 CBR 600 F2 and a 2006 650 V-Strom

Posted a number of knife and gun pix at Head-Fi Photo before it blew up, but here are some of the Randalls. No new purchases in the last five or ten years. These are the ones I could lay my hands on right away. The ones that get the most use are the Model 8 and the Model 5.

Next time you're in a store that carries Henckels, check out the handles on the 5 Star line. The 5 Star line is made in Germany; Henckels and Wusthoff have had some problems with their Chinese production facilities. BTW, I've got about a dozen old Randalls, mostly with left-handed stag and sheathes. But this thread about "the last thing you bought".

John Boos & Company endgrain cherry cutting board to go with my J. A. Henckels 5 Star collection; hard to beat German stainless.

I am my own "oil services company".

#1 A blonde is showing off her new tattoo of a giant seashell on her inner thigh. Her friends ask her why she would get such a tattoo and why in that location. She responded, "It's really cool. If you put your ear up against the tattoo you can smell the ocean." #2 One day a fourth-grade teacher asked the children what their mothers did for a living. All the typical answers came up - teacher, nurse, businesswoman, saleswoman, doctor, lawyer, and so forth. However, little Justin was being uncharacteristically quiet, so when the teacher prodded him about his mother, he replied, "Well my mother's an exotic dancer in a cabaret and takes off all her clothes in front of men and they put money in her underwear. Sometimes, if the offer is really good, she will go home with some guy and stay with him all night for money." The teacher, obviously shaken by this statement, hurriedly set the other children to work on some exercises and then took little Justin aside to ask him, "Is that really true about your mother?" "No," the boy said, "She works for the DEMOCRATIC National Committee and is helping to get BARACK OBAMA to be our next President, but I was too embarrassed to say that in front of the other kids."

I'm generaling the thing (and doing the electrical), it's not an expansion, and it's coming home for $18-$19K total. There is no way I'm not going to get that back even tomorrow. 15 miles from downtown with an acre and an in-ground pool? And it's for cash in a paid for house. Did the downstairs bath complete three years ago for under $2K with, once again, sweat equity. We were out of that for five days total. I'll be washing dishes in the laundry room for maybe three weeks. Eating out is looking better, but you gotta have good coffee at home.

You smell right. Cabinets get here at the end of the week and tear out starts Monday. I've been looking forward to this for a while.

It will do bodies.

Nope, at the end of the trail. Leave the drinking while riding to Tyll.

Although not traditional, Maker's Mark goes down smooth neat. Usually in my tank bag for longer motorcycle expeditions.

Apples and oranges. I've been against the low doc/no doc/NINA mortgage loan practices since they came in in the late 90s. You'll get no argument from me that heightened regulation is necessary there and in other consumer credit areas. I am only talking about a trillion plus bill with bad provisions that is being fear-mongered upon us.

It's now been over a week since Secretary Paulson declared a national credit emergency requiring immediate legislative action to avoid immediate impending catastrophic economic doom. Paulson and the congressional leadership drafted a 200 page $700 billion package affording unparalleled discretion and lack of review to the Secretary of the Treasury in purchasing mortgage backed securities. On Monday we were told that the crisis was no longer a matter of being days or weeks away, but mere hours. But the House narrowly defeated the bill and the DOW went down an additional 400 points after the vote. We are then subjected to a frenzy of finger pointing and blame gaming from all sides, but the fact remains that congressional members on both sides were receiving communications from their constituents overwhelmingly against the bailout. Ninety congressional Democrats in highly contested races voted against the bill as well. And no more banks failed and the immediate doom did not materialize. So the Senate comes back and porks and earmarks up the bill for an additional 250 pages and to over a trillion dollars, but only 700 billion for actual bailout, and passes the bill by a comfortable margin but with almost every Democratic member who is standing for election voting against it. And the DOW goes down another 400 points with the passage of the bill in the Senate. And no more banks fail and the forecasts of impending credit doom seem greatly exaggerated. Then this morning Wells Fargo steps in past CitiBank and buys Wachovia in a stock deal. This deal does not require the FDIC to buy Wachovia's bad debt with out money. And Warren Buffet buys a load of GE's preferred to go along with the load of Goldman Sachs he bought recently as well (and Buffet, no financial dummie, has a large position in Wells Fargo as well). Result? The private sector is working out the credit crisis itself. And no more banks have failed and the immediate doom forecast by Paulson has not materialized. So what gives? October Surprise. It's time to say no to the bailout October Surprise and to panic in general. It's time to stop saving the banks and institutions that engaged in bad judgment and greed. Working through the credit problems is painful and there are and will be casualties, but it's better to lose the weak and corrupt quickly than to have them propped up by public funds to carry on as usual. It's time for the House to stop being given the bum's rush towards something the overwhelming majority of their constituents are rightfully against. If this bill was a pig (and it was) for $700 billion, it's an even bigger one porked up to a trillion with none of the additional earmarks for actual credit crisis relief. What it is is and unvarnished invitation to Big Government and socialism. Bad idea. Just say "no".

Paid off the mortgage ten years ago, no credit card debt or car loans, doing the full kitchen re-model out-of-pocket. How? Work hard, don't waste, and save. The portfolio values look sad, but I'm not planning to turn them into losses by selling any time soon. Even SWMBO is looking at me as prescient.

Oh no, not for years. Plenty more in the bank.

Yup, me and Warren.

$3G of AFL, $2G of JCI and $1G of P&G for my DRIPS, 8 quart La Crueset Oval French Oven for the stove.