I had planned to do the latest rifle postal match today.  Results are due by midnight tonight.  Then I got a call from someone else that is having some “unpleasant” dealings with Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.  We ended up talking for an hour or more.  This person knew of other cases similar to mine where Battelle (the company that manages PNNL) decided to fire someone and then found the slimmest of pretexts to do so.  Although the root of the problems we are having is very different we both had similar frustrations in getting action to be taken by the appropriate authorities.  In both cases it appears that by the letter of the law there should be people at PNNL facing fines and/or jail but in practical terms the law doesn’t apply to them.  We collaborated some and shared some information and brainstormed on different approaches.  It was a useful exercise.

I got a letter from my Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) attorney.  He resubmitted the FOIA request for material which PNNL previously told me doesn’t exist.  I know the material exists because I created a lot of the material.  He reworded things a little differently so maybe that will make a difference.  There really needs to be some penalties for the jerks that defy FOIA and the Privacy Act.  As near as I can tell the law says, “You must do this.” but there are no consequences if they don’t comply.  After all the instances of injustice and illegality in their dealings I’m surprised there haven’t been some cases of heavy metal (lead comes to mind) poisoning or something at Battelle and/or PNNL.

After I had dealt with the phone call and a couple of other things that just had to be done today I was faced with doing the rifle match in both the dark and in the rain.  I’ve done both, but never at the same time.  I decided to pass on the match this time.  I did some rifle shooting in the last month.  I nailed a deer in the spine of the neck at 255 yards last week so I guess that will have to be sufficient for now.  I really shouldn’t procrastinate so much on these things.  If I need to shoot something I should just get out there and do it.  I participated in an IPSC match (“combat pistol”) yesterday so it’s not like I’m completely ignoring getting some trigger time in.  I wasn’t shooting all that bad but I wasn’t shooting very good either.  I came in 4^th overall out of 14.  If I hadn’t had the one miss I would have come in 3^rd.  More practice is needed–after I start work I should have time to hit the indoor ranges in the Seattle area.