The anti-freedom crowd is “outraged“ by this:

TALLAHASSEE — The pistol-packing grandma about to be inducted into the Florida Women’s Hall of Fame is the most controversial appointment since its inception 22 years ago.

Why?

Because Marion Hammer, a squat senior citizen with a soft Southern twang, was the first — and only — female president of the National Rifle Association.

Gun control advocates and women’s rights groups are outraged at the selection of Hammer, one of three women Gov. Jeb Bush tapped this year to join writer Zora Neale Hurston, tennis star Chris Evert, former state Education Commissioner Betty Castor and Lt. Gov. Toni Jennings among others “who have made significant improvement of life for women and for all citizens of Florida,” according to the Hall of Fame’s Web site.

During the campaign against initiative 676 in Washington State a few years ago I got to meet Ms. Hammer.  She and her NRA staff helped defeat the proposed gun registration law.  I was impressed with her determination and her strength of will.  She seemed smart too.  I have no reservations about her being inducted into the hall of fame.  I’m sure she deserves it.

The article goes on to say:

Hammer, who said she never tells anyone how many guns she owns because “it’s nobody’s business,” remains nonplussed.

“Isn’t that a hoot?” she chuckled when told that the National Organization for Women and others plan to protest her nomination on Monday, the day before the induction ceremony takes place in the Capitol.

Yup.  That’s a hoot alright.

I just received email from a producer at the Seattle TV station KING asking about Boomershoot 2005.  I told them we would be thrilled to have their attendance.  Here is their home page.  The producer is John Stofflet.  Does anyone have an idea as to whether they will be friendly or hostile?

After reading the email to her this morning Barb asked me if there really are people that stupid.  I don’t know about stupid but he certainly is clueless.

I was out running errands when Kim called a little before 19:30 to announce she had arrived safely.  There was lots of laughing and giggling with Kayla in the background.  Barb and I will sleep better tonight.

As of 18:15 Kim had passed San Pablo Bay.

I ordered the boxes to be used for the medium and large sized targets for Boomershoot 2005.  Just 50 each to test and make sure everything is going to work.  Assuming they work as planned I’ll buy enough for the entire event.  Since these are standard off the shelf items there are no significant lead times and zero setup charges–contrary to last years target bodies.

The medium size targets are 6 x 6 x 1 inches.  The large targets are 7 3/8 x 7 3/8 x 1 3/8 inches.  All dimensions are interior.

I just called her.  Says she is doing fine.  She had some stop and go traffic for a while but made it past Sacramento.  She seemed to be in a much better mood this time.

PICATINNY, N.J. — Mar. 04, 2005 — The Army has approved its new long-range .50 caliber sniper rifle, the M107, for full materiel release to Soldiers in the field.

 

…

The M107 was funded as a Soldier Enhancement Program to type classify a semi-automatic .50 caliber rifle for the Army and other military services. It underwent standard type classification in August 2003. A production contract was awarded to Barrett Firearms Manufacturing, Inc., Murfreesboro, Tenn., the following month.

It’s a bit hard to see from the picture shown here but I expect the M-107 is very similar to the gun shown here at Boomershoot 2001:

More from the Army website:

The weapon is designed to effectively engage and defeat materiel targets at extended ranges including parked aircraft, command, control and communications, computers, intelligence sites, radar sites, ammunition, petroleum, oil and lubricant sites and various lightly armored targets.

In a counter-sniper role, the system offers longer standoff ranges and increased terminal effects against snipers using smaller caliber weapons.

The complete system includes: the rifle itself, a detachable ten-round magazine,a variable-power day optic sight, a transport case, a tactical soft case, cleaning and maintenance equipment, a detachable sling, an adjustable bipod and manuals.

The Army plans to modify the M107 in the future by adding a suppressor to greatly reduce flash, noise and blast signatures.

“No one said to take the San Francisco exit on 80.  They just said follow 80.”

Kim is not happy.

A while back I reported a video I had worked on was going to The Whitehouse.  It apparently hasn’t made it that far yet but my co-worker “from downstairs“ just popped her head in the door of my office to report the customer showed it to his boss and was “dancing up and down with joy” about it.  Everyone is very, very pleased so far.

I finally put up Kim’s final target from Monday afternoon.  According to this site she will need to increase her speed by a factor of about 2.4 to qualify and will need to become just a little more accurate all while using a full power handgun instead of a .22.  I expect once a week for a year should do it.

Last night after Kim went to bed I continued to work on her navigation problem.  I started guessing alternate street names and got a hit in a city just outside of Santa Cruz.  The street Kim was to take as an exit off of highway 17 was close by so everything matched.  Kim apparently misunderstood the street name.  She had one letter wrong.  I sent her a message on her cell phone to call me before she left.  She called me a few minutes ago and I gave her the MapPoint directions which avoid I-80/880 through San Francisco which Kayla had given her and instead routed her south on I-5/205/580/880 to highway 17.  We also discussed how she should leave the GPS unit on to enable back tracking should she need that and finally I gave her the lat/long of Kayla’s house.  I think I have prepared her as best I can now.

Kim was supposed to call when she arrived at Aunt Susan’s place near Sacramento. ETA was 18:30. At 19:13 I called her. She said she got turned around and got lost for a while but was on a particular street that meant she only had to make one more turn to be on the street that Aunt Susan lived on. I figured five, maybe 10 minutes maximum and she would be there. At 19:21 I received a call from Kim. Happy moment! Whoops, celebration started too soon. She was lost worse than before. The street she was on changed into some highway and she didn’t have a clue which way to go. From her description of how she got there I couldn’t find the highway she was on. I had her give me her GPS coordinates, used my calculator to convert them to a matching format for Microsoft MapPoint and found her location on the map. Some way or another she had been going west when she thought she was going east. For the next 39 minutes I navigated as she drove. At 19:29 call waiting said Barb was trying to call me. I ignored her as Kim was going through one of many tough intersections. Kim then reported Barb was trying to call her. We agreed to ignore her for a while. Kim ended up in the wrong lane once and was forced to make a turn she didn’t want to. No problem, she took the next easy turn into a residential area on Winding Creek Road and I navigated her past Random Lane (honest!) back to the street she wanted to be on bypassing that tough intersection. At 19:45 Barb called again. Kim had it easy for a while and I took the call, quickly said things were under control and to leave us alone for a while. Barb wanted to offer suggestions and I wasn’t particularly polite in my response. I switched back to Kim and continued to navigate for her. At 20:00 she recognized Aunt Susan’s house. I called Barb and reported the safe arrival.

Tomorrow Kim drives to her friends place in, supposedly, Santa Cruz. Kim just called a few minutes ago with the address but that address and other streets with the directions she has don’t show up on MapPoint. It’s going to be an interesting day for both of us tomorrow.  GPS, MapPoint, and cellphones will get us through.

I just got a call from our oldest daughter–Kim.  She just entered CA from Oregon and is on schedule to be at her Aunt Susan’s place near Sacremento by tonight.  She spent yesterday afternoon and last night with me in Richland before continueing her trip to visit her friend in Santa Cruz.  She quit her job on Sunday and on Monday got her old job back from her previous employer.

While visiting me in Richland we went to the range to start her training towards meeting the handgun proficiency requirements of a being a Federal Air Marshal.  You can see a few pictures in the photo album I created to track her progress.  I have another target I still need to take a picture of which should go up tonight.