Danger Rane

I can tell you that I grew up in a household that handled the holidays the same way you do with your kids. While I can tell you now as an adult that I can understand the religious theory behind it, I will also tell you that me and my sibling have always resented my parents for it. My wife and I are both Christians and we feel like we have been able to provide a good balance of the truth and the fun of all the Holidays. My parents still sound like you and are pretty verbal about their disapproval, which has resulted in them loosing out in a lot of valuable time with their grandkids as a result. Completely your choice Sir, but I would be remiss if I didn’t share with you one perspective of those choices through the eyes of a kid that lived it.

Welcome to the group!

Damn dude! Glad you are still with us and able to talk about it. Thanks for sharing.

It costs alot of money to look that cheap.

I hate that you are being put in that position from your employer. As I’ve stated in this and a couple other threads, I think that at this point the mandates are less about them caring about our health and more about them seeing who can be controlled. I personally am choosing not get the vaccine for now, and I hope that many more that are willing and able can also hold the line and resist this gross over reach of power. That being said I would never fault anyone for wanting to, and would not support anyone trying to guilt someone into getting or not getting the vaccine. It should be a personal choice based upon your individual situation. If you have a Dr that you trust for advice great. I have become rather cynical in recent years, particularly in regards to “news” sources of any flavor. They are all biased in some form or fashion. I am not a Doctor but I am a medical professional, working primarily in the field with EMS. My wife is an RN that works at our local hospital and usually works at least one day per week on the COVID floor. Our observations are pretty different than what I see on any of the local or national news. We have observed that even the local health care systems have agendas, and at some level even some of the Doctors, Nurses, EMS providers have agendas, though often different from the hospital. The hospitals care about making money, period. Their big money makers are elective surgeries and common procedures that they can churn through and release the patients the same day. But some of the surgeries cannot be performed unless they have some available beds in case the patient has complications and has to stay overnight. If the beds are full of Covid patients it cuts into their profit from the money making procedures they normally perform. Which is why at the height of the hysteria last year hospitals were laying off staff left and right. Throughout the pandemic we have at times heard from the “news” that the hospitals are full….giving the impression that literally every bed is being taken by a COVID patient. While there have certainly been times of high COVID patient numbers, the bed capacity is more often dictated by the hospital staff or lack thereof. If a hospital has 200 beds, but only enough staff to care for 100 beds, they are saying they are full/at capacity when they fill those first 100 beds. For those that don’t know, most Doctors, particularly the ones in the Hospitals, get paid based upon the number of patients they see per day. Doctors in hospitals typically have specialties, many of which have nothing to do with what most COVID patients need. I do think that some doctors actually do still care about people, but I also work with a lot of them that seem to care about money and their misplaced self importance more than anything. With this in mind it is not hard to figure out why many of them are motivated to push the vaccines so hard. When you look at the nurses, and most everyone else in patient care, they make the same amount of money in their shift whether they take care of 1 patient or 20. Unlike the Doctors and the administrative staff they are the least effected financially (unless they got laid off) but they are most effected by the staffing shortages resulting in normal patient:nurse ratios jumping from 4:1 to 4:6-4:8, resulting in a LOT more work for the nurses, and reduced quantity/quality of care for the patients. So for Nurses and EMS providers their agenda is typically related directly to their increased workload and how to get it to return to normal. I realize this turned into a long ass post. I just wanted to give y’all a peek behind the curtain so to speak at some of the driving factors here locally, and more broadly at the national level. I can tell you that from what my wife and I have personally observed so far throughout the pandemic….mind you this is from me interacting with patients in their homes and as needed taking them to the hospital, and her taking care of them in the hospital. The overwhelming majority of people who get COVID do not go to the hospital, or need anything beyond over the counter meds. But of the ones that do require care, the vast majority are either morbidly obese, respiratory compromised, diabetic, or have renal issues, and or heart issues. I can tell you that even at my age of 41, if I fell into any of those categories I would probably get the vaccine. It still might not save you, but it does appear to lessen the effects. I’ve only seen a few people under 50 with bad enough symptoms to need our help, and they were either morbidly obese or in one case a skinny hardcore smoker, and in another case a skinny hardcore vaper. I hope this information can be helpful for you guys, I don’t mean for it to do anything other than keep you informed. Do what is best for you and let your neighbor do what is best for him. This is the way.

Next time you talk to those Police Officers maybe ask them (1) were the majority of these stolen guns taken from unlocked cars? (2) how many guns remain in their patrol cars when they are not in the vehicle? Id be willing to bet that if you asked them they would tell you that the 2nd most common place guns are stolen from are peoples homes.....would it make you feel better if we didn’t leave guns in our homes if we aren’t there? How about we place the bulk of the blame where it should be, which is on the sh!theads stealing other people’s things. As is often the case when someone makes a blanket decree as you did above, you fail to keep in mind that not everyone here lives in the same place or under the same circumstances. Maybe it’s not a good idea to keep a gun in a car where you live, but that’s not the case everywhere. I know several properties within a few miles of me that have guns in just about every vehicle and farm apparatus on their property, none of which have ever been locked, and none of their guns have ever been stolen. I also know a guy that left a gun case in plain sight on the back seat of his locked truck over in La Vergne a while back and somebody broke his window out in broad daylight to get it. While I do think in modern times it is advisable to take some reasonable precaution to keep it out of direct view, I won’t be condemning anyone for keeping firearms in their secured extension of their castle.

If we apply that same concept to the big picture of COVID and the vaccine, it makes for an interesting picture. According to Biden over 200 million Americans have been vaccinated, yet COVID cases are up 300% from before the vaccinations started.

If anything I’ve seen as much Remington ammo on shelves lately as I have any other brands. I don’t like the prices, but they are definitely cranking it out. Reloading supplies not so much.

The Academy stores in Cool Springs and Smyrna have a plethora of 5.56, 7.62x39, and 7.62x51. It’s more than I want to pay for it, but for those that are running short they have some of the lowest prices I’ve seen lately.

You are talking about two different scenarios here. I think all of us and the majority of our jobs would agree that you should stay home if running a fever, though at least a couple local hospitals have asked COVID positive staff to come in and work on the COVID floor if they feel like they can work. But think of how many things, some of them quite critical, would shut down if employees didn’t come in or were sent home after every confirmed exposure, to COVID, the flu, or anything else. At my work we get exposed a few times a week, sometimes we have a heads up and can wear appropriate PPE, sometimes we don’t find out until a day or so later. If we are having signs/symptoms of an illness we can call out or go home. If we think we have COVID we can get tested, but either way we have to come back after 48hrs without symptoms, to exclude loss of taste/smell which can linger for weeks to months. Based on most of the comments in this thread I’m going to presume most of y’all are in a high risk demographic. For those of you that are I hope you were able to get vaccinated if you wanted to. I personally have had a close friend in his 70’s with COPD and significant heart issues survive COVID, presumably because he was fully vaccinated and got the monoclonal antibody infusions immediately after onset. He is truly a walking breathing example of vaccine success. On the other end of the spectrum I know a very healthy lady in her 30’s that got the vaccine while 7 months pregnant with her second child and lost her baby 3 days later. It was up to that point a heathy pregnancy. All that being said the vast majority of people that get COVID, to include the D variant, do not get hospitalized. They feel like crap or they don’t, they get past it, and they get on with life. It is a significant threat for some, but it isn’t for most, and I think that fact gets lost on many of those that are most worried about it. I just encourage y’all to keep that in mind when talking with your friends and family that may not seem as concerned about it as you are.

Also most who get COVID are not dying.

That’s a pretty disingenuous statement considering (1) neither the vaccine nor the virus have been around long enough to know long term effects, (2) the vast majority of people that have come down with either of the COVID variants never need hospitalization, vaccinated or not. At this point it appears that those that are predisposed to have a bad outcome with COVID have a much better chance of survival if they get the vaccine, but that is not the majority of people. Since we now know that the vaccine does not protect the vaccinated from catching or spreading COVID, it is hard to justify the lengths that are being taken to force or shame those that do not want the vaccine to get it.

Dang @E4 No More sounds like a rough and serious experience. Glad it worked out and that you are still here with us. I hope you continue to mend.

Erik, I’m not sure how many COVID patients you’ve dealt with lately that ended up in the hospital, but I can tell you from my experience, that alot of them are having the hard time with it that they are precisely because of their past health decisions. Obesity, diabetes, and history of smoking are absolutely contributing factors in how severe an individual’s reaction/symptoms will be vs someone of good health. So yes, these conditions are a drain on resources, just as they are without COVID.

Yep, pretty messed up. Imagine going to sign up to be an awesome fighter pilot and they instead put you into a syphilis study.

Welcome to the group Pong.

We should all be thankful that many generations before us did indeed value Freedom, to the point that they prioritized it before their individual health. It is possible to take this virus and its subsequent effects on the world seriously, while also being aware of how it has been used and manipulated by individuals, businesses, and governments alike for power, control, greed, etc... You don’t have to be on one side or the other, people choose to be. Not everyone who has gotten the vaccine is a mindless sheep, just as not everyone that hasn’t gotten it is some evil, selfish conspiracy theory nut. Within our country there is a pick a side and win at all cost mentality. While that is fine for things that don’t really matter like sports teams, it’s a dangerous mentality to hold when it comes to our country. Ultimately the only thing that matters is Freedom, and our ability to protect it.

In other news, the hospital system that my wife works for is trying to bribe the workers to get vaccinated by entering then into a drawing for $5,000. If that’s not alarming to anyone I don’t know what is. The majority of those that haven’t gotten vaccinated have either already had COVID, are currently pregnant or trying to get pregnant, or just young and/or healthy and not at high risk. Meanwhile they have not had a COVID patient in her hospital in a couple weeks.

Like every other early winter?

For production ammo current rates in my area are $1-1.10 a round for plinking grade 300 blackout and .308/7.62x51. On the rare occasion that I’ve seen match grade or hunting .308 in stock it’s running $2-$2.75 per round. I saw some 300 blackout last week that was marketed as a hunting projectile and it was $1.72 per round. Hope that helps.

With that logic it’s amazing that you are into guns at all .

It was very common “back in the day” to delink belts of .50 ammo to shoot out of the Barret M107. The one exception to this was the slap rounds, for this exact reason. The M2 with its crowned barrel had no issues with them of course, but the M107 with its muzzle brake had known issues, and it’s the only round that I know of that was prohibited for use in the Barret. I recall there was even a picture up for awhile in our arms room of a left handed shooter that had been injured to the right side of his face from a catastrophic failure that had occurred after shooting a few slap through his Barret. There were also instances of spotters being injured by the shed petals deflecting back at them. Possibly another contributing factor at play in this instance would be the higher pressures that the SLAP rounds needed to achieve the velocities required for effective armor penetration. I don’t recall exactly but I recall there was a substantial muzzle velocity difference between the SLAP rounds and the standard FMJ round used in the Barret, something to the tune of 1,200fps difference. Thankfully the guy in the video lived to tell the tale, and if nothing else it will hopefully spread the word and prevent others from this same dangerous mistake. It’s wild how we can get in our own bubble sometimes and think these things are just common knowledge/sense to everyone.

Sounds like you are in an ideal situation. I’m not yet in that situation, but once I’m there I think I would load enough to shoot 4-6 months at a time, or to survive the first couple waves of zombies, and then load more as needed. Worse case scenario, if you ever needed money for any reason you could easily sell off the components, or once you’ve passed if your family isn’t quite as into shooting as you they would have a much easier time selling the components than your loaded ammunition. I’m only 40, but a lot of my gun/ammo purchases at this point have ease of future resale in mind, as my kids just aren’t anywhere into it like I am. For probably the last 10 years anytime we have gone into a store that sells ammunition I have always bought a box (if they’ve had any) and often tell my wife and kids when they roll their eyes that I’m “investing in their future” or “investing in precious metals”. Whatever route you go, don’t feel guilty that you are in your position. You are there because you’ve built yourself a life that provided you the means to prepare for “whatever may come” and you’ve obviously had the foresight and discipline to do just that. I for one salute you, and am trying my best to emulate.

This site has a sale going and free shipping. I just ordered one. https://www.rockeybrass.com/Midwest-Industries-Upper-Receiver-Rod-URR_p_7627.html

For TIG welding in particular, welding tips and tricks on YouTube is an excellent resource. He covers everything, but his Information on TIG equipment, setup, and techniques have really helped me a lot.