In Training

Real Fear is

not being able to defend yourself.

Unfortunately, the United Kingdom reads it a different way.

Bullet found in doorway

Goodness, whatever shall we do?!!?  PANIC!

-- "LIVE ammunition has been found lying in the doorway of a busy high street shop.

The .22 calibre short round bullet was found at the entrance of the 99p Stores in Walthamstow High Street on Wednesday morning, November 1. Haroon Khan, who has a firearms licence and is a member of a local gun club, was alarmed to discover live ammunition in a Walthamstow doorway.

The bullet, of Swiss origin, was still in its brass casing, complete with enough gunpowder for it to fire itself. Mr Khan said that if it had been struck hard enough or exposed to heat it could have gone off.

Italics mine. As OA&TL says in his post "To fire itself, it must have been one remarkable cartridge"

"This sort of thing should not be lying around. It was live, primed and active," he said. "But rather me pick it up than a little kid.

Yes, heaven forbid a child try to swallow it, considering that is about the only way it could hurt a kid.

-- "How can you feel safe when you are finding things like this on the street?

I've got a couple bullets lying in my car, along with some shotgun shells, I think there are a couple hundred in the garage, possibly in the driveway, and I'm feeling pretty damn safe.  Hey, maybe that's because I know how firearms work... ?

-- "To get hold of one of these is not easy. You have to go through a scrutinised search, you need a licence and you have to belong to a club."

Oh holy cow.  Too bad all that doesn't lower the crime rate.  Seems a shame.

-- Ammunition of this kind would ordinarily be used in a small handgun or pistol, and both can be owned legally under licence. But to leave strictly controlled goods out in the street would be enough for a firearms licence to be revoked.

The bullet has been examined at a Metropolitan Police laboratory and details about it kept for future reference. A police spokesman said: "Recovering firearms and ammunition is a priority for the police. We take the same view of ammunition as we do of a gun.

"If it goes bang, it is still lethal."

Little 11/14 Update: In my rush earlier I didn't comment on that last gem of a sentence.  I can't believe that police spokesperson isn't being laughed out of the station, "if it goes bang?!?"  Is that the technical term officer?  Is this the extent of your firearm knowledge?  Gimme a break.

Police are treating the unattended ammunition as a crime. Mr Khan alerted them at 10.16am, and they arrived at his shop to pick up the bullet at 11.32am."

I can't believe they waited more than an hour to take care of this obvious hazard to society.
Don't imagine I think that uneducated people should be just out there messing with firearms.  Safety is key.  But that's my whole point, educate people, educate kids, and your problem disappears.
Via Of Arms & the Law

I need to shoot

I have been sick since last Friday, finally having to miss two days of work this week.  I'm back now, though probably shouldn't be.  I pretty much had to come back as the place would fall apart without me.  In the past three months, my boss, marketing coordinator, AND our marketing coordinator quit, we got a new boss, new boss needs me to do everything because she knows nothing, new boss hires new chick who starts Monday, new boss hires another new chick who starts a week from Monday.  New boss never even gives an interview to my co-worker-who's-been-working-here-two-years who applied for marketing position.  This girl is upset, as I'm sure I would be if the boss had done that to me. 
So, you see, I had to come in to get ready for next week and calm down my generally lovely co-worker.

All I know is, that with everything going on in my life, sickness included, I need to go shooting.  Pretty please. 
Well, after the headache goes away.  No one likes to shoot with a headache. 
This is where Royal is lucky, he gets to shoot for a living.

Hasta

Between working this weekend and packing for my 3 week trip, (and then leaving!) I'll not be posting much.  While I'm there I'll try to get in a couple - but no promises!

I leave y'all with this:

HEH!

-- "A study carried out by the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies (CCJS) describes government strategy on tackling knife crime as "incoherent".

The Home Office said British Crime Survey figures to March 2006 pre-dated the knife amnesty, which began in May. The CCJS claimed knife amnesties have a "negligible" impact on knife crime.

The report - carried out by the charity, which is based at Kings College, London - also found insufficient evidence to show amnesties or tougher sentences reduced the numbers carrying or using knives.

The study comes weeks after more than 100,000 weapons were handed to police in England, Scotland and Wales during a national knife amnesty."

I really appreciate all your support, hope your next three weeks rock.

Background:
The world is ending...
That damn knife amnesty
Don't bring back sharp pointy things

Best Gun Vid

Totally Awesome Guns & Range Video

"Rock shown may vary from your actual rock" 

Heh.  This video is speaking truth to the world, we should open our eyes and our minds.

Via Of Arms & The Law

UK Gun Vacation

I mean holiday, of course.  It's a very interesting article on Bisley, the National Shooting Center and home to the UK National Rifle Association.  I had heard of Bisley before this article because Royal has experienced shooting there before.  There are a few funny moments in the article (emphasis mine):

-- "Bisley's managing director Jeremy Staples says children are happy to spend their time gambolling in the sunshine at the site, seemingly unperturbed by the nearby sound of gunfire."

I can't believe they weren't on the ground cowering in fear.  Covering their ears, screaming to make it stop. Make it stop.

-- "Shooters are also desperate to dispel the idea this is an inherently male pursuit, and there are plenty of female competitors walking around the site, although anyone passing the stall advertising "Big Boys Toys" might think otherwise." 

This is nice, it's even nicer as they have a photograph of a pretty woman with a gun. Way to go guys!

-- "But Mr Cheshire insists the image of shooting "is generally [dictated] by what the media chooses to perceive. If only the media were prepared to come here more often. You don't have accidents, you don't kill people, you shoot at targets." Yet this is a sport that involves real guns and real ammunition, the same bullets used in an AK-47. 

Is there a point to that last sentence.  Always has to have the last word. 

-- "For those people who do not care to find out more about the sport, the shooting aficionados on their unusual holiday in Surrey could be dismissed as "gun nuts". And Bisley is after all the base of the National Rifle Association. Its US counterpart conjures up images of Charlton Heston inviting the authorities to take his rifle out of his cold, dead hand.

Bisley's faithful seem a lot less ardent. Remove the futuristic rifles and the participants appear utterly ordinary."

Riiiiight.  And we Americans don't. I'm not so sure "Bisley's faithful" would appreciate being labeled "less ardent."  And by the way, it's "cold, dead hands" plural.

Very cool that this "unusual sort of holiday" even made the BBC site in a fairly positive way.

Heartbreaking

I know, I know.  I'm all knives lately.  But so is Britain.

Getting rid of 100,000 knives

-- "All the knives took about 5 minutes to mutilate"

It's heartbreaking, really. 

Also heartbreaking?  Chairman of Hooter's passed away

Best lines:

-- "Hooters Girls have the same right to use their natural female sex appeal to earn a living as do super models Cindy Crawford and Naomi Campbell.

"To Hooters, the women's rights movement is important because it guarantees women have the right to choose their own careers, be it a Supreme Court Justice or Hooters Girl."

Don't bring back sharp pointy things

Or we could all die.

-- "As part of a year-long anti-violence campaign, police and customs have joined forces with airport operator BAA Scotland to highlight the issue. Every year Scots fail to heed the warnings and bring back potentially lethal weapons."

It would seem to me that instead of confiscating "potentially" harmful souvenirs, you might want to invest in some nice mental health facilities, or even possibly a nice educational program on how not to be an angry scummy violent person.

-- "Assistant Chief Constable John Neilson, the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland (Acpos) spokesman on violence reduction, said it was important to make the distinction between a holiday souvenir and an offensive weapon." 

I'm glad the government is here to help me with that, I'm not quite sure what my new shiny set of kitchen knives is capable of.  And here I thought they were for cooking, I'm so embarrased.

-- "He said: "Although these weapons may be readily available while you're abroad, when you get home they are classed as offensive weapons."

Oh.  Okay.  So it's just y'all that classify whatever you see fit, whenever you see fit.  To continue cultivating a culture of fear.  And lots of innocent dead / maimed people.  Gee, now I'm just embarrased FOR y'all.

-- "Most people do not intend any harm when they buy them and simply see them as a holiday souvenir - but if they get into the wrong hands, they could prove fatal." 

Translation:  Our people aren't smart enough to do anything correctly.  And they hang out with the bad crowd.  All of them.

-- "AnnMarie Symes, senior officer of HM Revenue & Customs at Glasgow Airport, said: "HMRC helps to protect society from the threat of bladed weapons in the same way that it tackles drugs offences, by stopping the importations as they come into the country. We are very much alive [heh, alive - what a nice thing to be, interesting choice of word - Kath] to the risk of the illegal importation of bladed weapons and other prohibitions in carrying out our frontier control activity at ports and airports throughout Scotland."

Derek Provan, head of security at Glasgow Airport, urged passengers to heed the safety advice and consider the consequences of carrying offensive weapons. 

"Hopefully this campaign will dissuade travellers from making what could be a costly mistake," he said.

Under current legislation, those found in possession of offensive weapons in Scotland can face sentences of up to four years imprisonment."

Four years if you carry a knife to protect yourself.  I just have this creeping suspicion that I'm not going to have any friends in the UK.  I can't even begin to tell you how many "lethal weapons" are in my house right now.  You name it, we've got it.  It's funny though, because I've never ever had the urge to hurt somebody... maybe I'm missing something. 

At any rate, it's a good thing Royal hasn't flown into Scotland in the last 2 years, I think he's probably taken no less than 10 knives back to England from here in that time.

UK man attacked at home by cannibal

'Cannibal' raider bites pieces from pensioner

I almost hate to keep driving the exact same point home in my posts, but people keep giving me the means to do it.  Emphasis is mine:

"A pensioner was brutally attacked in his home by a 'crazed cannibal' who ate his thumb and bit chunks from his face and body, it emerged last night
.... 
When the pensioner confronted the intruder, he was punched and bitten viciously across his face and upper parts of his body.  The attacker then bit off part of his thumb and ate it. Mrs Morgan, also in her seventies, locked herself in a bathroom to protect herself from the attacker.  She is understood to be suffering from shock after witnessing the beginning of the brutal assault on her husband
....
A police source said: 'There was blood on the walls and this guy was just laughing like a maniac. It was a bizarre and appalling attack on an old man about to go to bed in his own home... Mr Morgan put up a brave fight but was set about in a cannibalistic way. His thumb could not be sewn back on, because the attacker had literally eaten it.'
Residents of the quiet village were horrified by the incident in the early hours of Monday. One homeowner, who refused to be named, said: 'Everyone is scared witless. There is talk of a cannibal attack and no one can quite take it in.'

Okay.  His wife hid in the bathroom while her husband was brutally attacked, could have been killed, could have been eaten.  She had to hide in the bathroom because she had absolutely no means to protect herself, or save her husband.  Can you put yourself in that position?  Having to listen to your husband (or wife) be literally torn apart and enjoyed by a cannibalistic maniac?  I cannot.

"Everyone is scared witless."  Well, no kidding, this is what happens when there's been a brutal attack in your sleepy town and all of a sudden you realize you have nothing to fall back on but a telephone (hopefully) and the unarmed police. 

Maybe the government will outlaw people with teeth, and the world will be a better place. 

Via Of Arms and the Law

EDIT: Sun article, slightly more details

Turns out Mr. Morgan also lost a nipple in the attack that came less than two years after his triple heart bypass. At least the Sun refers to the attacker as "the nut"

"Cops who arrived at the scene had to drag the nut off blood-covered Doug, who had passed out with shock."

That damn knife amnesty

The BBC updates us: Knife amnesty nets 17,700 weapons

"Machetes, meat cleavers and axes as well as knives were among the haul of 17,715 surrendered to the 43 police forces across England and Wales. Home office minister Vernon Coaker said the results were "encouraging".  The five-week amnesty, running until 30 June, allows people to surrender knives at police stations without fear of punishment. Mr Coaker urged those who had not yet handed in their weapons to do so.

"The initial figures for the first week of that campaign are very encouraging, " he said.

"That is 17,715 fewer weapons that can be used in a crime against ordinary, law-abiding citizens.

"If you carry a knife out of self-defence, you run the risk of having it turned on you. Carrying a knife is illegal and will not be tolerated. It could land you four years in prison"

Hmmm.  Four years in prison or death?  Four years in prison... or death? 

"Police say that from 1 July tough action will be taken on those found armed with knives.

However, some families of victims of knife crime have questioned the effectiveness of an amnesty, calling instead for tougher sentencing."

So they are saying you should get the actual criminals off the street?  What are they smoking?  I'm glad the BBC devoted one sentence to that. 

Bunch of wankers. 

And if you fancy a laugh... knife amnesty in pictures. I'm sure this is supposed to scare me, but instead I just say "I want that" to every photo. 

The thing is, how can a culture be so completely unsupportive of their women and children?  The man is supposed to protect the family, we all know that, but how can the British government and people expect women and children to be left with nothing to protect themselves?

When I move over there, I will have nothing.  I'm 5 foot 2 and 101 pounds.  How am I supposed to protect myself when my husband is off fighting ?  All they are doing with this knife amnesty is cultivating a culture of fear. 

May 30th, 2006 Knife Amnesty Post

In My Explorer

If you were to look inside my vehicle (or try to take my vehicle...) you would become very familiar* with the above items.
Okay, not the knife on the bottom, that's a Benchmade  that my father got for me after I passed my concealed handgun course.  But it looks pretty in the photo.  For those that don't know, I collect knives, have since I was young. 

The handgun is a Browning Hi-Power, my concealed carry gun for the moment.  I carry two magazines with 10 rounds each.  The two black knives are part of Cold Steel's Nightshade series, top right is a Tanto, and middle is the push blade.  To be fair, I actually keep the push blade in my purse... but when I'm in the car, it's in the car so it counts!

* actually you wouldn't be able to see any of them, as they are all concealed. It's more like, if you knew me pretty well and I thought you could handle knowing where they were, you would become familiar.  When Royal's in the vehicle, he makes sure everything is in his reach  ;o)