Packing Heat

Our family has always had a loaded gun or two in the house.  Ever since I was a little kid, I remember the old man telling me in his best no-nonsense voice that this was real, this was not, and you don't touch the real gun.

I only made one mistake back then, and I didn't get larruped for it - although I might have, and no one would have faulted the parent.  My best friend, whose family were also gun owners, and whose older brother was a gun owner, questioned whether or not my father owned a pistol.  So I showed it to him.  I didn't pick it up, and I'd have stopped him if he'd tried, but we all know what we all know.  My thinking was that he was my best friend, and so qualified as a family member.  The aspect that applied here was that Timmy was something of a dunderhead, which I didn't realize until I was much older.  His father didn't think he'd make it through adolescence, and so took out life insurance on him.  His poor mother acquired more gray hair from Timmy's shenanigans than anything else.  The kid would try to beat out cars when crossing the street - I once saw a dump truck driver slam on his brakes, and another time my father did the same thing, in our driveway no less.  Then he severed several tendons while carving a pumpkin, and a few years later blew himself up while he and a like-minded friend screwed around with Sterno and live ammo Timmy had borrowed from his older brother.  There were other escapades, but I don't think they altered his mental process much.

I've digressed, but that was then and this is now, and the things people do still aren't predictable.  Which is why I'm packing my gat with one up the pipe.

Keep reading with the usual disclaimer about anti-freedom zealots and overly sensitive Lefties.

Things Your Dad Never Told You

 I got this off an FB page, and reading through got me to reminiscing.  Evidently, whoever wrote this was thinking about Ward Cleaver or Ozzie Nelson.  This isn't the way things worked when I was growing up.

I was raised on a horse farm.  My parents had palomino show horses when I was growing up, and I learned how to ride.  I never liked it.  We had ten to fifteen horses, and guess who got to take care of them - yours truly, that's who.  I cleaned stalls, fed and watered them, and was the chief hot walker (see the expression rode hard and put away wet).  I also hauled sand and gravel in a wheelbarrow, chopped wood, did any number of odd jobs and chores.  This ten point meme got on my very last nerve, and inspired a reality check.  I don't know who had a father like the one described above, but I sure as hell didn't.

My reality is below the fold.

Noise That Makes Me Nuts

I caught this on Knuckledraggin' and liked it.  These days it doesn't take much to drive me right out of whatever remains of my mind, but rather than focusing on me (kind of like being fascinated by a train wreck), I'd like to hear from anyone reading this hound.

But first, a little background.  The scientific name for this condition (I read about it on the Internet so it really does exist) is Misophonia, sounds that make you bat shit crazy.  This could be pretty much anything, from the sound of the cat yowling for heaven only knows what, up to and including the budding musical genius next door who is learning to make noise with a bassoon.

Do you have a noise that you absolutely cannot stand?

For me it's boom cars, bad table manners, and eating while talking on the phone.  That last item is extremely offensive to me, and I won't tolerate it for any length of time.