How we are going to be safer.

Gun Control is often very hard for us to understand because we are not members of the intellectual elite. Therefore I decided to cut through the confusion of "big words" and use this picture to illustrate the forth coming peaceful utopia America will be experiencing in the near future.

Gun Control Explained Straight Forward in a Crooked World

In-Vested

When the rise of the pocket .380 took off a few years ago it was an attempt to answer the common man's problem with carrying concealed. They sold like a house-a-fire (as did the ammo). Easy to carry and weighing next to nothing it can be easy to get lured into such an attractive package.

I don't ever really preach against one gun or another for one reason, it's your life and you are an adult you should carry what YOU want for your own reasoning. That said one has to concede that some are simply more limited than others. Don't misread the intention there, all are capable of putting holes into the anatomy of a miscreant.

The problem arises with the circumstances in which that miscreant presents himself. While virtually sightless pistols like the Ruger LCP, Kel-Tecs or Beretta cats can serve well for the "street mugger"  or "backed into a corner" scenarios where the distance may be just a few feet; little guns with little sight don't serve well for contending with a spree shooter where you need sights desperately as you are shooting around other people.

Dry wall doesn't forgive. And while intentions to stop a bad guy are good a missed round that zips through the wall behind him and into someone is never okay as we don't hold to a collateral damage philosophy.

That is not to say you can't miss with any gun, but the bigger the gun, the better the sights, the more control we have on the grip, coupled with good training and even better marksmanship on the range increase our propensity for a solid hits on the bad guy.

The challenge to carrying conceal though is often the concealed part, especially when we start looking at mid size and full size framed guns. Something I learned early on in executive protection. One Principal that I worked exclusively for an extended period of time was a VP on the payroll for corporate America, which meant so was I. So those workaday dress codes applied to me.

In the bodyguarding world your manner of dress generally reflects that what the Client is wearing (though you don't ever out dress a Principal). So if the Client is in a suit, you are in a suit and, frankly this is the most ideal circumstance for concealed carry because the jacket affords a lot of latitude in what can be concealed.

Ironically enough so does uber relaxed summer wear like bowling and Hawaiian shirts that are expectantly worn un-tucked. So while your client is at the beach in swimwear you can appear to the casual observer like another noob on the beach but still be heavily armed.

My challenge while working that Principal in particular was in fact corporate casual, where I was expected to wear my shirt tucked in be that a polo or a button down dress shirt. While those instances made for a more relaxed setting from the suits I wore the absence of a jacket meant all guns had to go internal. 

Thus my form of holsters went to things like ankle rigs, pocket holsters, and Thunderwear (don't knock it till you've tried it). No doubt there are tuck-able IWB holsters I've just never really cared for them as a whole (attribute this to muscle memory). Needless to say these were all small framed and short barreled guns. While I have absolutely nothing against them and carry them regularly through out the the summer months they just are not my preference for working a protection detail.

This rolls over into other aspects of work and of course personal life as well. While It's easy to wear my Woolrich Rhodesian Army or Carhartt jacket or even just a shirt untucked there are times when the Wife likes a little more effort put in for an evening out. And of course there are client meetings that don't necessarily require a suit but there still needs to be a professional appearance.

Hence about three years ago I started wearing and utilizing a variety of vests and it has worked out very well on numerous fronts.


"Vests?" You ask

Yep. Not the notorious photog vest that everyone has (they do work in some environments after all) but rather a variety of suit style vests to heavy wool vests from Filson and Orvis.

The obvious benefit is the ability to cover, in most cases, the grip of a handgun carried in the waist band with some vests cut long enough to cover the traditional hip carry.

The not so realized benefit to the vest is the flexibility it allows the wearer. Take for instance the colder weather of the winter, coats and jackets allow for easily concealing practically any handgun the individual so desires....until one becomes to warm. Take your pick from the perennial problem of the winter coat vs the movie theater, the mall, the cafe....the drive across the state. The moment you become to warm in your coat and in public you get stuck with the choice of either suffering through the ordeal and looking somewhat out of place two hours into a movie and still in your parka or going into the bathroom and un-tucking your shirt that was previously nicely tucked in.

I get it. You're saying "geez what a prissy SOB doesn't want the world to see a wrinkle in his shirt tail". I assure you my I like my Triumph motorcycle shirt and my ten inch topped boots very much but I also have a damn practical streak I can't shake either.

Growing up hunting here in the Midwest I learned early on the value of dressing in layers, something that has applied well to work life. One of the first vest's I got was a heavy wool western cut style from Filson. Not long after getting it I had to make a long single day drive to locate a few individuals and gather varying pieces of information from them. That morning when I left it was somewhere in the mid 20s outside so I threw on some light weight long underwear, jeans, a long sleeve waffle shirt, a button downed winter weight shirt, slipped on my Combat Commander and then put the vest on, I tossed my wool pea-coat in the back seat and headed on down the road as they say.

As the day progressed through a series of in an out of the vehicle to talk with people, get fuel and coffee it was nice to be dressed in such a manner that I could drive with the heat on and not burn up and get out and not freeze to death. This I realized when walking with a guy through a largely abandoned warehouse as it snowed outside and he kept asking if I was cold without a coat on. I never really was.

Fast forward to late Spring when the Wife and I went to wedding of a friend that was going to be a rather formal affair..even as weddings go. A few days before the event I picked up a black suit vest that I could wear under my jacket (and lest you think this was some overly priced one I think I picked it up at Target for around $25). At the reception as dinner was served gentlemen were told they could remove their jackets (this is actually proper etiquette of a host for formal events......and no I don't frequent such events normally unless I'm getting paid). Me being the proper guy I am for such an occasion wanted to wear my "nice" Colt 1911 (read: Combat Elite) as opposed to my workaday one. Thanks to my $25 vest I was able to dance with the Wife throughout the evening while being well heeled and no one the wiser.

The one piece of advice I will pass along that I learned from my first vest, which led to the choice on my fourth or fifth one, of which are both of the Filson wool variety. When I paired my collared western cut vest with a coat like my Carhartt or Pea-coat the collar cause the jacket to ride high on my neck an shoulders. It fit fine it just looked a little odd so when I got around to the next one I purposely went with a collarless version. Problem solved, the jacket sat on my shoulders as normal.

It's not so much that it's trial and error as it is more of a "not a one type fits all solution". Just something to keep in mind.

So how does this apply to you?

Vests like an individual's preference for manners of dressing come in a variety of....fashions. Maybe you're a cowboy or rough neck who spends most of his time in Wranglers and pickup trucks, or a pro-gun urban hipster who likes skinny jeans, rolled up long sleeves and baby Springfield XD's (I actually didn't intend for that to rhyme btw), or you are a corporate creature where work allows conceal carry but you just have to do in khaki pants.

More hand waving, "wait a minute I'm a stay at home mother of three" or maybe you're a self-employed woman with a business to run and a CCW permit to use. Don't worry there's a vest for that.

Like everything else in the CCW game you have to do your own work. Find out what might be too short or too thin and might leave you with an exposed gun.

Look it's easy to get lazy in carrying concealed because "nothing has ever happened yet" but, I caution you this, if that is your philosophy on carrying a handgun you've turned it into a talisman not a gun.

"but you just wrote about carrying a .22 pistol a couple of posts ago". Indeed I did and if you read it carefully you will see that I don't ever say it's the best solution only that it can be "a" solution or even a intentional secondary piece for varying occasions.

Personally I'm not a fast successive shooter...you know the guys who knock down all those pepper poppers at lighting fast speed...yeah it ain't me. I am however pretty decent in the accuracy department and when the barrel is longer and the sights are bigger I tend to do better. While you might envision all sorts of positive aspects of yourself in an imaginary gunfight let me assure you, the hands shake, the pupils dilate and you seriously think about not fucking up. Because while you and I might be exceptional on the pistol range you can bet you are going to be mediocre in the fight. So give yourself every advantage on an increasingly frequent basis to up the odds of winning and keeping your life.

Here is the endgame. We are so inundated with "tactical everything" and then mocking each other for it that we have forgotten that OUR gear....clothing included needs to fit the specs for our lives and their varying degrees of living.

When only the military has "assault rifles"

untitled in wake of an atrocity

In wake of the atrocity (which is the correct term instead of the misplaced tragedy) at Sandy Hook Elementary I have, like many of you, found myself amidst of old and failed debates. The idea, or rather ideology that there is a solitary solution to end violent crime is of course a false one.

Earlier today I received an email from someone who went into grand detail telling me that I had blood on my hands as an NRA member and, gun rights activist for the actions of Adam Lanza. Below is my reply that I felt I would share.

"I own chainsaws, I am not to blame for the deforestation of the rain forests.

I own a car, I am not to blame for the drunk drivers of this world.

I hunt wild game, I am not blame for those who slaughter wild dolphins in Taiji.

I own a camera, I am not to blame for the pornography aimed at children.


I have a butcher knife, I am not to blame for slasher that rides the train.

My shed holds gas cans, I am not to blame for the arsonist.



My garden requires fertilizer, I am not to blame for those who blow up buildings.

My hands bear fists, I am not to blame for the man who beats his family.

My body bears a penis, I am not to blame for the rapist.

I run a business, I am not to blame for  the con man who runs a scam.

My heart bears love, I am not to blame for those who are loveless."

Incoming

So there are posts in the works (I swear). Life, like always is never dull around here and time is always precious and has to be prioritized.

I've got a rough post etched out on my time down on the Arizona/Mexican border back in October. There's a sit down with a local journalist discussing work as well (so we shall see).

The next installment on here should be regarding a piece of (ahem) "tactical clothing" that doesn't look remotely tactical in the much overly-misused-sense-of-the-word.

There is also a small transition in specific articles coming probably starting mid-winter aimed at personal protection written from two perspectives. One from a work stand point for some of you other professionals out there who share the same line of work (or are considering as a career path). The other is taking some of those personal protection techniques of what the layman calls "bodyguarding" and the rest of refer to as "EP" or "Executive Protection" and how all of us can apply strong defensive roles to our domestic life.

I think for the immediate future the "Dark Arts for Good Guys" is wrapped up. There maybe the odd and occasional post in the next year or two but, I'm looking forward to these new series.

That said, I wish all of you a very Merry Christmas forth coming.

The .22 LR Pistol and You

Once upon time I spent a week with a retired CIA spook (in Oklahoma of all places) who was kind enough...well actually he was paid, to give me some training in electronic counter measures, lock picking and a few other useful skills that would aid me in some of my future en devours.

One evening after a steak dinner someplace he went to pay the tab and was looking for a pen or something in one of his pants pockets and in the process laid out a worn pocket holster with a small automatic resting inside. It turned out to be an equally worn blued Walther TPH (German made) and, having never seen one before I wanted to know more about this Walther PPK someone had left in the dryer.

He told me of a few misadventures surrounding the piece but, it was his parting remark that stuck with me "If you are lucky enough to travel around the world armed and doing it mainly alone do yourself a favor always carry a .22 pistol, regardless of anything else you pack."

It was a piece of advice that I remembered sometime later when I was tasked with recovering someone who was missing on purpose because bad men were hunting him. For a real nice ten days I had a Beretta Bobcat that never saw use only because the gentleman who was in-charge of granting me access to where I was decided he liked it as well and the price of admission was...you guessed it. One itty bitty .22 pocket gun.

Some nights later sitting in the dark with the no-longer-missing-person-in-question getting ready to make a mad dash for the territory ahead so to speak and, people with not-so-questionable intent well within my comfort space...which was down the stairs. I didn't think about wanting a rifle, or even one of my beloved 1911s I remember longing for that .22. Not because I thought it superior weapon to anything else (because it certainly is not) but, rather due to the fact I should have had it with me.

I see you. Your neck all tense your fingers locked in tight. You've barely made this far without leaving me your expert opinion in the comments section.

Breathe man.... breathe.

If you are going to compare the calibration of the .22 long rifle to anything else (minus the .25) you have to ask why are you even having the internet figh....I mean discussion. Obviously it falls short so if you can bear that in mind you should be fine reading the rest of the post. If not there's not much I can do for you.

While some of us who inhabit parts of this planet are allowed to own, shoot, and carry a wide array of calibers, actions, and magazine capacity, others are not so fortunate.

For example contrary to popular knowledge gun ownership and even handgun ownership for self defense in Mexico is not actually illegal. It is just damn near impossible.

Why?

Because in Mexico there exists only one legal gun store and it sits on a military base in Mexico City. The law says a household can only have one defensive arm and it can be either a pistol or a revolver but, it has to be within the .22 to .380 scale...and you can only possess 200 rounds of ammo a year.

If I were a honest Mexican citizen and left with that choice I'd choose the .22.

"Whoa!" you say

If you live in such a place where it simply is that difficult to obtain a firearm what do you think the availability of shooting ranges are? Hence some things need to be done covertly where a drive into the country side and back into the trees you can fetch you some quality private time without a lot of unwanted attention.

And for people who live in countries such as those with restrictions it's also easier to FIND .22 ammo on the pseudo black market without having to delve truly deep into conversations with individuals your mother wouldn't approve of let alone the policia.

Say you had to be on the move through a varying landscape from Urban to semi-rural for a few days with various unfriendlies about. And you had to do this primarily on foot, or catching the occasional mass transit system, or train, or negotiating a ride for the next twenty miles. Maybe its to get in and find someone and extract them...maybe its just getting out. There on your hip concealed in all of its glory is your beloved full size center-fire pistol and two fully loaded magazines.

The point two two handgun, as the Brits like to say, offers a level of flexibility to your self-defense/feces-impellar kit.

There are times and places in this world were suppressive fire is just good application. For some folks who work alone, far away and, outside of official channels there is a place for the .22 in your life.

A fixed, threaded, or extended barrel can be temporarily suppressed, ripped off and tossed away in a moment solving an up close situation.

Likewise it can serve as a not so gentle reminder that incoming fire has the right of way to those who are actively shooting at you and trying to close the gap.

Perhaps the need in solving the problem is less than conventional.

In a mobile pursuit or an about to be mobile pursuit tires can be flattened from a distance. Traffic jams can be created BEHIND you thus assisting in the escape. Being pursued on a long and rural darkened road head lights can be shot out (don't intentionally misinterpret that as one bullet for one head lamp as if it were an steady and calm Olympic event). 

And say what you will. I've never met a soul willing to pursue at a high rate of speed in near pitch black conditions. And while I've seen plenty of spare tires on vehicles I don't recall too many spare headlights.

What message would it say to your would be aggressors walking down the street if a shot rang out, then another and still another as street lights systematically were shot out. A man (or woman) willing to not only embrace a fight but, to deliberately do it in the dark will give pause to most anyone.

All that can be done without having to sacrifice your limited ammo availability to your primary center-fire handgun.

Because two hundred rounds can be squirreled away most anywhere let alone fifty or a hundred.

But then you knew this...

You know if need be, you can stash a couple hundred round of .22 high velocity long rifle rounds into a 20 oz Starbucks paper cup without having the bottom fall out.

There is something else you have to remember about bullets. All of them. The lowly .22 included.

Bullets cause destruction when fired into living things and in self-defense situations where it is your life or the bad guy's, creating trauma that stops his onslaught is the general idea.

Oh I know....I know. Your brother's cousin's nephew once put a .22 through his frontal lobe while squirrel hunting and, sneezed it out a few days later.

Bullets do weird things but those weird stories are about solitary rounds.

But five or six of those itty bitty rounds into the forehead or sternum cause repetitive systematic destruction.

Take your index finger and tap yourself once between the eyes. Just once.

Now do it five or six times.

If those where fast moving .22 rounds what do you think it would do to you.

Mentally? Not to mention physically?

Now apply this to a bad man.

Bone has been fragmented and broken, the body's primary control area has received substantial damage and things begin to shut down and not in some priority status way. The visual ability to target a victim has been either removed or compromised, not to mention the most basic ability to conceive, maintain, and rely upon any real thought process is gone....gone.

The attack breaks. Because the attacker is breaking down.

Repetitive-Systematic-Destruction

There. Again... I see you. Arms crossed. You are gonna play the trump card.

".22's misfire...end of story".

Guess what. There are no free lunches anywhere when the fight for your life is on.

Clear the fucking round and get back in the fight. There is nothing different about a misfired .22 and a stove piped 9mm. Both require you to disengage, do some manual labor and, re-engage. Personal responsibility isn't going anywhere.

One gentleman I knew, who worked all over the world in varying capacities carried two guns for the majority of his work. A Browning Hi-Power and a Ruger MK II.He managed to repeatedly come home from really shitty places and situations and, to do so he had to put in a lot of personal effort.

So do you.

Ultimately there the opinion of many out there who don't ever favor the .22LR for defense work. I can say for me it has been a choice at times and it is never my first choice but one does have to remember this amidst the "stopping power" business. Bullet holes of any caliber in the throat end a fight as do puncture wounds to the lungs especially multiple ones. Regardless if they come from a .22, a .460 Rowland or a kitchen knife.

Gear Review: Pathfinder Water Bottle & Cup

When I was a kid I carried this old school WWII/GI surplus canteen and web belt, the ones wear the canteen pouch was felt lined and the whole thing was khaki. By the time it came my way it was easily forty years old and, it escorted me on every summertime bike and creek adventure, squirrel hunt and, deer hunt of my youth (and more than a couple of my professional adventures as an adult).

There were (and are) a lot of things I liked about it, first I'm a sucker for old school stuff, second it was a metal canteen that sat in a metal cup. As a teenager I was caught up in everything "survival", reading every Tom Brown Jr, Bradford Angier, or Army Survival Manual I could get my hands on. My favorite "trick" so to speak was that I could boil water to purify it in my canteen and drink it in the cup that it was wedged into (do that with a plastic canteen).

Then I grew up and abandoned the old G.I. canteen to the plastic Nalgene bottle trend at the start of this century. It did however leave me wanting.

See I've got this slightly different perspective on the whole SHTF scenario in that I've been there when it's happened on those micro occasions as opposed to the "big event" we all talk about and plan for.

Which having come through those situations combined with my survival skilled-and-filled youth left me liking to be prepared. The down side was in all that over prepping I developed the bad habit of over packing or rather packing in redundancy.

Over time I've learned to shed the extra gear and not be so African fetish about it in the process... it just took more than a few layovers, custom officials and back breaking runs to airplanes to learn how to stream line and find multiple uses for single pieces of gear.

Fortunately, when you sometimes spends hours and... days alone you get a lot of time to think and mentally sort out details of your personal kit, perfecting it along the way. You also mentally write a lot of blog posts that show up two years later...

One of those stream lined pieces of gear I wanted to find was a wide mouth stainless steel water bottle (like a Klean Kanteen), with a cup to go with it. Like all things I added to the basic idea.

I wanted a way to also turn it into a portable coffee maker for those times when gear REALLY had to be limited. Nothing complicated, just be able to put the bottle on a small stove or straight into a fire, boil water, then add a bandana full of coffee. That thought developed into wanting to design a French Coffee Press for my new kit I didn't have.

Then on one expedition to a local sporting good store I saw it. A french press kit for a Nalgene bottle....which of course meant you had to pour boiling water INTO the Nalgene bottle then make your coffee in it. As opposed to...oh I dunno....that aluminum camp coffee pot I already had trucked all over the world, and done the same thing with.

But a fool on a mission is undeterred. I bought it. And no other piece of gear ever sat so beautifully unused on my equipment shelf.

But a patient man I am. I knew....I just knew...one day.

A few years ago when he was still on youtube and before "Dual Survivor" hit the Discovery Channel, I had enjoyed Dave Canterbury's Pathfinder school vids. By happenstance earlier in the summer I came across his on line store. Low and behold Dave had a 32oz stainless water bottle and, 25oz cup combo for $35.

Done and done.

Ordered on a Friday it arrived on the following Tuesday.

Let's be honest, there isn't really anything overly exciting about a water bottle or a cup but it is the combination I've wanted for a long time at a price I like. The measurement gradients inside the 25oz cup (GSI's is 18 oz by the way) may prove useful in cooking some remote meal at a future point and I thought they were a good inclusion.

So what about the whole "French-Pressed-coffee-over-an-open-fire" thing (see pics below). It works rather well actually. The only hiccup in the plan was the lid/top of the press is made to Nalgene specs and wouldn't screw down but, it proved to be unnecessary anyway. The press part works in the bottle superbly and....I can always buy an extra lid and drill a hole for the press rod, another for a spout and, a third for airflow and be good to go (life ain't perfect).

The truth is what I like is that I've got a make shift way to purify water or sterilize med gear or cook in a situation where I'm working with minimal gear in a shit situation. I also like that I'm not out a ton of cash in the process which is nice for the bottle's main purpose in my life.

My primary Go-Bag is a BlackHawk! Mobile Operations Bag (size medium). In one of the three side pockets are a stainless steel Thermos (no handles) and the PathFinder waterbottle/cup combo. Both sit idle but ready in the bag until it's time to roll out...which doesn't seem to be slowing up anytime soon for me.

"But is it THE BEST!" you ask.

Because you know the Internets demand all your gear be THE BEST.

Dude, its a metal water bottle that seals up tight with a metal cup on the end what else does it need to do?

As for the coffee makin'....

pics are below. How much coffee does it make? By the mark of my coffee pot in the kitchen, seven cups which works out to roughly four mugs of coffee. Note: the smaller mug in the blue Nalgene bottle is an 18 oz GSI Camp mug shown for comparison.