You should go HERE and read. He’s hit it outa the park….

It happened to all in the past.

Via ElmTree Forge

Show this to your liberal acquaintances.

Try to make ’em think…

Y’know, when you meet a cop on the road, it is a crapshoot as to whether your day will improve or devolve….. depends on whether he will be a good cop or not:

Ferinstance:

So I leave the homestead the other day to go run errands in the late morning……a wonderful bright, sunny day. Upon my return, I see, about a half mile from my driveway (past my driveway),a box trailer sorta katywampus across the road. Being the nosy person that I am, I drive the car down to see what is going on. I stop behind the trailer and turn on my flashers and get out.

I find a young man, 20something, trying to find a way to get the tongue of the trailer off the ground. Apparently, when he hitched it up, he didn’t get the fork of the hitch under the ball, and it bounced off the trailer ball (or he didn’t latch it) and was now resting on the ground…(good thing he attached those safety chains!). The problem was that the trailer jack was one of those “swing away” types, and there was no way he could lift the tongue of the trailer up enough to get it to flip down. I tried to help him, but it was too heavy for the two of us to lift.

Being the helpful sort that I am, I told him I’d be right back, and to disconnect the remains of the safety chains and damaged wiring and move his truck forward about 30 feet….and I turned the car around and went back home. Went inside and got the key to the Kubota and fired it up. Put a chain in the bucket and drove to where the trailer was. I did turn on my LED strobe to enhance visibility….

Hooked the chain to the tongue of the trailer, put it on the hook on the bucket and lifted….Not.

I’m not sure if he had the trailer loaded wrong, or if his load had crashed forward, but my tractor wouldn’t lift the tongue….2400 lbs is what the tractor will pick up with the bucket, and the trailer wasn’t budging.  So I unhooked the chain and turned the tractor around so I could lift using the three-point hitch on the back (4800 lbs capacity). As I was turning the tractor around and backing up, I see a cop car behind the trailer.

Up walks a county cop. He beckons me off the tractor and is yelling at the kid as I get off.  He starts in on youngblood, telling him he is causing a traffic hazard (what, like people haven’t been slowing and then going around us?….some even offered to help) and telling him he is gonna get a ticket for blocking the road and when the kid answered him back, he mentioned “disturbing the peace” and something about “Traffic hazard”…

“Hey, brother,” I said “if you’ll wait about 4 minutes, we can get this thing hooked up and get him off the road, and then you can yell. If you are really worried about safety, why dontya turn on your lights so people will see us sooner? “

He told me his name wasn’t “brother” and I could address him as “officer”…and offered to arrest me for “interfering with a police officer” and something else that I don’t remember. and a ticket for not having proper safety equipment or something….and demanded my ID. I refused.  Firmly.

I actually smiled. “Sure thing, son…Your game, you call the rules…Except you will address me as “Sir” from this point on….Oh, and another thing…(I kinda got in his personal face space here) “Officer”:…. “Supervisor” …. Now…. You call one to this location on your radio, or I do it on my phone. And get out of the way.”. I climbed onto the tractor. I was shaking, I was so mad.

He stood there, in my way, talking on the radio.

I resisted the urge to move him with the bucket, and waited.

Sure enough, about 5 minutes later, another county car arrived and pulled up behind everyone and another , somewhat older, cop got out (he, at least, turned on his lights). I got off the tractor, and walked up. Young cop tells his story, young man nods and answers a question, then I stated my piece. I asked where county cops get off being dicks and hindering rather than helping or at least staying out of the way…I pointed out that I would have had the whole thing fixed and off the road if young stupid cop had just gotten out of the way as I suggested and I didn’t appreciate being talked to and threatened the way I had been. I said I wanted to make a claim for intimidation and threatening. I pointed out that he had been an ass, and had wasted time, if there really had been a danger to the public he had made it last longer.

Old cop, the supervisor, took a look…then he helped me hook up the chains and directed me in lifting the trailer. He himself put the jack down and unhooked the chains. He directed me backwards to hitch to the trailer.. I suggested to the kid that we pull the trailer to my house and we could straighten the hooks enough that they would be safer. …and legal. (and pointed (loudly) out that if he wasn’t legal the first cop was dick enough and would no doubt LOVE to arrest him or at least give a ticket…)

So the Supervisor asked me if I would let him handle the young asshole cop. I said sure, but this shit has to be dealt with. I didn’t appreciate being threatened with arrest for trying to help, and I didn’t like his attitude or the fact that he made a simple thing take longer….and he didn’t even make the scene safer by turning on his lights.

“Yeah, I can handle him,” he said, “or you can make that complaint. But he will like it less if I handle it unofficially….He really is a good officer, he just has bad days sometimes”.
I suggested that if he has days like this, over something that is this minor, perhaps he shouldn’t be a cop…….Which didn’t go over well. But he did promise to counsel the other cop.

So supervisor makes the young cop “escort” me and the kid back to my driveway…for “safety”…on foot! and walk back. In the sun. They stood on the side of the road for about 20 minutes when kid got back to the two cop cars, talking and sometimes waving their arms a bit.

Supervisor shows up at my driveway while I am helping the kid get his chains fixed and the wiring repaired enough to be legal. At my suggestion, the kid opens up the trailer to pull some of the cement bags back from the front. Supervisor and I talk for a few…..I pointed out that isn’t normal behavior for a cop, and that young cop has, apparently, authority issues (I did use the phrase “Respec Ma Autoriteh!” which brought a smile,) and maybe anger management issues.

I asked him how someone like that can become a cop? No psychological screening?   And perhaps the kid needed to learn the difference between some gangbanger kid he’d pulled over at 2 AM and someone like me in the middle of the day…older and wiser and not someone who can be can be leaned on or threatened… and suggested that the kid cop either learn how to handle people or someone like me was gonna run his ass over or shoot his ass someday….which also didn’t go over well. But the point was made. We shook hands and he left. Kid cop was long gone by then.

I dunno. Haven’t seen the kid cop since though.

I still wonder if I should have made a complaint though….or at least a report.

So on Labor day (among others), I always take an hour and fire up the Backup Generator…just to lube the internals and make sure it is ready to go when it is needed.

Like a carry gun or a fire extinguisher, you don’t need ’em until you really need ’em.

So I take the time to fire it up, make sure the internals are lubed and operated long enough to warm it up and dry it out, and spend a few minutes with an oil can making sure that things that move are lubed with clean oil. Check the air filters for mice and other things which might clog or otherwise hinder the operation. Cooling vents are clear and unobstructed and everything is ready.

All good this time.  Ready to go, and it fired up nicely. Should do what I need when I need it.

When was the last time you checked your generator?

“I have been criticized by referring to our federal masked men as “ninja” … Let us reflect upon the fact that a man who covers his face shows reason to be ashamed of what he is doing. A man who takes it upon himself to shed blood while concealing his identity is a revolting perversion of the warrior ethic. It has long been my conviction that a masked man with a gun is a target. I see no reason to change that view.”

Jeff Cooper

The new Grey Man episode..Partners.

You should buy it. If you haven’t started the series, you should. The Kindle versions of the erlier books are ON SALE.

I ordered 2 tri-axles of stone to be delivered today. One for my driveway (which has needed stone for 5 or 6 years, and one for the road I am finishing to my barn. After 16 years, the fill has finally stopped settling, and I am willing to put some stone on it so that I don’t have to drive in mud.

So the first load was delivered. at 6:30 AM. I spent about 3 hours carefully spreading it, making sure the drainage was good, and carefully filling in the edges.

The other load wasn’t delivered until 4:15 PM.

The driver backed carefully down the lane, and set his chains to tailgate it out along the lane.

He lifted the dump box. Higher. Higher yet. Even higher…..then, at the top of the lift, he jerked the truck forward just slightly to make the stone slide….the whole load slid back. All at once. The truck did a wheelstand. No shit, I could have walked under the front wheels.  For a second, I thought the thing was gonna tip over. All the weight was on the passenger side rear wheel.

He ever so gently let the dump box back down. The truck slowly came back to earth. Pretty smooth, actually.

He finished the job, but the stone just wouldn’t slide out smoothly. Instead of a smooth road, it’s a series of hills.  (I’m gonna work the Kubota tomorrow).

He pulled back to level ground and inspected the truck. No damage (except to the driver’s seat) and some new handprints on the wheel. Permanent ones….

The spring on the back was….compressed. Enough to have flexed all of the paint and concreted stone off of it.

I’ve never seen a dump truck with it’s wheels that high before. Neither had the driver….

Kinda like this:

Only uphill and on ONE Rear Wheel.

So the Department of Homeland Security, staffed and led by Obama appointees, is worried about election fraud (yeah, that pegged my Irony Meter…) and would like to federalize the election process…

(One wonders why they haven’t been worried about vote fraud until now…..at least not since the Florida Bush/Gore debacle…and that only because it appeared that bush was winning)

Yeah, Trump is gonna have to beat Hillary above and beyond the Margin of Fraud as it is….

I trust my government not at all in cases like this.

If you are a good shot….then apparently .410 with 7.5 birdshot works well.

Woman shoots drone: “It hovered for a second and I blasted it to smithereens.”

I’m a terrible wingshooter. I doubt I could do this.  I’m always late and low. the rifle shooter in me always squeezes the trigger too slowly.

At least she “recycled” the drone….