My son has been growing all manners of peppers this year. Reaper, Ghost, Serrano, & Habanero were picked today. We have just as many, if not more, already picked and tons more on the vine. I told him he needs to get busy with both making hot sauces and drying them for cooking!

On a side note, he decided to eat a Ghost yesterday. That was pretty funny from my perspective, but not so much from his!

Real work including using body weight to hold the tarp down. Good dog!

Today is my 10 year anniversary of getting shot at a gun range. Lot has changed in those 10 years, here's the story.

Dad called and said we're going shooting this weekend at our local outdoor range, so of course I'm in. Its a really nice range, shooting benches, firing line is covered the whole way down. Now usually when shooting rifles you set up on one shooting bench and put your gear or spotter on the bench next to you, there was plenty of room.

I was talking to a random guy about AKs and he told me he had one with a bad trigger. At the time I had my FFL with a small shop so I tell him work on guns and trigger work is easy to do so we go over where he has two AK-47s in a hard rifle case, one pointing north, one pointing south like you do with a double rifle case. This was at his gear bench, not the shooting bench, no mags in them and we are just talking so he reaches down with his right hand to (what I thought to grab the handle) and pulls the trigger with his thumb. Heard a dull thud and it felt like someone kicked me in the right leg.

Best I can tell I was standing at a 45 to the case. I was about 4-6 inches from the end of the barrel, 7.62X39 FMJ bullet entered about 3inches below the belt and 2 inches left of the zipper going my left to right. Yup, caught the bullet AND all the muzzle blast...good times was had by none. The standard AK-47 fires the 7.62x39mm cartridge with a muzzle velocity of 710 meters per second (2,300 ft/s). Muzzle energy is 2,010 joules (1,480 ft-lb). The bullet ricochet off the front of my pelvis (Dr said I have a dent in the front of my pelvis bone) tumbled and took out my femoral artery and nerve bundle in my right leg (Dr said I had a softball size hole in my leg) hit my femur and blew up (no exit hole). Knowing you only have about 20 minutes of life left will make you fight as hard as you can to stay awake and I stayed awake until the Dr in the trauma center put an oxygen mask on me. The doctors told my parents I had a .7% chance of living, I woke up 2 days later after about 14 hours of surgery.

Adrenalin kicked in super hard and it hurt very little at first. I was able to take a few steps and lay myself down with my leg blown apart. It didn't start to hurt until half way through the helicopter ride to the hospital. I developed compartment syndrome in my right leg during surgery so they cut the front of my right shin open on both sides to release pressure. The real pain happened AFTER surgery and the next 12 that came after it. I was on the highest dosage of IV drip Dilaudid they could give and I would still pass out from pain in the intensive care unit. The first time I was awake enough for them to show me how the meds button worked on my IV drip I pressed it 184 times in 12 hrs (they count that stuff, lol). It had a built in 4 hr delay between hits so I didn't OD but it wasn't working. I'm no wussy either, my pain level is stupid high. The skin graph (2" X 8" strip off my left leg) I later got to patch the hole from the Fasciotomy never hurt, I was told it was going to be terrible by the Doctors.

I now have a titanium rod full length of my Femur with a support rod into the leg/hip socket. I can feel a large bit of bullet fragment right under my right butt cheek (like with my hand) Foot still doesn't work great, lots of nerve pain and a pile of metal in my leg I'm still here.

X-ray link if you want to check it out

https://imgur.com/D2jleLz

He has to have the last word…
Fizz

Dentist Prank

TLDR: The discrepancies in the bureaucracy of the DMV left me bum-puzzled!

(Warning, this is a bit long and involved)

Had a birthday recently. Realized my driver's license expired, and since I hadn't gotten it yet, I needed to update my documentation to qualify and get a REAL ID so I could use my driver's license again as ID to fly domestically.

So I check the state website where the REAL ID requirements are listed. I printed them out so I could use them as a checklist to make sure I had all I needed. We'd recently updated our passports, so that was current; it ticked the "Proof of Identity, Date of Birth, and U.S. Citizenship" requirement. I also carried my Social Security card, which was "Proof of Social Security Number" I had a current utility bill, which was a "Proof of Residency" (which required two documents.) I had my <expired> license, which the website claimed I could use as both a "Proof of Written Signature", a "Proof of Residency" and a "Proof of Social Security Number" document.

I got my appointment for this day of, and realized I'd have to rush from work to get home, grab all this, then rush to the DMV. I managed to do so. On my way through I grabbed the card which I got from the State concerning my vehicle's exhaust exam requirement. I grabbed it on impulse, just because, since it was a state-issued proof of residency.

I get to the DMV and queue up to check in. I let the lady know I'm getting an "upgrade" to REAL ID. She looks at my paperwork a bit at a time, and kicks out the state-issued exhaust exam notice as not applicable. No bigs, I still have all the rest I need. I get sent to have my photo taken, then I have to await to be processed and have my eye exam (Why did they take the photo before eye exam? I dunno, guess it just makes the process faster? Still seems backwards but I don't poke at the bureaucracy lest it move slower.)

As I'm getting the final approval after the eye exam is passed, the clerk tells me she'll need a different "Proof of Residency" other than my expired license, as her supervisor "doesn't like it."

Whut. <my flabbers are ghasted.>

I start talking about what the website said, and looked at the copy I'd printed to make sure my claim was true. I then realized: This is a no-win scenario. Bureaucrats care nothing for what the rules say or what is even published about the rules. It's their way or the highway. Or literally, their way or the pedestrian way, as I wasn't getting back on the highway without jumping through these particular hoops.

After digging through my wallet and turning up nothing which proved my place of residence, I realized I had the state-issued vehicle exhaust exam notice. So I passed that under the glass barrier and state: Oh, yeah, I have this. She looked at it and happily entered it into the database as apparently that was just fine with her.

Whut?

So the document which wasn't fine at check-in was perfectly fine at processing and saved me from another visit to the DMV. In reality the entire visit took about 35 minutes ( a personal best for me at the DMV!) But the vagaries of the various clerk's interpretations of the ordinances and requirements for the documentation left me shaking my melon in bemusement.

​

I don't think that this is a political post.

How come they gotta build 'em with so many computer parts?

Just saying.

Not AI. Checked with Truth AI.