Hank Ellis

Got a mechanic at work whose first name is Phuc. Yes it's pronounced like you think it is. His cohort with the aircraft has the last name of Dequer. Be very careful how you page this pair in the same sentence. One of our pilots changed his name after arriving in America to something very American because his name in Vietnam was Long Dong.

Easy. Landings are boring and a sad reminder that we are tied to the Earth.(are they all dead?) Nope. Google "BASE fatality list" and peruse a few of the lists. Some have photos. All have a name or two of those that I've known.

Lets put this in perspective. I play with guns. The only thing I've ever killed is time. Think I got my finger stuck in the slide once but no lasting injuries. As long as the muzzle is pointed at the target and safe backstop. I'm good, you're good, we're all good. I skydive. 2000 jumps. Expert license, gold wings, diamond freefall, blah, blah, blah. Here I've got two parachutes. Once packed by a certificated parachute rigger. Doesn't matter whether I jump from 20,000 ft or 2,000 ft, either way I've got to throw out strings and cloth in 120 mph winds and hope that the deployment sequence works like it should. If it doesn't, pull one handle to get rid of that one and pull another for the reserve. Even then once every few years there is someone where the odds get to them and the reserve fails. Worst injuries I've gotten in all this was a twisted ankle from landing in a gopher hole and few bruises. Feces occurs. Gave wingsuit flying a try for a while. With normal skydiving you really don't have a feeling of flying. Put on a wingsuit and things change. The feeling of flight is incredible. Turning and banking are somehow tied in to something primordal. Just think turn and you turn. But .... The risk factor is increased a bit. See the wings restrict the movement of your arms and you have to compensate during deployment. Additionally parachute gear really wasn't designed for the canopies to be coming out of the container at a 45 degree angle and some really weird things can happen. I've had a few spooky deployments while wingsuit jumping and I'm telling you right now that when the deployment starts going bad at 4,000 ft you start rethinking the risk analysis you did. The wingsuit (Bird-Man Classic) is up for sale if anyone is interested. Never did BASE jumping. Had a chance one time to do a static line freebag from the Superdome but an accident with a bungee jumper cancelled the whole package. A static line freebag BASE jump is the safest you can do. Here you have one parachute that is packed by you. The gear isn't certified by anyone except you. If the one roll of the dice comes up snake eyes, you die. Pretty simple. I've probably seen hundreds of BASE videos and in every one the jumper pauses just a bit before exit. They are asking themselves whether doing this is worth the risk of death. The whole flight or fight syndrone kicking in. Now if BASE jumping or wingsuit jumping isn't dangerous enough, combine the two. Now you have the limited mobility and potientially dicey deployments of the wingsuit combined with the one parachute option of BASE. What could possibly go wrong? Well OK. Now that we've figured out how wingsuit BASE can be made to work lets take it a step further and start flying around the object we just jump from. Fine you've just taken away the safety of altitude by intentionally flying close to the object. Now if anything, and I mean anything, go much as twitches you're dead. In 20 years of skydiving I've run into individuals like the ones in the videos. Either one of three things happen. They push the envelope too far and get into something they can't get out of and bounce. One of their close friends bounces and they rethink what they are doing and get a grip on reality. Or they can't handle reality and go down the gutter with drugs and/or booze. However those that push the envelope but stay within reality advances the sport for all of us. Otherwise we'd still be jumping WWII surplus parachutes and still trying to figure out how to touch another person in freefall.

Great. Half of my crew at work is from Alabama. They will be in mourning for the next two weeks and I'll get no work out of them.

Falling bullets kill.For some reason the culture in NOLA meant popping a few caps in the air on New Years Eve. Several years ago a tourist in New Orleans was killed by a falling bullet. Since then the city made a huge push to clean up this nonsense. News release this year happily proclaimed that no one was killed and only one man was grazed by a falling bullet. First report of a falling bullet injury in 3 years. Nice place to visit. Glad I don't live there.

Never did like the cars as gifts ads. Something eliteist about it that strikes a nerve. My brother-in-law is the head of sales at a Lexus/Acura dealership. Hold the jokes please. We had dinner Christmas eve and I asked him how business was doing with the recession. November and December are the months for largest sales at his dealership and historically for the auto industry. At his particular dealership he saw only a very small downtick. His place was bringing cars in from the east and west coasts where the recession has hit a bit harder. The downtick he said was in cars as gifts which are a decent percentage of sales. If you note, the car as a gift ads are high end cars. You don't see this type of ads trying to sell a Chevy Aveo. My takeaway from this is that these ads are not geared toward my income level. FWIW: Now is the best time to buy a car in decades. Prices are nearly buy one get one free with super attractive financing. If I already wasn't into a car loan I'd trade in the POS '93 Dodge van and get a SUV or pickup.

http://www.gamaliel.com/Give them a call and see what you can work out. For me if I did an order of $1500 or more they will pick up the freight and the HazMat plus knock a little bit off the lead shot price. Since the bulk of the order will be lead shot picking up the freight is a big deal. The $1500 floor is for anything. Shot, primers, powder, etc. You just have to find a way to unload it off the truck. A commercial address is preferable.

Sorry to see you go. One thing I've learned about the shooting sports is that it's like a neighborhood. Travel down the same street day after day and everything is very familiar. But some day you decide to take a different route. You take a right and you find a whole 'nother world in the 'hood that is right at your fingertips all this time. Really neat stuff. New sights. New sounds. Let's visit this path for a while. Till our paths cross again ... X rings and A zones for your future.

Geez. Two months since the last update. Time flies. We have electricity! Just a week ago the power company hooked us up to to the meter pan. They had to remove some damanged underground wiring and splice in some new. The scraps are still in the yard. Copper prices being what they are I'm saving it and going to turn it in to the scrap metal place. I see at least a couple cases of beer there. Bone the one-eyed electrictian goofed somewhere. When the main breaker was set fire and sparks blew out of one panel so says my general contractor. A bit of warranty work was done and so far everything works. We'll see once the rest of the fixtures are installed. At least we can do laundry now. The HVAC guy is here as I write finishing up the last of the heating and air conditioning details. Painter will be here later today to stain the cabinets and finish up the last of the trim work. Flooring dude was here yesterday to measure and scope out the job. Flooring should go in sometime between Christmas and New Years. The cool part. The contents adjuster is a third party hired by the insurance company to replace the big stuff. Apparently they buy in bulk and get a major price break which drops the cost to the insurance company. The adjuster must be a shooter. The conversation went something like this. Him: I see that your reloading equipment was damaged. We are a Dillon and MEC dealer and we'll get that on it's way. Me: Yeah, but I really need to get the major appliances going. Him: The appliances are easy. Let's get to the important stuff. Your reloading equipment can be sent anytime. Just say when. Me: Now is as good as time as any. Make it happen. Him: Good. Call me tomorrow on the exact make and model of major appliances and I'll start working on that. Fridge and stove. Minor details. Reloading equipment. Top priority. Love it. Move it date has been pushed to third week of January. Plan is to have enough of the house up and running so we can enjoy Super Bowl Sunday on the flat screen. Man I can't wait. This camper living has worn out it's welcome. Burned out. Oh yeah. I'm keeping my eye on the prize. It will be worth it. We have our moments where if you don't laugh you'll cry. From the "What I Love" forum.

As some of you know I took a tree in the house from Hurricane Gustave. The rebuilding is going as good as can be expected. If all goes as planned we should be moving back in sometime the first half of January. The downsides are that we are living in a 26' camper in the backyard. Water is from 120' of pipe strung across the fence from a water hose. Sewage is in a 250 gallon holding tank that's pumped out once a week. To take some of the stress off the camper sewage I've been using the porta-pottie in the driveway. Laundry runs $20 a week at the laundrymat. No room to store anything. Got a big chunk of our possessions in a storage pod in the front yard. The rest is under a tarp in the backyard. Nowhere to hide when the wife and I get on each others nerves. But hey I'm keeping food in a refrigerator, got a bed to sleep in and a roof over my head which puts me in the top 25% of the worlds population. Attitude is 90% of getting through this so in the holiday spirit....... I woke up to 2 inches of snow December 11th which in south Louisiana is a major occurence. Nothing says Christmas like snow and wreaths.

Had a Pact MK IV timer/chrono combo that gave me fits from day one. Sun too bright, didn't work. Too many clouds, didn't work. And the thing was consistently giving higher readings than what the chronos at the matches were giving. Gave up on it and went with a CED with IR screens mounted in a chrono coffin. Couldn't be happier. FWIW: I still have the chrono kit for the MK IV. I'll let it go cheap. Complete with a couple of spare uprights that have been lightly shot.

Was on the phone with Jim Jr. yesterday. Covered a bunch of issues. Ordered a DPMS LR-308B with a few mods so I can complete my Heavy Metal setup. Talked about cleaning up my 1911. Went over a couple of items about my Gator. Top shelf guy that Jim Clark Jr. Receivers has been a problem. I ordered a Gator in Feb '07 and when it didn't arrive by Oct '07 I was ready to find something else. Happened to find a used one for a real good price (thanks General Chang). Cancelled the order. Your order was timed perfectly. Oh, the estimated delivery time for the LR-308B ... 9 months.

Ended up getting a Kimber 82G from the CMP. Won the razor lottery and got one without a scratch on it. Unpacked it. Stuck it in the safe. Then two weeks later I got hammered by Gustave and I'm still rebuilding the house. Haven't even cleaned the preservative off the gun yet. Once I get back in the house and get settled I'm looking forward to getting back to rimfires ... and handguns ... and centerfire rifles ... and airguns ... and reloading.

Outstanding. Last question. How bad are you gonna whip my butt with it?

From order to ready, how long the wait? Full gun or an upper?

Hank, I thought that the MRE coffee was supposed to go between the cheek and gum on the opposite side to the chew.I'll keep that in mind next hurricane season. Couldn't be worse than reconstituting the sludge. Maybe sprinkle in a few granules in the chew. Damn, you got me to thinking. A dash of Kahlua is also worth a try.

Once you've had to drink that freeze dried coffee that comes in MREs even office coffee is a step up.The company I work for uses only Community coffee. A local Louisiana company that knows what works down here. A while back in a cost savings move they went with some national brown water brand. The natives got restless and revolt was ugly. Community was quickly brought back in.

My Ford Focus has the pump symbol with the hose on the left side but with an arrow pointing to the right where the filler is. The wifes Acura has the pump symbol with the hose on the right side. No arrow. But the filler is on the left side. No reason for any of it.

I'm in the same boat as trodrig. I normally make a big order around this time of year to pretty much set me up for the next season. Shot, bullets, primers, powder, wads. All of it. But my house and reloading bench got destroyed in Gustave so I haven't done any reloading. Can't order due to having no place to put it. I'm looking at maybe January before I'm back in the saddle and geez, all the reloading components have dried up. I've got maybe 3 months of components stocked so maybe I can wait this one out.

The coffee pot is a required piece of support equipment for rotorcraft operation and maintenance. Without it all but a select few of the crew will cease all useful function and operations comes to a halt. One of the functions of this supervisor is to explain to the new hires proper coffee equittete. If they dare to not follow this one simple rule they risk the wrath of a caffeine starved individual who makes a rabid dog look like a good house pet. Several years ago we returned from a hurricane evac to find our base lightly damaged structurally but no power except one out building. That out building had an operating coffee pot. The sole function for one facility maintenance person was to make a pot, bring it over to operations, return with the empty pot, make another pot. Repeat. This went on for 5 days, 12 hours a day. Around day 3 he told me that he felt that he wasn't pulling his share to get the base up to full operation. "Dude. You are doing one of the most important jobs in the company right now. Keeping the customers and us in coffee." Once power was restored to ops he was relieved of coffee duty.

I have no love for the TSA. The agents at the screening points at airports give the illusion of security but real security, nope. Keep focusing on the objects and not the people and the security they seek will not occur. I also feel that the most dangerous place at the airport is the security screening port. I won't give details on a public forum but lets say that if you give it some thought you'll agree that the model we use is a recipe for a serious event. In addition the TWIC card I had to get just to continue doing what I do for a living still gives me a sick feeling in my gut. Has it ferreted out any terrorists or any others who wish to do harm? Not that I'm aware of. It has ferreted out deadbeat dads, a few who have had outstanding warrants on lessor crimes, and a few others who were on the fringes of the law but not a real threat to society. Rumor on the street is that some of the service companies have had to terminate the employment of those who couldn't get the card. Replacing those workers means that wages are being bumped up to attract the 'proper' worker. Workers who can pass a drug screen, TWIC card background check, and are willing to do dirty grunt labor don't come cheap. Ugh! {Virtual throwing arms up in disgust.}

Skydiving seems to come up as a frequent item. I can help. Go to www.uspa.org. Click the "Become a Skydiver!" button then "Choose a School". Find a couple schools near your area. Visit them and talk to the owner and jumpmasters. Pick one and just do it. If the school is a USPA member DZ then you can be 98% sure they are top shelf. The last 2% is a gut feeling once you visit them. Give it a try. The HALO jump is one of the most difficult jumps to make if you're not enlisted. Primarily due to the equipment and resources required. Finding someone who has the knowledge to teach you isn't easy either. But there is one group who can make it happen.www.halojumper.net. The principals of this operation are Kevin Holbrook (special forces ranger ret.) and Ben Crowell (SCPO ret.). I've jumped with them, shot with them, and discussed the state of the Union over adult beverages with them. I trust these guys with my back at any time, anywhere. So what are you waiting for?

One of my pilots had a custom bumper sticker made up. "Nuke an unborn gay commie whale for Jesus." Interesting reactions.No stickers of any kind. Not shooting. Not skydiving. Not scuba diving. I'd rather not have a neon sign that says I've got expensive stuff here for you to steal.

My local mom n' pop gun shop reported very brisk sales of anything that goes bang. Didn't check prices but knowing the owner he wouldn't live with himself if he scalped. About a month ago I picked up a new Armalite AR for $850. Not a steal but a decent deal.

Athough the gun was used by a criminal, there is no blood to the gun. To me, not an issue in this case. Shoot it.Here's another spin to ponder on. A few years ago I needed another main canopy for my backup skydiving rig. Went to my horse trading gear dealer to see what he had. I was looking for a particular make and model to match what was in my primary rig. Off hand he didn't have what I wanted. However he did have a main that had a story and he'd let it go at a good price. The story was that an inexperienced jumper with a high performance canopy made a pilot error doing a low turn that resulted in fatal injuries. The widow sold the rig to the gear dealer. He was willing to part out the rig. However the canopy has a few .. uh .. stains. 'Bring it out.' I said. The stains were blood that were on the slider and lower part of one line group. Gee, it's only strings and cloth made from petroleum distallates. It has no soul. Money exchanged hands. Replaced the slider due to the blood stain damaging the fabric and grommet. Rinsed the line group with fresh water. Good to go with a slight discoloration. Probably have made 150 jumps on that canopy. Opens great. Flies and lands sweet. Don't even think about its' past anymore. Some would never jump something that someone died on. Just doesn't bother me.