More Bastardy From California

I thought this nonsense had been declared illegal:

Several major credit card companies have decided to move forward with a plan to track purchases made at gun retailers in California, CBS News reported Monday.

American Express, Visa, and Mastercard will implement a new merchant code for firearm and ammunition retailers, allowing banks to track “suspicious” purchases to comply with a new California law.

As I’ve said before, whenever government needs a BJ, corporations have absolutely no problem falling to their knees.

Fuckers.

Cash.  Gun shows/estate sales.  Individual purchases.  (I don’t know how any of this would help CA residents, as they appear to be doomed, gun-wise.)


Update:  Seems like Idaho has the right idea, though.

Combo Guns

Among members of the gun fraternity, “combo” / “drilling” guns (multiple-barreled rifle/shotguns) have never been as popular Over Here as they are in Yurp.  Here’s an example of one, the Merkel 961L as seen at Steve Barnett’s Luxury Death Dealers’ Emporium:

This one’s a little different from the norm in that it features two side-by-side 8x57mm JRS (rimmed) rifle barrels over a single 20ga shotgun barrel as opposed to vice-versa, but the concept is the same.  And let it be known that I have absolutely no problem with a pairing of 8mm Mauser with 20ga, no sir not me.

For those who would prefer something a little more manly, here’s a Merkel 96K, with two 12ga barrels over the wonderful 9.3×74R chambering.

Here’s the thing.  Combo guns have always had a devoted following amongst big game hunters of previous generations (much less so nowadays), but I have to tell you that in no way shape or form would today’s hunter be undergunned out there in the bush with either of the above.

Yes, they are heavy, but at around 8lbs unloaded they compare well with, say a modern single-barreled Steyr rifle in .300 WinMag which weighs about the same or even more.

But as examples of the gunmaker’s art, little can compare to the majestic drillings, and certainly not the pedestrian rifles such as the Steyr.

If I were offered one of the above two, it would take me hours to decide between two rifles/one shotgun or two shotguns/one rifle.  (I already have one or two single-barreled rifles, as any ful kno.)

Assuming I were able to go into the African bushveldt again, I’d probably pick the 12ga/9.3x47mm pairing if hunting anything dangerous, but the 8x57mm/20ga for smaller game.

By the way, the price differential ($19,000 for the 961L vs. $9,000 for the 96R) reflects the greater precision work required to register two rifle barrels vs. two shotgun barrels.

I love both, for obvious reasons:  hogsback wooden stocks, exquisite workmanship, manly chamberings… I need to stop now.

Quote Of The Day

In response to the celebratory picture of Vogue cover “girls” over the past [whatever] years:

…some guy SOTI grumped:

“Too much cinnamon, not enough sugar.”

I LOL’d.


*The word “girls” was put in quotes because some of the models (Oprah coff coff ) were last seen as actual girls back in the mid-Sixties.

“Dear Dr. Kim”

“Dear Dr. Kim,

“About six months ago, a new family moved in next door. They are a little younger than us and don’t have kids.  The wife works away a lot, while her husband works from home and has been doing up the house.
“From the moment they met, he and my wife seemed to take a shine to each other.  It didn’t bother me at first that he made her laugh, or that she was always popping over to take food.  But lately, I’ve noticed strong sexual tension between them. He often makes crude jokes, or uses innuendo. 
“Normally, my wife would find this rude or inappropriate. She doesn’t – she just laughs even louder.  They do this in front of me, so they’re not hiding it.
“I think they’ve been texting each other too, although I haven’t been able to confirm this as my wife keeps her phone close at all times, and I don’t know her password. 
“It feels like they’re intimate, or certainly about to become so.
“I’m not sure what to do. I don’t want to confront my wife and upset her if I’m wrong.”

— Unsure, Suburbia

Dear Unsure,

My old Dad always said to listen to your gut:  if it says it’s hungry, get something to eat;  if it says it needs to pee, go to the toilet;  if it says not to walk through Central Park at midnight, stay in your hotel room;  and if it says your wife is bonking your new neighbor, she probably is.  And in this case, your gut is absolutely correct — and all the evidence you’ve presented proves it.

  • he makes her laugh (always an aphrodisiac for women)
  • he’s younger than she is (makes her feel attractive)
  • she was always popping over to take food (dead giveaway right there)
  • she doesn’t find his crude jokes and innuendo inappropriate (behavior change)
  • she keeps her phone close at all times (of course she does, because sexting)

She’s fucking him — or very close to doing so.  The real question is:  what are you going to do next?

I’d suggest having a quiet word with Neighbor Boy’s wife, telling her everything you’ve just told me;  let him do the ‘splaining.  And when he confesses, which he might very well do, have her confront your wife.

In the meantime, let your phone’s battery run down to zero, and then ask your wife if you can use her phone to make an important call, in the next room.  If she refuses, there’s your proof right there.

Oh, and talk to a lawyer soon, so you don’t lose the house and/or kids when the SHTF.

Good luck.


By the way:  Deirdre has it precisely wrong.

Search String

Here’s an interesting thing.  The other day I was asked by an old friend from Seffrica where she could find one of my novels on Amazon, so I just told her to do a search for “Kim du Toit Prime Target” on their website.  Here was the search result:

Errrr what?

Puzzled, I tried one of the other novels:

No problem there… and likewise for all the other works I’ve published at Amazon.

Then I tried again, using just “Kim du Toit” as the search string, and lo and behold, they all showed up, including Prime Target:

Of course, trying to reach anyone at Amazon who could look at the problem is like trying to decipher the U.S. tax code at IRS.gov: opaque,  impossible and misleading.  Amazon must be the least-friendly organization on the planet when it comes to this kind of thing.

Anyway, here’s the link to Prime Target, in case anyone is still interested in a story about a government agency spying on U.S. citizens’ private data.

Cute Name

The Daily Mail refers to them as “Rolex rippers” —  a cutesy name for thugs who attack and rob people in the streets for their watches:

A spate of luxury watch muggings in London is putting wealthy owners off flaunting their wrist candy — and may be contributing to collapsing demand for high-end timepieces.

The value of secondhand watches, as tracked by the Bloomberg Subdial Watch Index, is down more than 40 per cent since its peak in April 2022.

Major UK retailer Watches of Switzerland has seen its share price drop by 53 per cent this year after announcing it expects revenue to be 10 per cent lower than forecast, while Richemont, owner of Cartier, has said half year sales are down by 17 per cent.

Typical Mail ignorance used as panic creation.  The “spate of robberies” cannot affect more than a tiny percentage of luxury watch owners, and while London certainly has a large share of sales of these overpriced geegaws, it’s not enough to account for the dip in Richemont’s sales.

Aside:  For those who aren’t aware of the Richemont empire, it includes luxury brands like Montblanc pens, Cartier, IWC, Dunhill and Purdey (!!!).  It’s controlled by a South African one-time tobacco tycoon, Johann Rupert, who founded Richemont as a way to get out of the tobacco business.

What the downturn in Richemont sales would appear to mean is that the demand for luxury items is dipping due to economic concerns (not street thuggery) — except that when it comes to individual wealth, sales are trendy within the various divisions within the luxury market.  Such divisions include real estate, cars, precious metals, clothing, yachts, watches and so on.  And of course, while “fashion” plays a lot in this market, the real motivator for such spending is driven by investment.

Note, by the way, that Richemont doesn’t own Ferrari or Aston Martin (yet), and if Sotheby’s recent auction of “desirable” cars is anything to go by, a larger chunk of disposable income has been channeled in that direction — one 1956 Mercedes 300 SC can buy a couple dozen  Vacheron Constantin watches, for example.  (I’m also told by sources within the collectible car market that sales are softening there too, but the sales of luxury yachts are still firm, even growing.)

We won’t even talk about real estate prices in the South of France or similar “must-have” destinations like the Gulf states.

Against serious high-ticket items like yachts and resorts in the Greek islands, for instance, Montblanc pens and Rolex watches are pretty small potatoes.  That said, however, I certainly wouldn’t risk wearing a luxury watch in London nowadays — although the discreet Patek Philippe is certainly not as noticeable as the chunky Rolexes and Breitlings.

The real story here is not the ups and downs of economic trends or the spending of rich people, but the ever-increasing rise in street thuggery (and not just in London), which law enforcement agencies seem unwilling to address let alone reduce because racism.

I also note that the luxury real estate market in Manhattan seems to be softening, and I’m pretty sure that it’s getting more difficult to sell those $50 million+ condos in an area where increased street thuggery makes London look like a kiddies’ playground.

Unsurprisingly, the Daily Mail  talks hysterically about the thuggery (because hysteria is their stock-in-trade), but not a great deal about lenient prosecutors and police inaction.  That discussion seems to be more acceptable to conservative outlets like Breitbart News.