Category: Guy Stuff

Things that make men go “Oooooh!”

5 Fings Wot I Done

Guy Stuff, Housekeeping

In keeping with the Musk Activity Report, allow me to list the five things I did last week — almost all of which, I’ll agree, I do every week.  Bearing in mind that I’m actually retired and not therefore required to do anything, here they are:

1) Prepared and posted about 30-odd articles for this here blog.  Some require little preparation — such as the Caption Competitions, Sunday’s Classic Beauty and Random Totty categories, of which I typically do a month’s worth in advance.  Others such as the Comment Of The Day also require little preparation other than formatting, but I typically do those as I stumble on them.  The heavy hitters (e.g.  Gratuitous Gun Pics, political analysis and social commentary) take a lot longer because in many cases they concern subjects with which I’m not familiar and require that I delve into the topic at some depth.  Reports on daily news take very little time, but commentary thereon does involve at least a little contemplation if not ancillary research, as does the weekly News Roundup.  As I’m committed to publishing at least four posts per weekday and one each for Saturday and Sunday, you can see how this all adds up, timewise.  And I count this as only one thing I did last week, and pretty much every week.  No doubt some Gummint bureaucrat would spin those out into at least a dozen things — such is the nature of make-work Gummint activity — but for me, it’s one.

2) Reading and answering mail.  I get upwards of two dozen emails a day from Readers.  Some require a response, some are FYI.  Whatever, thank you for all of them — regular correspondents know who you are —  and I value every single email.  (I don’t get much if any hate mail, but that’s fine.  If I wanted that kind of thing, I’d get a Twitter/X account.)

3) Grocery shopping.  Because New Wife works a day job (more on this below), it falls on me to keep the household running, and typically this involves about three separate trips per week (because I prefer to eat fresh foods rather than canned or frozen).  Once again, this I count as one thing not three.

4) Meal preparation.  There are two such activities.  Firstly, each night I prepare a “brown-bag” lunch for New Wife’s consumption the following day.  It involves a fresh garden salad, some kind of meat and a dessert (pitted cherries and full-milk yogurt).  Secondly, because she works five days a week, I see no reason why she should come home exhausted and then have to prepare us a meal;  so at least three nights a week, I prepare dinner for us both.  Friday nights we’ll either share a frozen pizza or whatever.  We don’t do takeout unless we’re desperate.  Weekend meals are an ad hoc  kind of thing — cheese or chicken toasties — unless we decide to treat ourselves to a roast, beef or lamb) which I typically do while she does household stuff like laundry.  (In passing, I keep the apartment tidy, bed made and the kitchen spotless because I loathe the alternative with a passion).

5) Range trip.  I view this as part of my civic duty.  Choice of guns depends on my mood or “rotation” (“damn, I haven’t shot Gun X for a while, it’s time”).  5a)  Maintenance.  I also clean and oil my guns once a week — not just those I fired at the range, but also one or two others on a rotation basis.  (I’m not compulsive about this because I don’t have to be.  While I have the cleaning kit out, in other words…)

Those are the five things I do every week, which I consider cumulatively as my “job”.  I didn’t include the voluminous reading  (paper and Internet), because that’s recreation.  Ditto the many WhatsApp messages to friends and family.

6) Ad hoc jobs.  Last week, I also fixed the headliner on the Tiguan — after only 135,000 miles, the glue weakened and the liner started flopping down, don’t get me started on quality control nowadays.  I also re-glued the gearstick shroud in New Wife’s Sputum (which had worked loose after only 26,000 miles because Fiat), and took it in for an oil change.

In government-worker terms, that list would probably exhaust most of them and require some time off.

On the other hand, I can’t get fired.

Design Notes

Marketing / Advertising, Toys

At some point, Someone In Marketing thought that this design change would be a good idea for Roger Depuis watches:

I leave it to your imagination as to the average cost of a Depuis watch… now double it, and you’ll be closer.

I’m always reminded of the immortal words of another Roger, Roger Moore:  “The point of language is to communicate your thoughts in the shortest possible time and in the clearest possible way.”

Now translate that into telling the time, and apply to wristwatches.

That Collecting Thing

Guy Stuff, Toys

Other than guns and maybe knives, I don’t know that I’ve ever been much of a “collector” of anything.  Oh sure, I’ve thought of collecting stuff before — watches, for example, if I were ever in a position to afford such a collection — but perhaps it’s a factor of growing older that the desire to own stuff of any one particular kind is no longer as attractive to me as it once was.

A good example is that of the aforementioned watches.  I’ve long had a list of watches I’d like to own, simply because I love the workmanship and craft involved in the creation of such creatures.  Then my list began to shrink, and a few criteria started to assert themselves:  no battery-powered — or “quartz” — movements, and even automatic movements began to lose their desirability because, frankly, they keep shitty time, almost regardless of their cost.  So:  manual-wind watches.  And then when I acquired my plain-Jane Tissot as a gift (thankee thankee, you-know-who):


…my earlier desire for other watches just evaporated.  (I have a couple others which I wear, very occasionally, for specific occasions, but this Tissot works wonderfully well for me, 99% of the time.)

Shocking as it may be to some, this “shrinkage” has started to manifest itself in my most long-time passion, guns.  (You may administer smelling salts at any point, now.)

Seriously.  I have a few guns that I judge as essential for self-, home- and social defense needs, and a very few sentimental favorites — the Browning High Wall 1885 in .45-70, the Winchester 94 in .30-30 and of course the Mauser K98 in 8x57mm, to name but some, and then the plinking equipment (which don’t count because, of course, .22 guns are household appliances and not guns, as I’ve stated ad nauseam  in the past).

Unlike many of my acquaintance, I have absolutely no interest — none whatsoever — of chasing after the latest whizzbang offering from SIG or Canik or whoever, so forget newly-manufactured guns, in toto.

But as I cast my eyes upon the contents of Ye Olde Gunne Sayfe on occasion, I sometimes wonder whether I should perhaps just get rid of a few outliers not because of financial reasons*, but simply because I cannot see myself shooting them ever again.  And having reached that realization, what point is ownership?

In one of my occasional Lottery Dreams (see the post above), I often wonder what car or cars I’d get to replace the Tiguan, and what’s interesting is that I’m having precisely the same feelings that I have with guns and watches:  nothing of recent manufacture at all — especially given that they’re all without exception loaded with electronic gizmos I don’t care for, or else gizmos that spy on you and/or could possibly be used to control your driving.  In fact, the more I think about it, I’d probably have to go back to pre-1970s cars — fully resto-modded of course — to find a car that has not a single computer chip in its driving operation.  And yes I know, modern cars are so much more efficient and economical than their forebears, but frankly, I’m prepared to put up with all the hassles involved with a stick shift and carburetors, for example, just as I’m prepared to have to manually wind my wristwatch every day or work the bolt of my rifle.  (If push came to shove, I could even go with a wheelgun, much as I love me my 1911s, as any fule kno.)

Hell, I’ve even tossed out the kitchen knife block in favor of just two or three basic knives hanging on the magnetic strip on the side of the fridge.  (I haven’t reached this stage with my other knives, however:  I’m sentimentally attached to pretty much all of them for one reason or another, but I don’t know if I’m ever going to buy another one.)

It’s an interesting thing, this change that is coming over me:  the desire to cut back, to simplify, to accept less in favor of plenty.

Anyone else out there feeling this way?

*Loyal Readers may recall that I had to hock all of them a while back, but I am pleased to report that the status quo has since been restored.

Grown-Up Sippy Cups

Guy Stuff

This is a silly topic to discuss, but whatever.  Even though I am by no means triskaidekaphobic, it’s nevertheless Friday the fucking 13th, so here we go.

Back when I worked in an office, I always used a coffee cup with a lid, because knocking an open cup over your PC keyboard was not one of life’s pleasantries, both in terms of the actual mess, and the hassle involved in cleaning the gunk out from under the keys.  Likewise soft drinks:  never a can, always a bottle with the screw-off top.

It’s a habit I’ve carried into my private life too, not only for all the spill containment, but also because these thermal cup thingies keep my coffee hot in case I forget to drink it quickly.  (I’ve talked about this topic before, under different auspices, but note the El Cheapo Magellan thermal cup I mention in passing.)

But it appears that this is no longer enough.  Advancing age has brought with it advancing clumsiness, and the problem with all these wretched thermal cup thingies (as you will see) is that very few of them have a screw-on lid — they all, even the nosebleed stuff like Yeti, have a simple press-in lid with a rubber gasket to hold the lids in place should the thing be knocked over.

And alas, with continuous use do the rubber gaskets deteriorate and loosen their grip, which means that if you do knock your adult sippycup over, the result is the same as if you’d just been using a regular plastic glass filled with the drink and (if necessary) ice:  a veritable flood of sticky liquid all over the floor.

Which is what happened to me the night before last, when in trying to move my tall Magellan sippycup over so I could see the beloved face of New Wife, I knocked the fucking thing off the side table and yea did the lid come off the cup, emptying the contents of ice and OJ all over the frigging carpet.

So yesterday was spent visiting various retail establishments, trying to find a container with a screw-on lid that wasn’t the size of a Thermos flask and resembled more a coffee cup, like the Magellan.

Total failure — and I went to Academy, Cabela’s and finally, Wally World, where I got what I was sorta-looking for, except that it’s tall and skinny rather than short and squat.

It’s also too capacious, at 16oz where I was looking for something in the 10-oz-12oz range.  But at some point one has to resign oneself to what the world actually provides rather than what the world should provide.

Earlier on I did find (and purchase) one such thing with acceptable dimensions and the proper screwtop from Cabela’s, but it’s so fugly that I was worried that New Wife would forbid its use in the public domain, and confine it to doing duty as my night-time cold-water source on the bedside table.  Surprisingly, she agreed that it’s kinda fugly, but likes its patriotic theme.  So she agreed to let me use it.

(Yes, she’ll be becoming a U.S. citizen as soon as the DHS/State Department/whoever gets their collective ass in gear.)

All this could have been avoided, of course, were I just to apply a leetle care in the handling of coffee cups — I could use actual china cups or ceramic mugs like civilized people do, and not have to look like an overgrown child with an expensive fucking metal sippycup.  But that’s the world I live in, and so it goes.

Anyway, having said all that, I’m off to make myself another cuppa in the tall black thing.  And by the way, it works really well at keeping its contents hot — actually, a little too well, as my scalded tongue will attest.  I might just go for the Patriotic Barrel instead… alert the media!

If I get too irritated by these two replacements, or if New Wife Puts Her Foot Down With A Heavy Hand© after all, they will be sent off in disgrace to live in our travel trunk, which we break out when heading for an open-road adventure and style is not a prerequisite.  They will join the regiment of other utensils which have been found wanting.

Whereupon the whole bloody search for the impossible sippycup dream will resume and my irritation, never far below the surface, will explode once more, to the consternation of New Wife and the chortles of my Readers.

You bastards.

Stupid Is

Guy Stuff, Morons & Idiots

…and you know the rest.

I have to tell y’all, I am generally not a fearful man.  That’s not a boast, that’s a summary of my reaction to several (very) scary incidents that have tested me over my six-score years or so of adult life.

That said, if you told me that my next dare was to throw a water balloon at Danny Trejo, I’d back away whimpering and head to the bar.

I don’t care if he’s 80 years old.  I wouldn’t care if the lion you wanted me to tease with a stick was that old in lion-years, or assured me that the black mamba I’d have to kiss had been de-fanged.

Ain’t no way.   NFW.  Not Danny Trejo, no water bomb.

Yet some pendejo  did just that and gave Trejo the goods.

And was surprised when ol’ man Danny laid a big can of whup-ass on him.

My Favorite Things (Part 1)

Celebrities, Good Stuff, Guy Stuff

Well hell, if Oprah Winfrey can do it, then by golly so can I.  Okay, a little background:

Every year, the media mogul, 69, shares an expansive gift guide filled with a range of products like kitchen appliances and cooking supplies, furniture and home goods, clothes and accessories, and skin, hair, and makeup items.

And 2023’s is no different. With 109 items in total, this year’s list has ideas for fashion lovers, at-home chefs, food connoisseurs, beauty gurus, and workout fanatics. 

As expected, her list is full of useless shit like face creams and bubble baths:  not the kind of thing on a Real Man’s list unless he’s buying stuff for his wife / mistress / both.

So without further ado, here is Kim’s Favorite Things List (Part 1 — Part 2 next Saturday) with something for everyone.  Oprah did 109 items;  I will only do 100 because unlike Oprah (who had staff to do all the work), I had to do it all by myself.

Aside:  I’m also 69, so there we have it:  battling lists from two Olde Pharttes.

Oh, and one last thing:  all the items below give me a warm & fuzzy feeling when I look at them:  it’s a “favorite things” list and no more.  (Unless you’re very wealthy, it’s not much good as a Christmas list either — unless of course you’re wealthy and want to indulge yourself.)

Buckle down:  this may take a while, but hey, it’s Saturday:  what else are you gonna do?  Let’s kick off with the spendy stuff (all prices are approximate), and there is no order of preference or cost.  It’s all good.

1. 2002 BMW Z8 (4.9-liter V8) — $212,000

Anyone can have a silly Ferrari, Aston Martin or whatever that breaks all the time, for even stupider money.  But there are only a couple thousand of these Beemers left in the world. (And yes, the hard top is removable.)

2. Mauser M98 Standard Diplomat (in your favorite caliber; mine would be 9.3x62mm) —  $14,700


…with manly iron sights, of course.  The optional companion piece:

3. Kahles K 3.5-18x50mm scope — $3,300
…or, if you’re going to be using your M98 for close-up dangerous game: 


4. Kahles K16i 1-6×24 3GR Reticle — $2,200

5. Annual Range Membership (your choice) — $600-$25,000
(This is Texas Defensive Shooting Academy — TDSA — but whichever is closest to you.  Dallas Gun Club, FYI, costs $25,000 per annum last time I looked, and there’s a two-year waiting list.)

6. African Hunting Safari (flight, luxury lodge accommodation only;  add $10,000 for several small-game license fees, up to $35,000 for lion, buffalo etc.) — $15,000 per person

7. Handmade shoes from Ludwig Reiter (Vienna) — $660-$1,200
 
Buy once, wear for life.

8. Matched pair of shotguns (links in pics) — $40,000-$$tupid
 
…for those of the “Over and Under” persuasion.  But for the more civilized amongst us:

9.  Classic watch (e.g. this Omega Genève from the 1970s) — ~$2,000-$5,000

  You may have to search around, but the search is part of the fun.

10.  Sickafus Montana  Shearling Coat — $1,700

Unless you live in the tropics.

11. Martin D-35 Standard Dreadnought Acoustic Guitar — $3,500

Possibly the best-sounding off-the-shelf acoustic ever made.

12. Saddleback Hardside Suitcase — $1,000

13. Zeiss Victory RF 10×54 Rangefinding Binoculars — $4,000

14. Browning Buck Mark Medallion Rosewood .22 LR Pistol — $600

Add the Vortex red-dot scope, for $300

15. Mini-Moke Classic Electric — $30,000
Yeah I know, it’s a damn Duracell car;  but I’d make an exception for this one.

16. Rhino Ironworks Gun Safe — $6,000

Ugly as hell;  but how cool is it…?

17. Chiappa Firearms Kodiak (.45-70 Govt) — $1,750

18. Leathercraft Conner Recliner — $5,000

19. Winnebago Solis Pocket Camper — $150,000


Don’t need much more than that, really.  We are not rock stars.

20. Canon EOS R6 Mark II — $2,500

21. London’s Lights (Leonid Afremov, 60″x40″) — $900

22. Longines Avigation — $2,700

23. DW Collector’s Series Purpleheart Drum Kit — $9,000

…add over a grand when you add the cymbals, stands, bass drum pedal and stool.  All worth it.

24. Hacker-Craft Destroyer — $375,000

I’m not even a Boat Person, and I love the look of this thing.

25. Karl Hauptmann Double Rifle (.375 H&H Mag) — $40,000

26. Angora Executive Desk — $25,000

 27. 1972 BMW 1602 (1600 cc 4-Cyl. 4-Spd manual) — $20,000

Before Beemers got really fuuuugly.

28. Nord Stage 3 88-Key Keyboard — $5,500

29. Beretta Mod 74 Target (.22 LR) — $850

30. Orient-Express: Paris to Istanbul — $20,000 (per person)

That’s the cost of the Grand Suite;  smaller cabins are (not much) less.

31. 1997 Land Rover Defender 110 — $66,000

32. Mesa/Boogie Fillmore 50-watt Tube Combo Amp — $2,700

33. Seychelles Vacation (Four Seasons Mahé) — $15,000/week

Excludes flights.

34. Five-Rifle Set — $1,200

Every so often, J&G puts one of these deals together and at the price, they’re an utter bargain.

35. Breitling Transocean Day & Date — $3,500

…or you can drop an extra $5,000 and get it in gold.

36. Mont Blanc Meisterstück Around the World in 80 Days LeGrand Fountain Pen — $1,000

37. CZ 457 Varmint MTR .22 LR — $850

Same hole, all day long.  And for its glass:

38. Trijicon Huron 2.5-10×40 30mm BDC — $700

39. Fazioli F308 Concert Grand Piano — $290,000

To my ears, the best-sounding grand piano of them all.

40. Viking River Cruise:  Amsterdam – Vienna — $7,500 (per person)

41. Fender Precision Fretless Bass — $2,500

My #2 choice for a bass guitar.

42. Wiesmann MF4 Roadster / GT — $150,000

…if you can find one, that is.

43. FN 49 Luxembourg Contract (.30-06) — $2,100

Shoots smoother than a Garand.  Still regret losing mine in the Brazos.

44. Stetson El Amo Premium 500x — $1,100

45. Driven Pheasant Shoot (UK) — $1,200/day

Assumes a 20-bird tally per shooter. Ammo, food, booze etc. not included.

46. Colt Single Action Army 3rd Gen. (.45 Colt) — $5,000

47. Roland JC-120 Jazz Chorus Stereo Amp — $1,250

… unchanged since the 1970s, it’s one of the longest-lasting and most popular guitar amps ever, and deservedly so.  As is the next one:

48. Fender ’68 Custom Twin Reverb Amp — $1,800

One of the cleanest-sounding guitar amps of all time.  Except when you don’t want it to be, and then it gets dirtier than Miley Cyrus on a Saturday night pub crawl.

49. Longshore Tides Dolores Bar Cabinet — $4,500

50. 1975 Rickenbacker 4001S — priceless

Why is it priceless?  Because that’s mine, is why.

Next week, the “budget” 50 favorite things.