Big Country Expat

Greetings and Salutations!
OK.
The ‘Grrrr’ part of the story. The gauges showed up today from Reamer Rental. As promised, it was a set of ‘Go’/’No Go’ gauges in 7x57mm:

Now… you can guess what happened….

Hence the ‘Grrrr’ in the title.

Problem is I’m hesitant to call this a complete failure.

My rationale for this is the red gauge as you see is plainly marked both with red paint, as well as the specifications of the gauge itself. The ‘theoretical Go gauge’ has NO paint and no markings.

Now granted they’re damned near the same size and all, but my worry is that the ‘Go’ gauge here is a field gauge. Field gauges are used, as they’re named in the field for a ‘rough estimate’ of “Is it safe to use this thing or not?” sort of situation. That’s the gauge I got for the Lee Enfield, and as I found, close enough is good enough, leastways speaking on the Lee Enfield.

Now on the ‘Unmarked Gauge’ it passed no problem. It seated nicely, the bolt closed w/no issue and hey, Good to go.

The problem or I should say in my personal experience is what happened with the obvious and well-marked ‘No Go’ gauge. I fed it into the chamber, closed the bolt, and about midway into closing the bolt, it caught. Got a wee bit hung up. Which is what a No Go gauge should do.

Then it ‘broke’ without too much resistance, and closed completely on the gauge.

Hmmn.

According to specs, the No Go gauge should not be able to close like that. However I’ve seen ‘close but not close enough’ gauging like this to make me think it might be ‘In Spec’ at least for now. I’m going to see when the new bolt gets here and if the same issue pops up, well then, I’ll play it by ear.

Either way, it’s getting the string test out at Cowboys in the very near future.

If it doesn’t blow up, then Huzzah!
If it does? Well hey I tried.

And then moving on to the next point of business.

Everyone who’s been closely following the Krain Situation has been wondering WTF is going on. The ‘usual suspects’ have been on and on and on about how the Russians are s-l-o-w-l-y working their way West. They take the lack of speed as if this was some sort of sign that the Russians are still on the ‘back foot’ when in reality, they’re going slowly because they can.

I’m not going to argue numbers, as every asshole has an opinion. The thing of it is, lately even the High Command in the Krain are screaming about the lack of bodies left to harvest to stuff into the Front Lines, and that if things don’t change, they’re utterly fucked within six months.

As far as Russian Numbers go, put it into perspective. Per the Goolag AI: “According to most historical records, around 8.7 million Russian soldiers (part of the Soviet Union) died during World War II, though some estimates place the number slightly higher, with the majority of these deaths occurring on the Eastern Front against Nazi Germany.”

That was from June 22, 1941 until the end of the war, with the fall of Berlin in May 2, 1945. That’s about 1410 days +/- from the start of the German invasion of Russia, until the end of the Battle of Berlin.

Russia invaded the Krain on February 24, 2022. As of today, that was 1072 days ago +/-, with it still ongoing.

8.7 MILLION KIA.
In a slightly longer timeframe
A profligate use/waste of manpower.
And back then, the Russians could afford it.
These days? Not so much. After WW2, and the various ‘issues’ population-wise (birth/death rate) Russia does not have the manpower to waste like Stalin did. Putin is going for ‘conservation of force/power’ IMO. It also keeps the ‘regular folks’ from getting too antsy about combat losses, especially when one realizes how truly massive the landmass of Russia is. People in Moscow probably rarely hear about “Siberian DotMil Member Casualties” and vice-versa amiright?

These days, I should say, Russia as a whole over all? They do have the manpower available but VodkaManBad prefers not to utilize it, as, for now, it’s not an existential issue.

BUT
If it were?
I guarantee VodkaManBad would have no problem reinstating a full on draft and putting a metric fuckton of cannon fodder in boots if needed. As of now? They’ve had all the volunteers they need, enough to equip six divisions. That are all currently in reserve. That doesn’t count the ‘regular’ 18 divisions they have at the ready.

To give you an idea, the entirety of the US Army, in total is 10 active duty divisions and a total of 8 National Guard divisions available. And that’s a best case scenario.

According ‘good sources’ including some I know personally, they say that the Russians have had about 450,000 to 600,000 Killed and Wounded in total IRL. The KIA for the Rus is about 450k+/- which are the plus/minus the real numbers that the professionals have figured out.

This in comparison to the Krainians, who as of now, and utilizing some of the same exact sources, in addition to some unclassified NRO pics of the expansion of Military Graveyards in the Krain, there’s the possibility of upwards of a million dead and wounded on the Krainian side. Call it 750-800k dead. Wounded? About 200-350k+/-. A lot of that from numbers from various prosthetic companies providing new arms and legs to the Krainians…

That’s a 2 or 3 to 1 ratio.

And if you decide to add in POW exchanges, and go by the corpse-exchanges, the numbers increase dramatically regarding the number of Krainian dead. Like 15 to 1. Prisoner exchanges run about the same at about 15-25 to 1 (Krainian to Russian). The problem is that no one on the Krainian side can afford to let the IRL numbers out, at all.

‘Cos that’d be a hangin’ for Krainfeld and his Klown Krew.

Hell, officially, they still claim only 60000 KIA!!!

In fact as of late, there’s been quite a bit of ‘leakage’ regarding MASSIVE protests of ‘regular Krainian’ women’ protesting “What happened to our men?” as many of them have had no word from their husbands/brothers/kinfolk in over a year. Whereas in Russia, where OUR media, the Ministries of Lies and Propaganda have yet to see such events.

Now those who say “Well the Russians are stopping the flow of information!!!” Really?

Please.
Enough with the naivete. A determined reporter these days sure as fuck can get a story out, no matter how hard, just as they did in the much lower-tech world 20 years ago. God know there’s a metric shitpot of ‘roving reporter cams’ out there, as well as everyday folks with cell-phone cams who’d eagerly ‘take up the cause’ and shoot negative vidya of the Russians if it was available. If anything, uncovering such info would be on the front Headlies of every. single. newspaper. in the West in less than 24 hours.

Much like the claims of the ‘meat assaults’ the Russians were supposedly doing, unarmed, with shovels, to no avail towards the Valiant and Upstanding ‘Defenders of Muh Democracy!’ The Krainians. That the ignorant and unarmed ‘orcs’ were butchered in ‘wholesale lots’ by the Krainians. The problem is that in this day and age of Go-Pro and the like? If the Krainians had such footage, it would have been on the International News 24-7 for weeks.

BUT

Alas… no such critter exists.

There -IS- plenty of footage out there of the body-recovery teams, Russian recovery teams, policing up both their own as well as the Krainian corpses from the battlefield. In fact invariably, the majority of the ‘rotting dead’ I’ve seen have been Krainian, not Rus. In fact part of my disgust for the Krainians is that a HUGE amount of video I’ve seen are from Krainians openly abandoning their dead AND wounded as soon as “Mister Drone” starts making a concerted effort to hit them. To me? There’s nothing more dishonorable than abandoning a wounded comrade on the battlefield… and that’s from THEIR videos… never mind the plethora of Rus vids showing the same.

And for those of you who want to say I’m ‘Pro’ VodkaManBad?

Nope. Ain’t got as dog in that particular hunt. I’m just interested in this war from a purely academic point of view. I will admit the tenacity of VMB in holding power the way he has, and how he brought Russia back from the bring of extinction. Otherwise, getting to watch a tech-leap at this level in real time? Priceless.

OTOH: Shit like this has made me exceptionally happy I’m no longer ‘in the game’ as being a unarmored grunt these days?

Hard Fucking Pass thankee very mucho.

Otherwise, the drone warfare has been utterly fascinating. The fact that people utterly refused at first to believe that COTS (Commercial Off The Shelf) Drones were doing what they did, and then the aftereffects of specifically designed drones that were made to bust tanks/bunkers and what have you… the fact that anyone ever believed anything that the Ministries of Lies and Propaganda have been spewing for the past two-three years regarding losses and strengths on each side?

This’s the same exact media who said January 6th was an “Insurrection”. In that “…three to four police were killed in line of duty!” on January 6th. These same exact assholes are telling you that the Krain is ahead and winning numerically????

Which brings me to the commentary from the Head of the Krainian Gestapo, Kiril Budanov, or as I call him “Thugface”:

Yeah… this asshole.

I will say that yes I’m biased AF against this fuck.

IMO He’s evil.

He’s the one who’s been behind a lot of exceptionally shady shit that I have issues with. Considering he even looks like a douche, and acts like it? Yeah, I got nothing for him.

HOWEVER

There was a leak recently from a meeting of the Krainian parliament. Seems Thugface stated, and it was leaked, that “Someone asked him: ‘How much time do we have left?’ He responded, with his signature cold smile: ‘If there are no serious negotiations by summer, very dangerous processes could begin for the very existence of Ukraine.’”

This to me is worrisome.
This is a guy who has pushed for attacking kindergartens.
This is a guy who wants drone production moved to schools (K-12) because it might keep the Russians from bombing them to avoid a bad PR event…
This is a guy who has pushed for the most rabid elements of the Krainians to ‘do their worst’ against Russia and has been a major player so to speak in a huge number of atrocities.

That ‘signature cold smile’ to me is not a normal reaction.

A smile like that, and knowing the type? (Pure Sociopath IMO)

MY worry is this joker has something up his sleeve.

He’s been devious as fuck so far
Downright evil as I said if you’ve been following this war like I have. It makes my hair stand up on end, because not only did I read this in ONE article, but there have been multiple articles that have said that this motherfucker seemed very content in saying that within six months ‘the existence of Ukraine’ is questionable….

Guys like this are fanatics.
THIS fukkin’ guy in particular.

Which makes me personally believe he’s willing to ‘burn the world down’ rather than have the Russians win. Lord knows they’ve (the Krainians) been trying for months (and as of late) have been ramping up the BIG drone attacks on nuclear power plants all over Russia (those that are within range) as well as the ones all over the Krain itself. Big Drones in that they’ve taken to using Cessna sized Aircraft, rigged for remote control, and packed with HE.

IMO that’s fucking madness either way…
…the Krain already lost HOW many thousands of square miles due to Chernobyl going ‘full retard’ and yet assholes like this guy and his fucking ilk are actively trying to have a repeat performance!?!

So forgive the hyperbole, but when a guy with the ‘yank’ this asshole has goes and says with a self satisfied smirk that “…in six months nothing will matter” (which is how I read it) that shit makes me feel like that’s ‘nervous-making’…

I mean there’s been rumors for a loooong minute that all the Krainian Nukes (the Russian ones stationed in the Krain back in the day) were not accounted for? Yeah… this asshole worries me. He’s just fucking whacked enough to do something that fucked up.

Anyways.
Food for thought.
Yours in the comments. Am I wrong? My intel-analysis antenna is buzzing, so let me know what you think.

More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
Well, call me a ‘convert’ on Brownells Aluma-Hyde II. I like the way the stuff works overall. A few gripes, but the outcome was really above what I had expected. After putting up the last post, I figured out how I could do the barrel and receiver. I took the long flower-tub I had used to soak the Lee Enfield in the rust cleaner (which had been drained) and then took a cleaning rod to use to suspend the whole thing over the tub so as to catch the overspray.

Then I had to let everything sit for 24-48 hours.
THAT is something I’m not good at. Waiting that is.

So, once I felt I could, I took out the sight bar and removed the tape:

Oh yeah… that came out nicely.
Then I mounted the slider:

I then put the hardware on to the stock, namely the butt plate:

OK, that looks great, and yes, the finish is silky-smooth.
Then it was inspection time of the barrel and receiver as well as the trigger group. I left the trigger group in place as at some point, the pin holding it all together got ‘mushroomed’ a wee too much for easy removal. Since it wasn’t in bad shape at all, and I really didn’t want to drill it out of mess with it, it remained in-situ.

So far, so good.

As I stated, it cause no issue when I did it this way:

“Looking Good Billy-Ray!”

“Feeling Good Louis!”

Indeed.
The final product:

And then the top-down view, including the action:

And then the flip side:

And lastly, from underneath:

So that’s a wrap on that except for the headspacing.
I’m still waiting on the gauges to get here.
Last I checked, they were in Atlanta?
Nope… now in Ybor… so figure Saturday maybe? Then I get them for 3 days, and have to send them back. Theoretically, the second bolt is going to be here tomorrow. I’ll believe it when I see it. If it gets here in the same timeframe, and I can test BOTH bolts out? That’ll work nicely.

So no politics tonight

And I’m not touching the DC Collision until we get some real answers. The only thing I’ll mention is the Aviators who fly for that unit? They’re among the best as they’re responsible for flying the Fat Fuck Perfumed Princes around… so you know the Gen’ruls and Admi-mules aren’t going to chance flying with low-hour Intrepid Birdmen.
Sooooo WTF happened?
Good Question.

So how do you think it came out?
More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
Well Praise the Lord for warmer temperatures! It got up to 66 degrees today, and this means that after work, I was able to start working on getting the FrankenMauser worked on.

Now one of you folks had made mention of Brownells ALuma-Hyde Epoxy coating. I did a little research, and when I went to Brownells, they had a special going on it, namely FREE SHIPPING!

Considering part of the reason I’m not a big fan of Brownells is they (by MY standards) are a bit heavy on the shipping rates. Even the basic rates, for itty-bitty pieces/parts, they tend to positively rape you on the shipping and handling.

But in this case? Free shipping on a can of Matte Black?
(which FYI, it’s still free for now… I took that screenshot right before I started banging this out)

$21 w/FL sales Tax +/-
I read various comments on it. Comparisons between it and the DuraCoat, as well as evaluations of the longevity and other things… Either way, I figured I’d get a can, as unlike the DuraCoat, it doesn’t have an expiration date.

The issue with the DuraCoat “One Can” coat, is that it has a built in activator, and states plainly that you only have 2-3 weeks before it’s no longer viable. You activate it using the red cap in the topper:

By pressing it into the bottom of the can here:

So the other thing that ‘nudged’ me into trying the Aluma was that it has a much lower temperature tolerance, meaning I can use it when it’s colder, whereas the DuraCoat requires 60 degrees plus.

So I started over the past few days taping and prepping the various pieces parts. One of them was the new rear sliding sight bar. I stripped it all the way down, and then taped it up to allow the coating to match up what it should look like. There are so many variants, that it comes down to what the owner wants to do. In this case, the centerline being blackened/blued, and the edges in the stainless like the bolt:

Once I removed it, and taped it up, it was prepped as such:

You can see where I tried to do the ‘heat and beat’ on the old one… I wasn’t happy with the outcome, so the $9 for the new slider (stripped) was worth the price, especially after it cleaned up so well.

The other part that I had reservations over was the butt plate. After my extensive research on all the Spanish Mauser boards, I realized that there were both blued plates, as well as ‘raw’ steel plates. Again, it all depended on the ‘where and when’ the rifle was converted and refinished. I concluded that MY plate was originally blued, so it too got the treatment tonight.

First, I prepped all the pieces parts by giving them a nice ‘bath’ if you will in some carb cleaner/degreaser that has a high evaporation point, so I didn’t have to worry about it being still one the part in a nook or cranny. Then I did a light pre-heat using a ‘baby sized’ heat gun I have before I hit it with the Aluma-Hyde. That also eliminated any left over carb cleaner.

It was now the ‘hold my breath and hope this doesn’t look like shit!’ moment. I laid out all the parts that I was going to hit in a smol-box, and went to town. The results?

Hmmn
SO far I’m very pleased.
I have to flip and move the stock rings and make sure I got all the angles on the trigger guard/mag well… but wow… I’m pretty damned pleased with this stuff so far (that being the key operative words here). Here’s a few close ups:

That’s looking good… might need one more coat…
The sight slider, from what I can see so far too looks good. Provided the tape held and I didn’t have any “bleed through”:

Another thing I did was after I got the parts in to set overnight, is that I again hit them all for about 10 minutes using the heat gun, just to assist in the baking on of the finish. The instructions say that if you really want to do it ‘right, that 3 hours at 195 degrees in an oven will do the trick, but I’m not in -that much- of a rush.

The barrel and receiver are the final parts that need to be done, and I figure tomorrow AFTER I get it gauged, as the Gauges are due to arrive by FedEx in the late afternoon. I don’t want to start working on the receiver, only to find out I have an issue. Better safe than sorry.

I also won a auction on eBay of all places that IF the headspacing is completely hosed, I have a spare bolt coming. I managed to ‘snipe’ that for $55. This is a great thing as the regular ‘buy it now’ pricing is $150+. If I end up using it, and I can get this headspaced, the spare bolt I’ll put up for $100 plus shipping, and I’ll be happy with a lil $25 Profit more or less.

SO thanks for all the comments from you all regarding your favorite weapons. I see a few trends out there in reading them, and some were quite enlightening. One of you asked the -why- of my (and others) love of the 249, so I might have to do another post on it, as I already did a pretty good writeup on it a waaaay long time ago, but hey, why not?

So More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
So besides the one guy who said last nights story was a repeat, there was another comment that made me laugh my ass off:

“Is there any weapon out there that DOESN’T look like a fuckin’ sawed-off Red Rider BB gun in your hands when you hold it?”
Sedition

This was in response to the pic I threw up of me holding my Heckler and Koch MP5-K model. The reason it hit hard was that before I published, I had actually mentioned something about the fact that I made it look like a small handgun as opposed to how a ‘puny stinking human’ would make it look.

I deleted my secondary commentary as it disrupted the flow of the narrative. I do a lot of self-edits when I do the 4-5 time re-reads before I hit publish, trying to make sure there’s no awkward sentence structure, as well as catching misspellings, which is a bitch if the autocorrect doesn’t catch it.

So due to that comment, I figured what the Hell, I’d throw a couple of pics with my favorite weapons I used to roll with. For an ‘unarmed Contractor’ I suuuure as Hell had a really good selection of firepower.

First one up is last nights MP5-K:

I purely loved that lil subgun.
Interesting side note: the MP5 series does not like hollow points. Since I was working on and in the CIF I traded some uniforms and boots to some Special Forces guys who’d been on the ground since BEFORE the actual Invasion, and their clothing and ‘stuff’ was pretty threadbare and wore the fuck out.

They gave me 6 MP5 mags, and about 300+ rounds of genuine Federal Hydrashok 147gn +P HP. It was a good deal all around, and especially for them, as I was told later that they had an ‘Inspector’ of some kind coming around, and they needed to ditch the hollow points, but didn’t want to waste them by shitcanning them outright.

Go figure… Geneva Convention and all…

Then, earlier when we first hit the ground running, one of our first weapons that we (Lil Country and me) shared together was your basic Ak-47, Type One Each:

Yeah, we were fucking around for those pics for back home…
Now I -believe- that it was a genuine early edition Russian made variant. I’m not an AK expert by far. It did (as you can see) have a milled steel receiver with a LOT of mileage on it. That pic was from about April of 2004, as was this:

I told you Lil Country was named b/c of our size difference.

So among many of the ‘deals’ I brokered over the first few months trying to get myself ‘heeled up’ properly, one of the weapons in particular was/is one I still regret not being able to get back to the States:

THAT was Uday Hussiens personal Hunting Rifle.
What or better yet who he used to hunt, I’ll leave that open.

I had this confirmed by the daughter of Saddams Armorer who used to assist Daddy with the cleaning and servicing of the family firepower… She was legit too, as CACI ran the LEP Cell, (the Local Employment Screening cell, responsible for vetting ALL Iraqis who wanted to work on base) and she had a full background check pulled, so yeah, I had in possession back then a rifle of pretty historical significance. (Like Eva Braun’s lil 7.65mm Mauser and the like)

It is, as you can see, A Dragunov SVD in 7.62x51R.
Specifically Crazy Son UDAYS Dragunov.

Lord knows I tried to get it legally imported to the States. I jumped through ALL of the fiery hoops that the DotMil, the ATF, and ALL the other pain in the ass bureaucracies threw in front of me. After 3 months of trying, if you can believe it, it was the fucking State Department Fags who said “No Dice!” as Iraq was still on the ‘no trade import’ list with the US.

What shocked me to my socks was the ATF response?
The Special Agent, whomever he was, put an approval on it, and then a post-it note on the file saying “AWESOME FIND!!!”

Color me completely shocked.
Stunned even

I ended up giving it, as well as the rest of my rather extensive collection over to a buddy of mine from 5th Group when I left at the end of 2006, as the last thing I wanted was to have them destroyed/looted/whatever by anyone after I left. That was actually the basis for my first Charlie Mike Comics story.

And when I say ‘extensive’, well you be the judge:

That was the ‘cream of the crop’ of my collection. There were about another 30-40 AKs and ‘other toys’ stuffed in two wall lockers that didn’t make the cut for the pic.

And yes, the chopped Krink looking AK at the bottom left on the bed was a silver plated AK belonging to Saddams Bodyguards. It was inoperative though due to a cracked bolt where the operating rod screwed in. Someone told me that was from the process of adonizing the silver… I’m not a metallurgist, so I don’t know.

I also on occasion got to fuck around with some DotMil weapons while there. In this case, a basic M-16A2 w/203 mounted under the barrel:

By that time I had gotten in really good shape and even with the PEQ, Aimpoint, and Surefire Tac Light, I was able to one-hand the fucker like Ahhhhh-nuld:

Not a bad sidearm if you can swing it Eh?

Anyways…
Cutting OUT of Iraq, after numerous years of being over there, I came home and became the DotMil Army Reserve Small Arms (Depot Level) Repairman. THIS was a dream job as I got to still play with Military Grade Automatic Weapons. On rare occasions I even got to test fire them. Like when I had to build some Mark-19 Grenade Launchers. An MP unit got 6 brand new ones in, and I never knew this, but they come without the barrel installed!!!

Which meant, per regulations that the guy who put them together was responsible for the first test-firing so that if HE fucked up, He was the one who got blow’d up. So this meant having to go to McDill, drawing some 40mm and testing them. This was me loading one into the van for transport:

It of course went off without a hitch.
I also got to test and play with the NEW M2A1 Browning .50cal Heavy Machine Gun. I never thought they’d improve on John Moses Browning’s (PBUH) design, but they did to a degree. In this case, The M2A1 has a quick change barrel and fixed headspace and timing which eliminated the whole HS&T thing. A good thing, but also a bad thing, as there are STILL basic M2s out there, and new grunts nowadays would have a clue as to do a headspace and timing, nevermind what they need to do it.

84 pounds of “Fuck You”

OF COURSE it takes like the single largest weapon in the DotMil Infantry Small Arms Inventory to look large in my hands, and even then, I’m holding it at ‘port arms’… I’m also one of 4 or 5? guys who, to my intel, to have ever fired the Ma Deuce, offhand (meaning from the hip/off mount) and not lost control and/or dropped it. It was only 5 rounds but still. How cool is that!?! TBH, it bucked like a pure-dee sumbitch!

Lastly, another weapon system I played with/serviced ALLLLL the time was my personal favorite, the M-249 SAW, the squad automatic weapon. I used this to great effect when I was in. Before the SAW became the Infantry ‘go-to’ Machine gun, I was a ‘Pig Gunner’, meaning I used the M-60A1. Unfortunately, those are but a memory now, as they went with the M-240B as a replacement. During that ‘in-between’ time, the SAW became my bestest fren:

Granted that’s a “chopped and lopped” parachutists version, but even then, I make that fucker look teeny. Just like the one I did akchully carry:

I love the SAW.
Love Love LOVE it.
A thirty+ year affair…
Even Gretchen knows a SAW can give her competition LOL!

If I had unlimited ‘Fuck You’ money, there’d be a brace of them here at the Casa. Even then, I’d LOVE to save for even a semi-auto variant, as I just love the thing.
Did I mention I love the SAW?

So yeah, what’s YOUR favorite weapon you used in the DotMil?
Or even as a Civvie?
Comments welcome below.
And for those of you who say this’s an ego thing, you’re damned right and it IS my blogg after all. Don’t like it? Make your own.

So More Later
Big Country

This one is Mine:

Greetings and Salutations!
Well I’m glad everyone enjoyed the story about the midgets. Per y’all’s comments, it seems that there’s a LOT of other places in the area, to include Afghanistan that ALSO had Dwarven Villages. I mean do you refer to places like that as “The Shire?” What’s the multiple of “Shire” I wonder.

I even got a text from The “Other BC” here in Tampa who got an email from one of the Feral Irishman‘s cronies, Rico, who ALSO contracted overseas. Rico asked The Other BC to forward them to me, and I’m throwing them up here as they ARE appropriate to the subject:

Like I said… pretty appropriate AND cool.

The other pic is this, and I can only guess as to which one is Rico… I’m thinking the guy on the left with the PKM as, to me at least, LOOKS like a ‘Rico’… The guy in the middle I’m guessing is a ‘Terp, and the Big Boi on the right with the AK and Drum Mag? No idea.

Either way, great pics Rico! Appreciate them!

Now, in keeping with the entire premise of some humor, I have ANOTHER humorous story from “The Big Country Baghdad Files.” This one ties into some of the things that OrangeManBad has been up to as of late, and I think y’all will get a chuckle out of it.

Now I started contracting back at the End of 2003. Meaning I got the job, however I had no idea what sort of build up that entailed. Meaning that it wasn’t a “Hey, grab your passport and get on a plane!” Nope. For quite a spell it was like that, but Uncle Sugar in his infinite wisdom of course had to set up a bunch of shit that absolutely positively had to be done before you could set out for the Wild Wild Middle East Shooting Gallery.

The problem stemmed from having to get medical clearance, prove I was who I said I was, and a bunch of ‘other things’ that as far as -I- could tell after the fact were fucking worthless. Like going to the Combat Readiness Center in El Paso at Fort Bliss. Outside of getting my ID card (which I could have done at McDill) and catching one of the chartered “Retired General Officer Airliners” CRC was a fucking two week joke.

I spent the majority of my time either shitfaced and/or hung the fuck over. I mean it was that bad and an absolute waste of money and time. The gear they gave me? I didn’t used one fucking piece of it. Not a damned one. In fact we didn’t get our body armor and helmet until we hit Kuwait FFS. Fun Note: I still have that original Old School K-Pot:

The only thing that is different on this one, is as I had it for SO MANY years, I upgraded the interior first chance I got. That means when the very first interior pad and webbing upgrades became available, I bought them and installed them.

As you can see by the pic, the OLD-OLD original Aramid layered shell is plainly visible. Those pads BTW are old leftovers that were left/found/worn out that I just stuffed in there as I moved the newest and bestest over to each helmet as I ‘upgraded’ the outer shell.

They issued me ONE whole dufflebag filled with the most useless shit imaginable. VALUABLE wasted space as we were only allowed TWO duffs per person. I think that duff spent like the first two years in a connex… I literally never opened it, and when the first contract ended w/CACI I brought it back to Bliss and just -dropped it- at CIF. When they tried to play that “It no clean!!! We no take it!” games with me, I told them “Too bad, so sad, I’m not in your fuckin’ Army anymore, so you fucking clean it!” and walked out. Those of you who served are familiar with asshole Civvies who run CIF…

THAT was glorious as I still got my “cleared” stamp, much to the consternation of Ajima and her ilk. (I use the Korean as for some reason, damned near all the CIFs I ever went through in the DotMil were run by Korean dependas which is also why it was broken ‘Engrish’ in what they said).

Anyways.

So… I finally made it to Iraq.
It took a looong minute, but I made it there. The Comedy of Errors of the First Night in Baghdad is worthy of it’s own post. At some point I might get around to telling later, but I and Lil Country, along with a cast of characters right out of a B Grade Spy movie arrived.

Officially my job was “Logistician”

In reality?
I was a bodyguard/recoverer of lost items/scrounger/thief as well as whatever else my Boss handed me as he felt like having us do. We worked for a Chief Warrant 5, which back then was rarer than rare.

We used to call them “The Tetris Cubes” The old CW5 was 4 Hollowed Out Cubes, instead of that silver bar with a line.

A side story:

Our Heap Big Chiefy-Chief, and yes I’d call him that to his face (he’s the one who hung the Big Country name on me, and FYI he was cool as Moose Piss on a January Morning in the Artic Circle), was one of the OG CW5s. When the DOD changed to the new rank badge, he had to fly back to Sodom on The Potomac for the ceremony, as well as brief the JCoS of just how the supply game was running in the AOR, as he was the Theater Property Book Officer… the head motherfucker in charge of ALL property books in the theater.

When he got back?
I saw the rank, and he looked pretty salty.
Lil Country broke the ice and asked, “Hey Big Chief, izzat the new rank badge?” He scowled and started muttering to himself as much as us something about “…hate that fucking thing…mumble grumble.” and told us that yeah it was, and he hated it.

Me being me? I blurted out the first thing that came to mind: “Damn Chief, I don’t blame you… You look like a cancelled 2nd Lieutenant!!!”

His eyes bugged out rather impressively.
Because of that, I thought he was going to kill me, but I think it ‘clicked’ and he suddenly started laughing his ass off and said “Big Country, you nailed it!“
Whew.

THEN he told us he had a new assignment for us.
Uh Oh.
Maybe I did shoot my mouth off one too many times…

The new gig: Oversee the construction and rehabilitation of two warehouses in Area 51 on VBC proper to be the first CIF in Baghdad. A CIF is a Central Issue Facility… all the uniforms, gear, armor, “stuff” was going to be issued to troops from there to save on the potential danger of having to travel back to Kuwait via convoy and such. Reason being this was July of 2004, and the Haj were getting really good at blowing up our convoys.

Needless to say, it was a hot, dirty job. We worked in connexes filled with gear, sort and size what was what, from what and where it would eventually go. 120 degrees in the sun, and the inside of a container was about 40 degrees hotter if you can believe it. Lethally hot if we weren’t careful:

Let me tell you, I lost that gut pretty damned quick working in that heat. Uniforms, boots, belts… we had it all. For a scrounger it was a dream come true as well, as it was ALL OURS!

Now, the facility itself.
Unfortunately those earliest pictures are lost to time. The warehouses we got were tin-roofed beat to hell empty GIANT warehouses that were left over from Saddam’s Mint, and where the ink and paper had been stored according to Rumor. No idea as to the veracity of that rumor, but the MPs lived in the Mint Building which was just a ‘ways over yonder’ from us, so maybe? Essentially we had a floor, 4 walls and a shot-to-shit roof. This is an ‘in progress’ pic that I took August 24, 2004 according to the data:

Now, you see that roof?

The original roof was a literal tin roof, rusted.

Plain, rusty metal. Gray in color. Part of our job was to get our workers:

To replace the roof.
As well as install/build ALL the ‘other stuff’ over a period of months.

Now, bossing a gang of Haj who don’t speak English isn’t without it’s issues. They were nice enough fellows, and all vetted and theoretically cleared from being ‘bad guys’. We had the architect/Head Haji Mohamned, who was our Straw-Boss Haj:

There on the left with one our NCOs, Sgt G.
Miss you G!
Now, the new roof as you see it is made up of aluminum sandwich panels. Much like seen below:

We went with this due to availability, and the insulation factor, as we ended up air conditioning BOTH of those GIANT warehouses. Each warehouse ended up with like 8 AC Units in each, and actually kept the temp tolerable.

Now anyone who’s ever worked with Iraqis know that there’s a few quirks you have to deal with. One is they’re damned child-like in their fucking around while they work. Lots of pranks, lots of tomfoolery. My attitude was it was all good unless it started causing problems. Another was pig-ignorance. LITERALLY zero higher education unless we were dealing with Mo our Haji-Pusher. Mohamned had a degree in architecture from Baghdad University, and spoke very good English. He was also a former soldier who did his two years mandatory for Saddam when he was 18 before THIS war, but AFTER the First Gulf as a Sapper.

So he could chew some ass like a good soldier should when we needed him to. Unfortunately I have no idea what happened to him in the long run. Nice guy. Hope he made it. He was also a great straw boss/pusher. Just to be dicks, we got him addicted to bacon and sausage just for fun by feeding him breakfast in the AM, and when he found out, he was like “Cool! Wish I had known about this before!” He started asking for ‘Infidel Meat’ whenever he could… go figure.

So a couple of weeks/months went by. One day, as construction was going on, and the Haji were up on the roof scurrying around, replacing the tin sheeting with the sandwich panels, a truck pulled up that we didn’t recognize. Big US Ford pick up. A largish American Male got out, wearing a construction helmet, safety orange vest, and carrying a clip board. He started bellowing “Who’s in charge here!!! I need to speak with whomever is in charge of this circus right now!!!”

Uh Oh Part Two.

Lil Country and I looked at each other, and since we were obviously had to deal with this guy, as we were the ones in charge, he said “I got this.” He knew that if -I- interacted with him, the odds were that bad things might happen. He usually was the ‘politician’ out of the two of us, and I was reserved as the ‘muscle’ should the need arise. Lil Country was known as such as he was a lot smaller than me:

Add on that back then my tolerance for bullshit was in a constant negative state, and since it was Baghdad 2004, killing someone wasn’t the issue as much as hiding the body. Even then, stashing a corpse wasn’t hard, just hard work in that heat… anywho… This was my regular work wear back then:

As you can also see, I had burned off a LOT of weight in 3 months, gotten swole, and had a great tan.
The attitude?
Dangerous
“Do Not Annoy”

So LC went to deal with this guy. I went and found Mo, and told him to stand by, make sure our guys were ready for whatever play we had to make, and to just roll with the punches. (“Get the tarps and the bleach!”)

LC then motioned me over all mad-like (never a good sign) and introduced me as such: “This asshole here claims that he’s from OSHA and said he’d shut us down, as our guys don’t have safety gear while working on the roof!” LC was getting really irate… I knew him that well. Said asshole started getting all affronted, and started to open his mouth, when I held up my hand, and literally said “Not a word.” shutting him down before things could escalate.

Now… mind you, the guy was right. Our Haj were running around barefoot on the roof, (literally running mind you) without a care in the world. That’s another thing about working with them, is their inherent fearlessness which I attribute to their religion that if Allah wants them to fall to their deaths, then they fall to their deaths. If not? It is as Allah wills it, Insh’Allah.

So the reason I kept my cool and interceded, with my rationale is LC never got heated, especially under these sort of circumstances, so I knew it was time to play it straight. I also wasn’t letting this asshole be an asshole, and I needed to take control of the situation, as I had no idea what sort of ‘juice’ this fool had. I also kept thinking was OSHA???? What in the blue-balled FUCK is OSHA doing here in fucking Bahdad!!!???!!!

OSHA: Per wiki: “The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA; /ˈoʊʃə/) is a regulatory agency of the United States Department of Labor that originally had federal visitorial powers to inspect and examine workplaces.”

As far as -I- knew, OSHA’s mandate was stateside… no one told US that OSHA had any claim to our turf…

I turned to said aforementioned asshole and introduced myself as Big Country, and then asked him WTF was he on about? He started in on quoting regulations, safety and allllllll the ‘usual bullshit’ one has found here in Construction sites here in the States. I pointed out “Warzone duh!” and (as far as I knew) complete lack of jurisdiction for him, over us, my Haj, Hell… anything and everything we were doing. I think I even asked if he was retarded at one point… I mean we’d been working with these guys for months, and when Mo said something was a bad idea we generally listened. This was “The Iraqi Way” of doing things… Now Mo who’d been listening in started muttering “Oh sheeet, Oh sheeet!” as he started worrying the way the conversation was heading.

So this supercilious prick really seemed to think he had the power here, so I decided to try a different tack. I called Mo over to be part of the conversation, and asked him “Mo, do we have safety harnesses, ropes and gear like that available?” Mo got this look of horror on his face and started stammering “Yes, Big Country, but is bad idea, very very bad idea!”

Under stressful moments, Mo’s English started to break down to a more-broken variant than when he was mellow.

OSHAPrick heard this, and then decided to try and gain the upper hand “Then why aren’t those workers using it? If I don’t see them in safety gear in the next ten minutes, I’m shutting this whole operation down, and launching a formal investigation!!!” he declared.

Mo, ever the worry-wart: “Oh sheeet! Oh Sheeet! Oh Sheeet!”

Mind you, Shut us down?

Suuuuuure buddy. I started wargaming it, thinking of ‘…how after I shoot you in the head, my workers are going to wrap your corpse in a tarp, throw your dead ass in a Connex, which we’ll then seal with a “Classified Equipment” marker on it, and have it sent to Thule or some other remote location without the proper paperwork, where the connex will languish in a frustrated cargo yard there until probably 2027, and when someone does open it, you’ll have been ‘Missing/Presumed Dead’ for so long, ain’t no one gonna care mister now-dead OSHAPrick.’

This thought made me grin like a Cheshire Cat.

OSHAPrick seemed to take a different meaning from the grin, and said “So you’ll do it?” I broke my reverie and said “Ab-so-LUTELY! No need for any unpleasantness!!! (the inner voice saying: “Yet.”)” I told Mo to “…go break out the safety gear, and get it to the guys post haste!!!”

Mo on the other hand kept saying “Oh sheeet, oh sheeet, bad idea, very very VERY bad idea! and muttering various imprecations in Arabic I assume on OSHAPrick and his life…
“No arguments Mo! This guy is now in charge of safety! Do what he said!” For the briefest ‘Mo’ment, I think he got where I was going with this. He dutifully went and grabbed a Haj who wasn’t on the roof, and had him and another break out a VAST assortment of what looked like climbing gear.

Mo called down the roof-guys, who then grabbed it all up and they gleefully started putting it on. THAT should have been a big Red Flag for OSHAPrick. To me, knowing and having worked with these guys, I knew this was leading to something fucked up. I had no idea what, but I knew it was going to good/bad. Probably good for us, but bad for the OSHAPrick. Mo kept muttering to me “Fucking children… Workers are like fucking children! We just gave them new toy! Sheeet!!!” I told Mo to calm his jets, and I then told OSHAPrick he could come back inside of a hour, and re-evaluate the situation. He then packed up with a smug look on his face, and told us imperiously that he’d be back!

What-Evz dude.

It didn’t take long.

In that big ole pile of various harnesses, helmets and ropes, there were bungee cords. BIG thick bungees. The kind they use on a job like this to lessen the impact of a fall-from-great heights.

What the Hajis did was one of them would ‘harness up’ and snap onto one of the bungees. He’d then have 4-5 guys go to the other side (downward slope) of the roof and hold the other end of the bungee cord, opposite from where he’d do his ‘Derring-do of Death Defying’ and then he’d jump up, and slide down the roof (at speed mind you,) and OFF the fucking roof, to have the bungee “sproing” him back up onto the roof. Good Times and Great Fun considering how much laughter and giggling we heard coming from them. Mind you the pic above has smol buildings on the side of the Warehouse built up… back then they hadn’t been constructed yet, so there was nothing stopping them from going over the side for a distance.

Mo was damned near apoplectic over this. He was worried about wasting time, and that allowing these shenanigans long term might cause problems. I told him to relax, and enjoy the show.

About 30 minutes later, a now-familiar truck pulled back into the yard, and maaaan… Shock, horror, and disbelief ALL on the same face, at the same time. Lil Country and I at the time were leaning against our truck, grading the jumps on duration and distance. We gave points for distance, style and grace, and negative points if they failed to nail the landing back ON the roof cleanly… and having to be lowered to the ground for failing to make the bounce back up was an instant DQ.

So whilst we were fucking around, OSHAPrick bailed from the truck and came positively sprinting up to us and started sputtering and generally being utterly incomprehensible. He was literally trying to scream, all the while choking on saliva that I -think- would have come out as ‘outraged spittle’ had he not been so utterly discombobulated.

Lil Country said again “I got this.” and went over and held his hand up in a vague imitation of me, and said “Well, you got what you wanted. We tried to tell you. Our Head Haj tried to tell you as well. WE don’t speak the lingo, and I’m sure you don’t either, and since you didn’t listen to Mo, our Haji Pusher, he’s all moody now, and doesn’t want to translate as you made him all moody-like. So since YOU done fucked up, and didn’t listen to people who know how things are done here, Why don’t you fuck off, and keep fucking off and we’ll go back to working the way things are done here in Iraq as opposed to wherever the fuck you came from?” I just stood there behind LC being large and glaring.

Gotta say, he never said a word.
He just slumped his shoulders, and went back to his truck.
I think we broke him.
Never saw his ass again. EVER. In fact when I say that, mid to late 2004, Victory Base was small and you’d get a feel for seeing the same faces daily of who lived there. We never saw him again.

And like so many OTHER useless Federal Agencies in the gunsights of OrangeManBad, OSHA should be on the chopping block. Per the wiki (which ain’t zigzactly a bastion of Right Wing thought) even said: “A New York Times investigation in 2003 showed that over the 20-year period from 1982 to 2002, 2,197 workers died in 1,242 incidents in which OSHA investigators concluded that employers had willfully violated workplace safety laws. In 93% of these fatality cases arising from willful violation, OSHA made no referral to the U.S. Department of Justice for criminal prosecution. The Times investigation found that OSHA had failed to pursue prosecution “even when employers had been cited before for the very same safety violation” and even in cases where multiple workers died. In interviews, current and former OSHA officials said that the low rates of criminal enforcement were the result of “a bureaucracy that works at every level to thwart criminal referrals. … that fails to reward, and sometimes penalizes, those who push too hard for prosecution” and that ” aggressive enforcement [was] suffocated by endless layers of review.”

IE they don’t do shit, except suck up massive tax dollars ($26,563,600 in Fiscal Year 2020 alone, and they’re complaining it’s NOT ENOUGH!) doing jack and shit. If there was ever a bureaucracy that needed to die, it’s this one. And that investigation was from 2003. Just how much more worthless could it be? I shudder to think. Never mind what the current bloated budget is….

We also never got an answer on just the “Who/How/Why” of OSHA being on the Victory Base Complex and thinking they had some form of jurisdiction over anything anyone was doing at the time? Believe you me, we asked everyone as we still wanted to crush this Assholes nuts… nothing ever came of it tho… So I’ll just chalk it up to one of those fucked up “Forget it Jake, it’s Baghdad” things I guess…

So hope you dug that one too. I get some chuckles bringing up these old memories. I hope you laughed like I did.
More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
Not sure where you are, but here? Still cold ’round here but not so bad as it was the past few nights. Theoretically it’s supposed to get colder overnight than it’s been all week, but since it’s the Ministry of Lies and Propaganda’s Weather Folks, like the rest of the media, they all lie, and I no longer believe them.

Either way, everyone here at The Casa has their respective snuggies on until further notice. It’s still too cold for my liking.

So because of this, and the current insane workload at People’s Glorious Tractor Factory 561 (this week at least) I’m still happily out of the loop on recent events.

And on that, I started talking (or I should say emailing) Mark Baker who is the illustrator of the Charlie Mike Comic series. For those new here, Mark Baker is a retired Master Sergeant who is pretty well known in DotMil circles for his “Pvt. Murphy” cartoons which were published in the Army Times newspaper for 14 years. He and I collaborated on two stories for his Charlie Mike Comics, which you can find on the ‘Zon.

The first story with me in it was this one:

The link to get a copy is here: https://amzn.to/4hxuNQ5
And you’re damned right I get a taste. I’m a co-author. That was Volume One, Issue One.

The next where I was literally the cover-boy:

This one came out in October of 2022. The link to it is here: https://amzn.to/4jrmbfn The story was about some real shit that went down when I was in Arifjan and dealt with some for-real spooks/specters/ghosts/spirits/whathaveyou. Some of those vehicles were most definitely haunted. Mark used a bit of hyperbole when illustrating one of the pages, stealing a scene from “Heavy Metal: The Movie” It’s great.

Problem is, as much as I love Mark, he suffers from what I can tell is “Look! Squirrel!” issues. He jumps around from project to project like a mad man. Charlie Mike as of late has been sort of on the back burner.

But since I got to thinking about the Good/Bad Ole Days, I relayed a story to him, which I’ll retell here tonight, which had him highly interested in getting another CMC book out. I sure as hell hope he does, as it is a part of the retelling of the true stories of Iraq and Afghanistan from the soldiers perspectives.

Better to get them while memories aren’t too shot IMO.

In this case, I can’t remember what triggered the memory, but when it hit, I just knew it’s be a great CMC illustrated story. You be the judge.

As you may/may not remember I was the Operations Guy for CACI and we ‘ran’ Abu G.  I went there pretty frequently on support/inspection tours.

This segway is b/c it opened up a FLOOD of memories, one of which is hilarious from my twisted POV.

I went out to Abu Ghraib sometime in and/or around May? of 2005. It was our standard quarterly or sooner resupply/check on the guys/gals and make sure things were as good as they could be, considering where they were working. The Abu G scandal had already broken loose, so there was a lot of trepidation and tip-toeing going on when it came to our Interrogators and ‘Terps.

So there I was… Copping a smoke outside in the main courtyard. While I was out there a Marine 10 Ton came in. For those unfamiliar, the Corps has what looks like a Deuce-and-a-Half on steroids. Instead of a 2.5 ton, or a 5 ton, this fucker is, as stated a 10 Ton!

A BIG honking truck.
In this case, it came in hauling people. When I looked closely it was hauling what LOOKED LIKE a fucking TON of children!

To say I was baffled is an understatement.

I saw a Marine who was obviously awaiting this arrival, and asked the Lance who was standing by, waiting on the convoy I believe I said to him quote: “Just what in the ever-loving fuck are we doing bringing kids into this fucking place Lance??? This ain’t no place for kids and for fucks sakes… after the last shitshow??? We’re still trying to unfuck that situation!”

Mind you I was carrying a GS-14 ID card… that’s an equivalent to the military rank of O-5, or Lieutenant Colonel.  I mean I was management right? I usually never flexed like that, but seeing a truckload of kids being brought into Abu G? OOOOOH that was soooo potentially/catastrophically bad-bad... or at least so I thought…

His answer knocked me right the fuck into the Weirdness Zone.

The term I’ve always used is “Professionally Chagrined” to describe the look on his face… it’s the only way to describe it.

Embarrassed even…

“They’re not kids sir……………………..”
(Big Hesitant Pause)
“They’re dwarves.”

Queue my jaw hitting the ground.

Whiskey. 
Tango.
Foxtrot.
Over???

The reveal:
Seems outside of Taji as I recall (20+ years so don’t hold me to it) The Haj had a Ville that consisted strictly of Dwarves.  As being physically handicapped, this of course was a Curse from Allah so they were shunned and completely ostracized.  Islam being all so tolerate and loving right?

Riiiiiight.

Because of their handicaps, and being ‘Cursed by Allah’ and outright rejected by society at large, and since Taji(?) had a large enough ‘cluster’ of inherent Dwarfism, the poor little fuckers, Male and Female alike, formed up their own to-scale Ville and eked out a living as best they could.

Despite things sucking, they made it work pretty well from my understanding. Up until the “Resistance” kicked off. Not that the Resistance fucked with them, but just as everything everywhere started to suck in General, Iraq Wide.

Seems the US troops had heard of this Ville, but never confirmed it, and the other locals in Taji never spoke of it, as they were apparently an embarrassment maybe? My understanding is it was a ‘local urban Iraqi legend’ that the US Intel kids had heard of but never confirmed. That was up until in May of 05, when the AQI kids detonated a IED that kil’t a Marine close by. 

The Marine Battalion Commander was PISSED and put out word that ANY and ALL males over the age of 14? 16? (can’t remember) in like a ten mile radius from the bombing site was to be rounded up and transported to Abu G for a full-on interviewing and interrogation.

It seems that the Dwarf Ville was inside that circle.

Marines Being Marines…

Marines follow orders no matter how retarded, so….

We ended up with 50-60 fucking midgets on the back of a Ten Ton in Abu G.  Watching the Jarheads unload them from the back was hilarious, as it was like them grabbing oversized grocery bags with lil legs, and handing them down daisy-chain style.  Once on the ground, their blackout hoods were removed, and they were given a bottle of water.

The problem was the IED in Question?
It was like a 500 Pound Fucking Aerial Bomb that went off according to the EOD kids.

The entire Population of the Ville of Dwarves probably couldn’t have moved something like that easily. There were about 152 of them in that Ville, IN TOTAL including wimmenz and childerenz from my understanding, so, No Colonel, I don’t think the midgets had anything to do with your Marine being kil’t.

Now I had been present for a LOT of detainee round ups. 

Like I said, I was in and out of Abu G quite a few times. As well as the various Detention Facilities in and around Baghdad, and actually assisted in capturing (by accident mind you) an infiltrating Fedayeen Saddam terrorist on Camp Victory once. (Another story for another time.) So I had some experience in seeing the various reactions of local folks who’d been ‘hemmed up’ by the DotMil.

The usual look on the detainees was just like “OK… this sucks but it is what it is…”

To the Hardcore “I hate America and Americans with the passion of a Million Burning Suns and Swear Vengeance on them by Allah, PBOH!!!”

To the “Whatever… at least I’m not being hassled by the wife” looks. 

Believe it or not, MOST of the dudes were obviously happy to be away from the drudgery of the Daily Bullshit and/or their wives… Iraqi broads were Hell on Wheels to their menfolk behind the scenes… don’t let that whole “Patriarchal Islamic Bullshit” brainwash you…

Now
The midgets?
OMFG.

Field Triiiip!!!

They were THRILLED to be there.  

Now mind you a few of them had other congenital defects like a lil bit of Tardyness, or Downs, but overall, they were in a GREAT MOOD as they NEVER got to go ANYWHERE never mind to “the Big City”.  You have to see it from their perspective. EVERYONE outside the Ville shits on them, they’re NOT on the “Cool Kid List” and they generally had to stay inside of the perimeter of their Ville, lest they be victimized.
This shit?
It was one big Adventure that they were loving.  Waving at the Joes, smiling… generally having a blast.  It was sooooo Outer Limits you can’t even imagine…

I know it melted my cortex for sure.

And once they got them all dismounted, organized and ready, they single file started marching them into the DIF for processing…  I was fucking barely keeping it together… 

But me being the asshole I am, that’s when I started doing the first thirty seconds of Metallica’s “Frayed Edge of Sanity.” It’s best know as that these days (which is the reference I gave the Jarheads, but it dates back to “The March of The Winkies” from “The Wizard of Oz” (30 Seconds in)

“Oh Wee oh!  Ohweeeoh!” out loud…

Repatedly.

The Marines fully lost it, and then got in on it…  Then God as my Witness, some of the Dwarves started trying to do it, but got in the spirit and marched to the beat.

I almost broke a rib laughing.

A Rare Moment of Humor in an otherwise DARK Motherfucking Place. The good news is after all of this shit, the US DotMil as well as the rest of the support elements and Aid Groups running around Iraq at the time had found out as well as confirmed the existence of said-ostracized Ville, and they started getting a lot of much needed support.

Win-Win in my book.

Hopefully Mark can get on telling this story sooner rather than later. I think it’s be an awesome illustrated up myself…

So that’s tonights fun
What say you?
More Later
Big Country

Greetings and BRRRRRR!
Holy Hells it was 33 degrees this morning. SOUTH of Tampa Proper. The record low was 20 degrees in Tampa back in 1962.

Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey.

This A.M. when I went to walk the doggos both of them were not happy. The Sausage Princess usually refuses to go out in shitty wet weather UNLESS as mentioned before that it’s got to be a dire emergency. The Red Hot Chili Pupper doesn’t care if it’s raining or not, but today? Both had enough hydrostatic pressure built up that they absolutely needed to go out.

The Snausage went out and did a world class quick ’emptying’ but surprisingly, she stayed close to the Chili Pupper until she did her biddness. Then we all went in for breakfast. Poor Chili was chilled to the bones and was shivering to beat the band. The Princess was more disgruntled at getting wet, but was a champ shaking off outside as she’s trained to do. I handle her fully off lead these days, and she’s awesome… a great ‘Auntie’ for the pupper. She cuddled up with Chili and the two of them stayed bundled for a bit until they dried out and warmed up.

Got me a good lil pack happening here.

So no progress on the FrankenMauser yet. Like I said it’s cold AF. The great news is that the car is still doing well. The rule now is that we check the weather station inside, and if the temp is below 45 degrees, the car gets an automatic 10-15 minute warmup like I used to do back in NH back in the day.

That apparently has eliminated the issue.
Thank Crom.

On other news… well… I haven’t been paying attention too closely. The Lamentation of The Whammenz and Soybois has been epic, and the meltdown wonderful, but I’m still sort of disappointed by the TikTok ‘bait and switch’. My reasons for that is that I was looking forward to an entire set of morons and worthless eaters committing mass suicide after having their primary means of broadcasting their mental illness eliminated.

As I also stated on GAB about the ban?

“Regarding the TikTok ban: If your business model relies STRICTLY on a outsourced, shady app, which possibly (80/20 odds in favor IMO) is a intel-gathering tool run by and constructed by a defined enemy (Chyyyyyna) of the US as an intelligence gathering apparatus, you’re doing it wrong.

Zero sympathy. Zero anything for those who were soooo short sighted and LAZY to utilize such a thing. Especially as their primary means of generating income. TikTok is/was the VERY DEFINITION on a Millennial “Indoor Work/No Heavy Lifting” job that allowed kids to continue their juvenile fantasies, and their “Wannabe Peter Pan Lifestyle”.

VERY low effort “job” if you can even call it that…
Did it work?
Oh absolutely. FAR too many lazy assed retards who have a phone and record ALL their movements during the day in hopes to one day ‘go virial’… The problem is “there’s only so much space at the top” and Influencer Culture has lead to some serious mental health issues in the General Population… my step daughter suffers from Main Character Syndrome, where, because of the 24-7-365 aspect of social media, she genuinely believes that people are watching her like she was Truman on the ‘Truman Show’ and unfortunately, acts that way….

IRL?
Not so much. Who wants to watch the life of a overweight purple haired sub-90 IQ’d chick with bad tats, a ton of piercings, a boat load of mental illness, two kids that the state has taken away (one permanently), and has ZERO prospects, outside of the potential to watch her further ‘crash and burn’?

I got a hunch if they don’t keep the thing, in one form or another, ‘up and running’ shit might go apeshit that much sooner….. @mothersmurfer@Glenfilthie@ArthurSido@JohnWilder ALLL then unmedicated 16-30 something broads, cut off from their “Instant Gratification App?” It’ll be uglier than anything we’ve seen in a looong while IMO”

So yeah, the fact that they turned it back on mere hours after shutting it down? Booooo!!! Hiiiiiss!!! Shut that fucker off and let the fun begin. But then again, there’s the rare possibility that I mean maybe I did hit the nail on the head however…

That ‘they’ (whomever was behind that whole ban movement) realized that they were facing a potentially full on Mental Health Crisis that would make Trump Derangement Syndrome look like mild dementia. I mean according to the stats, in the US alone “There are 272 videos posted every second, 16,000 videos posted every minute, 981 thousand videos posted every hour, 34 million videos posted each day and 707 million videos posted each month on TikTok”

That’s a LOT of potential psychopathic breakdowns there.
59% of American Adults admit to using it at least once a day… and that’s just watching it. If 25% of people are actively poasting to it, and only 5% go full-on gun/knife/bomb wielding cray cray? Based on the US Census numbers in 2024, 5% of the U.S. population would be approximately a potential of 1.68 million motherfuckers going completely off-their-meds batshit insane.

And ONE NY Shooting Luigi freaked out everyone?
Just like Dorner had the entirety of the L.A. Police Department shitting in it’s collective pants?

Personally I think it would have been hilarious.

But I can see the “why” of it.
No one else has seemed to thought of this angle. Not that I’m right but there IS a bit of ‘symmetry’ if you will about my hypothesis. The very last thing they need right now is a metric fuckton of utterly insane folks going on a rampage. I mean they got the Izzys doing that in Lebanon amiright?

SO yeah.
Your thoughts?
Otherwise, ’tis faaar too cold for any more deep thoughts. Here’s a few Memes that cracked me the fuck up this week that I saved for y’all deplorable bastards. Hope you enjoy

And lastly, H/T WiscoDave:

https://t.co/aRsJXW9HL1

— BigCountryExpat (@BigCountryExpat) January 24, 2025

More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
Great News today in one part.
The car?
Looks like it was possibly temperature related.
The error code at AutoZone came up on the reader as P2101 which is either a Throttle Body ($250 for just the part) or the sensor. I woke up this AM and decided that letting it sit overnight might let the gremlins resolve the issue between themselves, and hey…

Whaddya know? It worked.

I also let the car warm up for 10 minutes when I did start it this time since when I ‘coded’ and went into safe mode, I literally had just went outside per normal Floridaman SOP, started the car and drove off.

From personal experience with extreme cold weather living in NH until I was 22, and literally having had the carburetor on my 79 Camaro literally freeze one night when I was on the Mystic River Bridge in high winds (wind chill was like minus 20 that night) at 0200 in the morning, AND that dumbass me forgot to add the fuel antifreeze?

Yep.

I seem to have forgotten that certain mechanical things don’t like the cold. Got me a hunch that the throttle was feeling the cold (for Florida) at 34 degrees and because of that, coded out as the error is between the throttle body and the throttle plate. My hunch is that it was so cold that my pressing on the gas wasn’t necessarily causing the proper reaction so it coded.

So yeah, went to Autozone after warming it up for ten minutes. Inasmuch for myself as it was for me, as again it was cold-cold even for Florida. Then after I got done at AutoZone (the kid there was really helpful and I made sure to tell his manager) when I went out to go home? Stared the car, and lo and behold, the “engine is fucked” light was off and stayed off, and the car was back to normal. I’m going to keep a close watch on it, but like I said, I think the car was grumpy that it was so frikkin cold, and decided it was -done- for that particular cold-assed night.

So whew.
Crisis and Damage to the Bank Account Averted!

Now, as far as the cold?
Well that ALSO is now part of the hold up (besides parts) on doing up the FrankenMauser. DuraCoat needs at least 50 degrees to be able to work, and right now for the past 3 days, we’ve been at less than 40, with maybe a high of 55+/-.

For Florida that’s cold.

I’ve got everything prepped. Sanded/sandblasted and ready. I even came up with a easy and cheap solution for a paint booth as I was wondering just how I can hit this while the pieces are hanging like I did when I used to do Cerakote back in the day. Don’t know if I ever mentioned it but back when I was doing the Contractor Gunsmith thing for the Army, I took on a part-time gig at a local gun store outside of McDill for Shits and Grins.

Looking back at it, it was because I didn’t want to be at the house where things were pretty much unpleasant at the time between me and the X, and the operational excuse was we needed the $$$. That only lasted for a wee bit as the owner was as shady as the day is long. He was a really asshole who had a “III Percenter” tat on his forearm, and constantly talked about his prowess and what he’d do when ‘things finally started’…

Pssh… he was a three year Air Force vet who’s been from what I found an admin clerk. I never said a word outside of the DotMil Armorer gig to him as I -did- ID him as a poser as well as a potential Fedboi… What killed the job was that I quit when I found out that he had had a ND (negligent discharge) in the shop when I was off, and tried to pay off/cover up the shooting, because a guy/customer actually caught a round! Not sure of specifics, but it was bad-bad.

The way I found out was I went in to collect my paycheck, and his wife (who was a total sweetheart) was all spooked and there was a BIG bloodstain in the back room where I worked. Dude wasn’t there, and his wife suggested I make myself scarce as Dude was looking for someone to confirm his alibi, as the ATF as well as the County and Staties were sniffing around. Yep. Fuck that noise folks…

Apparently he didn’t even call an ambulance, and drove the guy to the ER and dropped him off! Fucking gut-shoot a guy ‘cos you’re a moron, and not even do the right thing except to offer money??? Yeah, that’s a HUUUGE piece of shit IMO.

Needless to say, even though they owed me some ducats, I went and “got gone baby fucking gone” but fucking quick. Told the wife “You don’t know me, you never heard of me, I was a part time worker and baby I’m out!” Later, according to sources, THEY popped smoke as well. I drove by not even two weeks later, and the shop was emptied out and closed. It made the news at the time, but I can’t find a link to it. Thankfully no one ever connected me to that place as they were paying me under the table, so ZERO paper trail. Either way, it was a good job in that I learned how to Cerakote. He may have been an asshole, but he did know a thing or two about Cerakote, which I learned from him.

So anyways, back to the original point: I figured I’d share my idea regarding a paint booth. Cheap, Functional and Easy.

A quick and dirty (but as stated cheap) ‘paint booth’ for the purposes I’m needing/using/doing? Try one of those U-Haul Wardrobe Boxes!

It’s got the metal crossbar to hang the parts off of. Then you can tape the top three folding sides up together, thereby lengthening the top, and then you can cut the front down as needed for length.

$22 at the local U-Haul Shop
You’re Welcome.

Now I just need the weather to cooperate.

On other subjects:
Whilst we were on our Mini-Vay-Kay in Charleston seeing MomUnit, one of the things we like to do is hit the Goodwill outside of Seabrook Island and Kiawah. The last time we went we scored a brand new Keurig… like the latest and greatest $350 model that had never been used. Reason I knew this (that it had never been used) was it still had the plastic on the filter that goes inside the water reservoir, and when you opened the K-Cup holder, it still had the “remove before first use” cardboard insert. I paid $10 for it.

SCORE!

We do the same up at The Villages as the best places to hit a Goodwill or Habitat for Humanity Thrift stores are where, as I am wont to say, “The Rich Fuckers W/Out Kids Are Dying”.

90% of their shit gets donated to Goodwill for those not willing to put the effort into a estate sale. Especially if there’s no relations available. No kids means whomever is in charge of “The Rich Dead Fucker Estate” generally goes the quick and easy way to ‘clear the books’ as there’s no profit otherwise. Unfortunately, this time wasn’t as profitable per se, BUT!

I did score two magnificent tomes.
One being “The Rifle In America”:

A NRA Sponsored hardback and bound heritage edition of the History of the American Rifle. VERY good reference and historical overlook in general of the Rifle overall in American History. $5.00 Not bad IMO. The Zon has it listed at $15-20 respectively.

Then, the exciting one:

“Men’s Adventure Magazines” by Max Allen Collins, and published in both English and German by Taschen in 2004. It’s a panoply of awesome images, an example of such being:

Nazis, Guns, Bondage, Sex…

What is there not to like amiright?

I paid $25 which was a bit much IMO in a Habitat for Humanity store… until I looked it up on the ‘Zon:

Ye Cats and Lil Kittens!
$121 plus shipping!?!
Guess it’s sort of collectible.

Myself? I’m just pleased because I can scan a lot of the pics in it, and use them on Ye Olde Blegg as bloggfodder. I mean what is there not to like?

So… That’s what’s going on here.
More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
Ain’t got anything tonight. Except for a case of the ass. I’m pissed. The car had the engine light come on and went into ‘safe mode’ meaning I can’t drive over 10-15mph.

Why is it just when things are getting sorted I get another curve ball? The engine is brand fucking new. If you recall or you’re new here, the old engine ‘swallowed a rod’ at 80k Miles, and thankfully the 100k wheel to wheel warranty took care of it.

Theoretically this ‘new’ engine should have another 80k worth of warranty on it. However I know it’s going to be an argument/fight with the dealership that may end up involving a shovel and quiklime, if the last encounter I had is any indicator.

Funny thing is, when the car was brand spanky new, at about 20k miles on it, it had the. same. exact. problem. then. Engine light on, went into ‘safe mode’. I had the dealer look at it, and then never really did tell me what was wrong with it (I suspect a software or sensor reset issue… something so simple -I- could do it hence why they didn’t tell me) but it got fixed and then ran like a top for the remaining 60+/-k miles that I put on it until the engine grenaded on Gretchen.

So I’m just sulking tonight.

Also it’s too cold to lay on the DuraCoat, so that too is on hold.

Gah! I hates the winter!
We actually had to turn on the heat today to keep the pipes ok… yeah it dropped that much for a wee bit, and the poor Sausage Princess finally broke down and went out… she acts like she’s going to melt and absolutely hates the rain. She finally had to go as the pressure and discomfort was too much, but I’ll tell you… none of that “I have to find the best place to pee/poo!” doggy sniffing around jazz… not in the rain. Out the front door, a violent expulsion of excess cargo, and she ziiiipped right back into the house.

Pretty much the best and only laugh of the day.
She looked so miserable…

Anyways, that’s all I got for tonight.
I’ll try to be better tomorrow
More Later
Big Country

Greetings and Salutations!
So why the Hell not?
I got into working on the FrankenMauser last night a wee bit despite promises to myself and Gretchen that I’d take a night off, and did my ‘thing’ tonight for a bit.

A close examination of it completely stripped down, and I noticed that the finish is ‘off’ on the receiver and the barrel in multiple places. A close up:

The bluing job on top of the receiver is waaaay off. In a square as you can see. I’m thinking that when the 1897 Spanish Mauser, this particular one, went in for the conversion/arsenal rebuild in 1916+/-, the original receiver marking was removed, and when they reblued it, it was a shytte job compared to the original-original. The marking of which I speak would have looked like this:

There’s a multiplicity of reasons that this set of markings may/may not have been removed. Seeing that the serial number for this particular model I have on hand is from the Oviedo timeframe (1897) and that the Model 1893 Spanish Mauser model in particular is among the most refurbished and rebuilt Mauser rifles known. The first rebuilds took place in the USA when Bannerman contracted Springfield Armory to take the lesser condition Spanish American War-captured rifles and refinish and rebuild them for public sale. This involved cannibalizing hundreds of incomplete and damaged rifles, and not caring about what pieces-parts went back into the rebuilds. This –might– be one of them.

Bannermans being the infamous Army Surplus Company at the turn of the 19th-into-the-20th Century. Pollepel Island is a landmark 50 miles up river from New York City on the Hudson, and best known for the remains of Bannerman’s Castle.

This was was the warehouse/storehouse that Bannerman Senior built as both a house and as a storage area for VAST amounts of Military Surplus to include High Explosives. In August 1920, 200 pounds of shells and powder exploded in an ancillary structure, destroying a portion of the complex. According to some sources, it just didn’t destroy a portion, but blew the hell out of the place. It’s been off limits forever and a day, with the exception of guided tours that started in 2004, it’s still off limits for the majority, and that continues to this day.

I mean who wants to go crawling around a location with almost 150 year old potentially ‘grouchy’ UXO? Not me despite what some of my detractors might say… you won’t catch me in an impact area…

So other parts of the barrel are uneven as well:

and because of that, I’ve decided to not go with a full bore strip and rebluing.

That is, it’s time to try the DuraCoat. I mean I do have the stuff on hand, so since I’m experimenting, and even pristine M1916 Spanish Mausers aren’t exceptionally expensive, and add on that this is the point of this effort, that I’m going to go with the DuraCoat.

Another part of the reasoning is that when I did the Butt Plate, well… I’m not happy with the results. I did three coats. Of what I call “Heated Cold Bluing” meaning I heated up the piece with my torch between each coat and rinse as directed with cold water. Not exceptionally hot, but enough so that when I did it for the Lee Enfield, well, you all saw how nicely that Bluing came out. That was three coats and the metal there took it magnificently.

Not sure if its the metallurgy in the Mauser?

I’m just a gunsmith, not a science guy per se.

I just know that the various pieces-parts on this thing are right now, uneven as all get out. The Trigger Guard/Mag Well is a deep deep blue with nary a scratch. The Butt Plate is as I said blue, but not to the depth I’d like by far, and the receiver is splotchy, and I’m not sure if a full on stripping and Hot/Cold rebluing will do the job.

So DuraCoat it is.

I mean like I said, I’m fucking around, I may as well find out amiright? Besides I bought a set of it as a potential coating IF my bluing on the SMLE went sideways, so I may as well try it, if only to learn it.

And speaking of “Fucking Around and Finding Out”
WiscoDave sent me this gem tonight that I screengrabbed:

Link to the comments: https://x.com/HardPass4/status/1881353671705022804

For those of you ‘not in the know’ Lt. Col. Alexander “Fatso” Vindman was the guy who initiated the leak(s) that got OrangeManBad ‘in the soup’ so to speak for the first Impeachment. A member of the (((tribe))) he was instrumental as a Krainian (born Aleksandr Semyonovich Vindman) in being the Deep State’s DotMil boy in the Krain.

He’s a fucking foul traitor, and should be clubbed like a baby seal. He stepped outside the chain of command, leaked private conversations between Krainfeld and OrangeManBad and seemed to be the fair-haired boy for a while because he enabled the first bogus shampeachment to happen.

Like I said
For a while.

Guess who (leastways by his snivvling yenta-bitch’s Twatter poast) just got the “Patsy/Fall Guy” Badge pinned to him? Yep. The Blue Falcon Special… This fukkin’ guy.

Couldn’t’ve happened to a nicer asshole.

My guess is he uproots ASAP for the Homeland in the Krain IF they’ll have him back. Seeing that Der Chermans just cut off any and all Deutschmarks that were slated for the Krain, and the rest of the Euroweenies are following in lockstep (outside of the Brits… those fucktards could never take a hint) and that OrangeManBad has made his feelings pretty well clear regarding backstabbers and traitors? I’m figuring on since Krainfeld and the rest of his Kleptocratic Kocaine Fueled Klowncar Show are to pull up stakes shortly, and head to Israel?

More than likely?
Vindman is completely and utterly fucked.

I mean it’s not being talked about anywhere in ‘normal channels’ but as they say, “Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once and a while.” Seems the Krainians, for all their infamous cement-headed thickness are (leastways on their Telegram Channels) starting to realize that they’ve been played like motherfuckers. That 90% of the Recruiters, and 98% of the Politrooks and Commissars are members of a (((certain ethnic group))) and that they’re not serving on the front lines. That it’s been the poor, middle aged Orthodox Christian Males being spent for nothing on the front lines while the (((others)) are partying down in Kiev.

That this’s been as has been happening since the get go? That it’s been a provoked Brother War of Orthodox Christian versus Orthodox Christian for the bemusement and profit of a very smol group of smol-hat wearing people, both Krainian AND American? And man, one need to remember, the Krainians?

The Krainian SS Unit, the 14th Waffen SS Grenadiers, also called the 1st Galician, were considered to be the worst-of-the-worst when it came to Anti-Semitic Zeal. Hence the absolute confusion as the Azov Brigade are staunch Neo-Nazi Banderists, and Bandera since never reigned in his Krainians who had a real hard-on for Hebrews at the time, it confuses people today just -how- a Nazi oriented unit could be supporting an ostensibly Jewish President (Krainfeld). If truth be told, Bandera let his anti-Jewish compatriots run wild, and for this he’s been tied to the Holocaust. The only ones he hated to a lesser degree were the Russians as he was a fanatical Krainian Nationalist.

The backlash on THAT subject might be Biblical.

So much for history.
I AM howling with laughter though.
Vindman thought or more than likely expected to be paid for his services. He did, for a little bit with some appearences on MSNBC, but since then? Notsomucho. Instead, he getting what he deserves, and that’s so far.

IF and it’s a big bold IF he had the two brain cells that God gave a common chipmunk (and that’s asking a lot) that the first thing this piece of shit stuffed in a cheap suit does is run to the nearest AG that Trump is bringing in and offer up ALL the goods in exchange for a new face/life/protection. I mean all them proactive Pardons? In accepting them you waive your 5th Amendment Rights and if you get caught is a lie on the stand??? you’re fucking toast. In Vindman’s case, he’d best cut a deal sooner, rather than later. Otherwise, and you heard it here first, like Epstein, Vindman didn’t kill himself.

Jes’ Sayin’

So that’s the round up for tonight.
Your thoughts on the FrankenMauser are welcome
More Later
Big Country