disquiet

Just went to drop off the comforter and get it cleaned, since I don't have a washer big enough, and it's high past time. It's a gray, chilly Saturday, the kind that inspires baking things and hot tea to warm the house and soul, and the streets were no busier than a middle of the working day on Thursday.

As I parked near the little storefront for the cleaners, a slim, impeccably dressed Asian woman came to the door and watched me. As soon as I opened the back door and got the mass of cloth out, she had the door wide open, letting heat out with a smile on her face. "Welcome in! Welcome in!"

I walked in to find a very neat, clean shop with every spare surface crowded with photographs of family, and the woman whipped behind the counter. She was eager to pull out a pad and get my information, and when I pulled cash out of my wallet to pay, her eyes sparkled. "When do you need it back?" She asked, and her smile grew into a wide grin when I shrugged. "Wednesday, yes? You good customer, in no hurry, I love you! Is first time here?" And insisted on shaking my hand, introducing me to the family in the photographs, and proudly proclaiming her citizenship and her business's history.

I thanked her very much, and walked out smiling, but there was a little chill going up my spine.

More and more, lately, though, business owners and employees alike have been standing at the doors of their empty shops, ready to greet me, welcome me in, help me however I can, and could they carry my items out? For all their helpfulness, their excellent service (whether I want it or not), I find myself reminded of a wake. Where the survivors are saying "See this man, and hear my story, and share this memory, make him real and alive to you as he was to me."

See me, see this business I have built with my own hands, let me shake yours. See my family, I support with it, see how long I have been in business, see how I am part of your community and love your country. See me, and come back, please, and often. Please. Please.

There's a little chill thought that won't go away. A little voice in my head whispers, as grey and aching as my old injuries: This is not a healthy country.

Dehydration in the brain

One of the very cool opportunities from being in the Lower 48 was being invited to spend time with the Baen Barflies at DragonCon. Now, I've heard of Baen's Bar from a good friend and for the last twelve years, but somehow I never quite got 'round to joining - especially when he told me the good stories anyway. This includes moments like watching Mad Mike (Michael Z Williamson, whose books are as great reads as they are politically incorrect) make a drink called "clubbed seal" (and failing to get up off the couch afterward. Tasty and potent!)

It also included meeting Speaker To Lab Rats, who is a real live neuroscientist, and a really great guy. He is not only gracious and generous, he also has a wickedly keen wit and isn't afraid to use it. He keeps a blog that puts mine to shame:Teddy's Rat Lab, which explains very interesting science in ways that let laymen understand.

I was reading the second of his two-part series on Diabetes in the brain, on diabetic neuropathy, and experienced on of those moments in which the perfectly well-put fact suddenly acts like a seed in a supersaturated solution, making fuzzy generalizations, "everybody knows" and "the symptoms are" resolve into a perfectly understandable cause and effect.

As previously mentioned, neurons in the brain are not dependent on insulin for their uptake of glucose from the blood. This is not to say that neurons are insensitive to insulin or that insulin has no effect on neurons...

Thus, in the brain the effects of high blood glucose are largely due to the osmotic properties of the glucose molecule dissolved in the liquid component of blood. In this manner, glucose acts very much like high salt concentrations. It is fairly well known that one means of preserving food is to dehydrate it, quite frequently with salt.

I love learning things. Especially things that help me understand how the world works, and make sense out of the universe. So I dashed downstairs, and excitedly related this to Calmer Half. "So, it's actually the dehydration of nerve cells that poisons and kills them, which is why diabetics end up having problems with vision and feeling in their feet! Isn't that cool?"

Calmer Half, who is still having struggles aplenty with the low-carb diet and blood sugar, didn't look so calm as I name him. In fact, he looked at me with the same face a soldier on patrol turns toward the approaching sandstorm. "No. It's not." He frowned, and it was a frown that made me decide that maybe I better take myself off somewhere else and remove my feet from my mouth.

...And for some reason, the usual sources of carbalicious temptation just weren't as appealing that night.

Here's the holster!

There's a time for shaky cell phone pictures in available light, and there's a time for professionals. Oleg does awesome work - and so does Dragon Leatherworks!

I'm enthusiastic, not excellent

Once upon a time*, a mixed group of draftees and enlistees were in boot. They were lined up one at a time, handed something that went bang**, and pointed at the derelict hulk of a tank resting beneath the spreading branches of a tree. The tank had a big bullseye painted on the very dented front. One of the men involved nailed the center of the bullseye on the first try, resulting in a bang and flying debris, and was feeling fairly proud of himself as he stepped aside.

After him came a young man who was hobbling slightly, still getting used to wearing shoes. This young man took the weapon and stared thoughtfully at the tank, dappled with sunlight and shifting shadows in the breeze. Just before the sergeant lost his temper, he finally fired. The round rebounded off a swaying tree limb and dropped into the open hatch on top, followed by a curiously muffled whumph. As smoke gently wisped out the hatch, he turned to the sergeant and said in a painfully thick and slow drawl, "Well, you wanted me t' kill the people in the tank, right, sir?"

"You! Out of here!"

"Don' I get the other tries, sir?"

The first young man would go on to qualify as expert marksman in every firearm the army had in use*** (and bayonet, too.) However, he never forgot the lesson he learned that day in basic: never get cocky, because there's always someone who is so much better that they're not even in the same league.

Fortunately, he passed this lesson on to me, and I have tried to remember and live by it. I have met some pilots who were good sticks, who could do things near-impossible on a regular basis. I have met great shooters. I am neither - I really enjoy flying and shooting, but I am not that great at either. Keep that in mind when I talk about my plane, or guns, or reviews of anything, really.



*Not that long ago. The difference between war stories and fairy tales is that one begins "Once upon a time", and the other begins "No sh*t, there I was" - being as this was the Vietnam war era, and definitely not my story, I gave it a fairy tale opening.

**Question for the audience - I first heard this one when I was not quite as tall as a rifle with a bayonet, possibly the same day I got bored, lost, and was finally found sitting on a table in the armory, enchanted and excited while a very, very nice man with lots of chevrons on his sleeves showed off his many, many toys (so cool!). Anyone have an idea what sort of weapon was involved? I think I remember it being described as a 50mm shell, but that's really fuzzy.

***Which took quite a few years. In fact, as he was closing in on the goal, his daughter was getting to dating age. And the qualification targets, with their little tombstones, started to go up on the wall in the hall leading to his daughter's bedroom...

Things aren't as bad as they seem

direct link: http://youtu.be/BltRufe5kkI

A Lovely Leather Holster Fit For a Lady

Picked up my holster from Dennis of Dragon Leatherworks today! Fortunately, when I start making noises like a pre-pubescent girl at a boy band concert, Calmer Half and Dennis just smile.

Now, I knew that I was being picky and fussy, and asking for a holster that was just like this but not too much that, and straight-drop but high retention, and pretty but functional, and fits a gun that few people have handled (Kel-Tec PMR-30), and lightweight would be good, but stiff and sturdy would be better, and most of all it cannot dig into my ribs, or I will pout and never wear it... The man should have charged me twice what he did, because by the time he managed to give me everything I asked for and things I hadn't even thought about, it became a one-off custom design like nothing I've seen on the gun shop wall, or in any of Calmer Half's three boxes of holsters. Or Oleg's... I don't know how many holsters.

Instead of slots to thread a belt through, it has loops and snaps (heaviest-duty snaps he could get), and the center is a marvel - it's scalloped deeply enough I can get a good grip and easily get the gun out, but the back end keeps the butt of the gun from getting close enough to dig in, while the holster itself does an excellent job of keeping the gun easily accessible, tucked in close to my body and yet far away from my ribs. And even better, the stitching in the center means that the holster curves, just a little, to conform to the very non-linear form of my hip. I can wear this from the front to the side to practically the small of my back, and it conforms to each spot! (I didn't know holsters could do that!)



All you get right now are my cell phone pictures, but I promised Dennis I would be careful and keep it away from coffee, cat hair, sawdust, oil, or grime until Oleg can take Oleg-level awesome pictures of the sheer prettiness. And it is pretty!

As for retention, when I turn it upside down (with no magazine, then an empty magazine) and shook it like a salt cellar that's gotten a little caked by humidity, the gun didn't even budge. Granted, even a fully loaded PMR-30 is lightweight (otherwise I wouldn't love it the way I do), but I could make like it was a maraca and it wouldn't move.

Did I mention the pretty? Squeee! I mean, it's honestly beautiful. Rainbow-dyed python leather, burgundy leather shading to black... this is the kind of holster that demands open-carry just to show itself off, but when hidden beneath a jacket or blouse will still bring a grin to my face, 'cause I know I've got pretty underthings on!

And for those of you looking for a review from somebody who's going to sound all old hat at guns and holsters, go read Calmer Half's notes on his blog. And for those who want to see what it looks like on my belt - yeah, nobody's seeing my rear unless it's from a much more flattering view than the twisted-around fuzzy out-of-focus pictures I managed to get. Wait a while, and I ought to have the range report of learning to draw and shoot with it to go with better pictures!

Edited to add: Oleg has much, much better photos up here: http://olegvolk.net/blog/2012/04/04/serpent-skin-holster-for-pmr30/

Not Like Mama Made It

Daddybear was reminiscing on cooking, and on the difference between his wife's cooking and his mother's cooking (and Army chow).

Calmer Half, let me state for the record, is a far wiser man than to ever complain about my food being "not like mum made it." He is also a bit older than your standard fresh-faced newlywed, and has experienced a much wider range of cooking, from African tribal fare which did not involve such petty trifles as cleaning out the pig intestines before throwing them in the soup to "good homemade Indian curry" that could be classified as a chemical weapon in most civilized countries, as well as fine Continental (European) dining well before he was introduced to my cooking, (which draws from just about anywhere the US Armed Forces have ever put a base, or oil has been found.)

I have a lot of respect for his mother. The lady grew up in the depression after The Great War, married a young soldier whom she met during an air raid, and survived in London during the Blitz, from the firebombs to the rationing. When her husband took her to South Africa after the war, she walked into their hotel room to find the standard (for South Africa) welcoming basket of free fruit - and promptly burst into tears. It had been six years since she had last seen an orange, and never you mind at what price it had last been.

No matter the post-war South African dishes she fixed (or other dishes she learned, later on), her comfort food was... a legacy of two generations of rationing and harsh economy, of stretching what little food there wasn't to feed what mouths there were. It did not include a lot of fresh vegetables, spices, thick juicy steaks, or exotic (to England) ingredients.

So it's not fair to say that I cook better or worse than his mother, because our worlds, our styles, and our ingredients are completely different. And in her cooking styles and dishes, she was, by all reports, a damn fine cook. Sadly, she passed before I could meet her, so I'll never know... and the only observer who had directly sampled both our cooking is far too wise to get into such a fix as to find himself using words like "better" or "worse".