Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Minding my own business, not harming anything…..and as I walk into the local Albertson’s they have the usual stacks of cases of food piled up front. These are products that are on sale, usually part of their “10 for $10″ promotion. (For those of you who went to public school, that means $1 each.) Surprisingly, my favorite spaghetti sauce was on sale for $1 ea. Hmmmm….best price I can find is $1.50 on sale and the regular price is usually twice that. So…two cases later Im looking at the receipt:

Normal price: $3.19
Card savings: $2.19

Total savings: $52.56

So, what normally have cost $76.56 wound up costing $24. That, my friends, is significant savings. How significant? It means I can buy three times as many for the same amount. These are not savings to be trifled with, oh no…these are the types of savings that make a real difference.

Which is why, of course, Im heading back there later for another couple cases. Shelf life is 18 months and since I usually cook some form of pasta at least once a week I can get a years supply for about $50.

Moral of the story: watch for bargains!

(As an aside, yes, I could make my own spaghetti sauce from scratch and I often do. But I cant make it as cheaply. A 28 oz. can of tomatoes is a buck all on its own so right out of the gate we’re over the one dollar the bottled stuff is costing me. [28 oz. crushed tomatoes, 2 clove garlic, half a minced onion, oregano, basil, a little thyme, some salt. Simmer for an hour until thick.])

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Life continues apace. And while all is not sunshine and stun grenades around here, it could be worse.

Avian/bird flu is rearing its head over on the Asian continent – again. This time it’s the Indians (That’s Indians with the dot, not feather) turn and, according to various news reports, attempts to contain it are meeting with varying degreese of non-success. Not surprising. Who wants to turn in your chickens for slaughter when you cant eat beef because the cows are sacred? (Ghandi voice: No,no,no..don’t sanctify the chickens…they taste too good.)

Its already cold and flu season here in the US (that’s the regular cold/flu…not the bird variety). It sounds very elementary and basic but it really does seem to be true – deliberate and frequent handwashing goes a long way towards preventing a person from catching the bug. This makes sense if you think about it…probably 99% of your actual ‘contact’, as in bare skin physically touching something, is done with your hands on a day-to-day basis. You handle money (filthy stuff…terrific vector), doorknobs, store countertops, telephones, keyboards, etc, etc. with your hands and then those hands shove a hamburger down your gullet. Next thing you know, you’re in the bathroom driving the porcelain bus and trying to recall what it was you ate that might be doing this to you. So, reasonably, washing your hands frequently eliminates a large percentage of your vulnerability.

When the girlfriend and I go to WalMart for groceries I cant help but look at the masses of humanity wandering the aisles and think that these same creatures had their filthy hands on the handles of the cart Im pushing or basket Im carrying. So…in my everyday bag I have a small ‘pocket pack’ of bleach wipes. I take one with me in to the store and wipe down the handles of the cart/basket before I do anything else. Clorox makes the small pocket pack I normally use and I recommend them. They are also a godsend if you have to use a public restroom. To make sure they don’t dry out I keep the pocket pack in a small Ziploc bag. A tiny bottle of hand sanitizer also goes in my bag as well. (Hey, speaking of public restrooms…if you use your bare hand to hit the flush lever or pull the door open on the way out you’re probably asking for trouble. Use a paper towel, that’s what they’re there for.)

Bleach is some seriously cheap stuff. I just picked up two one-gallon jugs of unscented Clorox up at CostCo for something like $4.90. Given a choice, get the unscented variety…no additives…this way you can use it for water purification duties if necessary. While you’re in the local megamart go pick up a package of empty spray bottles. Fill one with a bleach/water mixture and use it for wiping down everything in your bathroom and kitchen. Very cheap insurance. Think about how much money you earn in a day and how much you’ll lose per day if you’re sick and unable to work. Now compare that with ten bucks for a gallon of bleach, a spray bottle and some bleach wipes. Cheap insurance, man.

Although I enjoy the face-to-face personal interaction with customers I don’t enjoy shaking hands with them. Sure, it has to be done sometimes but once the customer is out the door and out of sight the hand sanitizer comes out from under the counter. Its not OCD, its being careful. Buy yourself a big jug of the stuff and use it to refill your smaller ‘tavel size’ bottles that you keep in your car or bag. Saves you a few bucks as it keeps the viral nasties at bay.

Handled money? Wash your hands. Shook hands with someone? Wash your hands. Handled an object (keyboard, phone handset, shopping cart, etc) used by countless other people? Wash your hands. Just used a public restroom? Soak your hands in gasoline and set them…I mean, wash your hands.

I don’t know about you but I cant really afford to get sick even in the best of times… and I definitely can very much not afford to be sick when things get weird. Every little step counts in these regards.

Is this a guarantee of avoiding the various viral issues that circulate among us at this time of season? Nope. There are no guarantees…but it definitely reduces the likelihood of catching something by a very large amount. While we cannot exclude all risk from our lives we can certainly tip the odds in our favor from time to time. (And, really, being prepared is all about tipping the odds in you’re favor, isn’t it?)

Keep in mind that bleach does lose a bit of its efficacy over time. However, for less than three bucks a gallon its hardly a hardship to replace your fading supply after a year or so. More likely you’ll wind up using most of it before it ‘expires’ just doing normal things like laundry and other cleaning.

Vinegar has a reputation as being somewhat antimicrobial and the girlfriend uses it to wipe down the countertops here at the house. Makes the house smell like a salad. While Im sure vinegar has some merit in the ‘keep me from getting sick’ department I think bleach is packing a little bit more power.

Bleach, of course, has other uses. Mixed with ammonia you’ve got the pretty much the same stuff that killed thousands on World War One battlefields. Mix them together at your own risk. Seriously, its nasty stuff…people get hospitalized every year when a house cleaning binge goes bad and someone scrubs the tub out with ammonia and bleach. Its bad news. Be careful.

So head down to your laundry room, see if you have any unscented bleach and go out and pick up a gallon or two. While you’re at it definitely get the pocket pack of bleach wipes. They are a seriously useful piece of gear that’s worth keeping with you.

Whats the ‘best’ knife? I have no idea. Depends on what you think you need a knife for. If you’re going to chop your way through an Amazon jungle then a Leatherman tool is probably a bad choice, much as a machete is probably a bad choice for removing a sliver from your hand.

For a general purpose sheath knife, I’ve been liking the Glock knives. They are extremely affordable, take abuse exceptionally well, are largely indestructible, and seem to hold an edge. They are a bit light so if your needs including hacking/chopping you may want something with more weight. For busting steel bands, prying ammo crates open, digging stuff out of the dirt, and other abusive tasks it seems to perform very well. These are not unrealistic tasks for a knife. To use an example from real life, take the aftermath of Katrina – you need a knife that’s fairly impervious to the wet (and especially the contaminated, chemical-laden, mold-inducing wet) and that rules out a leather sheath. You’re going to need something for breaking windows, prying at hinge pins on doors, cutting seat belts, cutting wire, prying open crates and barrels, punching holes in materials, being hammered through tough-to-cut objects, and generally abused in order to achieve your goals. So you need something durable, cheap enough to have spares (because while a $400 damascus bowie may be a thing of beauty, it’s a little too pretty to mess up) so you can destroy a knife if necessary, light enough to carry all day, and built well enough to handle the ‘voids the manufacturers warranty’ type of tasks. Plenty of good synthetic handled, kydex scabbarded knifes out there but for the money I’ve found the Glock to be very very good.

The Glocks come in two styles (with or without a sawtooth back..the sawteeth do work well but their utility is debatable) and in three flavors (OD, black, desert). If you shop around you can usually find them for $25-35~. As you would expect from Glock, theres a goodly amount of plastic involved. The scabbard is molded plastic…heavier than Kydex and rather rigid. Whereas Kydex will sometimes break/tear where its edges are riveted together, the Glock sheath appears unbreakable. Oh, you might break it if you really worked at it in some way but I cannot forsee any normal (or abnormal) usage that would ruin it. I’d have no trouble believing it would be just fine after being thrown under the wheels of a truck. Theres a unique locking device that secures the knife in the sheath but is easily released with the thumb as you draw the knife. Knife can be carried in the sheath facing either direction, thus the scabbard and knife are completely ambidextrous. The locking mechanism for the securing the knife is also completely ambidextrous. These are very much ‘left-hand friendly’ knives.

The sheath attaches to the belt by an openable belt loop. You can remove the sheath from your belt without unbelting. The mechanism is somewhat similar to the old style Bianchi fastener on the UM84 holsters. The blades are non-reflective, approx. 6” long and have a false edge on the forward top portion. They come from the factory pretty sharp and I’ve only had to have mine sharpened a couple times. The blades will etch from blood, as will most knife blades, and when the coating wears of the blade the metal is a plum color. The handle is grooved plastic. The handle fits the hand pretty well, tapering at either end and swelling in the middle. Nothing remarkable there. The handguard features a bottle opener which is always a nice touch. There is a plastic buttcap/pommel which can double as a hammer but it will mar the plastic a bit. There is an attachment point for a lanyard.

I’ve had several of these knives over the years and one of them is usually with me when I go hunting. In fact, when the girlfriend got her deer I gave her the Glock knife to use and it (and her) performed quite well. The blade is rugged and durable enough to split bone and the point doesn’t deform or break when hammering it between joints. Pounding a knife with a rock to force the tip through pelvic bone is a fairly good test for durability…the Glock passed. These knives are quite affordable and for the money it would be hard to find another knife of similar quality and, more importantly, durability. They’re cheap enough that you can abuse one with no remorse. They are also cheap enough that you can buy several without breaking the bank. I have the one in my hunting kit that gets used on most of my outdoor escapades. Down in the bunker I’ve several more in various colors waiting for the time I need to replace my current one or to be given to someone who needs it. Plus, its nice to be able to afford to keep one in each backpack, always ensuring one will be available. Although it’s a ridiculous practice with absolutely zero practical application (except amusement) they throw pretty well too.

Are they the best knife out there? No such thing, amigo. However, it may be the best within certain parameters – the best, affordable, general purpose sheath knife not made in China for example. The hidebound will no doubt proclaim that their Kabar is the only real field knife out there and that anything else is unmanly. Whatever. I’ve used them too and they are good knives, especially with a Kydex scabbard. I like the affordability of the Glock although I appreciate the heft of the Kabar. When I do want a knife with a bit of heft and weight behind it I usually go to my BK&T BK7 or TacTool. (Which, like a lot of very cool products, is no longer made although they can be found on eBay and similar venues at stupid prices.) Of course, this doesn’t say anything about pocket knives (or folding knives). Those are a whole different story.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Recognize this? Its the ubiquitous 5-gallon bucket. (Although to be fair, alot of 6-gallon buckets look darn near identical to this thing.) They can be had new for somewhere between $3-5~ at any hardware store. The lids are a major pain in the ass to remove but they weren’t really designed for repeated openings. A product that I use and can honestly recommend is the Gamma Seal lid. These lids consist of a threaded ring that snaps onto the rim of the bucket, and a gasketed threaded lid that screws into the threaded ring. In short, it turns the bucket into an easily resealable large container…ideal for foodstuffs or anything else you want to protect from damage. The buckets themselves are usually pretty durable since theyre designed for shipping about 40# of paint around in the back of trucks and trailers. I suppose they might get brittle in extreme cold but I havent had it happen yet. Theyre sort of like lightweight, really big amo cans in terms of their usefulness of storage.
Anyway, back to the matter at hand. If you happen to have some of these buckets available to you, do yourself a favor and pick up some of the Gamma Seal lids. They can usually be had for around $8 a throw. Sportsmans Guide sells them for six bucks and change, and Im sure somewhere on the interweb theres a place selling ‘em for less if you order enough. I ordered a dozen from Sportsmans Guide a few years ago but they only offer them in whote and black. (And in retrospect I probably should have used the black ones for ease of viewing in these pictures…but, hey, Im not a photographer.) The lids come in several colors so you can color-code your buckets for rapid identification. A smart individual might code them white for food, black for ammo, red for medical stuff, green for…whatever green means to you, etc, etc. Of course, theres nothing to keep you from slapping a durable label (or better yet, a packing list) to the exterior of the bucket since the last thing you need is to be frantically digging through these things when you’re desperate for some piece of equipment.

The adapter ring attaches to the bucket using natures miracle adhesive – brute force. The ring is supposed to ’snap’ into place on the bucket but a rubber mallet or a length of 2×4 makes things alot faster. (Also alot louder. Make sure to set the bucket on a solid surface [like a concrete floor] before whomping on the adapter ring.) Both the adapter ring and the screw on lid have gaskets but if youre a suspender-and-a-belt kind of guy you may want to run a bead of silicone sealant around the lip of the bucket before hammering the adapter ring on. Once the adpater ring is on the opening to the bucket will, naturally, be slightly smaller than the actual mouth of the bucket but not enough to make any practical difference. The tradeoff for the ease of use in opening/closing the lid is worth it, in my opinion.

Now, if youre storing grains or other foodstuffs you could just use the buckets by thensleves for non-long-term storage. I keep a bucket of rice in my kitchen for daily use. Unscrew the lid, scoop out a cup of rice, close lid…that sort of thing. I’ve been using out of that same bucket for about two years now and theres no problems of any kind. No moisture, no contamination, no insects, no dirt, no nothing. However, why not err on the side of caution, hm? If youre going to store anything in bulk in one of these buckets do yourself a favor and entomb it in a nice mylar bag first. Its those nice, thoughtful touches that make the difference. Especially if you ever have to transport your precious edibles in horrid weather conditions in the middle of the night. Last thing you want to worry about as your barrelling down the road in thunderous rainstorm is whether the 25# of wheat in the back of the truck is getting ruined. Of course, if youre putting away food thats already in its own durable packaging (canned food, or pouched foods for example) you can just go ahead and and stack/cram/pack ‘em in there.

To get slightly sidetracked for a minute, I’m not selling these things, nor am I directing you to any place that does sell them. Not because Im above that…after all, from time to time I might try to sell you something…but because I simply am not selling this particular item. I would never advocate or try to convince you to buy a product that I was not willing to use myself, and since I use the Gamma Seals for my own storage needs I thought some of you who don’t have any experience with them might find a little post about them useful. As I said, I’ve been using them for several years now and have been pleased with them. In addition to the obvious things like food, theyre also good for storing first-aid kits or vehicle emergency kits. If you can stuff ‘em in there, theyre great for protecting sleeping bags or blankets in your vehicle.

So, as they say on television “I use and endorse this product”.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Its the little things in life that bring me joy..a pleasant summer day, an orange sunset over the mountains, a case of HydraShock 9mm sitting in the back of the truck…that sort of thing.

What makes me particularly purr-like-a-cat content this weekend was going to CostCo and stocking up on a few things. Also, saving money makes me happy. And if I can combine the two – stocking up and saving money – then Im about as happy as Bill Clinton at female swordswallowers convention.

About a week ago I was up at Wally World and while wandering the aisles I took the time to make note of various prices and serving sizes for later price comparison. When I was at Costco yesterday I checked against my notes and found that some stuff was indeed cheaper at CostCo than at WallyWorld. Example? The canned chicken broth I wind up using frequently was $0.72 at WW, if I bought a 12-pack of it at CostCo it came out to $0.5825 per can. A savings of approx. $0.14, or $3.36 for the case of 24 that was purchased. That doesnt sound like much but look at it another way, it was the same as if getting six cans free. Or, put another way, 25% off.

So, stocked up on a few flats of canned goods, a case of toilet paper (because while there are substitutes, there are no good substitutes), several pounds of butter, about 15# of pasta and of course a healthy selection of meat.

The bulk ground beef gets broken down into 1# packages, vacuum sealed, labelled, and entombed in the deep freeze. Of course, at the same time, the oldest ground beef gets pulled out and shuffled into the kitchen freezer for use. Currently, I think the stuff I have thawing is dated 2004. Yes, if you vacuum seal it and freeze it (not in the freezer built into your fridge, which doesnt usually get to the mind numbing cold of a true freezer) it can keep for years. Oldest stuff I’ve pulled out of the freezer has been close to five years. Once thawed it cooked up just fine. The obvious advantages (and disadvantages) make bulk purchasing of meat an extremely economical way of doing things.

Chicken, on the other hand, has been a delight to store. Know why? Theyre packaging the chicken breasts in their own vacuum sealed, datecoded, heavy plastic pouches these days. I dont have to do anything to it other than throw it in the freezer. Damn convenient.

And, just to keep my freezer from turning into some sort of meat mausoleum, theres a write-n-wipe board on the door of it that is used to keep track of whats inside. Thus, when I head for the warehouse store I can tell if I need another 15# of ground round or another 10# of bacon.

The butter, by the way, freezes really well but if left in the freezer for any real length of time will start taking on wierd odors and flavors. Vacuum sealing it prevents this and greatly increases its shelf life. Yes, you can also can butter (or buy canned butter) and although its more expensive, I hear its quite tasty. Handy for when freezing/refrigeration isnt an option.

So, returning from CostCo, running the vacuum sealer, stocking the shelves, updating the spreadsheets and admiring the enhancements to the food stockpile always put me in a better mood. Nothing says ’security’ like several months worth of food. Except of course for ammo. And fuel. And metals. And guns. And medical gear. And warm clothes.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Gratuitous girlfriend picture after the cut.

Read the rest of this entry »

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Hmm..the forecast calls for significant snow and cold in my area. Two words to Mom Nature: bring it beeyotch.

I got heat, I got lighting, I got food, I got water, I got commo, I got game.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

Man, I just cannot shake the feelings of impending doom everytime I listen to the news. (I’ve pretty much stopped watching the news. I now either listen to it on the radio or I read it on the various newswires on the internet.)

It seems like everything is doom and gloom about the economy, housing, fod and fuel prices, war, etc, etc.

I have to pause and think about my own exposure to these things – my house has a tiny fixed rate mortgage, I don’t have any debt other than the mortgage, the girlfriend has her job with a good degree of job security, we don’t have many luxuries other than internet and Warcraft, the truck is paid for, there no mountain of credit card debt, and by and large we’re not in a bad place should the economy tumble.

I cannot imagine being one of these people you hear about on the news…the family with two kids, three cars, an overpriced house, fifty grand in credit card debt and the threat of downsizing in the future. I think I’d explode from the stress.

But, at the same time, most of what I read and hear says that the majority of the people in these dire situations put themselves into it. Either by getting mortgages using inflated/falsified earnings data, living so far ahead of their income or just generally being incredibly shortsighted. So, while I feel bad for them I have a tough time feeling sorry for them. Earning $46,000 a year and lying to buy a $750,000 house isn’t a ‘mistake’, it’s fraud.

=-=-=-=-=

‘Jericho’ returns to TV next month for their abbreviated seven-episode season. I read somewhere that the first three episodes were leaked onto the internet so if you’re the impatient kind, you can probably find them out there. Don’t ask me about links, I have none. I read about it on arfcom so you may wanna go look there.

I will say that from what Ive read about the second season, it appears the first season format of ‘just trying to stay alive’ is going to give way to episodes about more ‘tin foil hat’ type of things. I’d elaborate but I don’t want to ruin things for anyone.

=-=-=-=-=

Still following the elections. I am still of the opinion that at this point who wins will be irrelevant in regards to gun policy. Nothing good will happen for gun owners out of the next election, it’ll only be differing degrees of bad. Buying magazines, ammo and gun s is never a bad idea and it is even less of a bad idea now with about ten months left until elections

=-=-=-=-=

That reminds me….

When you stock up on firearms and related materials, don’t think that you are stocking up for the day TSHTF. What you are doing is stocking up for the rest of your life. Whats the difference?

If you’re stocking up because, say, you live in New Orleans and you’re worried another Katrina is going to blow through you might stock a case of 9mm, a case of .223 and a case of 00 buck and figure you’re all set. You’d probably be right. And then when the Katrina Mk II is over then what? Say you used up half of that stash (giving it to friends, neighbors, etc) what do you do? DO you buy more? Of course you do…and you can do that because its still available now that the immediate crisis is over.

I stockpile firearms and materials on the assumption that whatever I have right now is all I have to last me for the rest of my life because at some point they will no longer be available. If I say that I have a Pelican case with x  Glocks in it someone will ask “Do you really think that when TSHTF you’re going to need x Gocks? If you need that many then you should have brought artillery support.” But that’s not what those are for..oh sure, they’re good to have if things really do get weird but Im not thinking that come some Katrina-esque disaster Im going to need x Glocks. I have as many as I have because someday the powers that be may say that no more can be sold, or they’ll restrict them so highly as to make them virtually unobtainable, and then whatever I have has to last me for the next 40 years.

Remember that wild and crazy Assault Weapon ban in 1994? Lets say it didn’t expire, however many AR magazines you had at the time of the ban would be all youd be able to have for the. Rest. Of. Your. Life. Sure, you might be able to buy more grandfathered ones…maybe for $30 ea…and ten years later for $50 ea…and further down the road at $100 ea. So at that moment, when you’re staring at the television watching the news and you realize that whatever you have at that moment is probably all you’ll ever be able to have….do you think you have enough? You have two AR’s in the safe, maybe thirty magazines for the pair and you still have forty years of living left in front of you. Forty years of hoping that your rifles don’t suffer failures, that you don’t lose/break/damage/forget or otherwise ruin a magazine. Do you even own anything mechanical that you’ve managed to consistently keep in good condition for forty years?

A lot happens in forty years…in five years you flip your truck on a patch of ice and your rifle is destroyed in the wreck. Eleven years from now someone breaks into your home and steals your pistol and a rifle. Fourteen years from some overzealous cop at the range says you’re gun/magazine is illegal and confiscates them..he’s proved wrong but you don’t get them back because department policy is to never return guns. Seventeen years from now your house catches fire and your pistol is lost in the flames. Twenty years from now your son is getting married, moving away and you don’t want him to be unarmed so you want to give him a rifle and pistol. Thirty years from now you want to set a pistol aside for when your grandson comes of age.

So, really, is it that outrageous for someone to think that maybe a half dozen rifles and a couple hundred magazines is a bad idea?

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

I don’t particularly like the Ruger firearms company. My main reason is for Ruger’s history of Neville Chamberlain-esque willingness to ‘compromise’ when gun legislation rolls around. For example, Ruger voluntarily pulled their folding stock Mini-14’s off the civilian market. Ditto for the factory 20-rd mags. And Ruger was proud to be the first to suggest to the .gov that pistol magazines be limited to 10 rounds. Their advertising of themselves as “Arms maker for responsible citizens”, has an undeniably, and to me offensive, Orwellian ring to it. To continue the WW2 analogies, Ruger was the Quisling of the gun industry.

But, of course, theres an ‘on the other hand…’

On the other hand, I do like Ruger firearms. Ruger makes some of the most durable firearms around.

I was re-reading Tappan’s opinion on revolvers vs. automatics for self-defense and especially for long-term use. Tappan opined that, by and large, an automatic could be repaired as fast as you could swap some parts. A revolver could be repaired as fast as you could get it to a gunsmith. As usual, there are almost no absolutes in there and the truth is somewhat in the middle. For example, in Tappans book he also goes on about how the 1911 is the finest pistol you can get…once you take it right out of the shipping box and hand it over to a gunsmith for all sorts of modifications. So, apparently, his vaunted automatic was no better than the revolver in terms of being ‘repaired as fast as you can get it to the gunsmith’. On the other hand, I’ve owned and shot revolvers over 60 years old that still seemed to work just fine. Go figure.

But, to be fair, Tappan was right in some ways. Revolvers generally have parts (hand, bolt, etc) that require some fitting by hand. On the other hand, you take a modern auto like the Glock and pretty much any part just drops in with no fitting…a very handy feature for the long term where you never know if theres going to be a gunsmith available. (Or when your favorite gun is verboten and you cant risk taking it in for repairs.)

Personally, I’ve gone past the dogmatic stage of unyielding allegiance to a particular brand of firearm simply because it sound cool to say “Glocks rock!” or “John Browning is my god”. I want what works. For playing at the range and relaxing I have other preferences but for “Holy crap, was that a mushroom cloud?” I want something that I trust implicitly. The main appeal of automatics, for me, is the capacity of the magazine. Ballistically, revolvers appeal to me more.

So wheres Ruger fit into this?

Its my opinion that Ruger, despite their cowardly political practices in the past, make some of the most durable firearms on the planet today. I will also say that they currently make the most durable revolvers. Period.

I’ve been wanting a .44 Mag for a while now. Logistically, it does not fit into my main cartridge hierarchy (.22, .223, .308, 9mm, .38/.357, .45 ACP, 12 ga.) but I’ve been wanting a powerful revolver for stomping around in the boonies as well as for general usage. I’ve owned .44 Mags by  other manufacturers, including S&W, and while they were certainly good guns I do not believe they could stand up to long-term use with full-power loads as well as the Rugers.

Currently, I’m torn between the new 4” Redhawk and the .44 Alaskan model. The Alaskan is built on the Super Redhawk frame and is, in a word, massive. I genuinely believe that twenty years after the bombs go off the only guns still functioning will be AK’s, Glocks and these monolithic blocks of Ruger steel.

At this point Im sure someone is saying “Why not .45 Colt? You can load it as hot as the .44 Mag and you’ll have bullet interchangeability with your .45 ACP bullets.” That’s true. Logistically, I could eliminate the need to stock .44 bullets and brass and simply use .45 ACP bullets if needed. However, I think availability of .44 Mag ammo is better than .45 Colt. Also, the .45 Colt ammo that is available, usually, is the lighter stuff meant for all guns whereas the “.44 Magnumesque” .45 Colt loads are either strictly a handloading proposition or are available only from a limited amount of sources.

Why a revolver? The revolver offers me more power than can be stuffed into the average auto. (Yes, I know theres .45 Win. Mags out there. Im talking about the average auto.) At its best, the .45 ACP puts out around 500 ft/lb of energy (a +p load with 185 gr.) The 10mm, a worthy choice, puts out 600 ft/lb. at its best. A .44 Mag can put out 700-1000 ft/lb. without too much difficulty. The .357 Magnum puts out around 500 ft/lb. so ballistically its as good as any .45 ACP. The attraction to a revolver is that I get an extremely broad selection of bullet choices. I can shoot shot loads for pests at close range, lightweight bullets for plinking or small game, heavy bullets for larger game, and wicked cavernous hollowpoints (or even inverted hollowbase wadcutters) for brutal stopping power. This is not to say I’d run off to WW3 with the revolver on my hip…rather, for everyday use in the boonies the revolver has more appeal to me than the auto.

Is the revolver my first handgun choice for running out the door with when Der Tag arrives? Nope. That would be my Glock. But when Im hunting, or mountain biking, or fishing, or just tooling around in the sticks it would be nice to have something that affords me a large degree of power.

So, I think for a .44 Mag the Ruger is going to be the way to go.

As I was typing this a customer came in and as he was fishing around for his wallet I noticed some speedloaders on his belt. “Packing the revolver today?” I asked. He replied in the affirmative and produced his 4” GP100 Ruger .357. Im a fan of S&W handguns, and have a bunch of them, but that GP100 is a rugged little piece. I may have to get a couple of them too.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Okay, you gotta admit…its a pretty cool looking bomb shelter.

“The disaster shelter that you are about to view was custom built for a very discerning and well-informed family. It took approximately two years to construct and was never installed. This project is available and ready for delivery.”