Tag Archives: wow thats expensive

Boundaries

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Heard b ack from the surveyors today. Theyre gonna start tomorrow.  I hope they know what theyre getting themselves into. I’ve managed to find all four ‘corners’ of the property but its a mix of official, semi-official, and I-think-thats-a-marker.

Corner #1: original marker from the  1915 Land Office survey
Corner #2: modern and official marker of recent installation
Corner #3: cairn of rocks with a sawed of t-post painted blue
Corner #4: fallen tree with a thin metal plate with notes scrived into it indicating border of property

Now, of those four only one could reasonably be considered definitive. Thus, the need for something beyond doubt. I have no intentions of doing anything close enough to the borders of my property that I’d be worried about encroaching onto my neighbor’s property. But I need to know so I can make sure the neighbors don’t encroach onto mine.

I’m hoping these guys will be done and have some info for me at the end of the week. Then its a matter of going up there, following the coords they give me, and seeing exactly where the boundaries of my property end and the neighbors begins.

Also, it’ll be nice to have a final bill as well. I’ve set aside a bunch of money in case of a ‘worst case scenario’ in terms of the amount of work they have to do. Hopefully, they can bring it in for less. But, until I know for sure I have to hold off on big spending so I have the money free to pay these guys.

Signing on the dotted line

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Signed the contract with the surveyor yesterday. Maybe now I can get on the calendar and get an idea of when this project will be done. Before I do anything near what I think are the borders of the property, I want to know. I am a very territorial critter and that cuts both ways…I want to know the borders precisely so I can make sure theyre respected, and I want to be twice as sure that Im respecting other peoples property.

Very much looking forward to the day I get the report back from the surveyor with a list of GPS coords to go find the markers with.

Universal currency

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So that happened……..

Normally I don’t buy these little divisibles because the premiums are way high. But, like the little 1-gram gold I bought a few months ago, these had a stupidly low premium … 1.25% over spot. And, thats actually a worse deal than I got on those 1-gram bars a few months back.

I have absolutely no doubt that someone is scrambling to make a post about how I shouldnt be spending money on this sort of thing and should instead be focusing resources on the land acquisition. Dude..use your head: this gold is part of those resources for land acquisition. If a deal like this comes up, I’ll convert some of that cash into gold. Net effect? $0 difference. $200k in cash, and $150k in cash and $50k in gold is still….$200k. Except theres the likelihood of the gold being worth more by the time its time to make the purchase. And, yeah, could go down too…but thats not really something I’m worried about these days.

Heavy metal

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So here’s the thing about gold. If youre in the gold buying and selling gold business, one of the things you try to avoid is buying a large amount of gold and holding onto it. The reason is obvious – if you buy 100 ounces of gold from a customer and the price drops $20 overnight, you’ve just lost two grand. Now, yes, the market could go up $20 overnight and you’d be ahead two grand… but thats not a chance you really want to take in the metals business. I asked my buddy about this and asked why he wouldn’t simply refuse the offer and take a pass on the deal. His answer, which made perfect sense, was that in the buying/selling business (of any product) you don’t last long or get a good reputation if you turn away people who want to sell you stuff.

So, what does this lead up to? Well, my buddy at the coin shop texts me and tells me that a rare opportunity to get a supremely good deal on gold and silver is available.

Apparently, he bought out an estate and wound up with several thousand one gram Valcombi bars, and a whole mountain of 100-gram divisible Valcombi silver bars. How good a deal? Well, I was told not to say, but it was an exceptionally good deal. Good enough to the point that I moved a good chunk of cash into them. He did not want to get caught holding the bag if the market shifted, so he almost immediately turned around and sold the whole thing to a wholesaler. BUT….he knows that Im always willing to buy gold if I can get a good deal on it.

So, I beefed up my gold and silver holdings. I usually prefer 1 oz. bars for my silver, but the Valcombi bars are always interesting and the price was too good to pass up, so I got a big stack of them as well.

Expensive day.

Steyr calling

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Well, the year is approximately 0.8219% over and I haven’t bought a gun yet, so that’s progress.

However…..

My final gun of 2024 showed up today. The conversation at work went like this:

Me: Ok, I’m outta here for lunch. I need to go hunt down FedEx.

Boss: Picking up a gun?

Me: Yup. Want me to bring it by and show it off to you?

Boss: Absolutely!

And that how this monster wound up sitting on the table in the conference room.

It’s a Steyr HS50M1. A five-shot .50 BMG bolt action.

I suppose you’re asking “Hey Zed, don’t you already have a .50?” Yes I do. The Barrett is a long-recoil action, much like a Browning A5 shotgun or Rem Model 8/81 rifle…the whole barrel recoils back and forth with each shot. This is not a recipe for accuracy. But, for what the Barrett was designed for, anti-materiel, it’s just fine. You don’t need a huge degree of accuracy to hit a parked plane, a fuel bladder, a microwave dish, or pipeline manifold…the sort of targets anti-materiel guns are designed for. But if you do want precision in a .50, you’re probably going to have to lean towards a bolt action. My first choice was a Barrett M95 since I already had the 82A1, but finding one was a stretch. Plenty of M99’s out there for about $3500-4000, but I wanted a repeater.

I almost bought the first version of the HS50 when it was still a single-shot gun. Was about $3000 at the time and I just couldn’t swing the deal. Different story nowadays.

This is yet another five-foot gun thats gonna be expensive to top off with glass. But, if I can keep myself from buying any more guns for a while, maybe I can afford the glass something like this deserves…thats gonna be a research project all on its own.

And…I still have to buy the reloading gear.

Another smart question would be why get a .50 ‘long range’ rifle when the .338 Lapua will have similar range and be logistically easier to feed? Well, three reasons. The first is that I just like the idea of having something that .gov doesn’t like people having. Or, in other words, “Because I Can!”.  Second, it’s just dang cool. And third, the .50 has something that the .338 does not – comparatively better availability of AP, API, APIT, Tracer, and Raufoss ammo. And while I will happily go to my grave without ever needing AP, API, APIT, Tracer, and Raufoss ammo, they are all a hoot to shoot at the range at steel. And you never know what the future will bring. When Skynet starts cranking out T-800’s, a little API could be handy.

I have gone __3__ days without buying a gun this year.

The Ruger P-series fetish continues

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Been a good boy and not bought any guns in a couple weeks. But….gun accessories, on the other hand…

I was doing well until an email landed in my box asking if I was interested in some factory mags for the Ruger 9mm P-series….you know…P95DC mags.

Me: How many do you have?

Them: *sigh*

Interesting thing is, this works out to about three mags per gun.

Unbridled lack of discipline

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In my defense, I was left unsupervised with an internet connection, an FFL/SOT, and a browser tab opened to Reddit /gundeals.

First off, I didn’t need some Beretta APX’s, but hear me out….at auction back in June I bought scads of magazines for various guns at bargain prices…about $4-$6 per mag. Well, since I have a stack of Beretta-made 21-round APX 9mm mags it wouldn’t be the worst thing if I picked up a few guns at discount, right?

[Handgun] Unissued LEO Trade-In Brazilian Police Beretta APX 17+1rd Black w/ 2 Magazines $299.95

Oh look…the Brazillians are selling a bunch of NIB APX’s they ordered. Brand new, but the manuals are in Portuguese. I can work with that:

I’ll keep one gun for myself and sell the other two off. Hmmm…what esle is out there looking for a home? Well, I’ve got the SOT so something being NFA restricted isn’t really a problem these days. Hmmm….14″ 870’s with receiver peeps and front sights. Better price if I order two or more….

[NFA] Remington 870 Police Magnum 12 Gauge Police Trade-In Pump Action Shotguns with Ghost Sights and 14 Inch Barrel $404.99 each when you buy two or more Plus Free Ship & Tax

Well, everyone wants to save money, right? In for two.

Holidays are coming up and I need gift ideas. This is the cheapest price I’ve ever seen Rugers MPR at.

[RIFLE] RUGER AR-556 MPR 5.56 AR-15 RIFLE 18″, BLACK 8535 -$599.99

The price was actually $50 cheaper when I ordered than what is listed now. The MPR is a good choice for an out-of-the-box gun with features that you’d normally pay extra for. I guess my Christmas gift shopping is done.

And….one more little jewel that is strictly for me. All these other guns are for resale or gifts, but there’s been something on my list for a while now and the vendor finally has them back in stock. Soooo…..

And that’s how I wound up buying eight guns in the space of a week. It also how I eventually wind up having to move into a storage unit because my house is full of guns.

Hobbies, man.