Bad Day in Bedrock - Update

Thanks to all who left comments yesterday, I can't respond to each individually but I assure you I read each one more than once. It is touching to know so many people I have never met personally care enough to show love and support and prayers. It is still hard to get my head around all this, I have experienced combat stress and I know the feeling. I know how my system becomes numb and functions on training and adrenalin, this is where I am at the moment.I also want you to know I read many of your blogs yesterday, it was good to read  other things and take my mind elsewhere, I feel like I am among friends here. I will give a little more insight here so hopefully someone who thinks there is good in everyone sees that is not the case, there is evil people out there.

Monday around noon we received a call form my step-daughter who just returned home from work, there was problems in the neighborhood, police everywhere. My mother-in-law had been assaulted in her home. I immediately headed home (it was a 10 hr drive) All during the drive I was getting updates from police, friends, my sons etc. Around midnight I wheeled into the hospital parking lot and headed for the trauma unit. When I saw her my heart was sick, she relayed the story, a young black man had knocked on her door with a story of missing the bus to school and needing money. She told me she always treated people like she would want to be treated, anyway she gave him a few dollars after thanking her he left. A little while later he returned and asked to use a phone to call his mom. My MIL let him use her cordless phone on the porch. At this point he hit her, knocked her down and drug her inside. This was not a light beating, she was repeatedly punched, kicked, strangled, she said she remembers him wrapping something around her throat while she was face down and choking her while his boot was in the back of her head. She told me all this went on for quite a while and she remembers crying out for Jesus to help her over and over. At some point during the beating he covered her face trying to smother her and she said she thought if she could just lay still and be quite he would think she was dead........it worked, laying there she passed out from the beating and blood loss and after about what we believe was about a half hour she came to, drug herself to the neighbors house who then called police. It was amazing how she got up and made it next door with a fractured hip and  skull and bleeding from ears, mouth and head wounds, prior to this she walked with a cane.

She is still in the hospital as I write but doing better and hopefully will be released to a rehab facility later today.

Bad Day in Bedrock

A lot of jokes is made about mother-in-laws, I love mine. She is the mother of my deceased wife and I have remained very close to her, she lives nearby, I take care of her when she needs help. Most Sundays I drive her to church and many times I take her out to lunch. She is one of the most kind people you will ever meet and will help anyone. She also has no other family close by except myself and one of my sons.
As I tell this account things are still playing out and I can't say anything to put this case in jeopardy. 
 I was out of town when my MIL was brutally attacked in her home and left for dead. I made a marathon trip home to find her in the hospital badly beaten. I wont reveal any details which aren't out there in the news at this time. I did not say anything yesterday because the media did not know the thug had been captured, but he was and they know now. The case against him is as air tight as they get.(if there is such a thing)
I can't express the thoughts I had about this piece of sub-human waste and what he did. I don't make threats so I won't here.......nuff said about that.
I will say if I get to be her age and have half the wit's about me and the strength she has I will be happy, she was beaten so badly and endured so much but her mind is clear and she has vivid recollection of all details of this event to the extent the detectives are shocked.
I will let you know more as I am able to and feel safe doing so.
PS. In the blogging world we try to protect our identity to a degree, I do and so do a lot of you. I say this because I am sure someone could scan news stories and find out a lot more facts about where this all occurred by piecing together info from my site as well as media outlets. I only ask if you do know more don't divulge it here on a public forum. Thanks, Duke.

Is This Coincidence ?

Is This Coincidence ? Richard Pryor skit over 30 yrs ago, would they do this today ?

Not Good # 11

Now where is the head, Oops my bad, wrong door.

Interesting Pistols

I have two 9mm pistols I know very little about. I do know they are old Browning Hi-Powers , I think made before WWII but I am not sure.
I acquired them many years ago from a man who owed me $300 and gave me these 2 pistols in lieu of money.

They did not have grips on them when I got them, They would have been wood, I installed the grips you see as a measure to be able to shoot them.  The serial #'s are 21XXX and are 3 numbers apart. When I tried to look up the numbers I could not find any that low. (The Serial #'s in the picture are partially covered.)




Here is a close up of the left side markings













This is interesting, they both have 500 meter tangent sights however being only 3 serial numbers apart notice the difference in the way the 2 sights are graduated.  The top one has the 500 mark near the pivot point of the sight while the lower is about half way.











Both are slotted for a shoulder stock. They also have an internal extractor which differs from the newer pistols. They still function and shoot well however I don't shoot them much. The serial numbers on the frame and slide match and apart from the grips appear original. I wish I knew more of the history behind them I am guessing they are more valuable together due to the serial #'s
From what I read they may qualify as a 
curio and relic.

This will tick you off.

Want to know what your hard earned taxes do, watch this Judge Judy clip.

Not Good # 10

Not a good day to not wear a helmet.

Welcome

Welcome to mmasse, thanks for clicking the follow button, your profile souns a lot like mine, Vet, NRA member, weapons enthusiast. Hope you check in often.

Airline Security, You believe this?

A few days ago I was over at  Tam's  blog where she had a bit about the TSA and airline security. I remember after 9-11 thinking that security would go nuts at airports, that is just the way the government reacts to everything I also said at the time that what happened that day would never happen again because in the past we were conditioned to negotiate with hijackers and everything would be fine but now passengers would fight back in order to save the plane, a fact borne out by the flight over Pennsylvania.   Tam's blog also reminded me of an experience I had a few years back and how rules are followed without any common sense.
 I was awaiting a flight to Iraq. Our battalion was leaving Gulfport Mississippi, we were flying on a DC-10 operated by World, a commercial airline which had been contracted to transport us. We were not leaving through a passenger terminal but were bussed to the plane and boarded via steps on the outside. As we were waiting to board the plane we were informed that because this was a commercial flight we could not bring knives, razors etc aboard the aircraft. On the surface this may sound reasonable seeing as we were making a layover in Bangor Maine and would be entering the terminal in the secure area where other passengers had been through security. What made it idiotic was we were carrying fully automatic weapons, every one of us had an M-16, We were boarding the plane with over 500 M-16's and 9 mm pistols and you want us to hand over knives? There was a bag we were supposed to drop knives into and we would get them back on the other end of the flight. I decided I would NOT give up my knife so I promptly opened up the butt plate on my weapon, took out the cleaning kit and secured it in my cargo pocket and dropped my knife in the butt stock, I assumed they would not make us strip the weapon down. I was right the knife was never discovered. It was quite amusing as we taxied down the runway the pilot came over the PA system and made the announcement, " Thank you for flying World Airlines with us today, please remained seated while the seat belt lamp is lit. Turn off all electronic devices during takeoff, please stow all weapons on the deck facing outboard, We hope you enjoy your flight, thank you for serving our country" ....................It was then quite.
A little while after we had taken off the pilot came back on the PA and announced, " you are now free to roam aboard the aircraft, the cockpit is open feel free to come up and visit with us" Later in the flight I did go up to the cockpit and sit down and talk with the pilots and got a mini tour of the flight center. The airline was very good to us which goes to show the TSA are the 'anal' bunch. But the government knows best, and now they want to be in charge of our health care seeing as they do everything else so effectively.
PS, The ones that turned knives in to security never saw them again.

Hog Day Afternoon

It's been a busy summer and the weather is turning cool, My chapter of the CVMA was having a get together South of St Augustine Sunday afternoon so took advantage of the excellent riding weather. I rolled my 2005 Harley Police model out. The fuel injected engine turns over once and fires into life and throbs with a low idle.

I headed down I-95, breathing the fresh cool air clears the mind, The big Harley engine cruises at about 3000 RPM, music to the ears. Sometimes you just need to get away.

 Must be the place, Combat Vets enjoy  getting together. We have a chapter meeting to discusses business and future rides then a cookout, It was good to see old friends again.

After a few hours I head home, I swing through down town St Augustine the bay front so pretty.

Sea wall by the old fort.

 

Blast from the past, Horse meets Iron Horse














 I turn down A1A to ride home along the ocean front

 I stop for a little while to enjoy the cool ocean breeze, I love breathing salt air........No really officer what 'No Parking' sign.

I day dream about days gone by when I used to take my old Chevy pickup and drive over these very dunes and drive down the beach, there is fewer beaches these days you can drive on.

Oh well back on the road it will be dark in a few hours, time to head home. It has been a good day. A chance to unwind before a new work week. Sometimes I want to load up my duffel bag, strap it to the back and hit the road for a few weeks.....maybe one day.

Not Good # 9

Not a good day any time.

Trucks in the Desert

Yesterday,  I mentioned about the old Viet Nam era truck we used for a while in Iraq.
One of the state of the art vehicles we had was the MTVR (Medium Tactical Vehicle Replacement) shown here. Don't ask me how the military comes up with the names. This one was one of our convoy trucks, We called it the BFT (Big, I forget what the 'F' stood for Truck) Notice the door is ballistic protected and comes up to head level. They were made by Oshkosh, I guess the same company which makes little kids cloths

They were very fast trucks, all wheel drive, automatic transmission, and even had compressors to inflate tires while it was moving so a bullet would not cause a flat, air would be continuously fed to the wheel although once it stopped it would resemble this. Notice this truck has taken fragments to the drivers door as well. We also had them with heavy guns attached and turrets on top.

We also used 'civilian' model trucks this one an International which had to be hardened for convoy use, thus the Kevlar panel on the door. Inside the door was a welded steel plate which covered your torso while seated, it did not hinge with the door so it was very hard to get in and out, especially with 75 lbs of 'battle rattle' and forget about doing it fast. You notice most of our vehicles had battle damage like the windshield here. 




Another Heavy Hauler by Oshkosh, notice door again. Also see the lifting eyes and towing points through the hood ad well as on the bumper. All of our vehicles had tow points like this. In case of any vehicle being incapacitated for any reason we would quickly hook to it and drag it back to base camp to keep the Hajji's from getting their hands on it and salvaging stuff to attack us with.  On the big vehicles the brakes would lock and they would be dragged with wheels skidding even to the point of wearing the rims down to the axle.

'Duke' with trusty M16

Case in point, Me standing in front of this convoy truck which was dragged smoking and burning back to Ramadi and left on the outskirts of the compound. As you can imagine there was a lot of heat build up dragging 50,000 lbs of scrap iron down a highway as fast as you could, quite a show to say the least. Not much worth salvaging from this vehicle.

Welcome in Order

Welcome to Kris, Thanks for hitting the follow button. It is always good to see new followers, makes it seem worth while. The rest of you check out her site.

A Day Down Range (part 4)

Holiday times in Iraq were celebrated as best we could, here is a 4th of July cookout. We were able to come up with some meat and have a cookout.

 In the early stages there was the ICDC which stood for Iraqi Civil Defense Corps. They liked having their picture taken. I did not trust them and I guess the higher ups did not either as they were not allowed weapons at first, later they were and there were cases where the same weapons were found in the hands of the enemy.

A picture of a warning sign around our armory where we could receive our ammo. I could walk up and draw ammo without any questions, not like stateside.
Wish I could do that today, it was good quality stuff. 
Basically the writing in Arabic said stay out or we will kill you and feed you to the pigs.  

 National Guard units brought their own vehicles like many units did. Many times these units did not have the latest and greatest in equipment. Here is a Viet Nam era 2.5 ton (deuce and a half) we used for a while around base camp borrowed from a Army Guard unit we were working with.

Not Good # 8

Not a good time to turn loose of the handle bars

Look Ma' no hands