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I took my nephew to Cherry Ridge yesterday as his birthday present. I've gotten him quite interested in shooting, he's bought 5 guns in the last year, and is dabbling in bullseye and action pistol. He'd never shot a rifle past 25 yards, and was very interested in trying that. So we packed a lunch, overpacked the car and his truck, and made a day of it. Eight full hours, and for the first time I actually hit all six ranges in a day: shotgun/five stand, archery, 25/50 yard pistol, 50/100 yard rifle, 200/300 yard rifle, and plinking. I'd not shot five stand before, and had an absolute blast with the various target presentations. The running rabbit and the incoming bird (which looks like it's launched from 200 yards out) are particularly fiendish. I rarely go up there on a weekend, but it wasn't too crowded. 50/100 yard rifle was most busy, followed by the pistol range. The shotgun range was busier than usual, but never full. Their wonderful plinking range usually had 0-2 people on it, and archery and 200/300 yard rifle were usually empty, but for us. A bonus of which I wasn't aware: for the month of August, Cherry Ridge is letting all members bring in one guest at no charge. The guest fee is normally $35, so it's a nice savings. If you're a member, or know one, try to take advantage! (Sorry, I've already used my free guest pass).

Give a neighborhood kid you don't like a dollar and a baseball bat. Watch the ensuing hilarity from inside your house.

So sorry to hear it. It's always brutal. Cherish the good memories.

Yes, but the echoes are still reverberating through the range...

AvGas does have a longer shelf life--it's very low in alkenes and alkynes which polymerize to form the 'varnish' that gums up carbs. It's expensive...the smaller (i.e. cheaper) airports around here are selling it in the $4-$5/gallon range. And it's leaded, slightly (much less so than the auto gas of yesteryear). I've not encountered a generator with a catalytic converter, so trashing that isn't a concern, but don't run it in a modern auto even if the 100 octane rating is tempting. Self-serve is legal for aircraft in NJ, which amuses me no end...if you want to look for a local avgas source, check Airnav, open the airport tab, and search for airports near you At the bottom of each airport page you find, it will show the current fuel price, and if self serve is available. Then you'll probably have to call the airport to see if you can access the pump; sometimes you can, often you can't get to it in a car or on foot. The credit card readers often make you enter the aircraft tail number to start the transaction, but if they're making non-aircraft sales, they should be able to tell you the workaround for that.

If they'd kept "Unacceptable: Political Affiliated Slogans and Material" and gotten rid of everything else in the Zero Tolerance policy, they would have accomplished the same thing with little or no controversy. Going into more specifics only stirred a bunch of hornets nests.

Subsonic ammo is perfectly legal. If hollow point, you want to be aware of the bizarre laws governing hollow points in this state.

I have, on occasion, bought open jugs of powder. To minimize risk, I did the following: Only buy open powder when I already have the same powder at home. Pour a couple of tablespoons of my powder, and of the powder I'm buying, onto separate sheets of white paper. Inspect carefully, to make sure the samples are visually identical, and that the powder I'm buying doesn't show signs of a different powder having been accidentally mixed in at some point. It's not foolproof, but it does offer some peace of mind.

For anyone that is a member of the North Jersey Clay Target club in Fairfield, Geiser Guns hasn't raised their prices, and they deliver shells whenever they send a truckload of clay targets to the club. I just ordered a bunch of these Top Gun loads at $52.95/flat, delivered. Today is the last day to place an order for their Aug 30 delivery, but they will require a name and matching member number to accept the order.

Right to Keep and Bear Arms. Don't worry about not knowing the acronym, most of the state needs to be taught it like they are 5.

Problem solved, I adjusted the valve clearance yesterday and it's back to being wonderfully easy to start. As is usually the case, there are YouTube videos that show the specifics. Interestingly, the manual recommends checking/adjusting the valves after the first 50 hours of use. The Hobbs meter on mine is showing 47 hours.

I'm smoking a brisket (flat only) tomorrow. I've not previously used the Texas crutch to get over the stall, but plan to give it a try on this one. I'm also planning to try for the first time the multi-hour rest, with the brisket wrapped in towels in an insulated cooler. Both techniques are more useful on a whole (packer) brisket, but I'll experiment on a small scale first. I'm planning on two smoked appetizers, but both use essentially the same filling. ABTs are my all-time favorite appetizer. ABTs And I recently found a recipe for Pig Shots, so they are going on as well. Pig Shots Last night, I made beer brats following this process--they were excellent! BBQ Pit Boys Beer Brats

Some more ideas that are awesome on the smoker: leg of lamb prime rib duck pork loin or tenderloin assorted sausages and don’t forget the appetizers: ABTs, pig candy, pig shots, smoked nuts, Moink balls, etc

Love the Anschutz line! There was a time when, for like two decades, every Olympic rifle medal was won by an Anschutz. At the beginning of my sophomore year in college, after a really good freshman year on the varsity rifle team, I got to unbox a brand new 1413 free rifle, for my exclusive use the rest of my college years. Unfortunately, the school felt strongly about not letting me take it when I graduated...

I could handle being a billionaire formerly from Mumbai...

I thought the same; even checked their schedule website, which shows them performing in Chicago this coming weekend. They might be headed there, or out for a practice session in advance of the show. They're based on Long Island. I still can't be sure from the photo, though.

Mine is quite hard to drain, so when I exercise the generator I just add enough gas for 20-30 minutes, and run it dry. If I've used it post-storm, I pump out as much gas as I can with a handheld fuel pump, then run it dry.

I can't ID them from the silhouettes, and I don't know of any nearby airshows they might be headed towards. It's too early for them to be headed to this flyover next month, but I think it is going to be a memorable one. End of WWII Commemorative Flyover of Washington DC

I have a little-used S&W model 915 I'd sell. It's a SA/DA 9 mm, alloy frame with a steel slide, housing a 4" barrel. Includes an Uncle Mikes nylon holster and two 10 round mags. $400, pics on request. When I'm reunited with my out-of-state mag stash, and if you are then in a place where you can receive them, I've also got 4 15 round mags I'd sell cheap...

Beautiful!

Just for reference, the popular Generac 5500 (5500 watt continuous, 6875 watt peak) burns 0.65 gallons of gas an hour, at 50% load. With a full tank, it will run 10.5 hours. The essential function for us is to keep the refrigerator and the chest freezer cold. Running the generator two hours every morning and two hours every evening is sufficient, with maybe another hour at lunch if it is a hot day. I keep 15 gallons of fresh gas on hand that is only for generator use, plus another 5 gallon can that gets used for the lawn equipment, so that's an additional 0 to 5 gallons, depending. So at all times, I'm covered for at least 5 days, and up to 7 days, without having to store crazy amounts of gas. And the cars always get filled up before a significant storm. We'll also run the coffee maker in the morning, the microwave occasionally, maybe a lamp or two at night, and charge lanterns and phones, but all that is still under 50% capacity for the generator. Cooking is mostly on the propane grill, with a spare 20 lb bottle always on hand. We have city water, and no need for a sump pump. Almost all of our outages are in temperate weather, so only once did I have to wire the furnace to the generator, and once (after a week-long outage) I had to connect the 240v lift pump in our septic system, but generally I just run one extension cord to the basement freezer, and a second to the kitchen (I haven't gotten around to installing a transfer switch).

Can anyone recommend a repair shop in Morris county to fix a portable Generac 5500? The compression release mechanism froze a day or two ago, making it nearly impossible to start. Fortunately, we got our power back a couple of hours ago I’ll check and adjust the valve clearance today, but if that doesn’t do it, I think I’d want to farm out pulling the cam.

JCP&L has been called out before for doing significantly less, relative to most other power companies, preventive tree maintenance along their lines. And once again they reaped the savings, and the consumers paid the price We just got our power back a couple of hours ago; we were out for 88 hours. Better, at least, than after Sandy (7 days) and Irene (8 days).

That must be comparatively new. It wasn't a rule when I was a member years back. I liked the club, but they did struggle with very lawsuit-happy neighbors trying to close them down.

Generator started on the first pull. Have plenty of gas, propane for the grill, charcoal for the smoker, bourbon, and beer. The house is at the top of a hill-water drains away in all directions. And we had the two giant-but-dying ash trees next to the house removed last month. Bring it.