Couldn’t resist posting about this story … out of New Zealand.

A judge in New Zealand made a child a ward of the court in order to change her name to something more reasonable. What was her name?

“Talula Does The Hula From Hawaii”

Okay then.

“The court is profoundly concerned about the very poor judgment which this child’s parents have shown in choosing this name,” he wrote. “It makes a fool of the child and sets her up with a social disability and handicap, unnecessarily.”

The girl had been so embarrassed at the name that she had never told her closest friends what it was. She told people to call her “K” instead, the girl’s lawyer, Colleen MacLeod, told the court.

For the record, I disagree with the judge’s decision. I believe the parents should be allowed to name the child whatever they want. Want a son named “I Am A Retard”? Go ahead.

However …

Once that child turns 18, he or she should have every freedom when it comes to beating the everloving shit out of their parents just prior to legally changing their own name. As a matter of fact, anyone who has any contact with that child should have the freedom to beat the everloving shit out of the kid’s parents. I know that if my son makes an 8-year-old friend at the park only to realize mere moments later that his newfound buddy’s name is “Eat Shit And Die”, “MILF-Porker”, or “Hey Is That Your Face Or Fucking Zit-Covered Pig Nuts” I’d sure as hell go beat the shit out of his parents for him.

Look at some of the names they’ve encountered:

Registration officials blocked some names, including Fish and Chips, Yeah Detroit, Keenan Got Lucy and Sex Fruit, he said. But others were allowed, including Number 16 Bus Shelter “and tragically, Violence,” he said.

“Number 16 Bus Shelter”? That child is destined to become homeless.

SEX FRUIT! How do you do that? “Hi, this is my wife Christine, our sons Anthony and Robert, and that’s my daughter, Sex Fruit.” That deserves a major bludgeoning.

I have little patience for parents pushing their own ignorance and bad behavior upon their children. Whenever I’m at a store and I see some 12-year-old girl walking around in platform shoes and a pair of hip huggers with the word, “Juicy” or “Bitch” or “Saucy” written across the back, the urge to throttle their parents bubbles up real quick. But … Sex Fruit?

New Zealand law does not allow names that would cause offense to a reasonable person, among other conditions, said Brian Clarke, the registrar general of Births, Deaths and Marriages. Clarke said officials usually talked to parents who proposed unusual names to convince them about the potential for embarrassment.

See, that’s what I’m not all on board with. Causing offense to a “reasonable person”? There are a lot of people out there, and it’s hard to peg who is “reasonable” about being offended or not. Generally, when people are offended by something, it’s hardly reasonable.

If I decided to name my child “Winchester”, there are plenty of people who would be highly offended. And plenty of those people likely WOULDN’T be offended if I decided to name my child, “Obama’s Disciple” or … I don’t know … “Face Slapping Cock Monkey”.

Hmm … “Winchester” is a pretty cool boy’s name, by the way …

Fair season is in full swing here in NH now. Seems like nearly every town has some kind of fair going on - carnival rides, displays of all sorts of stuff and people showing off cattle. I never thought I’d get into the horse-pulling and ox-cart obstacle course navigation thing, but it’s actually quite amusing.

In small doses.

One of the things I greatly enjoy are raffles. I like the idea of spending 5 bucks for a chance to win something cool. Sure enough, we stopped by the Haverhill Fair and there’s the Vermont Trappers Association booth! They were showing off a few stuffed critters and plenty of skins as well as a couple of firearms such as a pink .22 Cricket. Nice.

So what’s being raffled off? Well, tell me if you think it would be nice to win any of these for five bucks …

1st: Weatherby Vanguard 300 WSM

2nd: Remington Model 700 Buckmaster 30-06

3rd: Remington Model 870 Super Mag 3-1/2″ 12 Ga.

4th: Stevens Gold Wing 12 Ga.

5th: Mossberg ATR Bolt Rifle - 308 Win.

6th: Stevens Model 200 Grey - 243 Win.

7th: Mossberg 535 Turkey Model 3-1/2″ 12 Ga.

8th: Remington 870 Youth Model 20 Ga.

9th: Ruger Model 10/22 Carbine

10th: Cricket Pink Lady .22

You see that right … they’re raffling off all 10 in September. I’d be happy with any of them. I’ll be hoping for a phone call!

Crazy guy has a 10-inch knife in McD’s … waving it around and threatening people. Police arrive, shoot the guy, and he goes to the hospital. The story itself isn’t all that interesting, but what IS completely fascinating is the fact that the Police had means to stop this guy, and all of the people in McDonald’s didn’t … observe …

A female employee called police at about 7:40 p.m. asking for assistance. Officers responded and saw the man sitting in the restaurant that was filled with other customers as well. He refused to put down the knife when police asked, Monfette said.

Of course, nobody had a gun to defend themselves there. What about non-lethal self defense?

Officers tried to subdue him with two canisters of a chemical spray, but it did not stop him, Monfette said.

“He lunged at one police officer (with the knife) and another one shot at him,” Monfette said.

And there you have it. One method doesn’t work, the other method does. Crystal clear.

Well, that was fun.

As seen everywhere else, these were some of the fine people who attended:

Jay
Marko
Lissa
TOTWTYTR
Liberty
JD
Doubletrouble
Ted
Weer’d Beard
Bruce

… and special guest star …

Paul - From State Line Gun Shop

Now, the shoot was on the 20th, and I believe I had the most driving to do, so I was up at the crack of 0-dark-30 to get my butt in gear, inhale some caffeine, and start driving. The driving was rough going through Northern Siberia, across the Arctic, through the Canadian wilderness, and finally down through NH on my way to pick up Marko. Bingo! We have met our first other blogger, and I’ve only been on the road for an hour at that point.

I learned a little bit about everybody on Sunday, and thought I’d share my impressions of this most excellent event. First up, Marko, who I need to devote some extra space to, considering we rode together for four total hours on Sunday.

Marko was both an excellent navigator, and simply great company on an extended drive. I’ve never spent two hours in a car with someone I’d met in person only minutes before, so you never really know what’s going to happen in that situation. No sweat, though. We both have a tech-type background, we’re both at-home Dads, and even found that we share a similar nationality! At least in part. All in all, the perfect start to a great day, hanging with someone you have quite a bit in common with. We shared some laughs over Stephen King’s “It”, he gave me an excellent tip regarding Windex and corrosive ammo, and we talked about all things Dad-like. Turns out he believes - much as I do - that the Terrible Two’s don’t exist, but the Threes downright suck.

And he has the same opinion of the movie Mr. Mom that I do. Namely, the next person who mentions it when I say the words “stay-at-home-Dad” will get an enthusiastic beating.

We showed up and were promptly greeted by smiling faces, enthusiastic handshakes, and just a general warm brotherhood all the way around.

Oh yeah … and there were guns … EVERYWHERE. Friggin’ AWESOME!

And what did I learn about everyone else? In no particular order …

Lissa makes damn good cookies, is impossibly sweet and good natured, and I quite honestly think I had more fun watching her experience all sorts of firearms for the first time than I did shooting my own. I think part of the reason shooters enjoy new shooters so much is because we’re re-living that experience ourselves, at least in small part. I remember my first few shots with the mosin and the SKS. And Lissa and I took our first shots with a fully automatic weapon just a few minutes apart at the blogger shoot. Read her amazing perspective of the day. She gets it.

TOTWTYTR. Any owner of such a fine rifle as the Enfield No4 Mk2 is okay in my book. And a fellow Mosin M91 owner! “Too Old To Work, Too Young To Retire” … maybe, but just right to hang out and shoot with for an afternoon!

JD, I wish we spent more time chatting. I have to find out AFTER the shoot that you’ve been in Martial Arts for years and years. Dammit! Everyone at the shoot was smiling, having fun, and sharing funny stories about anything and everything, JD was no exception. And he’s an engineer!

And on that topic, if I may digress … ever notice that there are an abundance of techy-type people who are also gun-lovers? Perhaps it’s the love of simplistic machinery that goes bang when you pull a trigger instead of giving you an error, not allowing a bullet to exit a barrel because of a firewall, or requiring hours upon hours of coding to do something stupidly simple such as projecting a hunk of lead downrange into the plastic skull cavity of a furby at 2000 feet per second.

Doubletrouble. Our most gracious and kind host who was trusting enough to hand over his backyard to us all. One day, I want a backyard that at least temporarily contains enough weaponry and ammunition to invade a not-so-small country … twice. And the dude has a cannon. A CANNON! I mean, come on, how cool is that!

Ted. Ted brought the Teletubby, a Sun workstation, and an NT machine to a shooting range with the explicit intent of laughing while each of those objects gets fired upon. That’s just impossibly cool. Another fellow tech-person, a Dad, and yet another new friend met at the bloggershoot (that makes it sound as if though we launch bloggers into the air and shoot them …). Ted’s another person I met Sunday that I wouldn’t mind hanging out with at the range any time. If only I didn’t live in Moscow! Heh.

Weer’d Beard. One of the most knowledgeable firearm owners I’ve ever met. And he has some badass weapons of his own. How the hell do you look at an ejected case from a Mosin-Nagant and immediately point out, “Oh, that’s Hungarian ammo!” He’s a Scrapple fan with some highly entertaining views of French-Canadian cuisine. Like deep-fried lard dumplings in grease sauce. I had always wondered what that sound was at night - living a mere three hours from Montreal, I now know for a fact it’s the sound of arteries hardening across that border!

Bruce. Bruce started out the day by handing me twenty strippers! Err … stripper clips. We shared a meatball sandwich together, though rumors of it being similar to the scene from Lady and the Tramp are completely untrue. Bruce was highly entertaining and it was great to get to know him. He showed off his wicked good New England accent, and I’ve been laughing about the potato song since I left Sunday afternoon. Something about a spud patch or something like that. Dammit that was funny. He’s also a hell of a shot with that 10/22, nailing a 3-inch tall baby Shrek with ease.

And last but certainly not least, Jay. What can I say about this loud, wild-eyed organizer of the event other than, “he’s damn cool”. Bayonet charge on a teletubby? Check. Shotgun with a razor-sharp blade bayonet? Check. A few times during the event the thought crossed my mind … “He’s somebody’s DAD …. that’s friggin’ AWESOME!” He has some impressive firearms and was a major reason this event was the success it was by being the organizer and head range honcho, blowing the whistle loud enough to make dogs explode and simultaneously shooting enough ordnance towards Massachusetts to make liberals explode! Our kids are roughly the same age and I’m fairly certain our respective critters are going to have moments as they’re growing up where they are positively mortified at their parent’s exceedingly goofy (and quite likely remembered as hilarious) behavior.

I will save perhaps my most generous compliment for him. If ever there was a zombie apocalypse, I’d want Jay watching my back.

It’s easy to feel at ease around strangers with warm personalities around, and I think all of us were nutty enough to make this a rousing success. I can’t wait for next year!

Also a special thanks to Paul from the State Line Gun Shop. Paul loaded up and let me get behind that 9mm Submachine gun. After I emptied it, he was mightily impressed at my accuracy with the full auto. Now let me tell you - any person who compliments me by saying I have excellent accuracy with an automatic weapon will always be all right with me.

Damn that was fun. Let’s do it again!

Shotgun FRUIT SALAD!

More video to come … I think …

Where’s yer BSOD NOW, bitch!?

First … start with a watermelon. About 20-25 yards away.

Load up a shotgun with your choice of ammo. I think this might have been 3″ magnum shells, but I’m certain that’s up for debate as I don’t know who took the shot.

Now … shoot it. Watch splodey goodness!

Uhhh … don’t get anywhere near it during this step, unless you want a Gallagher-style makeover.

Wait for it to settle, and then … enjoy vaporized fruitiness!

Okay, two bloggers were taking shots with shotguns. Weer’d Beard and Bruce (both of whom, by the way, are extremely cool characters that I would be more than happy to supply with a Guinness and a trip to my local, big-arse, hundreds-of-yards range any day of the week) were both shooting. So … who’s taking credit for the splodey shot?

Before:

After:

Unfortunately, I do not have video of Furby’s electronic offal falling out of it’s eye cavity. But know that today there is one less obnoxious, slightly creepy furbish-speaking hellspawn roaming the Earth.