Good Evening! Happy Monday. The work week comes back around on the calender, as we head into the second half of September. It was a delightful weekend at Powley Place, despite the fact it rained a lot on Saturday and Sunday morning was chilly but beautiful. Today is sunny but cool. Last night was the first night at my dumpy little apartment in the suburbs that I slept with the windows closed.

Powley Place was quite nice, especially because it was still the way it’s been for years. Beautiful, quiet, and pretty much unchanging over the years. Both nights were relatively clear, and I could stand out on the bridge looking out at the stars, with a cold drink in my hand, and look back at the brightly lit flag. It was cold and wet on Saturday, but a nice campfire seemed to fix that nicely.

It’s hard to believe that summer has come and gone. Indian Summer is supposed to be back by the end of the winter, but the sound of bullets ringing out in the woods, and maples starting to take color in the Adirondacks. It will be November before you know it. Woke up yesterday, at Powley Place, an it was only 38 degrees. Brr. Not the 19 degrees one will experience in November, but time is rapidly going past.

Next Monday, Big Red goes back to the shop to get the driver’s seat fixed. Hopefully it will be covered by the warranty, if not, I will just pay for it. It’s annoying enough that getting it fixed is a priority. I am still not sure if the damage is accident related (the insurance adjuster said no), and this point, I’m ready to move on.

Bought an GAMO .177 Air Gun this weekend, which subsequently didn’t work. I thought it just got jammed at first and drove back down to Walmart (35 miles each way from Powley Place) to get  a cleaning kit, but after cleaning, it still doesn’t work. I will take another look at it tonight, and if I can’t get it to work, I will either call GAMO’s warranty line or maybe just take it back to the Gloverville Walmart and exchange it. Too bad, as I had really wanted to do some shooting this weekend. Maybe next weekend.

For just shooting targets in the woods, air gun pellets are certainly cheap enough. There like a penny and a half per round. And it’s single shot, so you’ll take a while to get through all that ammo. I have 540 odd rounds left. And as an air gun, it’s virtually silent, so you can do a lot of shooting without bugging other people like you might with a .22 in the woods.

My next firearm is going to be a general-purposing hunting 12-gauge shotgun. Probably get a pump model, as they are fast and reliable, although break-action guns have advantages too (simple, easy-to-clean cheap). Probably use the shotgun more for hunting then the air gun, which even with the “premium” 1250 fps ammo, is still much slower of a shot then a shotgun, much less a rifle. Maybe for Christmas I will get a .22, and by that point, .22 ammo should be much more readily available. Much more fun, but a lot more noisy, and you have to be 500 ft from other houses.

Drove over a rock at Powley Place, and took off the air-dam on my truck by hitting a rock and dragging it down Powley Road. It had been falling off for about 2 years now, and with the lift kit, it will be pretty pointless once my truck is lifted. The air dam had been partially ripped from hitting a low snow bank a few years ago, and was only time before it fell off. But it kept the campfire burning bright on Saturday night (see, I recycled it into bright colorful light). I support recycling, especially into fire.