Some Days

you eat the bear, and some days the bear eats you.

I went to the range today to sight the Mosin in, after the last range session I dropped it and the front sight just managed to catch the stool sitting at the bar and almost came all the way off.

I found some scribed marks on the front sight, so I moved it back to line the scribe marks up. To my delight it put the rifle right back at zero.

Ten test shots at 25 yards then three 5 round volleys at 100 yards and I was satisfied with the results (25 rounds total and no need for the assistance of dimensional lumber).  The first set of five was done with the blade sight all the way down, the next two were at the first click towards the 100 meter mark. As you can see I was pulling off to the left with the second and third sets; the first set was done with the bipod and the second two sets without. The rifle is much more accurate than her shooter is, so I'm pleased with the results.

According to what I've read here I'm supposed to give her a name. Range Partner asked if I had picked one out and I had to admit I have not.  Perhaps I will call her Ivana, meaning "God is gracious" because the first time I shot her I said "Good God - this thing has a kick!"

I did, by the way, manage to get the bayonet to slip on and off as it should. I haven't shot the rifle with the bayonet attached, but I have the option now if I want it. Plus, if I ever see a Nazi I can stab him with the bayonet instead of having to shoot him, which I'm sure would be much less punishing on my shoulder.

As we were finishing up another gentleman showed up on the range with a unique little rifle. It looked just like a Mosin carbine, but when he pulled the trigger back there was just a cute little pop instead of the massive shock wave of a 7.62x54R going down range.

It was a Polish WZ48 .22lr trainer, something that I had never heard of (not that that should come as a big shock, there are lots of things I have never heard of). It looked like he was having a great time shooting it, he said his next door neighbor wanted to learn how to shoot a rifle so he was checking it out to make sure it was ready to resume performing its intended purpose. Range Partner eyeballed me sideways and commented that I was probably going to be adding another entry to the "Guns I Want" list.  Maybe.

After the rifle shooting we moved over to the pistol range where I put about 50 rounds through the Grok. I did OK, I guess, no big holes right in the middle but lots of little ones spread all around.  While we were at the pistol range there was a guy that had a pretty big collection of Glocks, including a G-26.

I told him I was still on the fence deciding between the 26 and the 19, so he let me put a mag through the 26. I think it has pretty well convinced me that the 19 is the way to go.  Nothing wrong with the 26, it just doesn't fill the hand like the G-36 does, even with the extensions on the magazine. The G-19 fills the hand quite as nicely as the G-36 with it's mag extensions, and it uses the same holsters.

He also had a G-17L, which is a long-slide version of the G-17. He let me put a magazine through it as well, and it is a sweet gun.  I did a lot better with grouping my patterns with the G-17 and the G-26 than I did with my G-36, I'm hoping the addition of the grips (if they ever get here) will help with that. I'm pretty convinced that I need a europellet slinger though, just because.

At any rate, I had a pretty good day at the range. Again.