Whipped Cream Difficulties

Mike the Musicologist and I were in the middle of a used bookstore in Springfield, Missouri, browsing the shelves. MtM came up to me and said “Let’s go.” in that tone of voice. You know the one I’m talking about: not mean, not angry, but that tone of voice that tells you “Some s–t has gone down and we need to leave right now.”

He told me in the parking lot as we were heading to the car. It was in a Signal group chat we both belong to, but I hadn’t been looking at my phone. It seems to me like we spent a couple of hours (but it may not have been that long) in the cafe at a Barnes and Noble making calls to other people and trying to figure out next steps.

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We had dinner with Lawrence and some other mutual friends of ours and Andrew’s on Monday night, the night we got back to Austin. I remember thinking to myself, “If ever there was an appropriate time for the ‘Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?’ joke, this would be it.” Then Lawrence walked in and made that joke.

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I’ve been running flat out for the past couple of days. I got up Tuesday morning, after a short sleep, to find out that I had to deal with an Internet outage (that Spectrum didn’t fix until Wednesday morning) and also with our trash. I paid someone to deal with the trash so I didn’t have to deal with it when I got back. They failed. Enough said.

So this is really my first chance to catch up and explain myself and my adventures last week. Of course, it has taken me a few days to write this.

Mike the Musicologist and I drove to Springfield, Missouri, for the annual Smith and Wesson Collectors Association Symposium. The Association is trying out moving these events to later in the year, in hopes of increasing attendance. So far, the signs look promising – it was the best attended event since 2019 – but I’m not sure how much of that was the date and how much of that was the location. Next year is in Mesquite, Texas, and a little later in September, so we will see what happens then.

We drove because we probably would had to rent a car anyway to get around. Driving let us carry more stuff to and from Springfield, including things that would have been hard to get on a plane. And the cost for the rental car was competitive with air fare.

If everything comes together, I plan to have an actual display in Mesquite. I didn’t really display this year, but I have done displays at some of the other symposia. The running theme of those displays has been “Nothing To See Here, Move Along”, and they’ve mostly been things that I thought were curious and interesting and wanted to share with other people, without getting into a competition. Next year, I have a story to tell and something to see here.

(Someone gave me an idea for my display in 2028 as well: “Things I Picked Up While At the Symposium”. Start off with an empty table, and as I accumulate things, add them to the display. I’ll probably have to take a plane to the symposium that year, so this should be an easy low-stress display.)

The two questions I always get asked:

“Did you buy any guns?” Yes, yes I did. Two of them came home with us, and the third is being shipped. Photos to come when I get some time, but I think folks will enjoy them. I also bought another non-Smith and Wesson as we were driving back to Austin.

“Did you buy any books?” Yes, yes I did. Mike Wood of the Revolver Guy blog came and gave a presentation on the S&W Model 68 and the history of the California Highway Patrol. He also brought copies of his book to sell, and I bought four signed copies: one for me and three for my friends. I had planned to buy five, but…you know.

Both of my book buddies were there, and one of them brought me five Samworths, which I bought from him for a total of $250. Those will be documented as well, when I get the time. The other book buddy brought me two large flash drives loaded with various scanned articles, for which I am greatly indebted to him.

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We ate pretty well in Springfield, even though there is a noticeable shortage of “Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives” restaurants. We had good (but slightly expensive, IMHO) sushi at Ariake. We missed the free hotel breakfast on Tuesday and ended up going to Van Gogh’s Eeterie (in spite of the name) which I thought was delightful.

We had pretty good Thai food at Rama Thai and a more American/Route 66 themed meal at College Street Cafe. Several people praised the Black Sheep in Springfield to us, but we didn’t make it over there. We did make it to George’s Family Restaurant with some friends of ours, and I enjoyed that.

We tried to go to Bruno’s Italian Restaurant with some other friends of ours, but they were closed (even though Apple Maps and the hours posted in the window said they should have been open: their website says they are closed for roof repairs, but we didn’t see any indication of that at the location). So we went to a PaPPo’s Pizzeria & Pub near Bruno’s (part of a regional chain), which was pretty good (they do a nice thin-crust pepperoni with hot honey), and had a discussion of (among other things) the insanity defense and mens rea. (One of our friends is a lawyer. He also picked up the lunch tab. I will be sending him a thank-you separately.)

We also had a wonderful meal at Corner 21, a Chinese place. I initially thought the prices were a little high. Then we got our food. Two people could split a single entree and not walk away hungry: as a matter of fact, I think even two people would wind up with leftovers. And it was good. Really really good. (I had the chicken with mushroom in stone pot.)

Saturday night was the S&WCA banquet: steak, pecan pie, and Rob Roys for everyone of legal drinking age. Sunday night we went out for steak again, to Jimm’s Steakhouse and Pub. I liked it, but it was an interesting experience. If you can’t tell from the photo on the website, it looks like this used to be a Steak and Ale, and they didn’t do much remodeling. The salad bar looks the same as I remember from the S&A in Austin, the bathrooms still had “Lords” and “Ladies” signs hanging on them, and even the interior design looked the same as I remember from the one in Austin. It was fun, or at least as fun as it could be under the circumstances. (Old Fashioneds were drunk. Absent friends were toasted.)

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The Rob Roy was the late Dr. Roy G. Jinks’s favorite drink.

It seemed like there was a bit of a dark cloud hanging over things this year. Not just our personal stuff: this was the first Symposium without Dr. Jinks, who was a founding member of the Association and built it into what it is today (with help from others, of course). With his death, there is only one founding charter member remaining.

It wasn’t just Dr. Jinks, either. Every year, they read a list of the members who have passed in the past year. One of the deceased members was the man who sponsored me into the Association, back when you still had to have a sponsor. Another one was a man who I would regularly have lunch at Chipotle with, along with two other friends. He lived in a part of Pennsylvania where it was hard to get Chipotle, any Mexican food, or anything with spice. (One year, I brought him some of the habenero Tabasco. He was very grateful.)

Many of the older members are dying off, and knowledge is being lost with them. At the same time, membership is increasing. We’re doing a fair job of bringing in younger people, and I think the older people know they need to share stuff with the younger ones.

I’m cautiously optimistic. I just wish people would stop dying.

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The one touristy thing we did was to go to the Wonders of Wildlife National Museum & Aquarium at the Bass Pro Shop in Springfield. This is another case where I thought it was kind of expensive ($45.99 for an adult day pass).

But.

The place is huge. We spent five hours in there and didn’t quite manage to see everything (had to leave at closing time). There are themed exhibit areas devoted to the animals of different regions (Africa, “the swamp at night”, and even more that aren’t listed). There are other themed exhibits and exhibit areas. There are multiple “halls of fame”. And heads. Lots and lots of animal heads.

(All of this is separate from the NRA museum inside the Bass Pro Shop, which does not require admission. MtM and I had seen that twice previously.)

They also have Bass Force One and other presidential memorabilia. Mike observed that the presidential stuff ended with Bush 43: we speculate that Obama, Biden, and Trump are not really outdoors people. They also had a boat that they had painted up as “Pilar” but which is actually Pilar’s sister ship.

I don’t recommend springing for the $30 for photos, though.

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Could I live in Springfield if I got kicked out of Austin? Yes, probably. It seems pretty gun friendly. We saw several gun stores, but did not go to any of them for obvious reasons. Google searches suggest home and apartment prices are pretty reasonable. Again, though, I’m not planning to move there: this is just the Keller Test.

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1,407.8 miles driveway to driveway, including our driving around Springfield. I put some additional miles on the rental driving it before we left (and reset the trip meter at the start of the drive), but Monday to Monday we averaged almost 176 miles a day.

My thanks to the usual suspects. They know who they are, and I will be sending thank you emails and notes to some people separately.

Book blogging, gun blogging, and gun book blogging to resume soon.

This entry was posted on Friday, September 18th, 2026 at 12:30 pm and is filed under Boats, Books, Food, Guns, Hoplobibilophilia, Mixology, Obits, Smith and Wesson, Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.