The updates to the list of US Congressional representatives for Texas have been completed.
Please let me know if you find any issues with the list.
Well, that was easy.
January 31st, 2025Quick preview of coming attractions (also relevant to Lawrence’s interests).
January 31st, 2025I do intend to resume gun book blogging (and random gun crankery) soon.
Right now, I’m trying to finish the updates to the list of Texas congressional representatives. I’m about 1/3rd of the way through, and hope to have that done by the end of the weekend.
In the meantime, I thought I’d put up a quick post that’s sort of gun book related. Lawrence gets a fair number of possums in his yard. Or maybe just one possum, over and over again, that his dog keeps cornering. I don’t know for sure. I haven’t checked the serial numbers on his possums.
Anyway, I thought I’d throw this up as a preview from a forthcoming book: a recipe for “possum sausages”. I do think my use of this limited excerpt from How Wild Things Are by Analiese Gregory counts as “fair use”.
(Click to embiggen.)
One thing I do want to point out, though: Lawrence’s possums are the “Virginia opossum” (order Didelphimorphia). The possums the author is describing here are the “common brushtail possum” (order Diprotodontia), which are considered invasive in Tasmania. I suspect with enough pork back fat stuffed in, either one tastes good. Especially if you follow the recommended process of caging your possum for two weeks and feeding it fruit and veggies to reduce the “gamey” taste.
I do not know if the differences between Didelphimorphia and Diprotodontia make a difference to the cooking time or the taste of the possum sausage. I have not tried this recipe yet. (We don’t have a sausage/meat grinder. We do have a Kitchenaid stand mixer, but I would never buy the sausage stuffer attachment for it, as reliable sources say that is a POS.)
Obit watch: January 31, 2025.
January 31st, 2025Dick Button, figure skating guy. I’ve never been a big skating fan, but I remember Mr. Button from when I was young and actually watched some of the Olympics.
Iris Cummings Critchell. She was 104.
She competed as a swimmer in the 1936 Summer Olympics, and was the last surviving member of the American team.
She flew with the Woman’s Air Force Service Pilots, ferrying planes across the country for shipping overseas.
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In addition to her work at Harvey Mudd College, Ms. Critchell created aviation outreach programs for public high schools, developed manuals for the Federal Aviation Administration and worked as a pilot examiner there for more than 20 years. She was a longtime member of the Ninety-Nines, a nonprofit organization supporting female pilots.
She also competed in women’s transcontinental air races, known informally as the Powder Puff Derby, a term coined by Will Rogers. In 1957, she finished first in a race to Philadelphia from San Mateo, Calif., sharing an $800 prize with her co-pilot, Alice Roberts.
This flaming hyena goes to 11.
January 30th, 2025Obit watch: January 28, 2025.
January 28th, 2025The California Historical Society.
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I think that would have been a very cool thing to tour. But I understand the cost.
It might have been smarter to build a dedicated historical museum in some place like the state capital. But that’s just my opinion.
In 2022, Gonzalez said, the group requested a one-time grant of $12 million to support a partnership with the University of California, Riverside, which would have involved collaborating with Native American tribes to bring historical projects to underserved parts of the state.
The request was rejected. “The legislature gave us the same answer we heard from philanthropic organizations: This sounds like something a university should be doing,” Gonzalez said.
Wait, wait: the California legislature rejected a proposal to spend taxpayer money?
This actually makes me kind of sad. I like state historical societies, and I hate to see one fall apart like this.
But: their collections and archives are being transferred to Stanford University. I guess the school is now the de facto historical society, and that may not be such a bad thing overall.
Update 2.
January 28th, 2025The Travis County commissioners list has been updated.
I also made some minor tweaks to the list of US Senators from Texas.
We apologize for the convenience.
Update.
January 27th, 2025The list of Austin City Council members has been updated.
I’ve included staff members when I can, but several of the newer city council members don’t have their staff listed yet. Probably still hiring…
Tomorrow is promised to nobody, so keep your eyes open.
January 27th, 2025An errant weight thrown by a competitor struck and killed a spectator at a youth track and field meet in Colorado, according to officials at the university where the competition was held.
The hammer — a heavy ball on a chain — in the hammer throw event cleared certified barriers before striking the man Sunday morning at the University of Colorado’s Colorado Springs campus, according to a university statement.
Obit watch: January 27, 2025.
January 27th, 2025Jan Shepard, actress.
Other credits include a lot of TV westerns, “Highway Patrol”, “The F.B.I.”, “G.E. True“, “TV Reader’s Digest” (????)…
…and “Mannix”. (“Another Final Exit“, season 1, episode 20. She was “Rose”.)
Arthur Blessitt. He was a preacher in LA in the late 1960s, and ran “a Christian coffeehouse adjacent to a strip club”.
One day, he heard God telling him to carry a cross on foot from Los Angeles…to New York City. So he did. But that was just the start.
It took him six months to walk across the country. When he was done, he returned to Los Angeles, only to receive — in his telling — orders from Jesus to take his journey global.
“Go!” Jesus told him, he recounted on his website. “I want you to go all the way.”
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Mr. Blessitt kept meticulous notes abroad, detailing how long his boot soles lasted (about 500 miles) and how often he was arrested (24 times). He visited every continent, including Antarctica, as well as war zones, disaster zones and many other places where he was liable to get shot at, beaten or arrested.
He climbed Mount Fuji in Japan, confronted angry baboons in Kenya and was nearly blown up by a terrorist bomb in Northern Ireland — all while carrying his cross. He is listed in Guinness World Records for the “longest ongoing pilgrimage.”
It took him nearly 40 years, but in 2008 he completed his quest to visit every country when he was permitted to enter the last, North Korea. His “trek” there was largely symbolic: Authorities let him carry his cross from the front door of his hotel to the street and back.
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His decades-long campaign made him a minor celebrity. Profiles invariably zeroed in on his combination of dogged perseverance and an aw-shucks approach to his task.
“You’d be amazed,” he told People magazine in 1978, “how much attention a man carrying a big wooden cross gets.”
Short gun crankery.
January 25th, 2025I refer from time to time to the “Hillary Hole”, aka the internal lock on many recent Smith and Wesson revolvers. This made a lot of people very angry, and has been widely regarded as a bad idea.
Greg Ellifritz posted this article in his weekly link roundup this week. While I do regularly read the Revolver Guy blog, I missed this one before now, and I want to bookmark it for future reference.
“The History and Future of the Smith & Wesson Internal Lock”.
Obit watch: January 24, 2025.
January 24th, 2025Aaron De Groft. I don’t think many people will recognize the name, but his story allows me to indulge one of this blog’s interests: art crime.
Mr. De Groft was the director of the Orlando Museum of Art.
In February 2022, the Orlando Museum of Art opened a blockbuster exhibition of 25 paintings that Mr. [Jean-Michel] Basquiat was said to have created in 1982, when he was 22 and living in Venice, Calif.
Mr. De Groft said that Mr. Basquiat had sold the artworks, most of them painted and drawn on slabs of cardboard, for $5,000 in cash, and that they had languished for decades in a Los Angeles storage unit. In 2012, Mr. De Groft said, the storage unit was foreclosed for lack of payment and the contents auctioned off. A little-known dealer purchased the artworks for about $15,000.
Mr. Basquiat is a big deal in the art world, and this was a major coup for the musuem.
Hmmmm. Hmmmm hmmmm hmmm. Hmmm.
Days after the exhibit opened, The New York Times published an article raising questions about the paintings. The article noted doubts expressed by several curators, and reported that one of the paintings was made on a piece of cardboard shipping material containing a printed FedEx typeface not used by that company until 1994 — six years after Mr. Basquiat’s death and 12 years after Mr. De Groft and the painting’s owners said the painting was made.
The F.B.I. raided the museum four months later, confiscating all 25 works. An affidavit revealed that the bureau had been investigating the artworks and their owners for a decade.
Hmmm!
Mr. De Groft was fired. The museum sued him.
After the Basquiat exhibit was shut down, a Los Angeles auctioneer admitted to the F.B.I. that he had helped create the faux Basquiats in 2012, some in as little as five minutes.
Mr. De Groft countersued the museum for wrongful termination, calling their claims a “public relations stunt intended to save face.” He still insisted that the Basquiats were genuine.
He said the artworks’ owners had commissioned a forensic investigation by a handwriting expert, who identified the signatures on many of the paintings as being Mr. Basquiat’s. He also cited an analysis by a Basquiat expert — since disavowed — and statements by a member of the Basquiat estate’s now-defunct authentication committee, who found the paintings to be genuine.
The status of the lawsuits is unclear. The Wikipedia section in Basquiat’s entry on “Forgeries” is interesting.
Jack De Mave, actor. Other credits include “The F.B.I.”, “The Fugitive” (the original), “Adam-12”, and an uncredited role in “1776”.
You’re going down in flames, you tax-fattened hyena! (#141 in a series)
January 24th, 2025Joseph Molina Flynn is a lawyer in Rhode Island. He specializes in immigration law. He was also a municipal judge in Central Falls, Rhode Island.
“Was” because he resigned on Thursday…
…after the FBI raided his offices.
The investigation into Molina Flynn started before President Donald Trump took office and is unrelated to his immigration-related executive orders, according to two people with direct knowledge about the investigation who would only speak on the condition of anonymity.
They said federal agents are looking at Molina Flynn over allegations that he defrauded people seeking representation on immigration-related matters.
No charges have been filed. Yet. But it sure seems like there’s something there. Plus, I don’t get to use the “Rhode Island” category often enough.
Happy birthday, John Moses Browning!
January 23rd, 2025Not really much more to say JMB wise. The day sort of snuck up on me, and the weather this week has not been conducive to taking photos.
SHOT show is going on through tomorrow. I’m not sure if they have any JMB tributes planned, not actually being there for the show and all.
(I did take a look at the requirements for getting media credentials. Frankly, they seem kind of onerous. But it might be worth taking a shot for 2026. What’s the worst that could happen? They say no and I save the price of a ticket to Vegas?)
Speaking of SHOT…as you know, Bob, I am an unabashed Smith and Wesson fanboy. Also as you know, Bob, I own some stock in Smith & Wesson Brands Inc. so I have a vested interest in how well the company does.
With that out of the way, the’ve been introducing some interesting things in the past week or so.
- They’ve extended the line of “Ultimate Carry” revolvers by adding two new ones in .32 H&R Magnum with titanium cylinders. I already have my Ultimate Carry in .38 Special, but I might very well pick up one of these.
- They’ve introduced new “Mountain Guns” in .357 Magnum and .44 Magnum. Also something that’s tempting. The new ones are stainless steel, but it looks like the kind of dull stainless finish that I have on my 625 and I don’t find that obnoxious.
- The “no lock” classics: Model 10, Model 19, and Model 36 with no internal lock.
- Steel framed M&P pistols.
- And some new lever-action 1854 rifles.
I’m personally kind of excited about the way things are going.
(By the way: I wouldn’t exactly say I “missed” National Buy an AK Day. It was just there were so many things happening on Monday that I didn’t really want to post. Plus, I feel like the pressure is off at least until January 20, 2029.)
Firings watch.
January 22nd, 2025Trent Baalke is out as general manager of the Jacksonville Jaguars.
Sounds sort of like a combined resignation-firing, so I’m chalking it up as a firing.
Obit watch: January 22, 2025.
January 22nd, 2025Jules Feiffer, artist. He was perhaps most famous as a cartoonist for the “Village Voice”, but he also did some movie and theater work.
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In May 1997, Mr. Feiffer ended his affiliation with The Village Voice over a salary dispute. “It’s not that I’ve slipped,” he said at the time. “It’s that I’m too expensive.” (In April 2008, he returned for a one-shot, full-page take on Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.)
Later in life he derived great pleasure from writing and drawing children’s books, some in collaboration with his daughter Kate, among them “The Man in the Ceiling” (1993), “Bark, George” (1999), “By the Side of the Road” (2002), “The Daddy Mountain” (2004) and “A Room With a Zoo” (2005). A 2010 reunion project with Mr. Juster, “The Odious Ogre,” was warmly reviewed.
Garth Hudson, of the Band.
During its peak, the Band was famously a collaborative operation informed by the songwriting and barbed guitar playing of Robbie Robertson and the soulful singing and musicianship of Levon Helm, Rick Danko and Richard Manuel. But critics and his fellow band members agreed that Mr. Hudson played an essential role in raising the group to another level entirely.
Mr. Robertson, quoted in Barney Hoskyns’s 1993 book, “The Band: Across the Great Divide,” called him “far and away the most advanced musician in rock ’n’ roll.” “He could just as easily have played with John Coltrane or the New York Symphony Orchestra as with us,” Mr. Robertson said.