This month was rough. I missed three days of dry practice and broke my streak that was almost 140 days long – shattering last year’s longest streak of 46 days. Still in the first five months of this year I have trained with my firearm all by three days. I’ll offer you some ideas in this post to work some “advanced” skills into your dry practice routine.
Collecting Hammers and the Pillars of Skill Building
There’s an adage in the training world; “tools for the toolbox”. but are people really building a complete and useful panoply of skills, or collecting hammers?
Know a Knot! The Square or Reef Knot
Welcome back to Know a Knot! Today we’re going to talk about the square or reef knot, usually just known as the square knot. I came up calling it the square knot so that’s what I call it, but if you prefer reef knot, go for it!
WML Review: Streamlight TL-Racker
As you guys may or may not know, this year is sort of the “year of the shotgun” for me. I’ve spent an entire month doing daily dry practice with my shotty, and this month (June) will see me repeat that. I’ve read two books about shotgun employment, and am about to start a third. Today I am going to review the biggest improvement made to my shotgun in a long time: the Streamlight TL-Racker WML.
A Primer on Raising Chicks
Chickens are one of the quintessential preparedness food sources, and for good reason. While it is still fresh in my mind, I’m going to offer some after-action information for those of you who may be thinking of raising chicks. It’s a little late in the season for this, so maybe I’ll repost it early next spring, as well.
Why .25 ACP is the Ultimate Defensive Caliber
In this post I discuss why the much-maligned .25 ACP is the ultimate defensive caliber. I also explore the extensive testing and evaluation that has led me to this question, and how it will impact me moving forward. Enjoy!
How To Build a Lock Library
There is a ton of material out there about lockpicking and how to get good at it. There isn’t a whole lot of material about actually building a collection of locks with which to practice. As someone who has been very good at lockpicking and taught it for a living for five years I can tell you: having access to a large number of locks is essential. Today I’m going to talk about how to build a lock library that supports learning and progress.
Know a Knot! Directional Figure Eight
In this installment of Know A Knot we’re going to talk about a knot that kicked my butt for a long time. It’s a middle-of-the-line loop called the directional figure eight.
Security Sunday: Weekly Gear Maintenance
All of us have a lot of crap to do. Aside from getting dinner on the table every night, there are all these periodic tasks, like changing smoke detector batteries, paying taxes, backing up our computers, getting oil changes, etc. Most of us are probably tracking most of that stuff mentally. I have been looking for a way to make some of this stuff easier to track, and I’ve found a pretty decent solution: “Security Sunday” (you don’t have to call it that – I just needed a title for this article).
Lock Safari: Dublin, Ireland
Last year I had the opportunity to spend some time in Belfast, Dublin, and Cork. Unfortunately, most of my time was spent in Dublin – my least favorite of the three. Recently I was reviewing my photos from that trip and realized how many noteworthy locks I actually found there. This will probably only be of interest to the lock nerds. If you aren’t you can still get something out of this: most American locks are junk compared to the locks used by the rest of the world.