East St. Louis, Illinois at Night
While in St. Louis, Missouri for the NRA show, I decided to avoid the lavish parties - mostly because I wasn't invited to them - and take a stroll across the river in order to photograph East St. Louis, Illinois.
My cab driver (a very proudly naturalized US Citizen formerly of Nigeria who was studying for the ASVAB in order to join the Army) who brought me to my hotel on the first night described it as "Deathtown." He also said "everyone that lives there is an animal." For those that are not familiar with the town's reputation, its murder rate is twenty times the national average, and twice that of Gary, Indiana, which has the next highest rate.
I took photographs on two separate nights. The first night, Friday the 13th, a thunderstorm moved through, and I was essentially the only person on the street. The next night was clear and there were more people out - but not a whole lot.
I've uploaded the photographs to my newly created Flickr account. Here's a sample. Yes, they're all black and white (so far - I may upload some of the color ones with lightning from the first night).
Oh, here's a question. Would you have walked through this tunnel? And do you think I did? Answer below.
It was just a homeless guy picking up cigarette butts. I said hi as I walked by him.
My Letter to an AK Manufacturer
This email was sent to the contact address on the Colorado Gun Sales website on 3/21/12; no response has been received.
To whom it may concern,
I recently purchased one of your M10 rifles in 5.45 from AIM Surplus. It arrived on Monday evening and I am now, as of Wednesday afternoon, shipping it back to AIM for a refund. I wish to inform you of some issues I saw with the rifle so that you may improve future production runs. I do not expect any action on your part.
- The very first thing I noticed, out of the box, was that the screw attaching the folding stock to the receiver was too long, preventing the stock from folding.
- The next thing I noticed was that the upper and lower handguard had been forced into place with what could only have been a tool such as a hammer (or perhaps superhuman strength). The handguard retaining cap had been bent/damaged at the rear as a result of this. Also, the screws attaching the upper handguard to the lower handguard were crossthreaded at a relatively extreme angle.
- The trunnion appeared to have had some material machined/ground away - for some unknown reason - at the rear on the right side.
- The magazine well had apparently been opened up to a degree that did not allow the use of some surplus Bulgarian magazines. Of the magazines that did fit, the pressure of the magwell on the sides of the magazines caused slow feeding, which resulted in bolt over base malfunctions with Russian surplus 5.45 ammunition.
- Projectile impacts past 10 yards resulted in oblong holes on paper.
Regards
Andrew Tuohy
Military Poser Award Citation Ideas
After seeing a few photos of fake Marines recently, an 0351 friend and I bounced ideas off of each other for the details behind the awards some of these wonderful people choose to wear. You see, some of the ribbons they put on are for campaigns that took place before they were born, such as World War II. I guess when you're trying to build a stack the size of one of your manboobs, you need some filler, and that ancient campaign ribbon looks great next to your Army EOD badge and SEAL trident (no, seriously, go look at it).
Not to mention that the one guy is wearing his fourragère completely wrong, or that his gig line is comically bad, and the other guy has three Purple Hearts side by side, and on and on... I wonder if his Purple Heart "citations" read like this guy's?
Anyway, here are some of the awards and citations we came up with. I would suggest that posers use some of these, for it would really make the whole thing a lot more fun.
- Dual Congressional Medals of Honor from the Spanish-American War
- A citation for valor while serving in a SOAD unit during the American Revolution
- Letter of commendation from George Washington for the French and Indian Wars
- Silver Star for providing important aerial surveillance photographs from a U2 during the 3rd Crusade
- Legion of Merit for providing logistical assistance to the Huns as they marched on Rome
- Legion of Merit for leading the first "Out of Africa" migration
- Page 11 for eating the apple in the Garden of Eden
- Navy Cross for being the first sea creature to walk on land
Any other ideas?
Edit: Some good satire here.