[polishshooter]

So tonight at my KofC officers meeting that I’m running under “new” business a member brings up the “gun raffle” a neighboring council is having in March, $100 includes the meal, 40 guns to be drawn, 1-8 chances to win…

I’m thinking, “I’m in,” ask that the list be passed around…

It comes to me, as I’m ending the meeting…

Of the 40 guns…half of them are some new whiz bang plastic striker fired 9, I guess some of them good ones, I see a Walther and a Hellcat but a lot of “Caniks”…🤨I’m thinking “I hate striker fired…”… the rifles are pretty much CVA “Escape” 6.5 Creedmore or .450 or Muzzleloading .50s…with a smattering of Tristar shotguns, and a few Remingtons…huh, a V3 might be cool…

Funny I’m looking at the two 1022 packages thinking I might be able to use one of them, kicking myself I sold mine years ago…oh, a “Cowboy” .357 from a maker I never heard of, that might be nice…

But nothing “excited” me like raffles used to, figuring wth I’ll still buy a ticket, might end up with “trade bait” for a show where I might find a “REAL” gun🤔😉

Am I getting old?

Maybe I’m getting to the point where I really don’t NEED any other guns? (I could use a nice used M1A or a good BA in .308…the only thing I really don’t have, a good .308)

But at a certain age…

Funny that not long ago my last “real” quest was for a good carry single action 9mm..I had a Star BM, but didn’t want to trust it…then it just had to be a new Springfield SA-35, but didn’t know how I’d carry it and S&W came out with the CSX..bought one, perfect for me…a “real” gun I can stick in my pocket…

But since then absolutely no interest in any other gun, new or used…

Is there such a thing as being “satisfied” with the guns you own? 🤔

I never thought I’d reach this point…but maybe I’m just getting old😉

But then again, a lot of OLD guns catch my eye at shows…maybe hope for me yet😎

 

[Hawg]

I have no interest in plastic guns, guns with rails are a turn off. A 1911 with all the latest gizmos on it makes me shake my head. Actually any gun does but a beautiful piece like a 1911 with all that crap is.... I just don't have a word for it. Striker fired guns and double action only don't excite me either. I guess I'm old too.

 

[msheff]

Old guns for us old folks.

 

[polishshooter]

I don’t mind double action, heck for carry I have two DA only snub revolvers, and I made sure my wife and daughter had Bodyguard .38s. They CAN cock but I never taught them that they could…😉. No use for SA in a DA/SA revolver for self-defense.

But for hunting? Yeah, but why not START with a SA only, if only for the trigger pull? My hunting guns are a Blackhawk Bisley in .45 Colt and an old 3 screw unconverted Single Six. I don’t like “compromises.” Both have SWEET triggers😉

Funny that after I bought the used Single Six I sold my .22/45 bull I USED to think was “accurate…”😎

I USED to collect Mosin Nagants, I love military guns, I’ve owned hundreds of them…but over time…I’m down to about six…my first Polish M44 I bought with my CRFFL when I had it, another Polish M44 $19.95 ufixem I built into a “Sporter” that is really handy and will do 1.5” at 100 with good ammo. (Probably why I don’t own a nice .308 light rifle…😉). But I slowly culled my other Mosins and Enfields until I ended up with only one sweet Sako M39 (by accident😳) but after I bought my sweet Garand and 03A3 I suddenly lost all interest in “other” War 1 and War 2 weapons…(although if I stumbled on a “shooter” M1carbine I wouldn’t complain…😉)

I’m set with any shotgun I might need, for deer, birds, bunnies, squirrels, tactical, trap, skeet, “home defense”😉

My 336 .35 deer rifle is perfect for my hunting, I have a sweet 94 in.30-30 if I need a backup or a loaner…I’m set if I ever get a chance for hogs, might be ok if I ever get a chance for elk (which is one of the reasons I might want a .308 …or .300 Win mag. I “kinda” need a 1000 yd capable sniper rifle, just to fill a “gap.”🤔)

Yeah I sold the Swift (it became the Garand😉) but if I get to go Pdogging again I still have my 5.56 Predator, the best “walking around “ BA Varmint gun I could own…and of course the Rock River LAR (that I haven’t shot in 10 years…)

I am “culled” to no guns I REALLY want to part with, coupled with running into no guns recently that I HAVE to own…

Although if I ran into somebody dumb enough to trade me even up for an original or Repro Henry 1860 or an original or Repro Spencer 1863 or 1865 for the Rock River I might consider it😉

 

[MPistone]

" new whiz bang plastic striker fired 9, "
Ya, you're getting old

 

[polishshooter]

I don’t want anybody to think I’m bragging. I’m not. I’ve been a “gun nut” since the 1960s when I was 9 or 10 years old and started reading adult books about World War 2 and the Civil War and had a future bro-in-law and a family friend giving me their old Guns and Ammo and American Rifleman Mags that I read cover to cover. I had a father that had gone through the Depression that hunted to feed the family and taught us to shoot and hunt ( “with a shotgun, the only gun you ever needed, ‘wasting’ money on other guns was stupid, it was only a tool, you could only hunt deer with a shotgun {where I lived} everything you ever needed to hunt to eat you shot with the same shotgun, you couldn’t hit anything with a a handgun {from his experience in WWII} so who cares if they ban them, but let them try to take my shotgun from me!) that thought owning any other gun was stupid (although later in life admitted “a man could also own a .22 rifle,” and bought one after he kept borrowing mine😎)

I never had “money.” Dad raised 5 kids on a carpenters salary, and ended up on Social Security in a wheelchair.

I paid my way through college, hauling scrap metal, loans, catching shoplifters, and my parents giving me their “dependents” SSN when I was in school.

All the guns I’ve owned have been by “wheeling and dealing,” from my first “illegal (in New York) handguns I bought from the $50 Titan .25 I bought from a guy I worked with who needed cash to the $365 SN 1065 (I won’t forget it) Detonics .45 in bought from the VP of my department in the late 1970s. Making $2.85/hr. I got married shortly after school, my wife and I payed for our own wedding, and 42 years later are still together and are finally finally seeing “extra money” at the end of the month, even if it might be her Social Security lol.

But over the year I have “accumulated “ a lot of guns without taking money or food away from my family.

I said I owned “hundreds” of Mosin Nagants. I’ll have to check my old “bound book” to confirm, but my CRFFL in 2000 was perfect timing. I could retire now if I still had all those 5/$175 “G-VG” M44s or any of the “3/$99 Dropped in the rubble” M91/30s now, but I resold for $50-100 after researching them, cleaning them and Shooting them, “checking headspace😉.”

THATS how I got to where I am finally comfortable with my “collection.” (Accumulation?).

You young guys with bills and families can do it too…yeah, the cheap Eastern bloc CRFFL stuff is a memory, sorry…

BUT…make a list of what you WANT, then make a list of what you NEED…

…and start horse trading. Buy what you can afford for either list, then trade UP.

Guns ARE assets that APRECIATE over time, even if you shoot them and learn about them, with basic maintenance, not like other “shiney objects” that depreciate after the “shineyness” or “trendiness” is gone.

Yeah you WILL regret selling stuff for what you thought was a good price back then 20 years later, but you will have experience shooting and working with a HELLUVA lot more guns and types of guns then the gun guys that “buy, never sell…”

Maybe not more MONEY than they end up leaving for their dependents, but you can end up with a lot of experience and just maybe a “comfortable” “collection” (accumulation?🤔) a few years before your retirement like me😎

 

[polishshooter]

" new whiz bang plastic striker fired 9, "
Ya, you're getting old

I put 50,000+ rounds through my self-built 1911 in 12 months in 1985, shooting in my IPSC league, various other IPSC matches all over the Midwest including the Midwest IPSC sectionals, a bowling pin league, the first NRA Action Pistol matches and State Championship, and any other local IPSC, falling plate, PPC and “ LAPD Swat” matches I could enter.

Excuse me if I know the difference between the feeling of a proper mated sear, disconnector and hammer versus any mushy “striker” in a pistol😉

 

[MPistone]

I put 50,000+ rounds through my self-built 1911 in 12 months in 1985, shooting in my IPSC league, various other IPSC matches all over the Midwest including the Midwest IPSC sectionals, a bowling pin league, the first NRA Action Pistol matches and State Championship, and any other local IPSC, falling plate, PPC and “ LAPD Swat” matches I could enter.

Excuse me if I know the difference between the feeling of a proper mated sear, disconnector and hammer versus any mushy “striker” in a pistol😉

I was referring to the term "new whiz bang plastic striker fired 9, ".

 

[Virginia Patriot]

I must be "old" too! It seems that the guns that interest me now are steel and wood whether it is stocks or grips and leather holsters. I do have a "plastic" striker fired gun or two but, it is the old guns that turn my head now a days.

 

[Hawg]

When it comes to buying guns my wife gravitates to the whiz bang plastic stuff but when it comes to shooting it's the bigger wood and steel stuff she shoots the most.

 

[sharps4590]

I generally ignore the cheap looking, plastic and "tacticool" stuff where they hang flashlights, decoder rings and a Popeye lunch bucket. I lost interest in milsurps 40 years ago. It's almost 100% certain I won't see combat.

I like what I like and make no apologies for it. Same with what I don't like so don't try to convince me of some imaginary superiority of the ugly stuff. Yes, I am getting old. If the pups take issue with that, it's their problem and I suspect they have a good idea what they can do with it.

 

[mudman35962]

I generally ignore the cheap looking, plastic and "tacticool" stuff where they hang flashlights, decoder rings and a Popeye lunch bucket. I lost interest in milsurps 40 years ago. It's almost 100% certain I won't see combat.

I like what I like and make no apologies for it. Same with what I don't like so don't try to convince me of some imaginary superiority of the ugly stuff. Yes, I am getting old. If the pups take issue with that, it's their problem and I suspect they have a good idea what they can do with it.

SPOT ON!! as i read each post i was writing a responce in my head, then you posted my thoughts. thank you!

rick

 

[Alpo]

Guns America has a great gun giveaway, every Sunday. They give away a different gun every week. It's a raffle, but you don't have to buy a ticket. Just sign up.

I can remember signing up for two in the last year or so. A 1911, which I did not need but I would have happily accepted. And a single action 357 - el patron?

Everything else has been plastic with a dingus on the trigger, or an AR patterned rifle, or an AR pattern shotgun, or an extremely ugly bolt gun with a plastic collapsible stock and a barrel shroud chambered in 6.5 creedmoor.

I have no interest in any of them.

I'm old.

 

[jim brady]

Great post. I've thought about that, too. I haven't bought any guns for a long time now. Seems that I've reached the point where I've owned about every gun that has caught my fancy. I used to call myself a "Springfield Collector" - and at one time or another I've owned just about one each of everything they made since 1861. I don't go out and look to buy anymore. I'm getting too old and lazy to shoot them, clean them or go out and look for them, but I'm still too young to let them go.

I still enjoy walking Gun Shows to see the "neat stuff", but it is seldom that I'm seeing anything I don't already have (or HAVE had) that needs to follow me home.

The "getting old" part also applies - I'm finding more and more - to my visiting TFF and trying to help out others. My personal reading comprehension has always been a very strong point and has served me well in life. For the past year or so I've found that I will read something in a post - reply to what I've read - then find that somehow I misread or misinterpreted the question. Sometimes it's embarrassing to me or irritating to the person asking the question and I find myself apologising a lot these days. Not "bailing out" yet - but there are times I do consider it.

 

[Pyrite]

You're not getting old if you've accepted self contained cartridges as better than powder and ball.

 

[rawright54]

I've got a fair collection myself, and though there are a few more I'd like to have, I'm picky. I don't "need" another gun, and I'm definitely not old at 68. I can still recall my Dad's wise statement on the occasion of his 50th birthday. He told me, "Son, I've come to realize that the more things you own, the more they own you. I have accumulated a lot of stuff over the years, and now I find myself spending more of my time maintaining them, protecting them, insuring them, worrying about them, than I spend enjoying them. It's time to simplify." He spent the remainder of his life disposing of things he and his wife didn't need and distributing them to people who really needed them.

It's not being old, but becoming wise.

 

[Smoke]

With a 1-8 chances to win I would be in for sure. I wouldn't bet my life on one of those new whiz bang plastic striker fired guns but for banging on the gongs at the range they work just fine.

 

[gvw3]

I will be 73 in a week so I guess I am old. I carry a [email protected] Shield. It is good for the job. Light, accurate, and easier to conceal. It is the only plastic gun I own. They do have a place but for me, it is very limited.

 

[LimaCharlie]

I bought my first gun from the Sears catalog in 1962. I like big bore revolvers, government model 1911s, steel, and wood.

 

[msheff]

I don’t see anything these days that interests me other than the rare occasion a nice older side X side comes along. I have downsized quite a bit over the last few years.