What Gun?

Woke up to a beautiful morning, the sun was rising on frost covered grass and all was still save for the distant sounds of shotguns firing away on the farms. Then it was a spirited Mass and off to the next Mission; fine, until Global Warming and its friend, the New Ice Age, stopped my pick- up from starting. Disaster! Until a friendly parishioner lent me a car to complete the journey.

As I drove along my mind turned towards that burning and knotty issue - what gun to buy? Part of me thinks, "Get an M4gery", sure, but what brand? What caliber? .223 or .308 - maybe something else again... Bushmaster or Armalite? DPMS or Colt? etc. And with what optics/flip up iron sights?

Then again...

Why not get an M1A? Tempting. Or should I just be sensible and get a Tikka T3? No easy choice, is it, but then again, who ever said life would easy?

All advice welcome. Forgive the incessant questions.

Have a blessed Sunday,

LSP

Broken Old Rubbish

You know how it is, sometimes you get in the mood to buy a gun, which is the way I felt Thursday afternoon after riding about and target shooting at the stable stock tank. So I walked down to the "Gold Nugget Gun and Pawn" to see what was on offer.

Not much. An SMLE which looked sound and tempting until I found out that the bolt fell apart. Then there was a Mauser and that looked alright too, but its magazine was missing. An SKS seemed in decent(ish) shape but it was Norinco, so if it wasn't broken it soon would be, then there was a series of synth stock Savages in various of brokenness and so on, gun after busted gun.

Don't get me wrong, I like GNG&P and always have a pleasant visit while browsing the weaponry - but today was a bust - except, perhaps, an old Winchester 70, which seemed OK but a little pricey for what it was.

Anyway, what I really want is a semi auto battle rifle in 7.62 - just to have fun blasting away and using against pigs if the opportunity presents itself. Tom from Boomers&BS (check his neat post on 'Dragonslayer' & Encore projects) recommends an M1A/M14 type rifle or one of the FN FAL variants - as I understand it they're about the same price and performance. But I've never shot the M1A/M14 whereas I've had plenty of time on the FN (years ago...); so I guess the latter has a kind of nostalgia value and I used to be familiar with it. I think that swings me in the direction of the one time rifle of the Free World - still, the other's attractive because its American and, to me, new. What to do? Get both! But I haven't recieved a government bailout! I guess its FN first - then save up for an M1A, or something like that. saying that, all advice welcome.

Speaking of kit - great thanks to Suburban Bushwacker for "magisterial" knife post, which lured me towards the useful looking F1/S1 and the great looking custom jobs made by the Backyard Bushman.

Hope to make a dent in the porcine menace today - they've gotten away with far too much.

LSP