JsARCLIGHT

Well technically even during the ban you could buy them. While the H&K Model 91 (the Civvie version of the old G3 MBR) has not been legal to import since 94 when the ban took effect and is still not legal to import there are tons and tons of clones and old pre-ban originals on the market. You even have the south american CETME rifles (a very close cousin to the G3, so close they look almost identical) floating around. With the ban over all it means is now you can put the flash hider and bayonet lug back on. Some G3's came with the H&K telestock so you could put that on as well. I know of a few domestic makers who produce clone H&K 91's that are in the process of making a new batch of pre-ban rifles as we speak. A company called Special Weapons and a few other new upstarts who basically do what SW does are the ones to watch. The only real drawback is that the G3 series is as old as the M16 and is "old hat" when it comes to H&K weapons... the current push is on the new UMP series and G36 line. Expect to see much more civvie semi clones of those in the near future than the old G3 line.

Only if I can shave my hair into a mohawk, dye it red, don football pads and black leather and cruize around in search of "Gazzoline".

Soccer Mom is also a term that is a double edged sword. Like "Hoosier", Soccer Mom can be seen as positive or negative depending on who you talk to. Some people hear Soccer Mom and think either 1) middle / upper middle class stay at home mom who's life revolves around her kids or they hear 2) stuffy, opinionated, ignorant rich woman who believes she is ordained by a higher power to raise her children, tell you how to raise yours, tell you how to live your life and be a general bitch to everyone... even her kids. Around my parts (the midwest) Soccer Moms are a scourge on the land. Edit: a very, very obscure reference but IMHO the ultimate in the Soccer Mom stereotype is on the video game GTA: Vice City. On the radio station that has Maurice Chaves' "Pressing Issues" show they have a guest who is the typical Soccer Mom to a T. If you are ever in a spot to hear that audio from the game, bam, that is the best example of a stereotypical Soccer Mom.

So will that Airwolf come with a coked out pilot that crashes it into a hillside? ... or a drunk Jan Michael Vincent who doses off on shoots? ... or a bloated Ernest Borgnine who keeps steeling Jan's booze? ... or little speakers to crank the top 10 German dance mix of the theme song? God I hated Airwolf. At least Blue Thunder had Roy Shieder.

You may have missed the fine print.

On the contrary, that rifle is fully operational. The M203 has the firing pin and trigger mechanism demilled so it is legal to own without filing BATF Form 4 paperwork but with a few mods and swapping of parts it could be fully operational... but who really needs a grenade lanucher without any grenades?... or the BATF breaking down your door for possession of an illegal DD? There is no such thing as a "show pony" in my weapons safe, everything is a fully functional firearm capable of chambering and shooting live ammo in the capacity it was designed to act. You could say that it is for show because it will most likely spend it's entire life inside my safe next to it's brothers but unlike an airsoft or model gun this thing can be called to duty in seconds... The only thing is few people feel comfortable whipping out that goliath at a gun range and screaming "Say hello to my litto frien'!" As for the H&K Universal Combat Pistol, keep in mind that version you keep seeing is just the first prototype. Think of it like the H&K Caseless rifle, it is more proof of concept than it is functional military weapon system right now. It's goal was to build a combat pistol chambered in their new proprietary armor piercing round designed for the new MP7-PDW and to be a "mated" action piece to the MP7. Rumor was that it is slated to be the new sidearm of American and European combat troops under the OICW plan... but the OICW plan changes every year so we shall see. But for now don't be suprised if the outer appearance of the UCP changes dramatically over the course of it's development. Edit: Here is a pic of the UCP complete with it's special suppressor and LAM prototype unit. Smooth as a baby's ass...

The big question is do I put a sling on it? I have a box full of viet era green M14/M16 slings (the ones with the loud metal hardware the troops hated so much) and with a side sling adaptor I could sling it out... and the side sling was built in the late seventies so it would be period accurate for the most part...

OK so in my adventures in trying to get an AN/PEQ2 (and failing) I decided to scrap my plans to build out a SOCOM M4A1 and instead went back to my roots... the NAM. So I present my new baby, freshly assembled from a Bushmaster lower and a salvaged Colt M16A1 parts kit (semi auto guts used for legality) complete with a real steel demilled M203 thumper (not some panzy ass airsoft plastic tube) and a very rare early milspec fully adjustable leaf sight. My late '70s swinging quad sight is still in the mail (those early quad sights are hard to find nowadays)... and yes it is just as heavy as it looks. I was going to take a pic with L's brandishing it but my wife has this little issue (as do I) of her picture being posted on the internet so you steel hounds will just have to settle for a pic of the rifle and the early leaf sight.

But the sad truth of scientific advance is that we humans only truly eccell when death is the goal. I bet if AIDS or cancer was threatening our boarders or stockpiling WMD's we'd have a cure in seconds... or if some nutjob banana republic dictator was threatening to blow up the world and the only thing that could take him out was a functioning, reliable electric car. ... of course then again some bigwig in the government would trash those projects in benefit of his company's less reliable, more costly, prone to failure cancer cure...

I'm willing to believe those lines could have been added to the edited theatrical version when SW got all the ANH stuff put on the front end of it... the first time I ever saw that was on my first VHS release of the movie that I got for my birthday with my first VCR back in '83.

This is going to sound like a stupid suggestion but do you suppose they added those audio tracks for the LP release because you could not see what was going on and those scenes needed the extra "redundancy" put into them and then at some later point to keep consistency they were edited into the movie?

It was back then... I got tickets for it several times from the local PD for skating in parks. I got out of skating in 87 (junior year) mostly because it had become a mainstream fad at that point... when they start selling imitation skateboards at the local woolworths you know the movement has died on the table. ... plus I found a new after school activity: dive team. I'm just glad that grunge came along so when I got out of the army and looked like a slob people just thought I was another grunger.

Well call me behind the times then because I never remembered either of those dialogue moments in the original movie... why is it that the voice for the storm trooper is so different then? You'd think they would have used the same "trooper" voice actor that they used for all the other takes. Edit: and I guess I should also point out that I have seen umpteen different VHS incarnations, the original laserdiscs and a few of the bootleg DVDs and the only places I noticed both those dialogues appear where in the newer SE tapes and DVDs. I even recall seeing ANH four times in the theaters back when it first came out and I don't remember either of those audio moments... even though I was 7 or 8 at the time I clearly remember seeing the movie before it was called ANH and to the best of my damaged memory those two audio clips were not in the movie then... and if they were would this not be the first instance of GL "altering" the movies and in respect prove that he has always altered the movies?

I'm 34. I "skated" back in 1985 in high school. My knowledge of skate stuff begins about 84 and ends about 87. There is such thing as selling out, the problem is people today don't notice it because everyone has sold out. About the only "culture" that exsists that has not been permiated by corporate greed and finegaling has been the Goths and they are on the doorstep of corporate takeover thanks to joints like Hot Topic and the like. Back when I had a board, a Vision shirt and an attitude you had to dig deep and look long and hard for skate stuff. It was a rebel set back then, underground. Ever since the '90s and the coming of the X Games skating has become so corporate that they might as well be on wheeties boxes. No offense but when you pimp product for someone... anyone... you are a sellout. The sad thing is we are all sellouts to some degree.

Nike making skate shoes... wow. And here I thought the video games were the ultimate sellout of skateboarding.

Back in my youth "basketball shoes" (what we called hi-tops) were converse and all single color (usually white) nike style shoes. Today's sports shoes look like someone ate a bunch of crunchberries and puked on your feet. I was under the impression "busy" was out for kids again... all the kids I see are wearing fairly subdued shoes and mocs. I guess it is all about where you are and what the current style is there. Still, barf. Those shoes would look good on a 7 year old or a clown... that's about it.

(Shameless plug) I'm selling my SW DVDs already... bought em, watched em, ditching em. Posted them in the for sale forum for those who are interested. Price is negotiable, send me a PM if interested. (Back on topic) I think while I was enjoying seeing the movies for the first time in such clarity I was simultaneously put off by all the changes in the movies. People like my wife did not notice them as they have not seen the movies ten billion times like I have but is it wrong for me to have this feeling of "oh great, another change?" every time I saw something different? I can understand using the excuse of "Technology was not available in the '70s to tell the story he wanted to tell" but the subtle dialogue and context changes really start to bother me after a while. Things like changes in the Stormtrooper dialogue and even sometimes the voice actors (the blast door sequence is the most glaring, what are we too stupid to "get the joke" and Lucas had to add more dialogue?) and the addition of "explanatory" dialogue (like C3PO's explanation of how to shut down the tractor beam) just made me feel so "dumb" watching the movies again... as if GL thought I could not figure out what was going on.

Am I the only one who finds these shoes butt ugly? Being a fan is one thing but wearing those god awful things out in public is another.

ValkTP may not have shot a 1911 but I own one and have shot the XD line and I can say that the grip safety is very similair in execution but rather than the nice wide web of your hand filling smooth beavertail that most 1911's sport the grip safety on the XD is a nasty little thin buttonlike thing. See the below pic of a XD9 compared to a Glock: I myself found the grip safety on the XD pistol I shot to be uncomfortable compared to that on a 1911, it feels more like the hard button safety on an UZI. You are concious that it is there and that your hand is pushing it in while I feel that the grip safety on my 1911 is so smooth that you don't notice it's there. I have always been of the opinion that grip safeties are a waste of time... have you ever actually drop tested a grip safety? They don't work that well... Neither do trigger safeties like the one on Glocks or on the XD series. The only hard functioning safety is a nice mechanical firing pin blocker... all the fancy grip, trigger and whatnot safeties just annoy most shooters. As for "grab" security for LEOs the grip and trigger safeties don't add much extra protection and most of the time a nice no-grab positive draw holster is a better investment. As for the XD being a mutt, it is. Springfield wanted it that way to hone in on the Glock and Sigma market a bit with a combat tupperware of their own. I think they went a tad overboard on all the shtick... I mean they actually went so far as to glom a teeny little light rail on the XD Subcompact. That is just crazy weird. How many people do you know who are going to whip out a teeny Sub carry pistol from an ankle holster and click on their tac light?

One thing to keep in mind is that your USP's slide is milled from a brick of steel whereas that Glock slide (I have been told) is made from 7075 T6 Alloy. Steel rusts, Aluminum doesn't. But steel is far sturdier and lasts longer than Aluminum given propper treatment. The best way to prevent premature rustout on pistols and other long arms is to keep them nice and lubed with CLP. The oils from contact with skin and holsters can wick the CLP off a gun faster than a sponge and then begin to eat away at the thinner spots in the finishing.

Bah, Slim's not dead... he still is riding that A-bomb in our hearts.

Slim Pickens is a god among men. I actually use this line on an almost weekly basis at the office when I walk into the production area and everyone is goofing off.

That is the special in which Wilder refused to "take part in". His only "part" was limited to a simple, very short taped interview segment and he was the only member of the cast (other than Kahn, who had a pretty darn good excuse for not being there) who was not at the live event. I have always gone on the hunch that it was Wilder's teamup with Richard Pryor in the late '70s that started the divide between him and Brooks. I remember seeing a few interviews with Brooks back in the early '80s in which he was either asked or commented on Wilder's "newfound success" as Pryor's partner and Brooks did not seem enthused. Unofficial rumor mill from back in the day was that Wilder and Brooks were to team up on a few more movie projects and had something of a "gentleman's agreement" but Wilder skipped out on Brooks to do a few more movies with Pryor and a sort of mutual "well screw you too then" attitude developed between them. I always found it funny that Wilder made his name in the movie comedy racket at the hand of Mel Brooks teamed up with Cleavon Little, one of the pioneers of the smart mouthed urbanite character type only to leave Brooks and Cleavon and team up with Richard Pryor and basically do the same schtick over and over again for a decade.

To be more specific what I meant by "lost" was that Wilder has stated in the past that he chooses not to work with Brooks anymore... hence why he made such a bold move as to not be involved with the Young Frankenstien reunion... which I thought was quite douche-baggy of him. I think he had a massive falling out with Brooks a while back. ... but as for Madeline Kahn, yup she is deed.

Brooks has been sliding downhill for quite a while... just like all the other greats of hollywood. His first few movies were the best of the best (The Producers, Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstien), his middle camp were funny in spots but otherwise forgettable (High Anxiety, History of the World, To Be or Not to Be, Spaceballs), his later works are mainly avoidable (Life Stinks, Robin Hood Men in Tights) and his most recent efforts are just downright terrible (Dracula Dead and Loving It). I myself would rather see Mel retire and look back on a wide career than feel the need to keep cranking out bad movies. Having lost his two best character actors (Gene Wilder, Madeline Kahn) I feel Mel is still to this day searching for their replacements, most of his post-Wilder/Kahn movies just lack that "magic" that the early works have.