Two years ago, I started writing for GFZ. I had been supporting Miguel and J.Kb. for a while before that. Sunday will be my 950th article.

Hagar is a true author. She has multiple books that have been published. Nothing that’s gone viral and made her boat loads of money, but she writes. It is her job.

She also produces a vlog about writing, another about cooking and reenacting. She does all of these things.

One of the questions she is asked, “What do you do when you have writer’s block?”

The answer is simple, “You write.” It is your job, it is what you do.

I don’t know how much I read in a day, but it is 1000s of words per day. I read technical manuals. I’m 3/4s of the way through Left of Bang, I’m reading documentation and doing research. Plus, I am a programmer who sells my time writing code for people.

This is not a paying gig. It is something I do because I love to write and because I made a promise to myself, I would publish at least one article per day to GFZ.

If I have to travel, I’ll write multiple articles and schedule them. Then I only have to write one or two articles while on travel.

I was looking at writing something case related when I came across:

As I’m listening to William Kirk read parts of the brief on behalf of the state in Grant v. Lamont, 23-1344, (2d Cir.) I was cringing.

There was nothing in this that I had not read in other filings by the state.

Watch his video on just how nasty the state is, then go read the document yourself. I don’t feel like being more depressed.

Brief on Behalf of the State, 23-1344 2d Cir.

On my, it is finally Friday. Two hours of teaching classes, then a bit of driving.

At least I’ll be driving my truck, not my wife’s car, and it isn’t a long drive. Last week was 36 hours of driving in four 9-hour days. This is just a short drive to Mordor.

There are many 2A cases petitioning for a writ of certiorari before the Supreme Court.

They were distributed for Conference. That conference happens on the 16th of may.

This is a big deal. The steps to get to this stage are long and convoluted. As an example, one of the cases seeking cert was filed on December 1, 2020. It was decided in favor of the state on March 4, 2021. It was appealed to the Fourth Circuit court, where oral arguments were never even scheduled. The court issued their opinion on September 17th, 2021 in favor of the state. It was then appealed to the Supreme Court. There it sat until August 1st when the Supreme Court granted certiorari, vacated the Fourth Circuit’s opinion and remanded it for further consideration in light of Bruen

That was nearly 2 years ago. Since that time, that case has been heard by a 3 judge merits panel for the Fourth. The merits panel never issued their opinion. Instead, the en banc court took the case and oral arguments before the entire Fourth Circuit court on March 20th, 2024.

This case, even before oral arguments were heard before the Fourth had already petitioned the Supreme Court for cert.

The week following the 16th, we will see some action on these 2A cases. There are only a few options, 3 I’m sure of and 1 I am not. 1) They can deny cert. Those cases in interlocutory state will continue litigation, with the Supreme Court hearing the case in a few years’ time. 2) They can grant cert. The case will be heard by the Supreme Court. I do not know whether it will be heard this term or next. Regardless, less than a year for the Supreme Court to issue their opinion. 3) They can leave the case in limbo, redistributing for Conference as they want. At some point, this will devolve into state 1 or 2.

Option 4 is that they can grant certiorari and then immediately issue an order. A “Grant, Vacate, and Remand.” order. I don’t know if this has ever happened. If it does happen, it will be a slap in the face to the state. (The SCOTUS would just deny cert if they would decide in favor of the People.)

The comments are open. You poor readers will have to hear about cutting gears next week, if I can locate my dividing head. Somewhere in this house is a 50 pound 10x10x17 cardboard box with a never opened dividing head.

Machining is the process of removing material to revile the part that was living inside the raw material.

We use two different forms of material, cast/forge and “stock”. A cast item is an item that is formed to a particular shape that is further refined by the machining process. Stock is a standard shape that we then refine by the machining process.

Consider attempting to make an engine. The engine has many features within that have to be precisely machined, it also has many parts where “close counts” and other areas where it doesn’t matter at all. Plus, there are many voids. Places with no material.

Anything place that is void must have material removed. When machining an 80% lower, you must first drill some holes in the correct locations, then you have to remove all the material in the fire control pocket. As a forging, that pocket is filled with material that must be removed.

If it was a casting, then the rough outline of that pocket would be there. You would then use machining to remove the remainder to bring the pocket to dimension.

Same with an engine, same with many things. There are voids where we do not want any material. Using a casting allows for complex shapes and pre-placed voids.

So I’m going to talk about a chuck back.
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