Self-Indulgence

Does anyone else have a gun or two that you could just call “pure self-indulgence”?  My definition thereof is a gun that doesn’t necessarily serve a purpose — self-defense, hunting, etc. — but that is just plain fun to have and to shoot, when you’re sick and tired of doing your drills and you just want to bang away for the fun of it.  (And I’m specifically excluding .22 guns because plinking is just plinking.)

The other day I was rooting around in Ye Olde Gunne Clossette when I came across an aluminum handgun case, and for the life of me I couldn’t remember what I’d put in it.  So here it is:

Okay, that’s a little cluttered with the ammo.  Here it is sans the clutter:

The top gun is my much-loved Ruger Super Blackhawk 7″ barrel, in .30 Carbine, and the lower is the late Layabout Sailor’s S&W Model 15 6″ barrel in .38 Special.

I don’t know why I’ve held onto the Blackhawk for as long as I have.  It’s single action, chambered for an expensive and occasionally hard-to-find cartridge, and that lo-o-o-ong barrel makes it unwieldy.  But:  OMG when you touch off that trigger and are rewarded with a massive thunderclap and a 16″ jet of flame out the muzzle… like I said, there’s no reason to keep it, it’s pure self-indulgence.

And apart from sentimental reasons, there’s no reason to keep that battered old S&W revolver either.  It’s .38 Spec-only, I have gawd knows how many .357/.38 revolvers already, and I surely don’t need another one that’s just taking up space in the locker.  But:  the trigger is silky-smooth, made such by an uncountable number of rounds fired through it;  the gun is, to say the least, about 5x more accurate than I can ever shoot it;  and loaded with those 158gr. wadcutters as pictured, I can just shoot that thing all day — and I have, both with its previous owner (who was so generous in sharing), and by myself, when I just want to shoot something good and hard and for a long time.  In fact, it’s my “I don’t feel like plinking away with a .22, I want to shoot something bigger”  gun.  I think that every range session I’ve had with this gun has involved at least fifty rounds, and a few others a lot more.

So the two quite different guns each fill a very specific need, but both are undoubtedly an indulgence on my part.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I am so going off to the range.  Just talking about them has got me more excited than Christmas.