Kim du Toit – Page 400 – Splendid Isolation

Total Agreement

June 24, 2024 Kim du Toit The Gun Thing

This guy has produced a Top 20 Best Guns Ever Made video (delivered in a no-frills, dry-as-dust format), and it’s probably one of the first such made that I have absolutely no disagreement with, at least for the first dozen.

Basically, he’s included “popularity” as one of his criteria (hence the inclusion of the Glock), and that’s fine; when you end up making millions and millions of a particular gun, it’s hard to argue with his reasoning.

Hell, I don’t even argue much with his ranking — if indeed it is a ranking and not just a list — and my only quibble is that he’s included both the Winchester 94 and Marlin 336 lever rifles, and as far as I’m concerned, that’s really just a double entry of pretty much the same gun.

And yes, he’s only talking about cartridge-firing guns, and repeaters (e.g. no single-shot ones like Sharps rifles).

But those are just minor quibbles. I found myself nodding along all the way through. And I agree with leaving the Colt Python off the list.

You may all pick your jaws up off the floor.

Monday Funnies

June 24, 2024 Kim du Toit Funny Stuff

Here’s something to help you laugh off that Monday feeling:

Still on the topic of family relations:

Finally, one of my eyeworms:

Now go and take care of Monday.

Classic Beauty: Mitzi Gaynor

June 23, 2024 Kim du Toit Classic Beauty

I have no idea why I’ve never featured the lovely dancer and actress Mitzi Gaynor before on these pages, but let me make up for that egregious omission right away:

And then, of course, there are those legendary dancer’s legs:

I think I’ll save the color pics for another day.

Inescapable Comparison

June 22, 2024 Kim du Toit Beauty, Drive Time, Gratuitous Gun Pics

“Oh good grief, here’s Kim grinding on about old stuff again.”

Yeah, guilty as charged.

Watch Jay Leno’s glorious love affair with his 1940 Lagonda 4.5-liter V12. His is a direct, faithful copy of the cars which were taken straight off the street and raced at Le Mans in 1939 — and placed 3rd and 4th, the very first time they were entered.

After watching that, tell me you don’t want to smack him over the head and take his car. And if you feel a little intimidated by the size and manual strength needed to drive the thing, you need to take some double-strength manly pills. Me, I’d do it all in a flash.

Now watch Henry Chan shooting what is, to me, the firearm’s equivalent of that Lagonda: the Mauser K98 bolt-action rifle. (For background, here’s Ian McCollum.)

Same idea, same technique, same principle for both: outstanding performance, infallible reliability and guaranteed to put a smile on your face every time you take it out for a spin.

Like the one on Jay’s face.

I need to get back out to TDSA and shoot my K98, because I want to get that same smile. (And I use a rubber recoil pad, just like old hickok45 does.)

I don’t have a Lagonda, though. Bummer.

Top Guy

June 22, 2024 Kim du Toit Drive Time

We’ve had many conversations, sitting around the firepit on this my back porch, listening to the screams of socialists as they turn on the spit… where was I?

Oh yeah, that’s right: conversations about quality, technology and so on. I, of course, am a neo-Luddite when it comes to climbing up the quality / cost curve because as much as I may enjoy the quality or immense technology behind some geegaw (Purdey shotguns, Patek Philippe watches and Bentleys, to name but some), I just can’t justify to myself the horrendous costs involved in scaling the peak or reaching the very end of the curve, so to speak.

To give but one example, when I see the intricacy of a watch like this IWC Portuguese Tourblllon:

…I can appreciate the engineering precision and sheer brilliance of its design; but I just can’t see myself dropping around $150k on it.

But a lousy $150k is nothing compared to the other Tourbillon, that of the new Bugatti which will arrive sometime in 2026.

I did not know that Mate Rimac (yes, the guy who brought us the all-electric Rimac supercar) was now the CEO of Bugatti. But anything this guy touches turns to magic, so spend the next half-hour with him as he explains the design and engineering behind the new EB Tourbillon, which is to the current generation of supercars as the 2024 Rolls-Royce Corniche is to the 1924 Silver Ghost.

Never mind that none of us will ever own one of these, and never mind that it’s hopelessly impractical and horribly overpowered.

It is to my mind, however, the perfect marriage of design and technology, and an example of what happens when a man absolutely refuses to compromise, on anything.

He’s climbed the curve past the point where anyone else might have stopped, and frankly, there’s no telling where it will lead.

Brilliant.