Gadget & gizmo rant

[jtcarm]

My son & I needed a break from a houseful of in laws on a rainy Black Friday, so we took a drive to the Fort Worth Cabelas.

Call me old-school & simple (some would say just old & simple-minded) but every time we go there, I am positively staggered by how shooting & outdoor sports have been overwhelmed with gadgets & gizmos.

Don't get me wrong, some of the developments in equipment are truly great, and I'm not criticizing those who buy & use the other stuff. Affordable chronographs and the plethora of reloading components come to mind.

But it makes me wonder how my parents did it. They packed four kids plus everything needed for several days of camping, hunting, or fishing into a 1965 Pontiac station wagon. All camp sites were "primitive": no electricity, or water. Bathrooms were toilet paper, a shovel, and the great outdoors.

No offense to those who hunt this way, but here in TX, I see people headed for the deer lease in a spankin-new one-ton dually pulling a double-axle trailer loaded with an automatic feeder, deer stand you could live in, and at least one ATV. Friends show me pictures game taken on their "trail cams".

I think I'd sooner stay home & watch tv as spend my time at the range or in the field tinkering with stuff.

I guess that's what I like about revolvers: just the gun & ammo are required.

 

[Captain O]

I agree. A good pocket knife (i carry two) and a good "Folding Hunter type" (my Buck Impact works quite well, thank you). A good watch helps.

If I'm out "in the field" an excellent revolver 10mm Auto, or .41 Remington Magnum works just fine. In my Model 610, I can shoot .40 S&W or "full-tilt" Underwood or Double Tap 10mm Auto loads. In the .41 Magnum deer hunting isn't difficult at all.

Go figure.

 

[Inusuit]

I think 90% of everything that's for sale whether camping, shooting, or otherwise is unnecessary. But with so much of our economy based on consumer spending, the unmitigated greed of manufacturers, and the shop 'til you drop attitude (see fights on Black Friday), it's not going away soon.

Do you remember Bush's advice after 9/11? "Go Shopping!"

 

[jtcarm]

I think 90% of everything that's for sale whether camping, shooting, or otherwise is unnecessary. But with so much of our economy based on consumer spending, the unmitigated greed of manufacturers, and the shop 'til you drop attitude (see fights on Black Friday), it's not going away soon.

Do you remember Bush's advice after 9/11? "Go Shopping!"

Yes the consumerism is a bit disturbing.

Wish I could get my family to do things the way we did when I grew up, but when we go camping, the bed of my truck is completely filled. And there's just three of us.

I keep telling my wife, I go to relax and enjoy the outdoors. I can stay home and tinker with ****.

 

[A-37]

Gizmo Junk

When it comes to useless equipment, nothing comes close to the golf aids.

Inventors and manufacturers never stop trying to sell their junk "teaching aids".

Consider this pile of plastic with an MSRP of $1200. Several years ago, David Leadbetter was shilling a PVC swing trainer which you could build at home for less that $20.

Explanar Golf Training System at InTheHoleGolf.com

I won't even mention all the worthless putter training devices. If I were a famous swing coach, I'd be embarrassed to endorse this ****.........unless the pay was too good to pass up.

 

[jtcarm]

When it comes to useless equipment, nothing comes close to the golf aids.

Inventors and manufacturers never stop trying to sell their junk "teaching aids".

Consider this pile of plastic with an MSRP of $1200. Several years ago, David Leadbetter was shilling a PVC swing trainer which you could build at home for less that $20.

Explanar Golf Training System at InTheHoleGolf.com

I won't even mention all the worthless putter training devices. If I were a famous swing coach, I'd be embarrassed to endorse this ****.........unless the pay was too good to pass up.

Well it is on sale

Some of my favorite memories were our hunting trips to a South Texas lease as a young boy. We drove several hours in that old Pontiac to meet my uncle and five cousins.

My uncle had a couple of old Wilys jeeps for transportation around a 2,200-acre lease, or his pickup.

We checked zeroes on rifles with the hood of a truck and rolled-up blanket as our "bench". Targets were a paper plate with a bull drawn in the center using the lead of a soft-point bullet, nailed to a tree or fence post.

All eleven of us slept in a one-room cabin and cooked on a gas stove. No electricity or running water.

Except for breakfast, meals were almost all game, venison, javelina (I don't recall what it tasted like, so it couldn't have been too bad), blue quail, and the occasional duck jump-shot from a stock tank.

For a snack in the field, you dropped a moon pie or slice of mom's banana bread in your coat pocket. Thirsty? Go to the nearest windmill. They also served as showers.

 

[wbraswell]

Heck, in the back of a 65 Pontiac wagon, you could have stuck an entire sporting goods store of the day. We had a 65 Mercury Monterrey wagon that's about that size.

 

[Mule Packer]

Yep, I agree. Personally, I think a lot of the stuff that is being marketed now is designed more to bag hunters than to bag deer.

Take camo gear for instance. I can't believe all the stuff you can get in camo now...right down to pajamas, bed sheets, and toilet seats! I guess they're making deer and elk a heckuva lot smarter now, because I remember hunting in a heavy red wool coat and heavy gray wool pants....and believe it or not, I still got my deer.

Oh...and I didn't have a range finder either. Come to think of it, in those days, I was still hunting with my open-sighted Model 94 .30-30. According to the latest hunting magazines, deer absolutely will not even falter nowadays unless hit with a 7mm magnum or a .300 Win. mag.

And, you can even get laundry soap that magically washes away the human scent from your clothing before you go out hunting. What happened to hanging your old hunting coat in the barn for a week?

I can't imagine paying $2,000 for a pair of binoculars, but folks do it. Oh, don't get me wrong, those are great optics. I just can't help but wonder how I ever got by with that old pair of WWI Carl Zeiss 6x30 glasses that my dad gave me.

Of course, nowadays, everybody needs an ATV (in camo of course) to drive up and down the roads waiting for that big buck to be standing in the middle of the road as they come around the corner.

What happened to throwing the saddle on ol' Paycheck and riding way back into the back country (or even hiking) to bring back the winter's meat?

And knives??? Don't get me started. Even the sharpening systems nowadays are high-tech. And I just sit in front of the tv watching the evening news with an old Arkansas stone touching up the edges of my knives. Hmmm...do they even make Arkansas stones anymore?

Anyway, I guess the bottom line is...I'm wa-a-a-y behind the times....but after reading some of the above comments, it sounds like I'm in good company.

 

[Donn]

Hunters, campers and shooters are getting like golfers. They've gotta have every gimmick that comes down the pipe. An acquaintance of mine has an AK with every trick in the book on it. You name it. it's on there. Unless you look closely at the action, you'd never guess it was an AK. Despite all that, he still can't hit the proverbial broad side of a barn with it.

 

[Big Cholla]

Mule Packer's post struck a note with me. My father started hunting Nevada Mule Deer in 1935. He drove his Ford Model A with a rumble seat to the north woods from Las Vegas and made a dry camp. Slept in a bed made of blankets and tarps on the ground. He came home with his deer tied over the right front fender. I started hunting with my Dad in 1951. We were big time then with a '49 Ford 1/2 ton pickup. We actually had a war surplus tent by then! The stove was a homemade copy of the CCC campstove. I never saw a scope on a rifle until about 1957 in our deer camp. I thought we had achieved the ultimate in deer hunting equipment when a welder friend of my Dad's helped him build a deer carrier that looked like a stretcher with one bicycle wheel centered under it. Those mule deer were heavy and hard work to get out of the woods when we couldn't drive a two-wheeled drive pickup up close to the kill site. Then when I brought home a horse from my Uncle's ranch that would also pack, I thought I had achieved the epitome in 'gentleman's' deer hunting. I had a cousin living in Elko, NV who called me and wanted me to come up and meet him to hunt the Ruby Mountains. I asked what I should bring for camping gear. He told me to bring my rifle and my Toyota Land Cruiser and he would furnish everything else. Much to my absolute amazement, he met me on the East side of the Ruby's in a new motor home. He had an ATV on a small trailer behind it. We left each morn pulling the ATV with my LC. I would make a big walk circling from low to high and back to where he would be waiting on the ATV. We both got big Bucks, but somehow I felt bad in having the feeling that we didn't 'really' earn them. ................

 

[kenv1950]

I never understood all this 6 and 7 hundred dollar high tech. camo outfits and then put a bright orange vest over it

 

[jtcarm]

Yep, I agree. Personally, I think a lot of the stuff that is being marketed now is designed more to bag hunters than to bag deer.

Take camo gear for instance. I can't believe all the stuff you can get in camo now...right down to pajamas, bed sheets, and toilet seats! I guess they're making deer and elk a heckuva lot smarter now, because I remember hunting in a heavy red wool coat and heavy gray wool pants....and believe it or not, I still got my deer.

Oh...and I didn't have a range finder either. Come to think of it, in those days, I was still hunting with my open-sighted Model 94 .30-30. According to the latest hunting magazines, deer absolutely will not even falter nowadays unless hit with a 7mm magnum or a .300 Win. mag.

And, you can even get laundry soap that magically washes away the human scent from your clothing before you go out hunting. What happened to hanging your old hunting coat in the barn for a week?

I can't imagine paying $2,000 for a pair of binoculars, but folks do it. Oh, don't get me wrong, those are great optics. I just can't help but wonder how I ever got by with that old pair of WWI Carl Zeiss 6x30 glasses that my dad gave me.

Of course, nowadays, everybody needs an ATV (in camo of course) to drive up and down the roads waiting for that big buck to be standing in the middle of the road as they come around the corner.

What happened to throwing the saddle on ol' Paycheck and riding way back into the back country (or even hiking) to bring back the winter's meat?

And knives??? Don't get me started. Even the sharpening systems nowadays are high-tech. And I just sit in front of the tv watching the evening news with an old Arkansas stone touching up the edges of my knives. Hmmm...do they even make Arkansas stones anymore?

Anyway, I guess the bottom line is...I'm wa-a-a-y behind the times....but after reading some of the above comments, it sounds like I'm in good company.

God still makes em, I dunno if anyone quarries them any longer.

Knives & "sharpening systems" crack me up. People want knives & chisels they never have to sharpen. Or $500 power sharpeners.

Reminds, me: I'll put a translucent Arkansas on my Christmas list. I'm tired of fooling with an array of sandpaper grits.

BTW: no amount of camo is going to help a hunter who hasn't learned to be still and pay attention to the wind. I've never figured out why someone sitting in a completely-enclosed deer blind needs camo, anyway. But I guess a lot of the cold weather gear is only made in camo.

 

[Rustyt1953]

George Carlin said, "take two totally unrelated items, glue them together and someone will buy it".

 

[ChattanoogaPhil]

Most of these things fall into the category of hobby or recreation.
If you're trying to apply practicality to fun, you'll be easily confused.

 

[Peak53]

I am totally down with all the above. Catching flyfishermen has to be one of the most lucrative of sports. I still use my 47 year old glass rod given to me by Dad on my 15th. It's caught a few thousand trout. A few years ago, I thought I should have a rangefinder, but after pricing the good ones, I figured the old practice method of estimating the distance to that tree, then pacing it off is close enough for 30.06 work. I'm generally plus or minus 5 yards at anything under 200 yards. Between 200 and 300, just hold 6" high. Beyond 300 = don't shoot. Don't get me started on ATVs and the flatlanders that won't get off 'em to actually hunt.

 

[wbraswell]

Who would have ever thought that fishing would become a professional sport?
Maybe I should rephrase that to: Who would have ever thought people would be dumb enough to think that fishing could pass as a professional sport?

 

[Peak53]

Who would have ever thought that fishing would become a professional sport?
Maybe I should rephrase that to: Who would have ever though people would be dumb enough to think that fishing could pass as a professional sport?

Yeah, I don't get competitive fishing. It is supposed to be relaxing.

 

[Farmer17]

I can't even believe Cabelas and Bass Pro can stay in business, their massive and beautiful stores and utilites/overhead must be very expensive. I always thought if you wanted camo gear you just went to a Walmart or Army Surplus and got everything you needed for under 50 bucks. That won't even buy an Under Armor camo sweatshirt at those stores. Other than my guns and ammo all my hunting gear combined, I probably spent less than $100.

 

[Xfuzz]

Not much on doo-dads....but, I really like
using Game Cameras.

 

[kwselke]

Selling fishing lures is as much about catching fishermen in the store as it is about catching fish in the field. Some outdoors products are great and work very well, some are good ideas that the maker and the buyer just knew would work, but...