Some traditions are just too good to give up, and Rule Five Friday is one of those traditions.  Since this is the first serious, content-laden post since the reboot, I’ll touch on several different things today.  Hang on!

Just a few days ago, shops here in the Mile High City (hah) started legally selling marijuana for recreational use.

Interesting, eh?

I’ve been saying for over thirty years that marijuana should be legalized.   It’s arguably no more addictive and no more destructive than alcohol, and probably less harmful than tobacco (don’t ask me to give up the occasional fine cigar or pipeful of good black cavendish, even so.)  So why is it illegal?

Well, until the early 20th century, it mostly wasn’t illegal.  Then again, lots of things were legal then – laudanum, for example, which was an over-the-counter medicine containing a healthy helping of opium.  So marijuana laws, as these things go, are kind of a Johnny-come-lately.

There are a couple of reasons to favor legalization:

1) Cops have better things to do than chase down stoners.  Also, look at some of the things the War on Drugs has led to, enforcement-wise; no-knock raids, Constitutionally questionable property seizures, and courts clogged with non-violent offenders.

2) It’s not the role of government to shield people from the consequences of their own bad decisions.  With that said, though, it would be a good idea to take the resource now spent on enforcement and instead put them into treatment of genuine addicts.  As with alcohol and tobacco, the casual user isn’t a problem.

Marijuana, of course, remains illegal at the Federal level.  Under the Obama Administration, the Imperial Federal government isn’t doing much about this uncomfortable state of affairs – but that may well change in January of 2017.

 Moving on:  The esteeemed Robert Stacy McCain brings us a concealed-carry tale that brings a  shudder of revulsion.  Excerpt:

A domestic dispute over space aliens escalated Saturday morning when a lingerie-clad New Mexico woman allegedly pointed a silver handgun at her boyfriend, a weapon she retrieved from her vagina, where it had been placed while the accused was performing a sex act, police allege.

To make matters more strange, the arrested woman is the most recent ex-wife of Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Cormac McCarthy, author of “The Road” and “No Country for Old Men.”

…After removing the gun from her vagina, McCarthy pointed it at her boyfriend’s head, investigators charge.

Maybe I shouldn’t have brought that up on Rule Five Friday.

It is belaboring the obvious to observe that the whole point of concealed carry is to have a weapon available for use quickly in the event of an emergency.  In this case, since the handgun was placed in the… holster…  during a sex act…

I’m sorry, but what the fuck kind of a sex act involves placing a firearm in any bodily orifice at all?

And what kind of solvent would one use to clean the weapon following that act?  Summer’s Eve, Hoppe’s #9, or bleach?

An old saying, mentioned in the comments section in this story over at The Other McCain, goes “when the going gets weird, the weird go pro.”  That certainly applies here.

Preparations are under way for yr. obdt. to go on the road again starting Sunday, but regular posts will continue uninterrupted from the chilly environs of northern Indiana.  Stay tuned for tomorrow’s first reboot Gingermageddon.

It’s good to be back, True Believers; it’s good to be back!