Today was a good day.

Hey everyone. Finals are done. Woohoo. I can finally get back to writing my story full time (not really, I have a lot of family and friends to meet for a while, but it'll happen.) But that's not really what I wanted to talk about today. Because today was a friggen great day.
It’s the type of day where you want to climb a mountain and just shout to the whole world about how great it was. But I don’t have a mountain, I have a keyboard.

My family and I went to the local gunstore today. We’ve been trying to figure out what sort of gun mom would like for personal defense, and honestly for fun as well. And they were looking at the pistols, but for a history and gun nut like me, pistols don't cut it. I found myself gravitating towards the back of the store, towards the rifles.

Some people, most of my friends really, lean towards the cutting edge in terms of firearms. the newer the better. Not me. The older the better in my case. I headed past the AR-15's and the Kalashnikovs, to the far back. I have to admit, my local store is pretty well laid out, because on the back wall they have all the older classic stuff.

On the wall today was the same old. Up top were a pair of M1 carbines, then below that a few more AKs, then below that a pair of M1A's (M14's that are semi only, my family has one, they're really nice). below that was something that caught my attention. A Garand, and next to that a M1917 Enfield. But at the bottom was something that made my jaw drop.

It was a Lee-Enfield, No 4. Almost the same rifle that I gave to the Cavalry.

I had never seen a Lee-Enfield in the flesh before, but it wasn't for a lack of trying. Every time I went to a store, I'd look. But I'd never find one. "Holy shit" I muttered.

Now, and this is important for anyone who ever goes to a gunstore, If you don't think that you have the money and you spot your dream gun don't stare at it. The staff watches for this like hawks, and once they see a starrer they'll swoop in for the kill.

At the store, one of them swooped in. "Can I help you with anything." This guy was a shark, and he could smell blood in the water. I tried to play it off cool.

"No, I'm just looking." He followed my gaze to the Lee-Enfield.

"Would you like to hold it?"
Of course I would like to hold it. It’s a Lee-Enfield. As far as I’m concerned or know, it’s the last of the Lee-Enfields. So here’s the second lesson in gun store etiquette. Don’t say yes if they ask you to hold it.

“Yes.”

He picked it up off of the rack and handed it over to me. it was heavy, but not too heavy. The wood was dark and scratched, just enough to hint at a long and storied career. I brought it up to my shoulder and looked down the aperture. The sights were so clear and intuitive, the aperture big enough for easy acquisition. Hell, they were a little bit better than our M-14’s sights. I moved my hand to the bolt and pulled up. It popped up easily, only a quarter turn, and not the half that the Mosin-Nagant needs. In fact, the bolt didn’t even interfere with the sight picture. I pulled it back, and it went so smoothly, hardly an ounce of resistance against my pull. I put it forward, and again it didn’t fight back until the last inch. The bolt caught as the firing pin cocked, but I pushed it flush and threw the bolt back down.

Holy hell. It was actually better than I had expected it to be.

“How do I decock it?” I asked. I was deathly afraid to dry fire it and risk any chance of damage

“Pull the bolt back open, pull the trigger and ride the bolt back in.” I did, and the firing pin decocked easily. I grabbed on the back of the firing pin and pulled back until it clicked once and then tried to operate the bolt. Just like I had read, the bolt refused to budge. I pulled it the rest of the way back and decocked it again. I looked for the safety, and it was right where it was supposed to be, just to the left of the bolt. A safety that I could just flip on. Not like that garbage Mosin my brother has.

The reason that you don’t say yes if they ask you to hold the gun is that if you hold it and it’s as good as you thought it was, you’ll flip it over and check the price. In this case, 475 dollars.

If they see you doing that, they know that you’re not just looking at guns and wishing. They know that you’re entertaining the thought of buying it.

“So what do you think?”

“What do I think? I think it’s great!” I said, maybe a little too enthusiastically. It was at this point that I think that I came to a wonderful horrible conclusion, one that you could probably guess.

Come hell or high water, I was going to leave this store with the Lee-Enfield.

Unfortunately for me, all gun purchases in my family need to go through both the US government and through the Family Fuhrer, my mother. Shes pro gun, but she also thinks that the household has hit the maximum gun capacity. I was ready for a fight.

A fight that never came. She just said OK. A trip to the bank and 500 dollars later, I was the proud owner of the Lee Enfield. First gun that I ever bought. About half the money that I had gone in a flash.

I haven’t cleaned it yet, nor shot it, and I don’t have stripper clips which makes loading kinda a pain, but I’ve stripped it, cycled a full mags worth of round through to make sure that the action works, and so far I’m positively convinced this is the best 500 dollars I’ve ever spent. If people want, I’ll put up a review of this once I’ve shot it and got the clips.

In case I don’t put anything up, I wish you all a Merry Christmas, happiness, and a happy new year.