There's a clickbaity title for ya. 
The story here is that I have a collection of 11 customer projects, that for whatever reason I've never been able to return to their proper owners.
Several of them, involved contact through an .edu or .mil email address, that expired before the project could be completed. Presumably the fellow graduated, went on to a new posting or a new job or a new city, and the temporary address was deleted after he left. Others I simply lost track of one way or the other.
What happened in many, if not most of these cases, was I'd have some question about the mod, and I'd send them an email asking about it. Well, I of course can't just sit around and wait for a reply, so I'd move on to something else- and I very much admit that my early project scheduling involved a LOT of squeaky wheel lubrication. The noisiest guy usually got moved up the list.
So what would happen is I'd run across the project later- days, weeks or months, depending on my schedules- wonder about the progress, and check to see if I missed a reply. I'd usually send more inquiries, and after I'd "collected" four or five such orphans, I'd periodically send off snail-mail inquiries, which usually worked. (Not everyone- in fact, very few people, supplied a phone number.)
Eventually I gathered a total of 11 such orphans- not all markers, some where just bodies or parts. Multiple emails went unanswered- or worse, bounced back after the address was disabled- and I'd get no reply to snailmail. Even certified letters would either vanish into the void or would come back as "undeliverable".
Now, on the positive side, the newest one of those 11 has a 2003 postmark. I eventually got a more and more solid handle on my workflow, and more and more people would include a phone number, and fewer and fewer would use "expendable" college or work-supplied addresses.
I know I re-tried the certified letter thing at least twice- though the most recent of those was probably '07 or '08.
Anyway, I've always wondered what to do with them. By all legal rights and really, even by most moral rights, I'd done my due diligence, and the stuff became "mine" a decade and a half ago. BUT... that never felt right. Yeah, some of these have been sitting around since the term "hanging chad" meant something, and it's not like I had gone into hiding. I've had my domain name and that same email address since something like 1999, I've been widely active under the same screen name on dozens of boards, still have the same snail-mail box, etc.
But it still didn't feel right to sell them or even just add them to my own collection. So there they sat, and I figured they'd be right there and auctioned off for pennies on the dollar at my inevitable-yet-epic estate sale.
But then...
Just a few days ago, once this place came back online and people- including myself- started posting again, I got a PM from a freshly-registered type, with one post to his name at the time, asking me if I remembered a Taso Typhoon pump that he'd sent in to have a barrel fitted.
I said yes. I remembered both the gun, the name and the mod. This gun, point in fact:
It was a simple mod, just turning the end of a barrel to fit the body, a slip-fit kind of like the old Bushmaster pumps. But he also wanted an old Automag backbottle ASA mounted to the trigger guard, much like the CCI Phantom vertical ASA.
I can't recall precisely what happened- I've slept since then - but that faint bell that rang in the back of my head thinks I had a question about mounting the Automag ASA. Which uses comparatively large 1/4"-20 bolts, which would have forced me to drill holes that would have nearly sliced the trigger guard in half.
I believe I sent him an email suggesting we get a Phantom part and install that- would have been maybe $25 and change. (As you can see, he sent parts in trade, which we'd arranged beforehand. But I'd have had to buy the ASA, and thus would have had to charge him for it.)
I very likely then set the gun aside, and moved on to the next project. And probably found it later, checked, as I said, for a response, tried again, waited again, etc.
I can no longer read the badly-faded postmarks on the stamps (remember those? ) of the package, there's no delivery confirmation number (I don't think they even offered such a service back then) and as you can see, no date on the letter. But I believe this project arrived around 2001 or 2002. I'd used the then-new-to-me Logan to turn it, and I think I picked that up around then.
So it's been sitting here- languishing, really- for maybe as long as nineteen years.
But, as of Friday morning, it will be winging it's way home.
Finally.
And I can't tell you how much I wanted to use the old joke. The one where the older guy is going through his closet, and finds a suit. he realizes he hasn't worn that suit in twenty-five years, so decides to try it on. Once he puts it on, he finds a claim ticket in one of the pockets- a ticket for a pair of shoes he'd dropped off at a shoe-repair shop... 25 years ago.
On a whim, he checks the Yellow Pages (hey, like I said, it's an old joke )and to his surprise, finds the shop is still in business. So he takes the claim ticket downtown to the shop, and is further surprised to to see the original owner and his sons still run the place.
He hands over the ticket and inquires if the shoes are even still there. The proprietor digs through his old ledgers and yes, by jove, the shoes are indeed still there!
The proprietor hands the ticket back and says "they'll be ready next Thursday".
Doc.
The story here is that I have a collection of 11 customer projects, that for whatever reason I've never been able to return to their proper owners.
Several of them, involved contact through an .edu or .mil email address, that expired before the project could be completed. Presumably the fellow graduated, went on to a new posting or a new job or a new city, and the temporary address was deleted after he left. Others I simply lost track of one way or the other.
What happened in many, if not most of these cases, was I'd have some question about the mod, and I'd send them an email asking about it. Well, I of course can't just sit around and wait for a reply, so I'd move on to something else- and I very much admit that my early project scheduling involved a LOT of squeaky wheel lubrication. The noisiest guy usually got moved up the list.
So what would happen is I'd run across the project later- days, weeks or months, depending on my schedules- wonder about the progress, and check to see if I missed a reply. I'd usually send more inquiries, and after I'd "collected" four or five such orphans, I'd periodically send off snail-mail inquiries, which usually worked. (Not everyone- in fact, very few people, supplied a phone number.)
Eventually I gathered a total of 11 such orphans- not all markers, some where just bodies or parts. Multiple emails went unanswered- or worse, bounced back after the address was disabled- and I'd get no reply to snailmail. Even certified letters would either vanish into the void or would come back as "undeliverable".
Now, on the positive side, the newest one of those 11 has a 2003 postmark. I eventually got a more and more solid handle on my workflow, and more and more people would include a phone number, and fewer and fewer would use "expendable" college or work-supplied addresses.
I know I re-tried the certified letter thing at least twice- though the most recent of those was probably '07 or '08.
Anyway, I've always wondered what to do with them. By all legal rights and really, even by most moral rights, I'd done my due diligence, and the stuff became "mine" a decade and a half ago. BUT... that never felt right. Yeah, some of these have been sitting around since the term "hanging chad" meant something, and it's not like I had gone into hiding. I've had my domain name and that same email address since something like 1999, I've been widely active under the same screen name on dozens of boards, still have the same snail-mail box, etc.
But it still didn't feel right to sell them or even just add them to my own collection. So there they sat, and I figured they'd be right there and auctioned off for pennies on the dollar at my inevitable-yet-epic estate sale.
But then...
Just a few days ago, once this place came back online and people- including myself- started posting again, I got a PM from a freshly-registered type, with one post to his name at the time, asking me if I remembered a Taso Typhoon pump that he'd sent in to have a barrel fitted.
I said yes. I remembered both the gun, the name and the mod. This gun, point in fact:
It was a simple mod, just turning the end of a barrel to fit the body, a slip-fit kind of like the old Bushmaster pumps. But he also wanted an old Automag backbottle ASA mounted to the trigger guard, much like the CCI Phantom vertical ASA.
I can't recall precisely what happened- I've slept since then
- but that faint bell that rang in the back of my head thinks I had a question about mounting the Automag ASA. Which uses comparatively large 1/4"-20 bolts, which would have forced me to drill holes that would have nearly sliced the trigger guard in half.I believe I sent him an email suggesting we get a Phantom part and install that- would have been maybe $25 and change. (As you can see, he sent parts in trade, which we'd arranged beforehand. But I'd have had to buy the ASA, and thus would have had to charge him for it.)
I very likely then set the gun aside, and moved on to the next project. And probably found it later, checked, as I said, for a response, tried again, waited again, etc.
I can no longer read the badly-faded postmarks on the stamps (remember those?
) of the package, there's no delivery confirmation number (I don't think they even offered such a service back then) and as you can see, no date on the letter. But I believe this project arrived around 2001 or 2002. I'd used the then-new-to-me Logan to turn it, and I think I picked that up around then.So it's been sitting here- languishing, really- for maybe as long as nineteen years.
But, as of Friday morning, it will be winging it's way home.
Finally.
And I can't tell you how much I wanted to use the old joke. The one where the older guy is going through his closet, and finds a suit. he realizes he hasn't worn that suit in twenty-five years, so decides to try it on. Once he puts it on, he finds a claim ticket in one of the pockets- a ticket for a pair of shoes he'd dropped off at a shoe-repair shop... 25 years ago.
On a whim, he checks the Yellow Pages (hey, like I said, it's an old joke
)and to his surprise, finds the shop is still in business. So he takes the claim ticket downtown to the shop, and is further surprised to to see the original owner and his sons still run the place.He hands over the ticket and inquires if the shoes are even still there. The proprietor digs through his old ledgers and yes, by jove, the shoes are indeed still there!
The proprietor hands the ticket back and says "they'll be ready next Thursday".
Doc.
)
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