Chris from the Big Island, here.
Well, currently from BI. Grew up in Ohio casting bullets and shooting black powder (and anything else I could get my hands on) with my dad. Love shooting, love the intricacies of these little machines and really appreciate having gown up with them.
That said it has been a while since I owned anything to shoot. I moved to CA for work 10 years or so ago and didn't want to hassle with the gun laws there. Then moved here and had the same feeling for a while. Well, it didn't help that work has been slim - shooting has fairly high startup costs if you want to get something decent to shoot. So it was just about this time last year when I finally knuckled down to understand HI's laws and get meself a shootin' iron or two. Should have a rifle and a pistol in the next week or 2. 'Bout time!
But I'm an impatient cuss. So I got out some lead, hit the old BBQ, cast up some round balls and I've been fogging the local range for mosquitos with the BP Ruger Old Army I inherited from dad.
Fun. Dirty, but at least the ROA is easy enough to clean.
I'm also a political oddball so I'll just be up front about that. I don't fit in anywhere. On some things I lean left, on others I lean right. Which generally means that people who think in terms of "Us or Them!" generally assume I must be "Them!!" no matter how much I insist that I'm neither. Its frustrating because such sharp divisions are only good for getting sharply divided politicians elected and keeping them in office. It makes working for the common good and collaboration very, very difficult to imagine much less achieve. Built in tension in the government is good but this is getting ridiculous, in my opinion. Which I'm well aware very few people share. I'm used to it.
Studied Anthroplogy in college (study of human cultures) because it was interesting and the family insisted I go to college for ~something~. I've also studied primitive living skills to a degree. And now I make my living as a video, audio and media guy and a computer Witch Doctor. I tend to enjoy big picture, systems thinking and love understanding the context and history surrounding an issue. I've learned to keep my mouth shut about that kind of thing because no one else seems to care. I get a lot of blank stares when drawing parallels to the Roman Empire or pointing out cultural nuances around the time of our Founding Fathers. I guess I just see it as attempting to learn from our mistakes. I just define "our" much bigger than people expect, I suppose.
Anyway - I bring that up because people here will assume I'm Leftist Commie Socialist at times. I'm not. I'm as pro 2A as it gets. The spirit of the 2A would have rocket launchers, grenades, - any hardware the military has - as legally ownable in the US. And I ~really~ like that idea. Things look a little different now than they did then, though, so I'm not surprised the 2A is up for a great deal of interpretation.
Happy to be aboard.
Aloha.
C