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Cars, Trains, Guns and things

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johnfilmer:
 The Good Life

 
I grew up in a family that grew fruit and veg in the garden, and without a freezer (or even a fridge until the 60s) it was eaten seasonally or stored in the shed, bottled, pickled or made into jam. The smell of apples sat in trays in the shed roof is still with me today. It did mingle with the slightly "off" smell from the  silver paper, milk bottle tops and pie dishes, among other things that had been collected for the Guide Dogs for the Blind, that my mother did with the Townswomen's Guild (think WI but less Jerusalem).

 
I helped in the garden, partially out of interest, but once Dad was ill it became a necessity, certainly after he died. Therefore by my late teens, I had a reasonable idea about how to do things, and the techniques used.

 
Once I was away at University my mother soldiered on but after my Grandfather died (it was his house that the family lived in) she moved to a small bungalow back in Rainham. This had a small garden that she could easily manage.

 
I ended up, aged 22, living in a rented house in Culverstone, near Meopham. This I sublet to a variety of interesting characters over the next five years. One of these characters made the mistake of "hiding" his tall, green plants in the field. Unfortunately in summer 1976 the field died back to brown, leaving his well-tended, 6ft high plants very obvious. Good evening Officer.

 
Eventually we had a stable group, and we decided to grow some veg, and also kept a dozen chickens in one of the three Nissan huts in our large field.

 
Another of the huts was used as a temporary stable for a young horse that belonged to a local barmaid and girlfriend of a local (Pete) with whom we were good friends. It had a name, but because it was of Irish origin Pete would talk to it in a (bad) fake Irish accent and kept calling it Seamus. In a fairly short time the horse became known only as Seamus.

 
I got roped into helping get hay off the fields and into their barn, borrowing a dropside Transit from work. No problem until the next time when I was shown how to use a pitchfork to load bales onto a trailer. Lets just say that it is harder than it looks until you get the knack of it. I developed hay fever which has returned every year since.

 
When I bought my first house it had a small, terraced garden in which my dog reigned supreme, so nothing fancy grew. However, my girlfriend had bought a horse and this was kept as cheaply as possible in various locations around Snodland, then later on some ground just down the road with the other young horse she had now acquired.

 
Once we were living in the same house, the question of where to live next was starting to be asked. I had gone from needing a lodger to help pay the bills when I first bought the house, to seeing my wages rise as responsibility at work increased. She had worked in a pub to fund the animals (there was also her dog, and two cats...) but she also had an increasingly responsible job for SEGAS and for a brief period we were comfortable, even putting the horses into a livery.

 
After a few false starts we eventually found a small semi-detached cottage with an acre and a bit of grass and a few outbuildings. We cursed all those people who had bought these small houses, then extended the house out of our price range. What did we do ten years later? Oops.

 
The underlying soil was clay, such that when we first dug one border it was with a pickaxe. However over the years the application of well rotted manure, in industrial quantities, changed that completely.

 
Pete came down and gave us a hand. He had abandoned being an electrician and pump engineer and was now a self-employed gardening contractor. We cleared the field of brambles (with a chain saw!), ran a cultivator over the veg patch, and shifted some bulky feed bins in the back of his Standard Atlas pick up (remember them?). Then he emigrated to Australia to join the rest of his family.

 
We grew our own again.

 
Then parenthood. Our son was allergic to cows milk, and in 1981 alternatives did not fill the supermarket shelves. Sally's answer was typical, she brought home a goat. Unfortunately its name was the same as my business partner's wife-oh well, life goes on. Mandy was an Anglo-Nubian goat, a browser. Hedges are seen by most animals as a barrier, not to her – Lunch!

 
In order for goats (and cows) to produce milk they regularly need to have offspring to feed. Taking the goat to the billy was something that I never did, but I have driven with two goats in the back of a van, and they look out the back window like any other animal, the following vehicle's driver's expressions were "interesting".

 
Although I muttered about the effect that The Good Life as a TV programme had had on my wife in her formative years, we were able to do a more sensible version. More raised beds for vegetables, a fruit garden, a few chickens and more goats. We were able, and occasionally did, put a meal on the table that was completely ours, with wine (we don't talk about the parsnip...) except for the flour used to thicken the gravy.

 
Billy goat kids were never pets. What's that one's name? Was answered by "Freezer", and that's where they went, via an abattoir, as soon as they had horns and started to smell like a billy. We reckoned that they had a good life, well looked after, well fed and outside playing every day. They make a wonderful curry. The nanny kids were either reared on to replace or increase our herd, or sometimes sold on, but not to anyone we did not know.

 
Careful cross breeding had got Sally a herd of 12 milking nannies, all hand milked, and she was producing various milk products, soft cheese and yoghurt which we sold to my work colleagues and at the gate.

 
Sally was approached by a local farmer who was breeding a flock of expensive sheep. He had a couple of rejected lambs. These need colostrum which is in the early milk produced when the lamb, or goat is only up to a few days old. There was some available from one of her nannies, and we fed these little lambs until they were able to graze. Goat milk freezes well so it was straightforward to keep any excess early milk for future use. The farmer also happened to be butcher, so when happy, well fed lambs were given back to him ready to increase his flock, we were paid in meat, usually beef as we had pork.

 
What a good idea it was to keep a couple of pigs, I was told, get piglets, fatten them for a few weeks then off to the butcher and pork chops arrive. Now my idea of a piglet was about a foot to 18 inches long, how big could that get in 3 months? However... When they arrived they were already the size that I thought they would be at the end.

 
Anyway they hoovered up the surplus milk, and the ullage from the local pub, and the swill from the school kitchen and anything else put in their way.

 
They then had to be persuaded to board one of the company Astra vans. Getting one in is tricky, two nigh on impossible, but they went in eventually. They were taken to a local butcher where a swift and humane end was assured. The meat was excellent.

 
We did this a couple more times, asking for help to load them usually got refused the second time as the locals got wise. One piglet escaped when still small and a neighbour, not in the first flush of youth, lent a hand. I was at work, but by all accounts (and there were many witnesses) he got hold of a hind leg thinking that was that, until he was pulled, at some speed, through the adjacent brambles. To his credit he did not let go and the piglet was recaptured.

 
During this time the goats were often to be seen being walked up the road to other fields, just take the lead goat, and the others follow. There was even a registered herd name.

 
However, rules change and this semi-commercial milk production became impossible under new hygiene regulations. A while later the butcher stopped slaughtering as he found the new rules less humane in his environment.

 
Our last goat was kept as a pet, and when it died was buried (without full military honours) in the field. It needed a big hole!

 
We still kept growing our own.

 
During all this we had chickens, which, everytime I was left in charge, would be prey to the fox. So on one occasion when my wife was away I agreed to take a friends older hens as he wanted commercial production which is only from young birds, we were not so pressured. I went and picked them up (in a firm's Astra van, again) and was amused to watch in the mirror as they leaned into bends as I drove. So instead of there being fewer chickens there were twenty more.

 
Once we had got back to a sensible number of hens, we had a cockerel. He grew quite large, and was a splendid example who looked like many of those on a pub sign. He was called Rambo. Now what you should never do was get between Rambo and his ladies, or he would attack you. This is not to be taken lightly as he had large, sharp spurs and beak. Going to feed the chickens armed with a large plastic shovel was a wise precaution.

 
One evening we had forgotten to shut the birds away and after a commotion we found a couple of hens dead, and Rambo lying on his side, very still. While I was racing about with a powerful torch and shotgun, Rambo suddenly shook himself, jumped up and was back on guard. Cue "I say, I say, I say boy" impressions. Closer examination showed his spurs covered in blood, not his, he had attacked the fox. He was never quite the same after that, and with "Son of Rambo" who was smaller and more user-friendly the pair protected their flock for some time.

 
We eventually got some ducks instead of replacing the hens. These we could let wander the garden, being less destructive (no digging or dustbaths) yet still producing eggs.

 
Visitors were often startled by the other garden occupants, free range Guinea Pigs. They were surprisingly effective mowers, and their speed across the lawns was quite amazing. If you didn't expect them they usually made you jump, and immediately think rat! They also grew quite large, maybe almost twice as big as the average, caged, pig.

 
We concentrated more on growing higher value crops, and those that only taste as good a few minutes after picking. A greenhouse helped, and in it we grew the usual array of tomatoes and cucumbers, but also very early and very late peas. I started to count the cucumbers, growing over 90 from one plant, and over a hundred the next year. All visitors were given their obligatory cucumber, or two...

 
About six butternut squash seeds germinated, were potted on then put into the veg patch. The triffids then took over and shortly everyone had a squash to go with their cucumber. I took both to the local pub when visiting (regularly of course, got to keep up with local events) and they even raffled one as it was an "interesting" shape. A few more pounds in the charity box.

 
We continued in this way for a few more years, then moved, downsizing pending my retirement. Our new house came with a strip of land, long neglected, that has now sprouted a garage, many raised beds and fruit trees, some trained onto horizontal wires.

 
After we moved, Sally's ageing horse spent a couple of years stabled at her sister's then when they retired, he was moved to a field just up the road from us. She started growing veg there, using the readily available source of manure to help it all along. Sadly at 32 years old, the horse died, but we continue to have an "allotment" on the field that adds to our ability to grow our own. We also have free access to the adjacent small orchard of a wide selection of apples, mostly old varieties that are very tasty but would never be seen in a supermarket.

 
There is something most pleasing about popping out to the garden to pick fruit or veg for breakfast or dinner and knowing that it is both organic and as fresh as possible. Long may it continue.

 

 

 

johnfilmer:
 Guns, Part 2As my firearm certificate renewal got ever closer, I contacted one of the organisers of the local pistol league, thinking to maybe just do a bit of pistol rather than the full-on everything that I had done a year or two before.As it happened, his club were off to Bisley that weekend, so, slightly reluctantly, I went. A few rounds at 600yds and I was hooked again, so I became a member of the Maidstone Home Guard (1944) Rifle Club. Ightham was also a club that came from the old Home Guard, practising and competing against each other. Early on in my time at Ightham the armoury was behind a shop in Ightham Village, where it had been since WW2. They even had their own version of Private Pike, who had shot as a lad in the Home Guard and still shot into the 1980s. When the Home Guard was stood down in 1944, many of the units continued to shoot and became the basis for rifle clubs post war. Maidstone HG shot indoors on a narrow 25m range at the Grammar School. Pistol was accommodated with a trestle erected at 20yds. Regular fullbore rifle at Bisley, and pistol at Stone Lodge resumed, but at a lower level, more casual shooting and just a few competitions. A year or two later and the club secretary resigned, having ceased to be a regular shooter some while before. The Secretary usually holds the club firearm certificate and has responsibility therefore for the weapons and ammunition, although club officers can transport them and supervise their use. Reluctantly I agreed to fill the vacant position. I therefore found room for another, substantial, gun cabinet and various weapons. I had earlier sold my Browning .22 pistol and upgraded to a Unique DES69, a French pistol designed for Olympic Standard Pistol. During my time with Maidstone I also acquired a Smith & Wesson Model 52. This was a 38special semi auto, designed specifically as a target weapon it would only chamber wadcutter (flat nosed, seated flush to the case) ammunition. This worked best with slightly more powerful loads than the revolver, there being some energy lost in operating the mechanism. Lastly I bought a Colt .45ACP Gold Cup semi auto. This was a target version of the famous military sidearm. It also required me to have additional reloading equipment to suit the different calibre. More fun with infinite variations of bullet, including fully jacketed, and slower burning powders. With these additions, as well as the club weapons, the local police firearms liaison “suggested” that I should have a decent alarm system to supplement our two German Shepherds. All the shooting gear (guns and ammo in steel boxes with serious locks) was in a small cupboard, which itself had a slightly reinforced door and a quality deadlock. It now had its own dedicated alarm circuit.
The .357 Magnum revolver remained my favourite for its simplicity and accuracy. Shooting at Stone Lodge one evening, I was just starting to pack up when I realised that I needed to shoot one more competition card. With a tad of bad grace, grumbling away as everybody else was getting ready to leave I put up the card. I had already put away my spotting scope, and to save time just left the bench flap (like a pub bar flap) up and shot the first five. With the naked eye there were nines, an eight and a seven - rubbish. It was late, I was tired, shooting in the dark under lights, so I just reloaded and fired the last five almost casually. Immediately I finished I started to pack up and someone else went and retrieved the card. When I was asked to sign it, I said just mark it and record it and lets get home. Then Andy suggested that I look again, and he witnessed it. Hmm that seven was an eight, the eight was a nine, and the rest were tens! 97 out of 100 my best pistol score ever – I still have the card somewhere, it used to live in a clip frame in my office, but the glass got broken. I also have the first rifle 100 that I shot, an external postal competition card, returned by the marker as a memento.
In the box of bits and pieces handed over from the previous secretary were a couple of journals. One detailed the early years of the Maidstone area small bore rifle society from the start of the first world war. The gentleman writing this was resident at Somerfield Terrace, now part of the Somerfield Hospital. The intention was to provide basic skill at arms before entry into the services and many additional ranges appeared, often attached to Pubs either physically or as homes for their teams. The usual give away is a long, low building. The two hobbies really should not meet.
A mention was made of shooting in the upper floor of what is now the Carriage Museum, and I have often thought to see if any evidence survives. The records continue into the inter war period, with full bore rifle shooting taking place in an old quarry at Tovil.The advent of the Home Guard effectively took over the sport. Post war there were Rifle clubs all over the place, in Maidstone there were clubs shooting at various Paper Mills, Rootes, Tilling-Stevens, Haynes and many others. I also became a member of GEC Rifle & Pistol Club, but although I rarely shot in their indoor range, I was a mid-week regular on the outdoor range. This was behind the main hanger of Rochester Airport, and accessed past Medway Aeronautical Preservation Society’s wonderful sheds. The range was 50m small bore rifle, shot from a covered slab of concrete – think bike shed without the racks. Very strange sensation to be halfway through a competition card and a plane, or the Air Ambulance would take off just above the sand bullet stop brick support wall in clear view above the barrel. Another one for the excuses list…
Excavated at a lower level was the 20m pistol range, for small and full bore pistols, complete with turning targets. As one was above the other, either rifle or pistol could be shot, but not together!
A constant theme had always been the occasional Fun Shoot, where no official competition took place. I have previously mentioned the disc breaking, and we did a pistol version, just once as the discs were about the size of a Polo Mint, and nobody could hit the darned things.
We had shot our .22 rifles at 200yds at Bisley one cold winter afternoon and found them to be surprisingly accurate. Another winter at Bisley saw Maidstone with an array of unusual weapons that we all had a try at. A Brown Bess Musket, hugely long and unwieldy, a couple of muzzle loading, black powder, Enfield 1853 pattern 0.577” rifles, that were surprisingly accurate, but slow to load. As well as a couple of 0.303 Lee-Enfield variants, an early one, still my favourite, and a WW2 number 5 Jungle Carbine that was, shall we say, best at short range. Previously we had been using the Gallery Ranges at Stone (I think our usual turning target bay had stopped turning) so there were other shooters mixed in with our lot. I had finished my card and was idly watching someone I had never met before shooting a flint lock pistol.  Realising my interest he showed me the piece, and after the targets were changed suggested that I might like to shoot it. Damn right I would!He loaded it, explaining his actions as he went, then went through the drill if it didn’t fire. No flash, just re-cock the gun and try again. If it happens again the flint needed adjusting. A flash but not firing (literally a flash in the pan), hold aim and wait in case there is a hang fire. If not, then the flash hole needed pricking out (to enable the flash from the pan to travel to the main charge) and the pan primed again. So I held this thing, with a grip like holding a walking stick, pulled the flint back to full cock (from the “safe” position of half cock) and squeezed the immensely heavy trigger. Click! Nothing happened. Recock it, try again, a flash, no bang, so I stood there for about 10 seconds holding aim, then he poked about a bit and reprimed the pan, and I tried again. A flash. Ah I thought here we go again, then with some delay a gentle woosh turned into a long steady push on my arm totally different from our usual sharp recoil, as it fired.The owner’s efforts had scattered shot holes around the target, I took great pride in hitting a Nine, thanked him and gave him the gun back. How on earth did we gain an Empire with weapons that tricky? I had a “slot” on my licence for a while that enabled me to buy a Black Powder pistol, but I never did. possibly put off by the gent at GEC who turned up, put on a disposable overall and gloves (with hood, as seen in all forensic investigations) shot his replica Colt pistol, then stripped off the overall and gloves into the bin and went home to an hour of gun cleaning. John Wayne never had that problem in any film that I saw! We once met a group of four young men from Gloucester who had decided the night before to come to Bisley to try each others guns, and literally had a Cortina boot full of just about everything. Full bore semi-auto rifles were still permitted, but to our amazement one of them produced a Bren gun. He had just bought it and this was the first chance he had to shoot it. When questioned as to how he had got this on his licence it seems that he simply listed it as a self loading rifle made by the Brno small arms company of Czechoslovakia. We were astounded. As the afternoon went on we continued chatting, and were offered a go with the Bren. It had the top mounted box magazine, and the simple instruction was to hang onto it as the action made it “walk” forward. It was rumoured to be very nice to shoot, and our brief encounter confirmed that, with good accuracy at 300yds. When we had finished, the owner showed us how good he was with it, then pointed out the catch that in military use gave fully automatic fire, which I believe also had a 3shot position. Either way, to demonstrate that it was disabled he flipped it over, took aim and fired. Luckily the range was by now fairly empty and nobody else appeared to have realised that it had just gone, briefly, full auto. It was hastily put back in its case and carted off to the car.
At Ightham, because of the shoulder to shoulder league, we knew many of the other local clubs, and on one occasion were invited to try some of the local TA equipment. This was literally enlightening with light intensifying telescopic sights we were shooting at targets in virtual darkness. They extended an invitation to a few clubs for their open day shoot at Milton Ranges. We were firing .22 training anti-tank guns, and the old 7.62 SLR rifles, the actions of which sound terribly tinny when wearing ear defenders. There was a “closest to the middle” competition onto a blank target at 200yds with the marker waving an arrow on a stick to show the fall of shot. The unkind tried to shoot the arrow, and were quickly dissuaded. With only minutes to go I held first place and our rifle captain second, but a TA Sergeant had to wrest some glory from the civvies and just managed to win at the very end.
A falling plate competition was the team event, where each rifle club, police and service unit had four or five shooters, each with a randomly allocated SLR with a full magazine. Against the clock who could knock over the metal targets scattered across the range quickest, two teams at a time. The trouble was the SLRs sights were all over the place and by the time you had worked out where to aim you had to be economical with the ammunition. If only we had taken our old bolt action rifles we could have shown them how to do it with ease. The Met Police won. Highlight of our year was the Pistol AD event (so called as it was Pistol 92, Pistol 93 etc.). This was held over a weekend at Bisley with huge numbers of competitions, exhibitions and what I can only describe as a shooting oriented cross between a boot fair and serious professional stalls, all set up on the half acre green space at the centre of the camp. If it was legal you could buy it, and although a pistol meet, the offerings covered every aspect of shooting.
However, many of us felt that there was becoming too great a move towards the “practical” disciplines, mainly pistol. At their worst they were almost like playing cowboys and indians with real guns – an exaggeration of course, but a bit too quick draw and moving about for my, Olympic based, tastes. However, when on a range, keeping your pistol with you in a holster was more about ensuring that no one else could pick it up, than playing Dirty Harry. One range officer was moaning about this as a “yoof” thing to one of our more senior members, who, as we got onto the firing point, removed his 38special revolver from his shoulder holster…
However, after the horrors of Dunblane the writing was on the wall. I will not dwell on the arguments for or against the pistol ban, it happened, it was politicians and civil servants taking what I saw as the easy route, and at a stroke many people lost a sport, a hobby and for others also a livelihood. Those included the leather worker who made pistol belts and holsters through all aspects of range operation, gunshops etc., mostly small, specialist businesses.
The consequence of the ban was the hand-in. Pistols were either surrendered for a generic (low) fixed fee, or against a suitable gunsmith’s valuation. There was a tariff for just about anything to do with the sport. Being organised by civil servants, probably with no knowledge of which they wrote, the other eligible items were full of anomalies. The simple concept was sound, if it could be used for other things or aspects of shooting, then it was not eligible. However with reloading equipment, unless it was “pistol specific” it was not included. The problem was that reloading rifle ammunition was a very niche hobby compared to the relatively huge numbers who reloaded pistol, and most of us preferred the safety and “feel” of stronger equipment which was capable of loading both. In common with many others, a group of us went for a last blast, shooting anything and everything that we had, trying each others guns and attempting to use up our ammunition. Some moved their guns to continental clubs rather than surrender them, and a regular Eurostar trip kept them happy. This did not appeal to me. Others faced a dilemma over historically significant or special weapons. Hand them in and argue for their value, have them de-activated (ruining them for what they were, and their value) or sell them, probably through a dealer to a collector abroad to keep them used and appreciated.
The actual hand-in was quite well organised. I went at the appointed time to one of the old Police Houses behind Maidstone HQ, and met two of the familiar firearms personnel. I had two because of the quantity of equipment that was involved with the club and my personal items. I went in my wife’s Land Rover 90 Station Wagon, the rear of which was filled to window level. I handed in 9 pistols, holsters, speed loaders for revolvers, magazines for the semi-autos, empty cases, bullets, reloading consumables and much more.
I kept my pistol belts, very thick (7mm) leather, lined and with sturdy brass buckles, they were intended to be worn over your normal belt and clipped to it, but with a couple of extra holes drilled through them they still hold my jeans up very effectively.
I subsequently had a serious spat with the Home Office who tried to cherry pick what to agree to accept and for how much. I had ended up travelling a fair distance to a dealer who was prepared to value my guns. The Unique was the problem as they were uncommon. It was valued at £710, but the Home Office wanted to give me the basic £150, while agreeing to the other valuations. A few letters later and slowly increasing offers, I was awarded the full amount. However my reloading gear was rejected, despite having adaptations specifically for pistol loading. Again a few more letters and I was partially successful as I got a simple reloading press with a fixed 38special case holder accepted for the basic compensation – which was more than I paid for it. My main reloading equipment was sold for a fraction of its worth to one of those going the continental route.
The aftermath was quite strange. I was seriously annoyed at what had gone on, a little lost without some of my sports and hobbies, but understanding of the concerns that prompted it all. A year or so later and I had a health issue that prevented me from shooting prone rifle for a while, and I resigned as Secretary, donated my .22 rifle to the club and sold the Enfield and my rather nice shooting jacket to another club member. I kept my firearms certificate open with a .22 semi automatic rifle for vermin shooting, but I’m not much of a hunter and eventually that was sold and in 2015, after 38years I did not renew my certificate.

johnfilmer:
My Enfield T4 was chambered for the 7.62mm NATO cartridge, which was for many years the military standard.
In America it was also known as the Winchester 308, as it was 0.308". Very similar in performance to a 303 round if loaded in the same way, but the case design was fundamentally different. The 303 had a rim around the base of the cartridge, like most classic rounds, but the 7.62 was rimless, actually with a groove around the base for the extractor to get hold of. The rimmed case was usually chambered into the weapon against the rim, but the rimless chambered against the taper between the body of the case and the reduced diameter that held the projectile.
Both had about the same kick, and after shooting nice, tame, .22LR rifles could give a beginner a nasty surprise as well as a black eye if they had the sights too close.
When precision target shooting, a revolver was always shot single action to give a nice, consistent trigger pull and predictable release. Double action required a long steady pull, often without too much indication as to when it may release. However, shooting the more "practical" disciplines such as Police Pistol, required, in the last sequence, the shooter to fire two shots in 5seconds at a turning target 6m away. The shooter waited at the ready with his arm below 45degrees until the target turned, then up on aim and fire. The first shot would be single action, and usually quite accurate, the second with the long trigger pull, even using two hands, would be less reliable.
To slow down the very best shooters we often handicapped them by only allowing double action shots, even so one particular comrade could beat the rest of us, especially if there was beer to be paid for as a result.
My younger son, shooting my T4 at Bisley when he was about 14.

MartinR:
Cowboy films are mainly wishful thinking.  Prior to 1854 revolvers were loaded with black powder, ball and percussion cap.  Even when metallic cartridges were introduced it was 1889 before the first double-action revolvers were available in the USA.  Until then the hammer needed to be cocked by hand for each shot,seriously limiting the rate of fire and reducing accuracy.

Dave Smith:
MartinR. You're right about the Lee-Enfield recoil, that's what I fired first in the RAF.  .22 first, ok but .303, wow but we had been warned so success. The Bren was a different animal, great & very accurate; supposed to be good for 1600yds, although we only went up to 1200 I think, but very accurate at that range- if you had good eyesight of course! The Sten was a different animal again but the other way- when holding, keep your fingers well away from the magazine slot! I never knew revolvers had rifling, thought they were carbines like the Americans' used. We were always taught to fire a double shot as they weren't very accurate & you definitely had a better chance of hitting the enemy. The Western gunslingers must have had rifling & a long barrel methinks- or the cowboy films were just wishful thinking!

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