I know this can be a devisive subject among readers here, but after seeing a reference to this “gun turn in” event, I thought of a few true beater pistols I have. They were given to me over the past few years by friends who thought I might be able to scavenge parts from them or whatever. These are guns I won’t shoot and would not even think of giving away, much less selling for fifty bucks. Come on. A .25 caliber Raven arms? FIE, RG… Nah. I missed The last “buy back” event because of a scheduling conflict. But I was free this weekend. I made it a point to be. Especially after reading the flier . . .
The event was co-sponsored by Cease Fire Oregon. And the gift cards were not donated by the Kroger-owned Fred Meyer, they were purchased by Cease Fire for this event. And my local Fred Meyer has a decent gun counter with handguns and rifles. And ammo. And magazines. Taking money from the enemy, getting rid of a few questionable gats, and then turning the gift cards into?
Bwahahaha!
So I gathered up my POS jam-o-matics, and headed to Newport City Hall.
I also took a wad of cash. Just in case someone had something interesting that I could buy my way into. And here I thought Newport, during a decent winter storm, wouldn’t be very busy. Well, I thought wrong. I was greeted by these guys and a couple others who were out of view.
“Cash for Guns” says the sign on the left. Apparently, I wasn’t the only smart guy. One fella I met, Dave, drove up from Medford. Over 250 miles. He had a stack of gift cards from junk guns and a wad of cash as well. He and a few others had already bought a couple of guns from folks.
It seems Ceasefire under estimated the amount of like-minded individuals. By the time I got there at noon, they had already run out of gift cards. I was immediately bummed. That is until I was informed they would give out IOU’s. Well, I had already driven two hours to get there. Why not?
I walked up to the first table and handed a Newport P.D. officer my grocery sack with the three zip tied pieces of pot metal disguised as pistols. He didn’t take a second look at them as he piled them on a cart that probably had 75-100 guns of all flavors of rust. On the very top was a double barrel shotty that was all of 12 inches long. Hmmmm. The officer checked a box on a piece of paper and wrote the number ‘3’ on it.
I made my way to another table with three smiling older ladies seated behind it. They explained that they had run out of gift cards but would write me an IOU, and that my actual gift cards would arrive in the mail within two weeks. I had made up my mind I was OK with it because if they didn’t come through, they would have to give the guns back or face criminal and/or civil issues. An outfit named Ceasefire is not going to give guns away. Especially with no name attached to the gat. So I wrote my name and mailing address down and she handed me this:
So I had a nice drive to the coast, spent about $25 in diesel, and in a couple weeks should have $375.00 in gift cards that I will turn into either ammo, or a subcompact carry piece of a more modern and reliable nature. Or maybe a new scope. Hmmmm.
I love it when a plan comes together.