Trunk Monkey
member
This question came up yesterday on a different forum. I really feel like the person who asked at the other forum feels that carrying a gun every single day is a little bit ridiculous but it doesn't make the question any less valid.
I've said this multiple times but it is an iron clad rule for me that if I'm not in bed or the shower (basically if I'm dressed) I have a gun on my person but when the question was asked I really stopped and thought about how I would explain myself if I was honestly asked.
This is the answer I gave there:
I never really did any soul-searching or questioning the odds. I bought a gun the day I got out of the army and I started to carry it.
My wife (then fiance) was really freaked out by guns so before we got married I got rid of all of mine and for the first 10 years we were married the only gun that we had in our house was an NEF .22 revolver that we kept in a lock box in the garage. I don't think we even had any ammunition for it.
In 2006 two incidents happened. First somebody put a Drano bomb on our neighbor's front porch. When it went off it rattled windows in our house across the street. The second was (I suspect) an attempted home invasion on our house.
My wife and I sat down and had a discussion and we bought a gun a RIA 1911.
Several months later my wife was involved in a road-rage incident that absolutely terrified her. She came home and when she got out of the car she was shaking and she told me that in the middle of it she realized that if that person had got out of the car because of her disabilities there was nothing she could have done to defend herself. She said to me "I want a gun and I want to get my permit." We took the class together we got our permits at the same time and we both started carrying.
Shortly after that Colorado voted to legalize weed and the City of Colorado Springs began to change for the worse.
Colorado Springs is overrun with homeless people. Between the two of us my wife and I knew four people who were murdered either by homeless people or in the middle of drug deals that went bad. When I say knew I mean people who were actually part of our lives, not random people we knew by name. We also knew 2 people who committed murder and did time for it. We also have an ex-SIL who is a suspect in several murders. The reason I mention this is because murder is not an abstract concept to me. It's something that has impacted my life multiple times and because of that it's something that informs my world view. I know too many people that it's happened to. I know too many people that have done it. I have no problem believing that it could happen to me.
There is cartel activity in Colorado Springs because they're growing weed here and exporting it out of the state which I guess is easier than importing it across the border into America.
Carjackings are becoming a nightly occurrence. Multiple convenience store robberies are becoming a nightly occurrence. A week ago Saturday some Maniac walked down Wasatch street in downtown Colorado Springs randomly shooting at people. I think he killed 3.
I think a month ago another random maniac walked down a hiking trail from Cimarron Street to America the Beautiful Park and stabbed eight people apparently at randoml. I think he killed one of them. The have been three other active shooter events in Colorado Springs since 2007.
I've been the victim of an attempted robbery right outside my home that I was able to stop because I had a gun.
As far as we know it's never happened to us but we have a neighbor down at the end of the hall who says that she's been sitting in her living room late at night and watched somebody try to to turn her front door knob.
I've been working nights since roughly 2003 and I see what kind of people wander around this town at night. Even before I started doing security I worked in a machine shop and I would come home at 3 in the morning and my neighborhood looked like a scene out of The Walking Dead. I'd see homeless people just wandering through the neighborhood every night.
I do not leave my home without a gun under any circumstances. Not even to take out the trash or check the mail
I've said this multiple times but it is an iron clad rule for me that if I'm not in bed or the shower (basically if I'm dressed) I have a gun on my person but when the question was asked I really stopped and thought about how I would explain myself if I was honestly asked.
This is the answer I gave there:
I never really did any soul-searching or questioning the odds. I bought a gun the day I got out of the army and I started to carry it.
My wife (then fiance) was really freaked out by guns so before we got married I got rid of all of mine and for the first 10 years we were married the only gun that we had in our house was an NEF .22 revolver that we kept in a lock box in the garage. I don't think we even had any ammunition for it.
In 2006 two incidents happened. First somebody put a Drano bomb on our neighbor's front porch. When it went off it rattled windows in our house across the street. The second was (I suspect) an attempted home invasion on our house.
My wife and I sat down and had a discussion and we bought a gun a RIA 1911.
Several months later my wife was involved in a road-rage incident that absolutely terrified her. She came home and when she got out of the car she was shaking and she told me that in the middle of it she realized that if that person had got out of the car because of her disabilities there was nothing she could have done to defend herself. She said to me "I want a gun and I want to get my permit." We took the class together we got our permits at the same time and we both started carrying.
Shortly after that Colorado voted to legalize weed and the City of Colorado Springs began to change for the worse.
Colorado Springs is overrun with homeless people. Between the two of us my wife and I knew four people who were murdered either by homeless people or in the middle of drug deals that went bad. When I say knew I mean people who were actually part of our lives, not random people we knew by name. We also knew 2 people who committed murder and did time for it. We also have an ex-SIL who is a suspect in several murders. The reason I mention this is because murder is not an abstract concept to me. It's something that has impacted my life multiple times and because of that it's something that informs my world view. I know too many people that it's happened to. I know too many people that have done it. I have no problem believing that it could happen to me.
There is cartel activity in Colorado Springs because they're growing weed here and exporting it out of the state which I guess is easier than importing it across the border into America.
Carjackings are becoming a nightly occurrence. Multiple convenience store robberies are becoming a nightly occurrence. A week ago Saturday some Maniac walked down Wasatch street in downtown Colorado Springs randomly shooting at people. I think he killed 3.
I think a month ago another random maniac walked down a hiking trail from Cimarron Street to America the Beautiful Park and stabbed eight people apparently at randoml. I think he killed one of them. The have been three other active shooter events in Colorado Springs since 2007.
I've been the victim of an attempted robbery right outside my home that I was able to stop because I had a gun.
As far as we know it's never happened to us but we have a neighbor down at the end of the hall who says that she's been sitting in her living room late at night and watched somebody try to to turn her front door knob.
I've been working nights since roughly 2003 and I see what kind of people wander around this town at night. Even before I started doing security I worked in a machine shop and I would come home at 3 in the morning and my neighborhood looked like a scene out of The Walking Dead. I'd see homeless people just wandering through the neighborhood every night.
I do not leave my home without a gun under any circumstances. Not even to take out the trash or check the mail
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