Concealed Handgun License - TX

20 years ago I was into IPSC pistol competition big time. I had received a new holster in the mail and there was 10" of snow on the ground "no match today". We lived in a nice but not snobby part of town. TX didn't have a CHL at the time. My wife and I tired of being cooped up indoors decided to walk the dogs around the neighborhood. New holster no match, might as well see how it feels on the walk right? Well if your going to carry concealed illegally you might as well top it off right? We go on our walk and are only ten houses from being back home when a lowrider Impala with real dark windows pulls beside us. The window comes down, there are four young men that aren't really in their environment, if you know what I mean. They start saying @#$%$$ to me and my wife about what they plan to do to her and they might let me watch. Not a pretty situation. Luck is there is a car at the curb right there and we get behind it and tell them to go on. We go one way they backup, ect. Their door started to open I pushed my wife low behind the parked car and laid over the hood with a loaded 45 acp. Well the Impala's door shut and it looked like a pinball machine bouncing off the curbs leaving. Not a shot fired and the situation is over. How many times something like this happen in this country daily? What I'm trying to say is it was God's doing or fate or whatever that day. We weren't victims because I was armed, but everything played out because of fate. Both you and C.Jedi are right 100!

 

Thank God it ended well for you, and yes family protection is job number one, and if I had a weapon in that spot I would have done the very same. What worries me the most is the night, reliving the scene had it not gone well. The smell of the sulfur, the color of the "dark" blood as it stains everything it touches, the ashen color of the flesh as it dies, watching as death takes over, knowing that no matter how much money or remorse you may have, the wheels of life or the lack there of will not stop for you, that reversing this "bad" day is not an option, and will be set in history, it will always be there, and so will you. Always...

 

very long close call story, i'll try to keep it short.

i wear glasses, can't see for shit, well one night around 3 am the alarm went off. i got my gun to go "check things out" well, i saw two flashlights going around the house threw a window... OH CRAP.... i didn't know what to do. i'm a smoker and left the garage door up (don't smoke in the house) anyway, im in the garage and i had accidently left the door up..... i saw the flash lights coming around the corner, i knelt down and took aim, SCARED TO DEATH!!!! ( i also saw a white fuzzy car out in the street) as they turned the corner i did NOT shoot, just sat knelt down when i heard "STOP Houston Police Department" i immediatly stuck both hands in the air, and again thank god they weren't lying and actually were the cops responding to the alarm.....

well, they disarmed me and told me burglers did not carry flashlights, i said "well hell, they do in every movie i watch!" and they said ok we'll give you that, but they don't drive cop cars!!!! without my glasses i could not see the blue lights on top....

my point is be careful and don't just shoot at things that go bump in the night.... maybe it's your rebelous teenage son sneekin back in or the cops.... make sure you really need to take deadly force action, once a bullet leaves that barrell you can't get it back.

 

DMZ? does that stand for de-militarized zone?

 

Yes.

 

Saying you can't choose whether or not your a victim is not "victim speak". carrying a gun unfortunately doens't mean you wont be a victim. what if someone came into your house and had youand your wife at gunpoint before you could get to your guns? Guns can reduce the liklihood of being a victim but unfortunately nothing will guarantee you wont be one. And the "what if" talk is mainly us venting about how sometimes people who are protecting themselves get introuble for doing so. Criminals have too many rights and depending on where you live you may go to jail for protecting your family. Fortunately i live in a state where this kind of thing is rare.

 

Having a plan in place means more than just having a gun, or guns available. Knowing the laws and how to respond after the fact are all part of the plan.
Please read any of Massad Ayoob's pieces of work on this subject. He covers the whole spectrum of before and after the use of deadly force. No, I cannot guarantee that I or my family will never be victims, but we can take the steps necessary to prevent it as best as we can. Hell, even at our camper in the country we keep a .22 revolver on hand as insurance against rabid two and four legged creatures. Meth-heads and feral dogs truly are everywhere these days.

Concretejedi, I sincerely apologize for the South Korea comment, I know better than to make light of anyone's service to our country. I stand by the rest of what I said though. Killing in uniform and using deadly force against a violent criminal are two very different scenarios. Why would I loose sleep over some predator who tried to kill or injure one of my loved ones? My nightmares would come from not stopping a violent criminal. Do you think the North Korean and Chinese troops opposite of you really cared for one minute about you and your family? They didn't see you as a protector of the South Koreans, more as an intruder into their country and as a threat to their goal of making South Korea theirs. Today still South Korea lives in fear of a nuclear attack from the north.

A friend of ours is a local cop who fatally shot a man a few years ago.(One of three such police shootings in our town in the last 7-8 years) He had just robbed a bank inside of a grocery store (after also killing his wife in Wisconsin) and our friend had to shoot him after he lunged at another cop with a knife. After he was cleared by the State Police in the shooting he went to a few counseling sessions as required by his department. When all of that was through his only comment was "I did the job I signed up and get paid for". He doesn't consider himself a hero, nor does he have any nightmares about what happened. A violent criminal put him in that position and his training took over. He didn't know at the time the guy had killed his wife, just that he was responding to a bank alarm.

All the hypothetical situations and hand-wringing issues stated here have been addressed in my household, long before we ever loaded a gun and put it in a safe place away from those who aren't authorized or capable of using them. We never handle a gun while drinking, and like Stratton said, having a gun doesn't turn stable rational people into monsters, (see Don G). That is the type of rhetoric the anti-gun people use. Remember, only 1/10 of 1% of all guns in the United States are used in the commision of crimes. The other 99.99% are used for every other lawful purposes a gun can be used for.

 

Yes, but it rarely is, just a term for the Geneva Convention, so if someone gets wacked they can place blame.

 

TacoMon, I accept your apology and offer mine for the "where were you" comment, it was my choice to join, and I hold no ill-will towards anyone who didn't serve in the military, there are many ways to serve as an American. You are probably right about the N.Koreans not having genuine feeling about me or any American there, but with this really long stale mate one mind begins to wander about a lot of things, humanity, life in the after world, and not to get on religion, but; thy shall not kill comes up a lot when pointing a loaded weapon at someone. I also started really thinking what you said and yes I would rather straighten it all out after the fact then to bury a loved one because I was weighing options. I feel the laws must change for the citizen trying to protect themselves and others, but with big money lobbyist, it a long road ahead. Nuclear bombs work really well when you have them in your pocket, everyone seems to keep there distance, but hand guns are a different matter, a human life seems to have less value if it only one or maybe just a few, but if we added up all he people killed by guns (I don't know this for sure) but I bet they out number the people killed by nukes.

 

Just like the fire extinguisher in my kitchen, its there and I hope I never have to use it.


Peace to you concretejedi.

 

...and to you.

 

here is a good anti gun one for you...kinda on-topic but in no way concealed... california banned the sale of .50 bmg weapons and their ammo...funny fact? there has NEVER been and american citezen killed by a .50 BMG the lawmakers (read crackheads) stated that the gun was the perfect sniper weapon to be used in violent crimes again law abiding citizens....hmmm use my $2000 BMG 50 cal and shoot people with $25 a piece rounds or use some standard $250 hunting rifle that ammunition is like a 1/10th of that....makes perfect sense to me (sarcasm it beats killing people)

 

Thats pretty funny. if you can afford a .50 cal and the ammo for it, something tells me your not in the kind of socioeconomic status that typically breeds violent crime.

 

And, perhaps more importantly...where the hell would you hide a Barrett .50 cal. rifle after the fact? You certainly couldn't run away with it, it's nearly 6ft. long, so you'd basically have to use it once (or in one situation) and throw it away (or leave it behind). Just about the only "sniper" this side of the military that could a) afford it as a throw-away, or b) afford the ammo is one of them professional killers that they make movies about.

 

But at least now they know it's illegal to have that weapon. That'll stop them, right?

 

Yeah, that always stops 'em.

 

You mean Governor Ahhhnold didn't veto it? What kind of Terminator is he?

 

hell all yal talkin bout lots of paperwork and all kinda runaround. i live deep down in alabama and i had to fill out a piece of paper and signmy name. took 5 mins and 20 bucks. now i keep a ruger 357 security six in the taco. just for protection of coarse.

 

If there's anything better than the south its the deep south

 

lol wish we had a system like that ... as for 50 cal yeah they are morons I mean you would either have to be a terminator to run through a building or any urban enviroment lugging a 50 cal along...OR you would have to be sitting in the back of a van of some sort sniping from there...when done start van and leave...but really my point is it looks like they opened a book up...found the most powerful rifle they could and outlawed it to sound cool kind of thing...oh yeah my daddy could kick your dads ass type of BS... I have a .223 bull barrel single shot that would be wwwwaaaaayyyy more suited to that type of work...and shells are $14.00 a box...and I STILL dont do it lol...