Justin Buist

Around 10pm tonight our dog went berserk, alerting that there was something outside. As he’s young (just turned 1 year) I’ve noticed him alerting on things that were well outside our yard, and total non-issues, but the last 3 times he’s done this somebody was within 5 feet of the house and visible to him. They were the electricity meter reader, the gas meter reader, and my brother when he stopped by the other day.

So, I thought I’d check it out. The woman put the TV on mute and I lit up the front of the house. We heard a faint “BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!” each one occurring about a second apart. Chuck (the dog) and I put them at the front of the house. The woman thought they were behind. Possibly fireworks she supposes. The sound stops, we run around a bit quick verifying that there’s nobody right outside any doors, and everything is fine.

Sorta.

I still don’t like it. I have no idea what caused that noise, so I grab my Glock 23C and its holster, stuff a loaded mag in it, chamber a round, drop it in the holster and suit up. Upon hearing me chamber a round she asks what I’m going to do and I give her a very brief explanation.

Now, let’s use this scenario to explain the mindset of a self-admitted gun nut:

I chose the 23C because I knew exactly where it, its holster, and a loaded magazine for it were. Those were my only criteria.

I chose a pistol, and this is the important part, because I figured my odds of actually needing a firearm out there were about 1 in a million. If I had any reason to expect I’d need a firearm I would have taken a long gun which was even more readily accessible. Well, that and I didn’t see any reason to freak out my neighbors sneaking around my own house in the dark with a loaded shotgun.