@baked: Also, dress appropriately for the range:

Guess what happens when stubborn girl wearing tank top/sports bra combo focuses on upper body form and locks her left arm while shooting?

A. Her hits are better.

B. Tank top/sports bra combo makes perfect basket for hot brass.

C. There is laughter on video.

D. All of the above.

Correct answer: D.

Noone is ever mugged, shot, or knifed, hereabouts, except for domestics and illegal business disputes, stranger-on-stranger crime is unheard of, like, getting struck by lightening.

My theory is that ever since the great depression, all the lazy, criminal, and idiotic people in the US have all harbored a dream to move to where its warm, and thus, SoCal, the Southwest, and Florida all have huge amounts of, well, just fucking lowlifes who drifted in over the years.

I agree with you that victims are usually women, and pepper spray is far from the most effective choice. I have several reasons I’m willing to depend on it: 1. I’ve never experienced a credible threat against me; 2. I have a low value as a target (being big and imposing looking, but not showing a lot of obvious wealth); 3. All I want is the 10 second break to get the hell away. I guess my thought is that if you’re in a situation where a firearm is necessary, it’s better to absent yourself from the situation than carry a gun and risk having to kill another person. Obviously easier said than done in some cases.

Justice’s wife launches ‘tea party’ group

Anybody recall if Justice Thomas has ever opined on the gay marriage issue? I’d love to see how he reconciles the fact that nearly every argument against it was also used (50ish years ago) against mixed-race marriage – but I’m always a fan of watching conservatives twist themselves into rhetorical pretzels.

I also have my pepper spray, small flashlight and a blade or two in my pockets or briefcase when I go out, and take a 5 ft hardwood rake handle when walking the dog. Lots of knife point robberies downtown in the summer, and only one gunpoint robbery of a tourist last year although gangsters shot a guy on the walking trail not too far from here a couple of months ago. I’m going to upgrade to a tactical flashlight with a scalloped lens crown and a get a hardwood cane for going out at for dinner or a movie at night.

Flight is always the first option, however, as when I almost got mugged one night in Albuquerque. First blow to the head and I was half a block away in an instant.

Glocks are well-regarded for their accuracy, reliability, ease of operation* and take down for cleaning. Tha Isrealites issue them to various security units. I took my 9mm Glock 19 to the range yesterday and it shot three different kinds of ammo equally well with no hiccups. Evil high capacity 15 round mags are standard equipment except in Cali, where 10 is the limit. I have the compact Glock 19 9mm pistol. I’d like to get a sub compact Glock 26 for carry.

The 9 mm cartridge is a decent cartridge because its powerful enough to take out bad guys with good shot placement using hollow point ammo in standard or +P loads (full metal jacket ammo should only be used at the range), and the shooter can keep the pistol on target due to the 9mm’s relatively low recoil. Of equal importance is that you can find the 9 anywhere on the planet.

As for the snubnosed revolver, it’s an excellent choice with some caveats – availability of ammo where you’re at, increased recoil especially when shooting .357s as I was over the past two days (about 100 rds), lesser accuracy due to the short sight radius (distance between front and rear rights). To mitigate these factors I use .38 or .38 +P ammo in my Ruger SP-101 although it is chambered for .357 mag (it shoots all three cartridges, very versatile that way), and I installed laser grips on it. Basically, the bullet goes where you point the laser, even without using the sights, which is pretty awesome. I’m also going to put a fiber optic sight up front as it is very hard to see against a dark target even in full daylight. I have no problems shooting the .357s out of my full size Ruger GP 100 revolver, a workhorse of a gun I carry hunting and fishing. I sub out all three for home defense except on martini nights, when I can use a chemical fire extinguisher (spray them with the white stuff, hit them with the red can).

I go into the belly of the beast next week when I take my qualification class for a concealed carry license, which I am getting at Mrs RML’s urging. Also, it is a fourth degree felony to tuck a pistol out of view into a fishing vest, as that is can unlawful concealed carry. Should be an interesting experience.

* Insert magazine, rack slide to put first round in chamber, acquire target, shoot. Slide locks back when mag is empty. Release slide, hit mag release, insert new mag, repeat as above.

Women shooting the Glock 19 and Glock 26 9 mm pistolas:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PR5ZByvx4S8&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qXh42LtPrc&feature=related

Review of Glock 19 and 26

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZUe-B1-vy8&feature=related

However, I think carrying a gun is asking for trouble. It makes you swagger and take stupid risks unless you have remarkable self-restraint (and a lot of people do, but lots and lots of people don’t). There’s a very good chance that in a violent encounter, your gun will change hands, and might easily be used on you. Bringing a gun into the equation introduces a bunch of legal issues, assuming you survive. In a situation where guns are absolutely outlawed, carrying one automatically makes you an outlaw, no matter what you’re doing, and the slightest carelessness will get you into big trouble, whether it’s legal trouble or the kind where a bad guy assumes you’re a rival bad guy and acts appropriately. I would personally never consider carrying a gun unless I knew of a real and immediate danger to my person that running away couldn’t solve but a gun could.

What I do carry, and think is a fine idea, is pepper spray. It’ll disable an attacker in most situations, for long enough to get your ass out of there. If someone gets it from me and uses it on me, I won’t be happy, but I also won’t be dead, and I couldn’t give a rat’s ass if a criminal gets a $10 ampoule of pepper spray. It’s not absolutely effective, of course, and is much more easily defeated than a bullet, but it also carries little in the way of legal or ethical risks while being quite useful. Pepper spray is also available in a very easily pocketable size, and if it goes off (which has happened to me) your skin will tingle a little bit.

RML will have a different opinion to some extent, and I’m sure he can offer actual opinions on what’s available in handguns to suit your situation. It makes it easier for me to be down on handguns because I find them clumsy and inaccurate in use, and only own a couple of .22 rifles. I wouldn’t consider aiming either of those at another person in any situation I can imagine actually happening. Zombie invasion is, of course, a different question.