Obligatory SDMB Condemnation: “You’re a bad person, and the God we don’t believe in doesn’t love you.”
:p;)
A similar thing happened to me. Though they did not break in.
But I think the police where in on it.
The sheriffs officers (two of them in separate vehicles along with a drug dog) said that a bail jumper had given my address as her residence.
Oooookkkkaaayyyy…… They gave me her name but said they think it’s an alias.
Oooooookkkaaaayyyy…… Do cops look for bail jumpers like this? They don’t know her real name?
Oooookaaayyy…
I was very, very nervous when they pulled up. My wife was not home and she was a few hours overdue. I was ready for the worst. Remember that seen in Saving Private Ryan?
I live in a pretty remote area. I can’t imagine how someone 100 miles away got my address. I’m not in the book.
Drug dog. Interesting. I have a pretty much perfect house to grow if I where to choose to. Passive solar heating. Lots, and lots of windows. Isolated property.
I think they came on false pretenses looking for a growing operation.
I’m not regularly involved with the police, and handled the whole thing horribly. I even let them come in my house.
I wasn’t able to really put the clues together untill after they left.
So you’re participating in the thread to tell us you’re not participating in the thread?
I have a replica katana that isn’t anything like combat-worthy but is sharp and intimidating. I also have a bokken (wooden practice sword) that would probably be more useful in a real fight; it’s essentially a 2X4, so who cares which edge is the sharp one?
Then, standard stuff…knives in the kitchen, a fire extinguisher. I’ve taken a tiny bit of aikido and some kempo and karate. I know how to punch correctly, and I know some good ways to hurt someone bad.
I have a dog, but anyone who’s ever met my Liza knows that she’s the least intimidating animal in existence. That includes moths, caterpillars and Hello Kitty. However, my landlord (who lives above me) has a large, angry-looking beast who barks like murder at the slightest provocation. I figure he could scare someone away.
If someone is coming to steal, I’ll let them take what they want and leave. If someone is coming to cause me harm, I’ll fight if I have to but run away first. If someone comes to hurt my wife, they will die, even if I’m dead too.
I have a knife which looks sort of like this one only the blade is 18-20" long. It’s not very sharp though and it’s in the back of a closet.
I have a baseball bat leaning against the wall near my computer desk. Since I don’t play baseball, it’s there purely in case something happens at night where I feel like a large piece of wood is something I want to have.
My wife is adamantly anti-gun so there’s not much chance of us getting a firearm. I’m not so much against it myself but I have to live with her daily.
I have no real training in how to use them, and I also know that they’re not very practical against an intruder that either has a gun or is better trained. I hold no illusions about my ability in a fight, which is not much. The best I’d be able to hope for it to scare someone away, or get lucky and incapacitate him quickly.
Remember that most people who would break into a home aren’t looking for a confrontation, they’re looking to grab some cash and jewelery and run. Seeing a resident with a weapon, any weapon, will hopefully make him reconsider. If someone truly wants to hurt me, he almost certainly will; my only hope is to either do the hurting first or get the hell out. Again, though, if someone is trying to hurt my wife (or, less likely, someone else in my family) there will be no mercy.
Okay, that made me laugh out loud.
Apparently, Jophiel, you could always just disarm them with your humor.
I can neither confirm nor deny that I’m participating in this thread.
Most likely the S&W .38 special snubbie that goes in my pocket when I get up in the morning and stays on my person til I go to bed at night. If I happen to be in the bedroom, either asleep or at the computer, I’ll probably opt for the Colt 1911A1 .45 that I keep secured there.
There’re also a great many other guns around here, including a Striker 12 gauge, a couple AK variants, a couple AR variants, some hunting weapons, and bunch of handguns. Those, however, are all locked away with the ammo stored separately.
Ah! I forgot one other possibility. My wife may let some daylight into said intruder with her pistolet makarova.
I’m with Valgard. I’ll throw anything I can get my hands on at them, although I think they’d be met at the door by the very protective 50 lb. Rott/pit who hates strangers, especially strange men. We have assorted baseball bats, golf clubs, soccer balls, carving knives, and ill-tempered lovebirds. Those suckers can peel off a fingernail in nothing flat.
Hee hee hee - I used to own lovebirds, too - a very mis-named species, as when they are angry or defensive they are about as loveable as a rabid T. rex. The hen once bit a vet-tech down to the bone, when they were done with her they had to sew his finger back up.
I can just see it - “Freeze! Or I’ll sick my parrot on you!”
Actually, the large parrots like macaws and cockatoos have been known to attack, severely injure, or even kill intruders (a parrot beak taking a slice out of your neck can easily hit a major artery)
I could fling poo at them, since I’d probably shit my pants in terror when I figured out what was going on.
I’d grab the cell phone and go out the guest room window, which is right above the kitchen roof. I’d call 911 and wake up the neighbors, and hopefully get back inside for some clean underwear soon.
I refuse to allow anyone to have a gun in the house because I have clinical depression. I’m very glad my parents didn’t have a gun in their house when I was a teenager, because I think there’s a decent chance I might not be here now if they had.
I have two options, depending on how much time I have and the perceived threat level: There’s my .40 Beretta; and then thanks to a truck stop I visited on a road trip, I also have a 19" lead core [del]club[/del] “tire thumper”.
I want a dog 
Questions for people with dogs and guns: would you worry about shooting your dog?
I get sick to my stomach whenever I see guns because of a traumatic experience as a kid, but a friend of mine who keeps very strange hours once heard someone creeping around in his yard. He went out another door, crept up behind the guy and did that ca-chicka-chacka thing with his shotgun. The guy took off at the speed of light, and no words had been exchanged. Were I to live in a less-safe neighborhood (see below), and if I continued to not own a dog :(, I think I might get a shotgun, since my real issue is with handguns.
At present, my home defense consists of so much clutter that the thug would trip and fall and trip and fall and his cursing at the top of his lungs would probably wake me. Then I have a fire extinguisher next to my bed, so I could extinguish his ass (maybe), and I sleep with a phone on the pillow next to me.
Last weekend I got a little data on my police department’s 911 response time. Some new tenants in the little cluster of bungalows next door, who’d apparently just learned the word muthafugga (because they used so very often) gradually started sounding angry, and then they started kicking and punching one or more of their own, I dialed 911 immediately, since I’d been standing at the window wondering if I should shout at them to STFU before the fisticuffs started. The cops showed up 55 seconds after I hung up! I guess those guys hadn’t taken note of the fact that the police station is (a) two blocks away, (b) on the same side of Pacific Coast Highway, so they don’t need to cross a busy intersection and (c) in a sleepy town that pays its police a lot of money, so they apparently spring into action whenever a citizen needs them. They’re rather assertive individuals and speak rather, um, bluntly to people they’re in the process of arresting.
Still would like a dog
BTW: My sister just started her arthritis-ridden dog on some sort of stem cell treatments(!) It’s still experimental, but it’s been used for horses for some years now, and they’ve recently started treating smaller animals. I’m amazed that I hadn’t heard about this before, because the claimed success rate for horses (pain-and-inflammation-related-relief) is 70-85%! If I find out more, I’ll report it; several of my friends have dogs with some age-related infirmities. I’m glad people are doing research on this promising science.
That’s why you follow up with a little face time with Sweet Lady Brick.
Martial arts classes and many hours of practice (with wood, padding, and Tylenol). There are many different martial art styles, and some have a large amount of classical weapon training involved.
probably one of these gargoyle bookends Unweildy, but skull-crushingly heavy. Used to have a very dull sword that would at least be intimidating, but it’s in storage until we get a bigger place. If I had time to get to the kitchen: butcher knife in each hand.
I have to say, I really enjoyed thinking about the Lysol spray and lighter weapon. Makes me feel not so helpless either as I could do that.
I’ve got a few flammable sprays here, although the trick would be to successfully deter an attacker in my apartment without setting my apartment on fire…
Violence.
we have a collection of edged weapons and firearms in various places on display or in storage. Probably something in any given room, to be honest.
I’d hope that should someone break in with intent to do me harm, I’d have the time & opportunity to reach something that would give me an unfair advantage.