Security in Your Home, Part 7, Conclusion

We’ve discussed using a layered approach to improving the security of your home, making your home too much work for the “casual” burglar. Most burglars will take the path of least resistance. Multiple layers of security remove your home from that path.

• Use effective lighing.  Don't leave potential entry points in shadows.  That's a good working environment for a burglar.  Make sure you can see what you need to see. 
  
• Use effective locks on quality doors.  Try to keep bad people out of your home.  Don't make a criminal's job easier. 
  
• Install an alarm system.  Don't let an intruder in to your home unannounced.  Monitored, unmonitored, or four-legged, don't be caught unaware. 
  
• Have a safe place to retreat.  Install a solid door to your bedroom and charge your cell phone there at night. 
  
• Get some training.  Regardless of your chosen means of self defense, learn how to use it effectively.
  

Have you done everything you can to make yourself safe?

Quote of the Day

Neighbor: "So why do you carry that?"

Me: "I don't want my last thought to be 'Gee, I wish I had a gun...'."

-Tam

Chauvinism

I am a chauvinist.

I don't mean that men are better than women. I don't mean that women should cook and men should drink beer and shout at the games on TV. I certainly don't mean that women are punching bags, literally or figuratively.

Quite simply, I mean that men and women are different. Furthermore, Viva la Difference!

Regardless of the efforts of some, a few thousand years of civilization can't possibly wipe out millions of years of evolution. Men are wired to be providers and protectors. That is our nature and it is an obvious survival trait designed to further the species. Don't expect me to apologize for my nature.

I will not apologize for it. I celebrate and embrace who I am. As a man, it is my job to protect and provide for my family. There is no job I'd rather have. It is my job to teach my children self-reliance and to smile as they take off on their bikes for some unsupervised play time. It's my job to make sure the doors are locked at night, the fire is burning in the winter, and food is available when needed.

Evolution has wired us with certain traits. An awful lot of the unhappiness in the world stems from fighting those traits instead of embracing and guiding them.

Unguided, our evolutionary decree runs a muck. Unchanneled aggression is assault and abuse. Channeled aggression is success. Undirected territoriality leads to gangs and turf wars. Directed, it leads to secure homes.

Our job, as men, is to protect and provide for our loved ones. There is no more sacred act.

Veteran's Day

You Can't Tell a Vet Just By Looking

He is the cop on the beat who spent six months in Saudi Arabia sweating two gallons a day making sure the armored personnel carrier didn't run out of fuel. He is the barroom loudmouth whose behavior is outweighed in the cosmic scales by four hours of unparalleled bravery near the 38th Parallel in Korea. She is the nurse who fought against futility in Da Nang and went to sleep sobbing every night for two solid years. He is the POW who left one person and came back another. He is the drill instructor who has never been in combat, but has saved countless lives by turning no-accounts into Marines. He is the parade-riding legionnaire who pins on his ribbons and medals with a prosthetic hand. He is the white-haired guy bagging groceries at the supermarket, aggravatingly slow, who helped liberate a Nazi death camp. A vet is an ordinary and extraordinary human being — someone who offered his life's vital years in the service of his country. He is a soldier and a savior and a sword against the darkness, and nothing more than the finest, greatest testimony on behalf of the finest, greatest nation ever known. We will never be able to repay the debt of gratitude we owe. —Author Unknown—

Interesting Knife