We were pretty shaken, frankly. I thought at the time that if I had been armed that problem would have been solved pretty quick. I did order two hardwood walking sticks with a metal jabbing tips and we have always carried them since. I also began carrying a locking-blade fighting knife honed to razor edge.

Then last summer my next-door neighbor, "Fred," was in his front yard when two pit bulls ran from across the street and charged straight at him. He ran for his front porch and had to kick one dog away before he got inside. He grabbed his 20-ga. shotgun and went back to the porch. The dogs charged him again and he shot one (just birdshot in the gun). They both ran away. Fred went inside and called the cops. Animal control located the dogs as belonging to residents across the street.

My town has a low crime rate. I am not really worried about a human attacker but I am legitimately concerned about the four-legged kind. The vast majority around here are penned and under control, but it only takes one or two that are not, as we and my neighbor came very close to finding out the hard way.

With only the walking sticks and the knife, I would have to do hand-to-hand combat with an attacking animal (or hand to paw, as it were). That is not a good plan. Armed with the 9mm, we are a lot more secure on our walks with a buffer zone of maybe 25 feet around us, which is about the maximum effective range of the LC9 with its three-inch barrel. We still carry the sticks and certainly do not want to harm someone else's animal, but we will not be victims when we are able otherwise. (Actually, I'd feel most secure carrying a light machine gun, but one does what one can.)