Close to me or on me. On my table right now and not in my robe's pocket.
NOW in town:
Bedroom, living room, home office, loaded and ready if I need it. Same for my husband. Not ALL of my guns are locked up. Not ALL of his guns are locked up. The living room and ESPECIALLY the office are within steps to the kitchen. LR/DR is a 'great room'.
When I lived in my rural former house back east:
A. Den right off of the kitchen. Two there always.
B. Living Room - one for sure. The LR was 28 feet long so sometimes 2 there.
C. Upstairs Bedroom - 2 or 3 there.
D. Sometimes in the big garage and/or small barn or ON us... my late husband and me. After those few people and "LOOSE MEAN DOG" incidents... if I was alone outside or @ home alone - I ALWAYS PACKED OUTSIDE even if there was NO CCW in that state - I was on my own land.
E. When he was overseas and after he died - I even took a handgun into the downstairs or upstairs bathroom when I soaked in the tub or showered. I put the gun close to my eyeglasses so if I was in the tub/shower upstairs or in the huge downstairs shower... I could reach them both EASILY! That may sound odd but I did it even though I had 2 VERY old dogs after he died who would ALERT me and try to defend me. When I came home alone @ any time, after he died or was overseas... I LOOKED all over the house including the closets even though I had a German Shepherd, a GS mix and/or mutt dogs that were GREAT watch dogs. I always had 1 if not 2 dogs. I called a friend, said that I got home OK in the boonies and they stayed on the line while I checked out the HOUSE.
When I camped and used a shower house - bathroom across from my camper - the OTHER side of the mountain road, creek and woods... I ALWAYS had a 1 or 2 firearms in my shower bag, my bathrobe pocket and/or in my fanny pack. (I did not have a shower in my Coleman pop up camper. I did have a sink and porta potty.) It was never really crowded up there in the Sapphire Mountains when I camped. Sometimes I was the only one there before and after the 'season' started/ended. Desolate. They had a small laundry area there too. I packed when I did my laundry too. The laundry area was right by the bathroom area. The public telephone did NOT always work either - with or without a prepaid calling card. NOT too many cellular telephones worked either. Weird system for sure! I rented a small log cabin with electric/telephone across from where I camped later on... it was super lonely aka desolate there in the fall, winter and early spring. It was one of the most interesting and SEMI HEALING times of my life. This was after he died, I sold out, retired and moved west as we had planned all along.
So to the person who mentioned guns in a BATHROOM... I did do that 'sometimes' in my former big house. I did that ALWAYS when I was the only one on a couple of hundred acres alone too. Bathroom, doing laundry, camping, hiking, log cabin time, driving, etc. Montana gun laws are much different that what I had in a NO CCW former state with a lying RINO Gov! That CCW law was changed AFTER I moved out here. I have not adopted another dog... yet.
I never had children. I rarely had children in my home back east and out here. My guests and FRIENDS almost always CALL first unless it is a super close friend. Unexpected company WAS a rare thing and IS a rare thing for me and/or us. I don't have people go through my 'things' or GUNS in my bedroom or my home office. Why would they even go in those rooms? Unless I ask them in to show them something... there would be no need for them to explore my home, eh? If they are gun friends and they see one of my guns here or there... they do NOT touch it unless they ASK ME FIRST, vice versa, and they KNOW it is LOADED. Even our super close, retired chief deputy, friend who helped me, along with some dear friends, when I had my sales, move some things in the garage and barn... saw one of my guns in my former den... on my oak table. I told him it was loaded and he knew that anyway. He had one just like it which I did not know! So even though he was a retired chief deputy, a gun man and a super close family friend... I would not let him touch it until I unloaded it and handed it to him empty because he wanted to check it out. He, his wife and a few others knew how I had things in my home especially since I became a widow with 2 old dogs back there.
I think that it depends on the person and their own situation on how they handle their self defense issues. I would NOT want to have to run to a basement, a first or second floor, here or there from OUTSIDE to INSIDE and have to UNLOCK something to get to my firearm EVER!
So there you go! Individuals and their own situations for 'protection'.
Catherine
