This just happened and I am still shaking.Pretty normal day until now. I went into my local orange home improvement store to return something I had found a better deal on somewhere else. I'm usually pretty aware of what's going on around me, especially anytime that I'm carrying (which is almost all the time I'm not at work). I also have a long career in private security, so I'm already in the habit of paying attention to the people around me, monitoring tones of conversations, and my brain picks out key words that the average person might miss.My return was going fine, I just had to sign for the cash I was getting back, when I overheard the man at the register next to me giving orders to the male clerk, telling him to put his hands up, which the clerk did, and then he told him to turn around and get on the floor which he also did. The man had a plastic bag (that store's) in his left hand he was shaking open and his right hand was semi-concealed from my line of sight. The woman helping me wasn't paying attention to what was going on, she was focused on processing my return.As soon as the man had begun giving orders, "put your hands up", I started to realize what was potentially happening and my body just started to react. I stepped back from the counter to the man's 9 o'clock position (he was focused on the clerk and not me), reached under my sweatshirt and put my hand on the grip of my pistol (Walther PPQ 9mm carried IWB right hip) and prepared to draw if necessary. But at that point I still couldn't see a weapon, and I was still trying to believe that this was happening at all. This is a small town on a Thursday afternoon after all.So I was ready to draw, and I got the man's attention and just asked him, "Are you serious right now?" He looked over at me and started to smile before he asked why I was asking and then he looked down to my hand on the grip of my now-exposed pistol, and just said that no he wasn't serious. He took his right hand out of his jacket pocket where it had been and it was empty. The clerk on the floor got up and the other one (mine) said something about him (that man) how "he gets better the more you get to know him" or something and brushed it off, they obviously already knew him. They also weren't able to see that I had been about to draw and had no idea how close their "friend" was to getting a gun pointed at him (FFS I thought he was trying to rob them!).Once the guy said he wasn't serious, I exclaimed "jesus fucking christ" and called him an asshole, and that that was a stupid prank to do in public.I started coming down from the rush of adrenaline that had started to ramp up and my hands began shaking, and I could feel my heart racing. Fortunately my return was processed about 30 seconds later and I was able to leave. I had planned to do some more shopping but that really got me jittery.So here I am in my car typing this out (on mobile, my apologies for any typos and formatting, etc), because I just had to tell someone. I still can't believe how much of a dumbass that guy was. Who the hell just fake-robs people at a store and tells them to put their hands up and get on the floor without thinking about how it looks to any reasonable person looking or listening in?Has anyone else had anything similar happen while they were out carrying concealed in public? via /r/CCW https://ift.tt/2BmGyXi
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