Metalhead47
Regular Member
I just got back from the local Old Country Store here in Freeland. This is one of the few place I never expected to get outright harassed for open carrying. Now I've OC'd in this place plenty of times, and on more than one occasion one of the employees was so happy about it that he insisted on practically dragging me around the store and showing me off to all his co-workers for "exercising my 2A rights," a little awkward but a nice reception at least.
So today I pull in and there's a guy working a forklift who was kinda giving me an off look before I even got out. I was in a weird spot, so soon as I did I asked him if it was ok to park there. He says "sure, but you'll need to leave your gun in your truck." Given my previous experience there that kinda short circuited me and I had to think for a second... "Um, now why might that be?" He goes on to say that "well this is a family store" and you can't open carry in WA, that's it's a concealed carry state & he knows the law. Also says that the manager at the Ace Hardware across the street had been talking to the sheriff about it and sheriff said so. I told him I'm a regular customer in that Ace, OC every time, have spoken to the manager about just this issue and explained the law, manager was entirely civil and seem legitimately interested (think I had another thread on that one actually), anyways, tried explaining the actual law to him & he wouldn't hear of it. Went off in a huff to "look it up [him]self."
Hung around for a minute, said screw it, walked in, asked for the owner/manager. No one there Sundays but other employees quite friendly. Walked around, picked up a bag of hay, went to the register, paid for that & a big bag of cedar shavings. Folks at registers were quite friendly as usual, even ended up spending a little extra time sorting out a little confusion over the shavings. No one said anything further to me, but I could hear this other guy in the back talking about it. Seemed to be on the loosing end of the argument too. Finished my business & left, no sheriff, no further contact.
Just left me thinking OMG, WTF??
Goes to show how fast a "carry friendly" place can become not so.
So today I pull in and there's a guy working a forklift who was kinda giving me an off look before I even got out. I was in a weird spot, so soon as I did I asked him if it was ok to park there. He says "sure, but you'll need to leave your gun in your truck." Given my previous experience there that kinda short circuited me and I had to think for a second... "Um, now why might that be?" He goes on to say that "well this is a family store" and you can't open carry in WA, that's it's a concealed carry state & he knows the law. Also says that the manager at the Ace Hardware across the street had been talking to the sheriff about it and sheriff said so. I told him I'm a regular customer in that Ace, OC every time, have spoken to the manager about just this issue and explained the law, manager was entirely civil and seem legitimately interested (think I had another thread on that one actually), anyways, tried explaining the actual law to him & he wouldn't hear of it. Went off in a huff to "look it up [him]self."
Hung around for a minute, said screw it, walked in, asked for the owner/manager. No one there Sundays but other employees quite friendly. Walked around, picked up a bag of hay, went to the register, paid for that & a big bag of cedar shavings. Folks at registers were quite friendly as usual, even ended up spending a little extra time sorting out a little confusion over the shavings. No one said anything further to me, but I could hear this other guy in the back talking about it. Seemed to be on the loosing end of the argument too. Finished my business & left, no sheriff, no further contact.
Just left me thinking OMG, WTF??
Goes to show how fast a "carry friendly" place can become not so.
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