Quote Originally Posted by sorraia View Post

My husband and I actually have an "abort word" now for this very reason. We came up with it after talking to others who have been in similar situations as us. If you are in a situation where it is dark, you cannot visually identify the person, and they are coming at you, there may not be time to ask "Who are you?" and get a satisfactory answer. My husband may come home in the middle of the night, sometimes leaves the bedroom at night (he'll get restless legs and leave the room so I can sleep), and after our dealings with the bad neighbors (LONG story), we decided that "abort word" was a good idea.
This is definitely a good idea, its called challenge and reply/response. Its used to identify a friendly. Heres an example of it in action. You hear someone enter the house without unlocking the door, its dark, your groggy, you grab your firearm and hold up in the room. You then call out "blue" and your teenage son who just snuck out for a night of partying without you knowing replies "Zebra" and you avoid a catastrophic event.