I’m originally from New York City, but spent 12 years of my adulthood in Colorado where I amassed a significant gun collection. Northern Colorado, though, was no great haven for gun owners, and in the county where I lived, residents weren’t going to come by a CCW permit or any NFA goodies with any ease. To make matters worse, in 2001 I had to move back to very gun unfriendly NYC. I was forced to leave my gun collection behind to be retrieved at a later date when I could plot my next move. When the time came, I chose a state that was not only warm year round, but had friendly gun laws — Florida . . .
When I moved down to South Florida, the first three things I did when I got here were, 1) apply for my CCW permit, 2) buy a SBR, and buy a 22LR suppressor. No joke, within the first three days in my newly adopted state of Florida, I accomplished these three things. I was so excited to finally live in a free state I couldn’t retrain myself.
My first carry gun was a super lightweight .357 Magnum titanium J-Frame, a S&W 360PD. Turns out the lightweight 357 J-Frames are not very pleasant to train with, even with 38+P ammo. Plus I felt a little undergunned with only five rounds on tap and a slow reload to follow if necessary. It didn’t last very long as my primary CCW.
From there I moved on to a S&W Shield.
It’s an excellent, super-reliable and very accurate slim nine. But after seeing horror story after horror story in the media, I again felt a little undergunned with it. “What if…” well, you get the point.