I am drawn to long guns. I love, of course, big doubles; I like hard thumping bolties. I like a few specific kinds of military rifles. Light and elegant side by sides. Slender rimfires, especially those Browning designs. Crowbar thick target rifles by the old makers. Engraved and elegant Schuetzens.

Oh, I have some handguns, and I like them- even a few nice ones, but handguns were never my first love. And so carry guns, for me, have been mostly whatever I pulled out of the gun cabinet. I looked at the little Walther PPK and clones because they fit my hand so nicely, but I think I’d feel heavily undergunned. 1911’s are great, and I have connections to get nice ones, but if I had a gun I spent as much on as my first five cars I’d feel bad about carrying it daily. I shot some glocks and they just don’t seem to fit my hands well. The Beretta 92 is just a monster. The Sigs are thick in the grip and while I can shoot them I find the controls to be in difficult positions for the shape of my hands. And all the guns I have seen and shot that I like a good deal are spendy as shit. So even if I had found something I really liked, I would spend a wad of cash and end up afraid to carry it.

I needed a sort of a volkswagon gun. Something cheap and cheerful, easy to shoot and easy to own, a decent caliber that fit my hand. And then Tam started testing the PPX.

I liked everything I saw about it. The use of some innovating materials and manufacturing to make it. The clever way things were done. I started to like it. I shot a box of ammo through a rental at a gunstore. And by this time tomorrow I will have one in my gunsafe.

It hits all the right spots. Cheap, good manufacturer, fits my hand, comes up nice, shoots well, and based on everything I see and read about it,. is surprisingly well made and well regarded by the majority of the people I know who have shot it. Tam’s reports haven’t hurt either.