RandyC

Thanks, Len. An extremely helpful post!

Earlier Norton versions seemed to work great. I have it on my Mac at work. But the latest version installed on my Dell at home was just awful. It slowed the operating system down to a mind numbing crawl. I had to dump it.

Condition One, always. And I agree with James on that cop's advice. It's easy to be cavalier about someone else's safety.

It depends. My waiste has expanded over the last four years but my pants haven't. Some I can still comfortably carry IWB but more and more I'm carrying OWB with a sport coat ( all these at 3 to 4 o'clock ). With just sweaters I'll carry IWB/SOB. I need to lose weight or buy more pants.

I always have a spare mag for my 1911 platform carry gun, also a spare for my bug. Chances are I'll never need to use them but I don't want to gamble on that. If I carried my XD-9 I wouldn't be as concerned about it, plus those double stack mags are really wide by comparison.

I'm concealed pretty much all the time. I work in a metropolitan area near Vanderbilt ( a liberal ant colony ) and see no reason to draw a lot of attention to myself. It's for the children.

I'm still in the music business but I retired from playing a few years ago. This was after 30 years of playing in the studios and on the road for a variety of artists. I've managed to have a heck of a good time along the way. A drummer by trade, I still like to noodle around and generally humiliate a couple of great acoustic guitars I have. They cringe when they see me coming. :D

My always gun is a Kel-tec P 3AT in my hip pocket. Cheap, light little fabric holster and a piece of pocket sized plastic cut from a milk jug to keep from printing. Super light and better for me than the expensive leather holster I used to use.

I use: 45acp ... 230 gr. Hydra-shoks but I'm not adverse to using others that feed well. I do stick with 230 grains though.

I have an XD-9. I don't use it for carry but I certainly could. It doesn't conceal quite as well as my 1911 pattern guns but that's mainly because my best carry holsters are for my 1911's. That XD is a great little gun and has never hiccupped through probably 1,500 rounds. I highly recommend them.

James, thanks for posting this. From time to time we all need to be reminded not only why we carry but also the importance of being armed in every possible instance. Do not burden yourself unduly over this. He was far better off having met you. It was his decision, for whatever reason, not to arm himself and the blame should rest on the man who is sitting in prison.

Permission to come aboard? Just heard about this site from The Firing Line. I'm looking forward to discussions with fellow Tennesseans and hope we'll have a bunch more signing on. I'm glad to be here.