A fool and his money keep getting parted with handgun excesses

I'm a latecomer to wheel guns, as some call revolvers, but I'm growing more and more fond of them daily.

My first revolver was a S&W 19 .357 Magnum that I acquired almost by accident. I had some work done on a shotgun and when I picked it up at the gunsmith's shop, I asked him almost offhandedly, "Ever get any used guns to sell?" He looked at me sorta funny and said, "Matter of fact, I've got one right now. This guy brought in a S&W to get some work done and never came back to get it. It's been here so long, I've decided to sell it." It had a pinned barrel and recessed chambers and was in great shape. I knew less then than I do now about guns but I knew enough then to know it was a great buy.

I bought it for a song, $225, and like a fool later sold it for $300. It had a 6" barrel so really wasn't great for concealed carry, at least that was the reason I let it go. But it was a great shooter and I shoulda kept it.

My second wheel gun was close to another accident. I was in a pawn shop browsing and found a S&W 29 .44 Magnum with a 4" pipe, the famed Dirty Harry model. It was also priced too low to pass up, $450, so I bought it. And I fell in love with my first .44. That one I've kept and always will.

I added a .44 Magnum single-action 6-shooter with a 6" barrel later just because I love .44s. It's a Hy Hunter Six-Shooter, a copy of the Colt Single Action Army, made in West Germany during the Cold War by J.P Sauer & Sohn. That's the German company that later merged with the Swiss arms maker Sig in the '90s to form my now-favorite pistol maker, Sig Sauer.

It's my fun gun, not suitable for carry but a lot of fun at the range. I suppose I could carry my Model 29 like Dirty Harry did, but I'm not as much of a man as he supposedly was. It's heavy.

Since I started working at a gun shop and carrying daily a couple of years ago, I've acquired other wheel guns in .38 Special, .357 Magnum and .44 Special, all with short barrels for carry, from 2 to 3".

And now I've done fell in love with another wheel gun, a S&W Performance Shop Model 327 .357 Magnum which some fool bought brand new and then traded it in at the gun shop. It's in perfect condition for a mere $925 on gunbroker, about $150 less than the new price.

It's made of ultra-light materials, Titanium and Scandium, so it's perfect for carry at only 21 ounces empty.

But who's going to carry it empty when it's best feature is that it holds eight rounds of .357 Magnum?

If this gently-used beauty hangs around the shop long before somebody buys it, I may have to find an excuse to add one more wheel gun to my arsenal. Somebody stop me before I commit handgun excess ... again.