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Author Archives: Commander Zero
Lifestraws on Amazon for $16
Hmmm…I was trolling around Amazon looking at my Wish List and noticed that the Lifestraws, which are usually a good deal when on sale at $20 ea, are down to $15.99 each.
I’ve been liking these for keeping in emergency bags, in the truck bag, etc, etc. Individually sealed and cheap enough to buy a half dozen at a time. They’re rated for around 264 gallons of water, which, at three gallons per day, means that you could, theoretically, use it for almost 90 days. I’ll settle for a long weekend. At that price I’ll just throw it away after one crisis and have a new, sealed one for the next. And when you’re in the grips of water-borne digestive distress you’re gonna think “Man, it’d be worth sixteen bucks to not have to spend all day sprinting to the bathroom.”
While supplies last……
Those OD space blankets are back at $10.01
Quite a few people managed to snag some of the OD space blankets at the $10.01 price before weird pricing algorithms started jerking the price up. Well, it appears theyre back at the older $10.01 price…for now. So if you missed out last time, here’s another chance. The price in the link below says, at the moment, $18 but click on the link and follow it to Amazon and the OD version is $10.01…for now. From the original post:
The hooded, pocketed, olive-drab, “blanket” has been rather heavily discounted at Amazon. Knocked down from $18 to $10. Get ’em while they’re cheap. Excellent for use as intended, but also good for expedient waterproof overhead cover, dry spot to sit your ass, etc, etc. Far superior than those stupid, flimsy mylar foil sheets. Heres the link:
Gear – Outdoor Research (OR) rain & sun hats
Many years ago I got turned on to the Outdoor Research (OR) line of rain hats. They were basically big GoreTex boonie hats. What was appealing to me was that they were available in somewhat military colors (forest green), were waterproof, and could be crushed into a small baseball-sized bundle that could be stuffed in a bag or BDU pocket. I bought a few of them and when they made a multicam version
I spent a week in Puerto Rico last month. While the rain hat was useful for those days when the rain blew in off the ocean, most of the time was bright sun and clear days. Unfortunately, I had no suitable hat for the occasion. I decided that when I got back to Montana I would order up a suitable hat for those sunny days.
As it turns out, Outdoor Research makes a sun hat that is basically a non-rain version of the rain hat I love so much. ( Helios Sun Hat, Multicam
The main differences between the sun hat and the rain hat, obviously, are construction. The rain hat uses different materials with an eye towards waterproofing. The sun hat is geared towards being lightweight and providing shade. Could the rain hat be used to shade your head and face? Absolutely, but if its suny and hot enough to need to do that then its also sunny and hot enough that the hat will make you sweat like a hooker in church.
(L.) Sun hat, (R.) Rain hat
I suppose that you could pick up a ten dollar no-name boonie hat somewhere and be set for the sunny outdoors….thats what I did for a number of years. I had some woodland boonie hat that I could drag through a creek and plop on my head to keep me cool during a day of fishing, etc. But..now that Im a bit older…I like nicer things, and a lot of my newer gear is moving in the direction of multicam, soooo…….
The rain hat, though, I highly recommend. I actually recommend both hats but folks are more likely to cheap out on the sun hat and thats fine. But the rain hat…you wanna spend the extra bucks there and get a nice one like this.
Article – Police: Delaware Wal-Mart Worker Stole Thousands Of Rounds Of Ammunition, Survival Gear
There’s a right way, and there’s..well..this way:
Well, I guess we know why that WalMart was always outta .22 ammo, don’t we?
I can see the temptation to loot your employer if your employer happens to deal in Things That Would Be Useful. But…stealing is stealing. While I can understand the temptation, I can’t support it. Suck it up and spend your own money, like the rest of us poor slobs.
Art – It’s the apocalypse, Charlie Brown!
I came across this while scouring the internet for new header artwork. It’s kind of amusing and sad at the same time. Snoopy looks like he’s seen things, man.
Last blockhead standing, I guess.
On the other hand, a more…violent…and adult version can be found as ‘Weapon Brown‘. (And if you’re not really a ‘Peanuts’ kinda guy..don’t worry..there’s a weaponized version of other comic favorites).
Guns – Non-NFA 14″ bbl. shotgun?
So I ran across this the other day. It is, if the owner is to be believed, a clever attempt to stick to the letter of the law. As you and I know, a shotgun has to have a barrel of at least 18″ or its considered a short-barreled shotgun and subject to NFA stupidity. But, according to ATF, if the shotgun left the factory with a pistol grip stock then it is not considered a shotgun (because ATF defines a shotgun as having had (or been designed to have) a shoulder stock) and since it isnt a shotgun it doesn’t have a barrel length restriction. Nor does it count as a handgun, by the way. It’s simply “other”….but it has to fit ATF’s 26” envelope for overall length or it becomes ‘readily concealable’ and is then subject to federal buffoonery.
So, in theory, if you want a short little stubby shotgun without a shoulder stock you could do it without the paperwork as long as its built up on a gun that came from the factory with a pistol grip.
Here’s the sellers statement about it.
I admit, this thing looks wildly impractical but fun.
Walking Dead – metaphors
Remember the last season episode where right before our crew of intrepid survivors walks into the setup at Terminus Rick is showing Carl how to make a snare to trap game? He explains how the animal is funneled into the trap and is caught before it knows its even in jeopardy. Remember that?
So look at the metaphor in tonights show. The horse has been running around during this crisis and has been surviving just fine. And then…someone tries to reintroduce it to civilization, and once its in the pen behind the fence it gets swarmed and killed by zombies. It was safer outside the confines of the pen, taking its chances with everyone else.
Foreshadow much?
First aid kit foibles
Years back,I used to have a bicycle that would, at irregular intervals, try and kill me by locking up the chain for no particular reason. I eventually got a newer, better, bicycle but the old Death Machine taught me to keep a first aid kit handy. On my bike I have one of these
Well, here’s the lesson for today… I left my bike chained up in the yard over the winter. As a result, the rain and snowmelt made its way through the bicycle bag and through the first aid pouch. Check this out:
Thats not dirt, kids….thats mold. Most first aid stuff is packaged in sterilized paper envelopes and those are less waterproof. So, virtually everything was moist/damp/moldy and had to be discarded. However, some things were not damaged. Observe:
Basically, anything packed in foil or sealed in plastic weathered it just fine.
So, by now, you’re thinking “No problemo, just seal up all the individual contents and you’ll be good to go.” A reasonable way of thinking, but it overlooks a big issue – when you need a first aid kit, theres a pretty good chance you’re under stress, your hands might be a little shaky, and you may only have one hand to work with since your other arm/hand might be injured. So, sealing things up in a manner that required two hands to open (or requires several repeated pouch-opening-procedures) might not be conducive to effective use of your gear.
Now, I rather like the Maxpedition FR pouch. It’s reasonably compact, fairly easy to organize, and has several methods for attachment to other gear. I’d hate to give it up. So, to me, the choices are two: a) individually seal the contents of the kit or b) put the whole kit into a waterproof container of some sort.
I’m leaning towards ‘A’. Best method? Well, there’s this:
Those are heavy-duty mylar bags with ‘tear away’ tops and zip-seals, and a 6″ heat sealer that I picked up off Amazon. The bags, in various sizes and thicknesses, are from Sorbent Systems. I got them expressly for the purpose of making small, weatherproof, resealable, firs-aid kits for my hunting and outdoors gear. For example:
That pouch contains most of the important stuff…gauze, non-stick pads, compress bandage, antibiotic ointment, bandaids, aspirin, tape, etc, etc. Not enough to do surgery or fix a detached aorta, but for the cuts, burns, scrapes and bloody messes that sometimes happen from bicycle accidents, knife slips, falls in blowdown snag, etc, its pretty good. And, it is now completely waterproof. Tear open at the upper corner there with your teeth and open it like a bag of chips. When done, you can reseal it with the ziploc-type closure. When the crisis is over, since I have a stack of these bags, I can simply transfer the contents to a new bag to seal. I’ll wind up getting a larger back, drop the Maxpedition FR into it, throw in a few oxygen absorbers to snug it up tight, and tuck it into my bike bag.
Now, if you have a vacuum sealer, you can very much accomplish a similar setup using your sealer and bags. Two big differences though: the mylar pouches pictured have a ‘tear notch’ to allow easy access (which a vacuum sealed bag does not); and the mylar pouch, in this heavy thickness, is much more puncture resistant than a vacuum seal bag (however, you can always wrap the vacuum seal bag in something to protect its integrity).
I have learned my lesson and won’t be leaving this gear outside over the winter again, but walking around in a solid rain for a few hours would have probably induced the same amount of moisture into things. Waterproofing/weatherproofing an important bit of gear like this makes sense. Fortunately, today I noticed it because I was thinking I should probably check to see how the gear fared over the winter…it would have been a different story if I was a couple miles down the road, sitting on a rock, trying to bandage a gash in my leg with wet and moldy 4″ gauze and pads.
Turning a .45 into a 9mm
Well, it took three months, but I turned this:
into this:
Thats the G21 with one magazine I purchased aobut three months ago. I maneuvered an arrangement where I got rid of it and wound up with a G34, box, docs, and three mags. Oh, and one of those “I-Just-Shot-Myself” Blackhawk holsters. (Yes, I know you’ve been using a Serpa holster for years and that its just a matter of trigger finger control, etc, but I’m gonna stick to something less ‘learning curve’-y.)
So….9mm logistics train back on its tracks, and the orphan .45 Glock is in someone elses hands. Win-win.