Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

[Author here]

The mindset is actually a large component of this guide, and it intentionally delays any discussion of "prepper gear" until it gets through a long laundry list of lifestyle tips and discussing the need to plan ahead, figure out what is likely, what can go wrong, what the decisions points may be, etc. In contrast to most other prepping docs, weapons are literally the last thing discussed, and only in a perfunctory way.

That said, I think that your view of emergency preparedness is far more narrow than what I aimed for in the guide. A significant focus of the doc is dealing with small-scale but common adversities, such as recessions / unemployment, house fires, backed-up sewage, and other "boring" but life-altering contingencies. Basically, the stuff that almost everybody will need to face at some point in their lives.

I'd wager that for 90%+ of the events that a typical person in the US is likely to experience, heading into the woods to forage on berries and hunt wildebeest is not the way to go.

I dunno, I re-read the beginning and I didn't see anything about the points I raised. I think your point that overzealous people who as you put it:

begin by shopping for ballistic vests and night vision goggles; they would be better served by grabbing a fire extinguisher, some bottled water, and then putting the rest of their money in a rainy-day fund.

is right on point, but IMO that just says - hey don't be insane.

Literally right now, my good friends are being rescued from a rooftop in Houston. No number of bottles of water in their basement or generators are going to help them. They are lucky in that they have some discretionary funds and Flood insurance, but more likely than not (if history repeats itself) they wont get fully paid out for what they lost.

What they should have done is learned when to move or when to stay by: 1. Not buying a house in Houston and then 2. Gotten out well before it was imminent.

Small scale common adversities like you are talking about can get critical really quickly. All those preparations, other than just having savings, is just making you slightly more comfortable and buy you a little bit of time so that you can make a bigger plan. Good, but insufficient and gives you a false sense of security. Again, these are things I've seen over and over.

Planning for the range of disasters from a month of unemployment and TEOTWAWKI is the same basic mental change, not just a full basement and bank account.

For pocketknives, some standard quality makers are Spyderco, Benchmade, CRKT, Kershaw/Zero Tolerance, and Buck. Prices really run the gamit, a low end Buck or CRKT will be $20 but will have lower quality steel that will dull rapidly. A high end Zero Tolerance will be from a known knife designer, will run an exotic super hard steel and cost $300. If you want a decent knife that you can rely on in an emergency, expect to spend $50 to $100. Spyderco knives are very well regarded, although some people find them ugly (I do, but I carry one anyway).

"Traditional" knife makers - for pocket knives like your grandpa used to carry - are Queen, Great Eastern Cutlery, some Buck knives, and A.G. Russell. Prices tend to be lower than for modern knives.

For multitools, it's really hard to do better than Leatherman. A Wave or a Skeletool will be about as good a multitool as you can buy.

For fixed-blade knives, which are better for hunting/fishing, camping, and general "survival" tasks, Bark River makes a very complete line and does a great job at it. They tend to run in the $150-$250 range. The Bravo 1 is considered to be their "do everything" knife. You can also buy fixed blades made by Browning, Helle (Norwegian outdoors knives), Buck, Benchmade, and Spyderco.

If you want to investigate this topic a lot further, there are several good websites. I read EverydayCommentary by Tony Sculimbrene, who reviews knives, and KnivesShipFree, which sells them.

Most worldwide don't actually. Suburban single family homes, sure. Apartments and the like, much less so. Even less so, in non-western countries with electric under sink heaters.

For multitool you can not go wrong with a leatherman wave. Great warranty too, they'll fix anything you break.

Not big but not really for pocket carry though.

For fixed multiuse blade (think bushcraft, not defense) I don't buy any other than Mora. Really cheap, like 20-30$. I give them as a present to friends when I go for a walk and notice they don't have any. They are made of great steel and keep the edge well. They are great knives with the price of dispossable ones so you are not afraid of actually using them.

I'm kind of afraid of really punishing a $150 knive, so they end as box queens at home..