International Travel During The Pandemic

I'm writing this as I'm sitting in quarantine. My opinions are thusly shaped by this situation. I realize that I should've brought more things and taken various things into consideration, and so here they are.

Before I even get into it, I'm going to strongly advise against international travel until such a time as there are no pandemic related restrictions. The strategies that various countries are engaging in may cause you delays or in some cases complete changes in your travel plans. Travel inside the continental USA, aside from some of the really weird places, is completely free and you won't get stuck. If you do get sick, medical care is, quite literally, first world and has the best chance of taking care of you.

If you choose to ignore my advice, then be prepared for a trip that could be extended for days, if not weeks, should the worst happen. This means that packing light is contraindicated, at least based on my experience. You should pack more of:

Clothes. Especially underwear and socks. Anything you don't want to wear over and over again, I'd bring more of.

Toiletries. A full tube of toothpaste would be an excellent start. If there's anything in your kit that looks like it is almost out, just replace it with a full item, or include a full item if there is room in your luggage.

Medication. Bring cold and allergy medications, even if you aren't currently suffering from either. Extra first aid supplies are probably not a bad idea. If you have any prescription medications, I'd bring several weeks worth. It won't hurt.

Cash. Bring enough to subsist well beyond what you'll need for the trip. You may need more for food, lodging, supplies, tips, or donations to public servants' charity funds. 

Entertainments. A fully charged kindle with several books on it is a great start. Even if you are completely without internet or data signal, this will keep your mind from turning into mush. If you're going someplace where internet is available, you may wish to also have a laptop or anything else that you use to interact with the world and your workplace. You may end up having to work remotely for some stretch if the worst happens. Also, a set of earbuds isn't a bad idea. Depending on where you are going, you may wish to bring the cheap ones, and you still will probably only want to use them in safe places. Doing otherwise may get you targeted for property removal/redistribution.

Batteries. If you have anything that requires charging, you definitely need to bring chargers for them. You may want to have an external battery that you can charge phones, tablets, and laptops from. And if you still have anything that requires disposable batteries, bring spares of those too.

Laundry detergent. Bring along a small box or pack of this. If worse comes to worse, you can hand wash clothes in your sink and then hang them to dry. You can also get a very light and packably small clothesline to hang your stuff up. That is definitely going to be on my future travel packing lists. I'm looking hard at the Sea to Summit Clothes line. It is $14 as of this article and weighs something like 1.3 ounces.

Dish soap. A small bottle of Dawn or similar will help considerably if you end up having to eat with the same plate and utensils repeatedly.

Tripod or selfie stick. Sounds weird, but if you have internet, you'll want to video chat with your loved ones who aren't with you. Sitting your phone up against walls and bookshelves starts to get old really quickly. Trust me on this one. They are pretty cheap on amazon.

In general if you think of what you'd bring as your normal checklist, pretend that your trip just stuck for 14 more days. If that happened, what would you add to your packing list? That will be your best clue. It may also be smart to have a bag or luggage that isn't completely stuffed full at the beginning of your trip. If you need to add to what you're carrying mid-trip, you'll have some convenient place to stow your new acquisition(s).

I wouldn't wish on you an extended stay against your wishes, but if it does happen, make sure you are prepared for it! If there's anything I've missed, email me and let me know!

The Expanse (Book Series) Review

 I just finished the series last night, and I have feelings. This series is of epic proportion, but grounded solidly as a story about people. While the TV series on Amazon Prime certainly serves as a companion and also a standalone, the book series is different. I suspect that the TV series will end with season 6 due to reasons that I won't divulge due to serious spoilers. Also, there are things they changed in the series due to the constraints of a televised series, and at least one thing due to the behaviors of one of the actors on the series. From here on when I refer to "the series," I will be talking about the books, unless I specify otherwise.

The series begins with events that happen in our solar system. The time is the future and we have expanded beyond the earth. The factions as they stand at the beginning of the series are Earth, Mars, and the inhabitants of the asteroid belt, aka "The Belters." While there are political machinations going on throughout the series, the politics aren't the center piece, which is fortunate, because if it were all about political maneuvering, I wouldn't have finished the series. The individuals who drive this story are the central force in all of the books, and no matter how fantastical the series gets, the characters in the story are what you care about.

The series explores a lot of things that interested me: how other intelligent life in the universe might evolve, how humans might react to the reality that we aren't the only life in the universe, and how humanity, even after time and technology evolve, are probably going to remain quite the same. This could be heartening or depressing, depending on which aspects of human behavior the series focuses on. For the most part this is a human tale, and while it sees the bad behavior, there is a lot of honorable behavior here as well. What humanizes the story the most, at least to me, is that the story is told completely through the point of view of the characters in it.

The series is penned by two authors, Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck. They authored the books under the pen name of James S. A. Corey. Unlike some other books I've read that were co-authored, this series doesn't have that disjointed and sometimes jarring feeling that one can get when a series uses two different writers to accomplish a task. Somebody smarter than me might be able to pick them apart more by writing style, but I didn't see any breaks. 

The Critical Drinker did a video on the TV Series, and he recommended it highly. One of his observations of the TV series was that it did diversity well. The characters are completely diverse, but it isn't remarked on, nor is it something that smacks you in the face. The future, as the writers have conceived of it, has a lot of mix of white, Asian, Hispanic, black, male, female, etc., and nobody cares. People are just people. The books from which the inspiration derives are similar in that the characters are of various colors and backgrounds, but that is simply what they are, not what they do or who they are. Likewise the female characters are all three dimensional, and their strengths aren't due to "grrrrl power," but instead derive instead from how they have lived their lives and the experiences and training they got from their past. 

If I would throw one half-hearted critique of the series, it is that Jim Holden, the main character, has a lot of crazy shit happen to him, more than one would expect due to reality and the relativistic universe. When you start talking about events taking place in multiple solar systems and galaxies, having one character span them all seems a bit far-fetched, but that one thing aside, that centrality also drives the narrative. 

In the end, the series is big. Like alien inteligences, light years, and time beyond comprehension. It is also small, like a person, a group, or a family. It juxtaposes both of those concepts so well that the balance happens without you having to consider it. Every time it throws big concepts at you, it does it through the eyes of the people experiencing it. When I finished it I was both overjoyed and sad, and that is a rare feeling for me when it comes to reading a series.

In short, I recommend it!

Benchmade Bailout 537 First Look

 Before I write anything about this knife, let me address the political situation with Benchmade. You can read about it here, here, here, and here. I could probably write an entire post about that situation, but this is not that post. Read on if you want to know more about the knife.

I own a Benchmade Bugout, and I find it to be an excellent knife. It is the knife you carry when you don't want to carry a knife. It disappears into a pants pocket and I struggle to remember that it is there when it is time to undress at the end of the day. It became my default knife for when I wasn't working or wanting a bigger knife. I remember talking to a Secret Service Agent about it, and he referred to the Bugout as "life changing." I don't know if it meets that level of hype, but for something so small, it definitely punches above its weight class. You could acquire one and do a bunch of destructive testing, or you could just watch this video and trust that they're pretty durable.

Now, we all probably understand how good the Bugout is, so why am I talking about the Bailout?

So I heard about the Bailout and how it was just ever so slightly bigger than the Bugout, with some different steels and profiles available. On two of the models it also features a glass breaker pommel, which seems like it could come in handy in some situations. Some of you probably feel that feature is over-rated, but I don't know that I can weigh in one way or the other. Your chance of getting stuck in a vehicle under water is low, but it definitely isn't zero. If you're in law enforcement, having access to one may be of use in other situations as well. ASP batons aren't great for breaking windows, and if you don't believe me, ask any poor cop who has tried it. There is a very specific technique and place to hit windows, and even then you have to apply a lot of effort.

Now the Bailout comes with exactly one blade profile, the tanto. Historically I haven't been the biggest fan of that profile, but if you're trying to create a more durable blade profile, this is definitely one way to do it. By profiling the blade as a tanto you put a lot more blade steel closer to the tip, which should help resist blade deformation or snapping if you use the tip as any sort of pry. (Not that you should do this, but sometimes if you're forced into a situation of bad choices, you do as you must.)

My Bailout arrived directly from Benchmade, which I purchased with my own cash. I suspect that I could've scrounged it up more cheaply from other sources, but Benchmade had it in stock. I paid something like $238 for mine if memory serves. MSRP is $260, but I see it available as low as $220 from Knifecenter and Blade HQ. As of this writing they are still calling it a pre-order though. When I got it the knife was in excellent shape, as you would expect. Blade was centered and the opening and closing required no break in to get it to flip open and closed easily. The pocket clip was installed for right hand pocket carry, but as I am a lefty, I swapped it. There was some evidence of additional thread locker on the scale behind the clip, but nothing that bothered me overly. The scales are very thin but surprisingly grippy for their size. If I had any complaint, it was the initial sharpness and grind angles of the primary cutting bevel. The knife certainly arrived reasonably and usably sharp, but it wasn't overwhelming. I stropped it a lot and it got better, but still not what I would want.

I ended up breaking out my Apex Edge Pro and getting all of the grind angles the way I wanted them. (Approximately 21 degrees.) It took me about 30 minutes of work to get things as I wanted. I then hit the edges with a strop for about 10 passes per side. When I was done, the edge would quite readily shave hair from my arm. (I have several bald patches now.)

One other downside to tanto profile blades is that you really have to sharpen it like there are 4 edges rather than 2. It basically doubles the time it takes to sharpen them. Also, if you're not careful, you can quite readily round off some of the angles of the blade. I would not use a belt sharpening system to sharpen a tanto, or at least not one you care about. 

Lastly let me mention the blade steel, which is CPM-M4. If you google it up, you'll find out that it is a "high vanadium special purpose high-speed steel." Doesn't that sound nifty? If you're a knife steel nerd it might tell you all that you need to know, but for those of us who don't obsess over the amount of chromium and other elements in any given steel formulation, what do we need to know? Firstly, you probably want to know that M4 is not stainless. This is one of the reasons why the blade has a coating on it, in order to deter corrosion. That said, you really need to keep a knife like this clean and wiped down every so often, or it will definitely rust on you. M4 is known for durability and edge retention, and it can definitely take a very fine and sharp edge, at least based on my work getting this one to where I wanted it. 

If you're looking for a small knife that is very capable and not horribly expensive, I would still steer you toward the base model Bugout. That can be found for around $130 at the time of this writing, comes with a S30V blade which is definitely stainless and also takes quite a good edge, and the profile of the Bugout is probably better suited to all sorts of tasks. The Bugout is the knife I recommend to police recruits who don't want to carry any sort of big knife, or for carrying while not at work. 

That said...

If you want something slightly bigger than the Bugout. If you want something slightly more capable than the Bugout. If you want something slightly tougher than the Bugout, then the Bailout is your knife. It still only weighs 2.7 ounces, which is stupidly light for a knife this capable. It'll require a bit more maintenance and upkeep, and it costs about double what the Bugout does. But if you need that additional capability, with the same very small and light package, the Bailout is definitely your knife.

Please note that my Amazon links are affiliate links. If you purchase any of these items through these links it will get me a small percentage of the cost of the item, but at no cost to you. This helps me offset my expenses for running a business, such as hosting fees and buying items to review. Thank you for reading this review!

Various Thoughts

 I don't have enough of anything for an in-depth writing, but here are a few random things...

I am still seeing ammunition pricing creep down, but slowly. If you dig you can get a case of 9mm for under $400 right now. That is still painful if you're remembering those good old days when you could scrounge up some for $180 a case. I don't know that we'll ever see that again, or if we do, it probably won't be during 2022. SG Ammo, Roger's Sporting Goods, and Norma are all good sources for inexpensive ammunition. Lucky Gunner is OK, but their pricing is higher usually. That said, if you can't find it other places, you may have more success at Lucky Gunner.

I saw a picture of the new Steiner MPS in Aaron Cowan's hands, which means he is probably beating it to death as I'm writing this. Looking forward to his video results, as this optic is a brand new entry in the pistol mounted optic world. There are really only three players right now, Trijicon, Aimpoint, and Holosun. As far as I know, most of the other entries out there are using Holosun electronics and changing the packaging up to one degree or another. I could be wrong on that last point, but I've heard it from multiple sources...

Speaking of pistol mounted optics, there is at least one major agency in my area changing over to them completely. Some local agencies have authorized them for some uses, but this will be the first agency going all in. I'm expecting good things, more to come on this one as I see it play out.

I ordered a Benchmade Bailout and will be getting it on Friday. I'm not the biggest fan of tanto style blade shapes, but the overall size and feature set got me curious enough to actually sink some cash into it. I'll be curious to see how it goes, but it may make my list of recommended folders. Speaking of that list, I probably need to write it out and publish it. That's something to do, but not tonight.

Speaking of orders, I have two things hanging out in the "ordered but still waiting" category. One is a slide that was sent to Agency to get their AOS installed. They quoted 20 weeks, which means I'll see it in March, I think. I also ordered a KKM barrel for my Glock, and I think their quoted turnaround for nitrided barrels is around 17 weeks, so that means I'll see it before that AOS slide, but not by much.