If you’re old enough to remember late-night television in the 1980s, you remember that a man with the energy of an entire pot of coffee could sell you kitchen knives by demonstrating their ability to dismantle your automobile.
Then he sliced a tomato paper-thin. Apparently, dinner preparation required a blade capable of surviving automotive suspension.
“BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!”
A second knife! A third, smaller knife! And, ABSOLUTELY FREE, a contraption that turned a potato into a freaky spiral staircase. Until that moment, you had been perfectly content with potatoes that lacked architectural features. Now you needed a russet suitable for evacuating a miniature lighthouse.
All yours for several easy payments. They never offered difficult payments. Those arrived later, on the statement.
Watch a vintage Ginsu knife commercial. The salesmanship was real. The potato building inspection is my contribution.
The Infomercial Has Learned to Follow You Around
Today, you don’t even have to stay up late. The commercial finds you while you’re drinking coffee.
Watch one video on your handheld Surveillance Platform and Advertising Machine (SPAM)—formerly known as a phone—about replacing flashlight batteries, and suddenly every advertiser believes you’re preparing to cross the Hindu Kush on foot. You bought it, charge it, and pay its monthly bill. In return, it tells the gift shop you’re coming.
The old knife demonstration has evolved. Its descendants dig trenches, saw branches, start fires, signal aircraft, open bottles, and allegedly tell you which direction you’re facing. Somewhere inside the handle is another tool. Nobody knows what it does, but it unscrews, so that’s a feature.
Every item is essential, according to someone who receives a small commission if you agree.
And just when you reach for your wallet: BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!
You’ll need the carrying case.
Welcome to the Hall
The Preparedness Hall of Questionable Purchases recognizes equipment that promised to solve all our problems and then created a new one involving storage, adapters, replacement parts, or most importantly, explaining ourselves to someone we married.
Our candidates come from many distinguished backgrounds. Some perform twelve functions, provided you don’t need any of them performed particularly well. Others are excellent specialist tools purchased by someone whose most demanding expedition is collecting the mail. We also welcome the bargain that required three additional purchases before it could begin saving money—and the item we already owned but purchased again because this version came in coyote tan.
And then there’s tacticool: that magical point where an ordinary household item acquires black Velcro, MOLLE webbing, three morale patches, and a price increase.
Your old lunchbox carried a sandwich. Your new Combat Ration Assault Pack / Sandwich and Condiment Kit (CRAP SACK) has attachment points for additional sandwiches, a subdued American flag, and a reinforced handle in case lunch becomes confrontational. The sandwich is the same. It now has a defense budget.
There are carabiners holding other carabiners, straps whose purpose nobody remembers, and a pouch attached to a pouch because the original pouch lacked sufficient pouch capability. Somewhere on the outside is a patch advising everyone to remain a “gray man.” It is the third-most-visible thing on the backpack.
Some of those features have legitimate uses. MOLLE can organize equipment, sturdy fasteners matter, and accessible pouches can be useful. But covering something in webbing does not automatically improve its ability to do the job.
Sometimes you’re carrying a sandwich. The ham does not require mission support.
We’ll examine these purchases one at a time, giving each a fair hearing. What does it promise? Where did the buying decision go sideways? When does the equipment actually earn its keep, and what might meet the need more sensibly?
Each inducted purchase will join our growing Hall of Fame, where readers can browse the exhibits and perhaps recognize something currently occupying a shelf in their garage.
There will be no velvet rope. We spent the rope budget on a survival bracelet.
Expensive Doesn’t Automatically Mean Ridiculous
Good equipment can cost money. Someone who uses a tool professionally, depends on it frequently, or works in demanding conditions may have excellent reasons for buying something the rest of us don’t need. We’ll give those reasons proper consideration before wheeling the exhibit into place.
But most mere mortals don’t need a set of Snap-on impact sockets to rotate the tires twice a year. A suitable set from Craftsman—or, God forbid, Harbor Freight—may serve them perfectly well. The lug nuts cannot see the logo. They have no idea you’ve disappointed the tool-truck community.
Someone earning a living with those tools may reasonably value differences in durability, fit, warranty service, and support. But if your impact sockets spend eleven months a year resting beside the Christmas decorations, you may be financing a level of professional readiness your garage has never been asked to provide.
Buy the right size and type, including impact-rated sockets for an impact wrench. After that, give the actual workload a vote before the brand name gets the entire food budget for the quarter.
Buying something simply because you enjoy it is allowed, too. I own amateur radio equipment. I am in no position to demand that every recreational purchase defend itself before a congressional committee.
Sometimes we want the thing. That’s fine. We can admit that without constructing a scenario in which the neighborhood’s survival depends on our ordering it before the sale ends.
The question is whether the purchase makes sense for the person, the job, and the budget. A costly tool that gets used and maintained can be good value. An inexpensive gadget that never works properly can be a waste of every dollar spent on it.
And an unopened box remains an unopened box, regardless of how prepared the photograph on the front looks.
Before You Proceed to Checkout
A useful purchase should have a job waiting for it. Before ordering, consider what problem it would solve, whether something you already own could handle that problem, and what else you would need to operate and maintain it. Then be honest about whether you’ll spend the time learning to use it.
Those questions won’t eliminate every regrettable purchase. Most of us have a shelf that could testify. But they may interrupt the journey between “that looks interesting” and explaining why a package the size of a water heater has arrived on the porch.
If the answers make sense, carry on. If your strongest argument is that the fellow in the commercial cut through a car door and then shaved a peach, perhaps sleep on it.
The peach can wait.
Preparedness should leave you more capable, with enough money remaining to buy groceries. We hope this Hall provides a few laughs, some useful perspective, and an occasional moment of recognition before you click “Buy Now.”
Hall of Fame
The exhibit space is ready. Our first induction is coming soon; each published entry will appear here with a link to its full story. For now, the shelves are empty—which is more than some of us can say for the garage.
Know a Worthy Inductee?
Found a survival gadget that does seventeen things badly? Bought something that required its own accessories, maintenance schedule, and explanation to your spouse? Nominate it for the Hall.
Tell us what it is, what it promised, and what happened when somebody actually tried using it. A product name and link will help us find the right item. Firsthand experience is particularly welcome, and personal confessions receive sympathetic consideration.
You don’t have to buy something to suggest it. Just make clear whether you’ve used it or encountered a sales pitch that deserves a closer look. We’ll supply our own questionable judgment; there’s no need to invent evidence.
When you email your nomination, tell us whether we may quote your story and how you’d like to be credited. Every nomination will be reviewed before publication. We reserve the right to discover that your ridiculous purchase is actually rather useful.
Send your nomination to hello@everydayready.life.
No purchase necessary. You’ve probably done enough of that already.
New inductees will be added as questionable judgment and available funds permit.
And please remember: If you order in the next ten minutes, you can still reconsider.