I got sucked into the flashlight subreddit years ago and have a small collection (11) of cool lights. I have some that can actually start fires, customizable UI, lots of fancy shit. I will say, having a good flashlight has actually saved my ass and likely helped me save lives more than once when happening across car accidents. I literally helped outfit a small group of people to rescue a husky that got out in the middle of the night one time. Power outages and camping too of course.

Do I need all the ones I have? No, and there's probably only 3 that I would keep if I sold them off. But they're fun things to tinker with, the charm wears off after a while though. Some people go on that subreddit and just show off their disposable income to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars, individual lights that cost $1k+, it's wild.

[–] Hexamerous@hexbear.net 8 points 3 months ago (1 children)

and likely helped me save lives more than once

"Mam! Are you alright!?"

"OMG she's having a seizure!

"Mam!?"

"She's an epileptic, turn that fucking strobe function OFF!"

"Oh shit!" click click

"Turn it off!"

"Fuck!" click and hold

"WTF ARE YOU DOING!?"

"It's a new UI!"

"What dose that even mean?!"

[–] tactical_trans_karen@hexbear.net 7 points 3 months ago

che-smile

This is gold, thank you!

The actual story is I've come up on accidents when it's completely dark out and the lights on the crashed cars were inoperable from the battery being broken. I have a diffuser wand thing to attach to the light to redirect traffic. Other times it's been in fog or white out conditions.

[–] spike@discuss.tchncs.de 3 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

In my oppinion it never hurts to always have a few tools at hand. A knife, a light, and something that can be improvised as a screwdriver or a hammer is ideal (most of the time that may be the knife and a sturdy flashlight). Man or woman or anything in between or out of bounds, does not matter, having things, when they are needed, is always helpful.

Ofc you could also go the "survival" route and pack survival kits and emergency bags, to have everything for every opportunity at hand, but that may be overkill.