I'm calling this Road Mode. It's been a number of episodes since I had left the desert and got back into driving and being in that modality after three years being in desert mode.
I had a certain profile of what you call everyday carry, or EDC, certain patterns of life.
Obviously all that changes if I become a full time mobility platform dwelling trucksteading, not just trucksteading on my land, but trucksteading out in the world on the roads, going from project site to project site and doing various missions.
It's worth giving an outline of what's changed about my life and about my EDC, and just go through a process of examining what it means for someone in my line of work and my spiritual mission, my purpose in life.
If I'm content to be compressed into truck, what I call trucksteading, then all my sampling of my preps have to be sorted out and have to be packaged for that lifestyle of actually being on the road and now I'm somewhat permanently in that mode.
My land is going to be a survival retreat, it's not going to be a place that I commute back and forth to on a regular basis.
So I will be pretty much completely in my vehicle dwelling, trucksteading mode for the foreseeable future.
I have plenty of work cut out for me to do, where I will be fully engaged in healing the land, growing food, supporting people, supporting communities.
That's what I'm built for, spiritually and intellectually, and even financially, to an extent, liberated enough financially to be able to be of service, where I am happy to serve, and not just where I need to go to get a paycheck for now.
That's what I have the grace and the blessing to be able to do.
So there was a lot of thought that went into how I was gonna configure myself to be out in the world again.
I'm gonna just go from head to toe to make it somewhat structured here, at least with the EDC part of this, because there's other lifestyle dimensions that I'll get into.
But from head to toe, I have a olive drab baseball cap, if you will, that is a little more socially acceptable than the hat that I wear, which has the large brim, call it an outdoor gardening type of hat.
It covers the back of the neck. You've got the circular, large brim, and it's nice to have just a baseball cap. If I'm in a vehicle, I'm shaded by the canopy of the vehicle, basically the cab of the vehicle, the cab of the truck.
I don't need to be, as I was in the desert, having that large brim hat on at all times.
So it's nice to be able to have a baseball cap and just less exposure of sun on the ears in the back of the head and the neck and the shoulders.
So I don't need all that protection, however, because at any point in time, if you're in an automobile accident or a breakdown, I want that large brim gardening hat with protection for the back of my neck. I want that in a pocket. I want that on my person.
If I get separated from the vehicle and I'm in the sun, that's gotta be on my person.
Next I have a key to the vehicle on a necklace so a spare key to the vehicle I'm driving is actually on a necklace for even more redundancy on not locking the key in the vehicle. That's the main reason to do that for myself.
I also have my encrypted micro sd drives in a waterproof match container that's also on that necklace.
There's other important text information that I carry in that waterproof container, meaning a miniaturized version of important documents but in a written form, things that I wanna make sure I don't forget, so there's a little bit of space for that.
I'm always wearing a long sleeve shirt no matter what, because if it's cold, then you wanna wear it, and if it's hot, you I don't wanna get sunburned below the sleeves and get the farmers tan.
I’m not afraid of what it looks like to have a farmers tan. Although it's not my favorite aesthetic, it is more about again, I don't wanna be separated from the vehicle and be getting baked in the sun and not have long sleeves or a long sleeve already on.
So it's a green long sleeve. It's not gonna be too hot to wear. I have black clothing, a lot of it, and the green is nice. I'm good with that color. And it is sort of in between that spectrum of it being very light and very dark.
So green long sleeve works for me. And then the layers of clothing that I'm gonna wear if it's cold, I like the idea that if it's a cold time of the year, you should always be wearing the clothes that you would be comfortable sleeping in.
And of course, that's gonna shift around from day to night. But in general, it's nice to sleep with a blanket, but it's also nice to know that if you were separated from a blanket and the sun went down, that at least you have with you in a vehicle, maybe in a bug out bag, you would have those clothes readily accessible.
And if you were to walk out of the vehicle at night and you're wearing clothes, you’d be comfortable sleeping.
So, however, you wanna work that out, but for me, I wear a lot of layers when it's cold so I have a lot of options to scale up and down from being cold to warm and then if I do any activity I'm gonna wanna remove those layers very quickly.
I've typically got a scarf, I do have a separate kind of hood that can be added on, I have a couple of beanies that I double up with, and fingerless gloves.
Again, like a layer of a hoodie, and then some layers of long sleeve thermals, a few of those.
I do two layers of long thermal pants, and then shorts, B-D-U shorts or fatigue cargo shorts outside of those thermal pants and to me that's the versatility of not wearing full length pants.
For me, when I start being active, or if it's hot outside, I just don't like wearing pants.
Even if I'm in a cold climate, I will wear shorts to hold all my keys, wallet, phone, other edc stuff.
But I like the versatility of always wearing shorts and then having the thermal pants below them, in different at least two layers, so that if it's cold outside, I walk somewhere, I go inside, and now I'm feeling stuffy in my thermal pants. I can take them off, roll them up, stick them in the cargo pocket, and enjoy the ventilation that occurs with not having pants.
I get really stuffy in pants and unless I'm doing extremely dangerous work I’ll wear shorts.
I'll even cut blackberries and work in thorns with shorts and just allow it, just accpet I'm gonna get nicked.
I'd rather get nicked a few times than feel really hot boxed in pants.
Everybody's different. And again, if I I've been on job sites where they tell me, hey, you can't wear shorts, you have to wear pants, then I will wear pants. If they tell me I have to.
But I prefer that versatility.
I have a studded belt, it's an imitation leather belt that I got from a friend, I don't need to go into the politics of that right now but it is what it is that I have it and that is great.
I have a carabiner that I attach water bottles to. The belt is sturdy enough it can have an array of kit on it from a firearm to extra ammo to first aid kit and communications devices and whatnot.
That belt has the qualities that you would wanna have to support a lot of those utilities, and plenty of weight, comfortably on the waist.
Out in the world, it's not a priority to be open carrying, I'm gonna be transporting weapons, firearms, in a legally compliant manner.
I'm not gonna go into all of that nuance. I'm just gonna say, I obey the laws.
It's a different scenario when you set foot off your private property, you have all kinds of layers of jurisdictions you have to be factoring in.
So I just comply as needed with that. So sometimes my belt is occupied. Sometimes it's not, I'll just put it that way, but the belt is a key feature that has to be discussed because some people think they don't need it.
You can cinch up some pants without a belt, or you could use a very light duty or very kind of flimsy belt just to keep the pants up.
But if you're talking about loading those pants with EDC items in the pockets and then decking out the almost the entire circumference of the belt with kit, then you need that belt to be very sturdy, so that should be an important consideration, should not be overlooked.
I do have traditional black combat boots and I feel most secure driving in them. Ideally, I will be driving always with those boots on.
Sometimes I have cheated and taken my shoes off because of the temperature or the duration of the drive. But really, that's bad practice. The best practice for me would be to always have those boots on.
Because if you're thrown out, if I'm thrown out of the vehicle or separated from it for any reason I don't wanna be then injured or immobilized by being barefoot or having flimsy shoes, because who knows what the terrain will be.
The idea that we're in these vehicles moving at high speeds and traveling across all kinds of different terrains, to not have the most versatile footwear at all times on I'm gonna say it's a PSA, that it is the best practices way to do it. Anything less than that is gambling.
So I do gamble sometimes I will admit it but ideally and the more I say this and verbalize this the more I'm gonna be reminded, don't get lazy.
Don't get complacent. You're in a high speed, moving death trap that is liable to break down at any moment from just rolling over a nail or hydro planning, whatever it is you're not in control of what you're gonna encounter when you get behind the wheel.
You are in control over your footwear, though, so act accordingly.
That's my PSA, mainly to myself, not to be complacent on that.
And hopefully, if you are good about being punctual, then you can change your footwear when you arrive, and you'll have plenty of time to. So that's another tip.
That covers the main attire. Now, getting into what is in those pockets and what is in the EDC, sort of first aid, survival, communications, water and whatnot.
So I have integrated a tactical vest. So that force multiplies, gives me four more cargo pockets than I would have had just with the cargo pockets on my pants.
So in them, I have a high powered LED headlamp. I have my individual first aid kit, including a tourniquet, and I have some auxiliary data storage devices that I don't wanna be separated from.
I have a large battery, USB. Can't remember the amp hours of it, but it's larger, the size of, say, a chalkboard eraser, is about the size of that battery backup.
So it's bigger than what you would wanna have in your pants pockets.
It does all right in the tactical vest pockets. But additional wire, cables for that as well to charge a mobile device and other USB items.
Also clear and shaded eye protection glasses and the large brim hat.
So that covers pretty much the tactical vest.
Then, obviously, keys, wallet phone, and I tether those with paracord in ways I've described at length in previous episodes.
But you got keys, wallet, phone. An additional slim backup battery also is in one of my hip pockets.
I have these two they're like cases for glasses, almost, but they're a little bit larger.
I line the pockets inside of both of my cargo pockets on the sides, the large cargo pockets, they're two separate man purses with a multi-tool, lighter, a pen, various cordage pieces, floss, a bit of parachord, Bluetooth earphones and more backup cables for charging, charging adapters, small first aid items, many other small items.
What I've arrived at is that just having a small tube of turmeric powder, that's how I'm gonna treat all my skin cuts, scrapes, blisters, abrasions of all kinds, any breach of the skin, any skin issue I'm gonna treat with that powder.
Then if it's a wound that's open and there's bleeding, then that's where I would go into the first aid kit.
But I try to keep that as close to me as I can at all times.
That first aid could also go on my belt when and where appropriate.
But at least there's always in that pants pocket, no matter what, there's a little bit of that turmeric powder, and there's a few other odds and ends.
But for the most part, the tactical vest would also have a water bottle attached to it with a carabiner.
That’s important to think about. Talk about road mode. What if you were separated from your vehicle? What if you were pulled over and sat on the side on the curb while they search your vehicle, which happens to a lot of people because they're racially profiled.
I wouldn't necessarily have that problem, depending on where I am, because if you're in the hood and you're white, you'll be racially profiled for standing out there.
They're gonna think you're there to do some drug deals, think that you’re a customer to buy drugs in in some circumstances.
So racial profiling can go either way, depending on where you are.
But the idea of being placed in custody in handcuffs on the side of the road without having long sleeves on, without having, I don't know if they would necessarily let you drink from your water. Maybe they would be humane, but it depends. But certainly having a hat that's gonna shade you from the sun, because that's not something they're gonna provide to you.
That's kind of a worst case scenario, but it's also just, what if you need to give somebody a jump and it's hot and the sun's out, or whatever, just always thinking about the what ifs of being separated from the vehicle abruptly.
What if the vehicle’s on fire? You're not gonna go back in there to get the first aid kit.
So I always say to myself, do not start up this vehicle unless that tactical vest is on, because that has the first aid kit that has the emergency high powered light, so that if I'm separated at night, I can operate and not have to go back into the vehicle.
Assuming I even have access to it. So I think that that covers it pretty well.
I'm not gonna go into all the contents of the first aid kit, it’s pretty standard, but obviously gauze, medical tape, disinfectant, masks, gloves, etc.
Obviously, the contents of the wallet. That's another factor. I have a auto club membership that's very key to be in a road mode, and the premium version that gives you the 200 mile tow if you need that, if you're going to remote places, for sure, more than one debit and credit card, so if one of them fails or gets breached, or you find out that it's no longer valid because someone made off with it or skimmed it or whatever they did.
Definitely having more than one of those. And then, of course, another factor is to have personal checks.
As much cash as you can afford to have, and then personal checks, if that runs out, because you can still use those in some places. Then forever stamps on the person as well. Yes, plenty of those. Driver's license, proof of insurance. The proof of insurance is good to have for me printed out in a physical form in the wallet.
Because if you have a wreck, you're gonna wanna have that insurance information on your person, not in the glove box.
I don't necessarily keep the registration on my person, but I do keep the title, and I've discussed that at length before.
The reason for that is, let's say you get in an accident in the middle of nowhere, your vehicle is totaled, and you wanna scrap it and salvage it and get it off your hands.
You need to sign it legally over and sign the title over.
If that's at your house in a file cabinet, what are you gonna do at that point?
How are you gonna release liability of that piece of junk?
Now, if your title is far away, that's gonna add a lot of complexity to that transaction.
Or if it was in a glove box, the vehicle catches on fire, or it's somehow just gets destroyed or maimed, or even underwater.
So to me, I like to keep the title to the vehicle on my person, and I do it in a way where I'm comfortable it's not gonna get damaged. But that's something that I hadn't thought about before.
I got seriously into all this stuff, and now I'll never go back, because it is possible that you could have that situation happen where you're gonna wanna scrap it and you're far from home, and you can't do that without the title.
So I think that covers it, if I'm missing anything, it'll probably find its way on another episode.
But at least that covers my thinking of how I wanna be rolling. And of course, I have all kinds of other tools, all kinds of other devices, all kinds of other, everything, the way that I travel with that, the way I secure items.
That's worth another follow up. If this is road mode, part one, the EDC aspects of it, those are the main considerations I wanted to go over. The tactics and strategies of being prepared to be out in the world, living from a vehicle. Operating from a vehicle, and thinking through those what ifs of at any time of day, in any climate.
In fact, I'm gonna reconfigure that now that I'm mentioning it, rain gear should always be accessible from the cab and not from the back, for obvious reasons, because if it's raining, you don't even have seconds to go and get that from the back.
You need to put that on before you step outside, if at all possible.
Otherwise, you're risking your life because of the the rate of your body heat being dissipated by being in contact with water.
It's a deadly, serious math equation to learn about how deadly it can be to get wet when it's even the slightest bit cold.
Not only will you be miserable, but you could be dead quickly because of that.
I do have part of my rain gear where it should be in the cab. But there's another part of it that that I'm gonna place in the cab so that I don't have that issue.
For now, that’s a bit of an update on my engineering of EDC. In the future I’ll go more into the vehicle preps list for trucksteading items.
But keep the tank topped off, keep the batteries charged. Be situationally aware.