Those things you don't really need, but take anyway

[pmulcahy11b]

What items did you or your characters take with them, even though you didn't really need them anyway?

When I was in, I always had a couple of books in plastic bags, as well as a cassette player and tapes (I preferred the cassettes because they were less likely to get damaged than CDs). Every other member of the squad also had a roll of toilet paper in their ruck.

[jester]

I could swear I saw a similair thread somewhere recently ;)

Consumables:

PX Generic POP Tarts, six to a pack, enough for one each day.

1 tube of Chips Ahoy chocolate chip cookies and 1 tube of Ritz or generic rits they go much better with the MRE cheese especialy if its warm, almost like a can of cheeze whiz which was sometimes taken too.

1 bag of dried pinapple chunks, or papaya spears or mango pieces.

1 Bottle of Tobasco Sauce.

Apple or Orange <oranges travel better> snatched from the chow hall the last meal before heading out.

Occassionaly the half cans of stew, ravioli, viena sausages or similiar foods would be brought if they were available.

Ramen packs, occassionaly, usualy one or two packs would be stored in plastic in the top flap as a "just in case" measure

Walkman, spare batterys in a 1st Aid Kit case, and three tapes.

Mini Crossword puzzle book and mechanical pencil in plastic bag and some notepapper. Perfect for sitting on airport runways or landing zones or compartments/halls and decks of ships and goes into the pocket very easily.

One book in plastic with a larger letter sized notepad and a couple envelopes in fanny pack with two more books in the main pack with notepad, pends and pencils wrapped in plastic.

Minimag light X2 one in your pocket or webbing, the other in the top flap compartment of the pack, angle lights were crap!


Personaly Owned Binoculars, our issued ones were seldom issued.

Spare 2 liter canteen <we never got water resupply>

Camo compact, much easier to put on than those camo paint sticks, and the mirror worked wonders for shaving.

Personaly made 1st Aid Kit, Generic Tylenol, Tweezers, Nail clippers, Mole Skin, neosporin bandaids and allergy/cold tablets. Nothing more miserable than having a wicked dripping nose in the feild coupled with fever, anti fungal ointment.

LARGE container of baby powder, helped with jungle rot, athletes foot and other issues.

2 pilots flasks, water or a few times "other" beverages. Easily carried when you don't want to wear webbing and a canteen will bounce around to much in a cargo pocket.

Personal Survival Kit in a plastic cigarette box (tin foil, fishhooks, line, snare wire, 2 nails, 1 roll dental floss, split shot, 1 book waterproof matches wrapped in plastic, 1 mini lighter, 1 liter plastic ziplock baggie, 2 razor blades, MRE tissue, 4 bullion cubes, 2 trick birthday candles that relight.

Airline Pillow; grabbed it from a flight, a little bit of comfort in the field was always nice.

Can or more of OFF insect repellant when it could be found, issue stuff worked for crap.

Of course cigarettes, usualy 1 open and one unopened in the pockets, 2-4 packs in the ass pack and about as many in the top flap of the ALICE pack.

Metal Spoon aquired from the Chowhall! MRE spoons used to be to too small <remember the tiny white ones?>, or break <the long handled brown ones with brittle plastic>, or once was defective with just a handle. Screw that!

Sterno, found a can in Infantry School while on a working party in the field where it had been freezing all week. a sheild was made from cutting both ends off a tin can and poking vents along the top for air. So you could then have some heat, or cook your coffee or cocoa without giving off alot of light.

1 roll electrical tape

Small pocket knife

Issue items that always were brought in pockets or ass pack:

Gloves, watch cap and fieldjacket liner

Those were some of the none standard items I usualy carried. Nothing really major as weight was always a factor, and at times some of the above would not be available.

[jester]

What items did you or your characters take with them, even though you didn't really need them anyway?

When I was in, I always had a couple of books in plastic bags, as well as a cassette player and tapes (I preferred the cassettes because they were less likely to get damaged than CDs). Every other member of the squad also had a roll of toilet paper in their ruck.

You didn't really need toilet paper? Damn, you guys were hard core ;) I hope you guys water proofed it.

[pmulcahy11b]

You didn't really need toilet paper? Damn, you guys were hard core ;) I hope you guys water proofed it.

Yep -- we put the roll in one of those gallon-sized Ziplock bags.

[pmulcahy11b]

I could swear I saw a similair thread somewhere recently ;)

Yeah, come to think of it, we did do this a couple of weeks ago. Sorry for the duplication.

[pmulcahy11b]

For some reason, I've always thought that good toilet paper would become a valuable trade item in T2K. I once gave the players a big shipment of toilet paper as a "treasure find," and they were able to trade for valuable things like MREs, autocannon ammunition, a home-cooked meal, and even a little antibiotics.

[jester]

I was wondering the same thing, thats why I asked a very similiar question yesterday on the yahoo group. What inspired me to ask it though was my room mate came home with a huge bag of sour patch kids. And I was thinking, what other items that were luxuries that people would want. You know, that mocha java expresso latter from Starbucks? Godiva Chocolates? One of the very few nintendo game systems left in the world with the most recent Call to Duty or Battletech or what have you.

[pmulcahy11b]

I was wondering the same thing, thats why I asked a very similiar question yesterday on the yahoo group. What inspired me to ask it though was my room mate came home with a huge bag of sour patch kids. And I was thinking, what other items that were luxuries that people would want. You know, that mocha java expresso latter from Starbucks? Godiva Chocolates? One of the very few nintendo game systems left in the world with the most recent Call to Duty or Battletech or what have you.

My mother would probably trade you God for a cup of Mocha Latte from Starbucks in T2K...:D

[jester]

My mother would probably trade you God for a cup of Mocha Latte from Starbucks in T2K...:D

Yes an evil god for starbucks must be the work of the devil! Its strong and too hot but it lacks coffee flavor at the same time and is twice as much coffee from Dunkin Donouts or yeah, Winchells which is usualy better.

Besides, coffee is made to be had like coffee not some fufu with alot of mixes and spices and freaky stuff that distracts from the real coffee.

[weswood]

Yes an evil god for starbucks must be the work of the devil! Its strong and too hot but it lacks coffee flavor at the same time and is twice as much coffee from Dunkin Donouts or yeah, Winchells which is usualy better.

Besides, coffee is made to be had like coffee not some fufu with alot of mixes and spices and freaky stuff that distracts from the real coffee.

I carried a lot of the same things as ya'll, but the main thing was a can of sterno and instant coffee. Somehow though, the Company Gunny managed to show up just when the first canteen cup of water was hot enough.

Please don't kick me out of the man-club, but I confess to a weakness of french vanilla cappacino. Never from Starbucks, usually Exxon, and I limit myself to every other week.

[jester]

Ah gas station coffee! Only a special type of person can do that. Just make sure you know the clerks so you know what pots are fresh and what ones have been sitting there all day.

By any chance was your Gunny from the Wing? Although, a gunny seems to grow a coffee mug out of his hand anyways ;)

[Dog 6]

toilet paper and beer. 2 must haves in a combat zone

[pmulcahy11b]

I guess I'm lucky -- I love the smell of coffee, but hate the taste. And that's another thing I used to take with me to the field -- a jar of a good brand of instant coffee. It was a great trade item!

[jester]

Trade! Two words, "Screw" and "That." The idea of humping something you don't intent to use and may or maynot be able to utilize in a trade. Forget it.

As they say on those Survivorman and the other half dozen shows. Items you multi task. Smokes, I was partial to Marlboro Lights back in the day but also did Reds and sometimes Newports. Not gonna hump something I won't use. I got a couple extra packs they can be bartered. If not, I use em.

Batteries, "AA's" were always worth their weight in gold. A high value item, you could use for your walkman, minimag, gameboy, NVGs, camera, and so did everyone else too. So, a good item to have, trade it but if not you can still use it.

Or Paul, did you just do lines of instant? You sick boy you :p

[pmulcahy11b]

Or Paul, did you just do lines of instant? You sick boy you :p

Caffeine gum, No-Doz, can't remember the brand, but they're German-made dextrose cubes, and chocolate. Oh, and when I was younger, I wasn't taking antipsychotics -- those damn things wipe you out!

[pmulcahy11b]

Coffee was something I could readily trade, or just make one of my guys feel better for a little while. And I'll admit to "scrounging" AA and D batteries wherever I could.

Oh, and I ditched the standard Army flashlight for a Mini-Maglite early on.

[weswood]

By any chance was your Gunny from the Wing? Although, a gunny seems to grow a coffee mug out of his hand anyways ;)

It was when I was in the Reserves, an Infantry Battalion.

[headquarters]

there were these blue packs of "cold medicine" pills which contained a decent amount of effedrine at the PX ? And of course the no-doze stuff.

Chocolate and cigarettes in abundance.

[pmulcahy11b]

there were these blue packs of "cold medicine" pills which contained a decent amount of effedrine at the PX ? And of course the no-doze stuff.

If you were an NCO or officer, you could ask for a "cold pack" from the medics, and they had those in them.

[Abbott Shaull]

It seemed like everyone brought out their cassette/walk-man with them and fair share brought out books to read. Most of us had mini-mag instead of the bent neck flash light. Some carried both!? The trick was how/where to pack the flashlights and walk-man on jumps so they were broken during the landing of your ruck and your PLF after the jump.

It was in imperfect science since what worked one time might not always work....Then again I have a story about a E-5 who always used the regulation small ruck sack that were issued, and seemed to have everything on the packing list in it. While the rest of the company seem to struggle in packing it into their large rucksacks...Oh boy.

[headquarters]

It seemed like everyone brought out their cassette/walk-man with them and fair share brought out books to read. Most of us had mini-mag instead of the bent neck flash light. Some carried both!? The trick was how/where to pack the flashlights and walk-man on jumps so they were broken during the landing of your ruck and your PLF after the jump.

It was in imperfect science since what worked one time might not always work....Then again I have a story about a E-5 who always used the regulation small ruck sack that were issued, and seemed to have everything on the packing list in it. While the rest of the company seem to struggle in packing it into their large rucksacks...Oh boy.

Plugged in to the vehicle com system ( dont recall the specific box we used -standard Nato internal com/radio system equipment) .
that way we could listen to music in the headphones in the crew helmets as long as the key was set in the middle ( neutral) .
As a cmdr I got to be a dj as well. 90s techno was useful to stay up and alert on long night patrols.

[pmulcahy11b]

The trick was how/where to pack the flashlights and walk-man on jumps so they were broken during the landing of your ruck and your PLF after the jump.

During my cherry jump at Bragg, we had one guy in my squad who had an interesting PLF experience -- somehow (he was never sure), his canteen broke open during his PLF. He didn't have a corresponding bruise or anything on him, so it was a bit mystifying. The only thing we could figure out was that it had a sort of hairline crack in it already, and during the PLF it hit just right to break open the crack completely.

[HorseSoldier]

In 20th Group one of the support companies had the way-too-much-time-on-their-hands cherry jump helmet painted bright red complete with some glued on stem. It vanished into the tree line near the DZ one jump when (if I recall right) a new lieutenant parted ways with it as he exited the aircraft.