Too Lazy to Fail

I’m into preparedness, which means almost by definition that I’m at least a little bit of a flashlight geek. Last time our power went out for an evening, I found that I had trouble doing anything really productive because of the need to carry my flashlight or candle around with me. Even the lantern-style flashlights in the house were a pain if I wanted to wash the dishes or clean a gun or do any other hands-on task. I’ve been on the lookout for head-mounted lights, but most of the ones I’ve found operate on AAA batteries. I keep deep stockpiles of AA batteries, which I find reasonably priced, but I keep a bare minimum of AAA cells because they’re way too expensive both in terms of cost and capacity for the tiny bit of space they save.

This River Rock headlamp from Target runs on three AA batteries, and switches between three modes: high (30 hours, supposedly), medium (50 hours), low (70) and a bright strobe (30). I find the bright mode to be bright enough to clearly illuminate large rooms and my yard, and the low mode was more light than I needed for reading, washing dishes, etc. The beam is vertically adjustable, so I can turn it down for doing things on a table with my hands, turn it up a little bit for walking around the house, or turn it such that it points slightly above me, which would be useful in the crawlspace under the house.

Two downsides:

- You look like a dork, especially since the battery pack is on the back of your head. I wouldn’t go jogging in one.
- It’s $25 at Target, making it expensive for something you’ll likely use a couple of times per year.

Rating: 8/10.

After a couple of dissappinting failures in my search for the perfect caffinated candy, I’ve hit paydirt: Icebreakers Energy Mints. With 10 mg of caffeine each, it would take a dozen to equal one strong cup of coffee, the upside being that you can moderate or spread out your dose.

And unlike the gum or the candy bar, you can’t taste the drug, because the mint is almost as strong as an Altoid. They’re actually very tasty.

Bonus! The top-opening tin is perfect for holding odds and ends in my Tactical Man-Purse.

Rating: 9/10. It would get a 10 if each mint contained 20 mg.

Mars has jumped in on the Energy Drink/Food/Soap craze by injecting 80 mg of caffeine into a candy bar. When I saw them for 50 cents, I figured they were worth a try for the earlier-waking portions of my insane work schedule.

The problem with a lot of caffeine-added foods is that you can taste the bitterness of the drug through the taste of the food. This was the case with the energy gum I reviewed a while back and it’s the case with Snickers Charged. This wouldn’t be such a turn-off except that it seems they injected the caffeine into the middle of the bar instead of mixing it with one of the ingredients. The result is a Snickers bar that tastes like a Snickers bar for the first bite, but by the third tastes like you’re biting into a bunch of Goody’s headache remedy. Blegh.

But at 80 mg, the candy bar matches the caffeine content of a Red Bull or a weak cup of brewed coffee. When you haven’t had many caffeinated drinks (I’ve been drinking mainly diet Kroger-brand Sprite), it will wake you right up.

Rating: 5/10