Use this thread to hang out, make cheap jokes about wornweight, joketalk about about gear, complain about r/ultralight, talk about Senchi's, maybe post a meme or two, and ultimately talk about the same things we did in last week's thread! Enjoy!

No lowballs I know what I got

Recently released ditty bags for the tips of our spoons, toothbrush sleeves, and trowel sheaths to keep our finest small items free of living room dirt.

Just got back from the first overnight of the season (3 days 2 nights at my stepdad's house national wilderness area). The weather in the basement TV room was only 70F so I know sub-optimal, but I was dying to test out some of my gear after spending all winter hustling behind the Wendy's dumpster to save up for my new Zpacks DCF tighty whities. Anyway, the trip started fine. I spent the first 36 hours in the TV room right outside my basement base camp. Gary didn't hassle me too much except about leaving my full WAG bags in the kitchen (I said I was coming back for them!!!). I got a bit of a headache while I was using my jetboil in the linen closet (only spot in the basement 100 yards from my tent), but the expired mountain house beef stroganoff and some cold-soaked oxycontin really took the edge off.

Towards the end of day 2 is when the trouble started. To make a long story short, I forgot my survival basics because my mom kept hassling me about taking out the trash and cleaning my room and getting a job and washing my Darn Tough merino cum socks so I decided I'd spend the second night in the driveway. In my defense, the weather was really nice and the driveway had just been repaved but still... I know. So anyway, I load up and head out to the driveway. My kit was pretty dialed in so my base weight was dead-on 9.9 lbs (this is important), not counting a 20 lb bag of frozen tendies or my keystered Helinox Zero and fox gun (obviously).

However, by the time I got everything in my dyneema stuff sacks and got outside, it was getting pretty dark. In my haste to make it to camp, I took off my sun hat and clipped it to my pack!! Suddenly the sky went super dark. The clouds opened up and I saw a terrible beast in the sky. Its trekking poles reached the earth and its gopro was in the heavens. It had the body of a bear, the trunk of an oak, the head of Andrew Skurka, the sun hoodie of Outdoor Research, and one thousand eyes made of backpacker bidets. Its breath was the stench of unwashed merino, and its voice was the rustle of silnylon in the wind.

I immediately realized my mistake--by clipping the sun hat to my pack it went from being worn weight to base weight and put me over 10 lbs. The vision reached its unwashed claws towards me and spake thusly: "Son of man, thou hast transgressed with thy base weight. Repent, lest thou be cast into the filthy outdoors from whence no man returns. For it is written, 'Blessed are the ultralight, for they shall glide upon the trails.'" I fell to my knees, trembling, as the beast continued: "Thou hast sinned with thy base weight, and now thou must atone. Cast off thy burdens, and let not thy pack exceed ten pounds, lest ye be forsaken." With my heart pounding, I scrambled to my feet and hightailed it into the garage. The beast's eyes followed me, and I could feel its gaze burning into my back. Only by the grace of Our Lady of Dyneema did I make it inside, slamming the door behind me. I could still hear the beast's voice echoing in my ears as I collapsed against the wall, my breath coming in ragged gasps. The one positive is that I think I set a FKT from the driveway to garage, despite the weight penalty.

So, this is just a friendly reminder to all to keep an eye on your base weight at ALL TIMES. Don't become a statistic like I almost did. I will not be taking questions.

Doing the lords work at Garage Grown Gear marketing department 🙏

Food weight is one of the constant bugbears of the ultralight backpacker, leading some extreme ultralighters to make unsafe choices such as fasting for the duration of a thru-hike.

It is common practice (I'm told) to hike with a group of 'friends'. It seems to me that the ultralight community has overlooked a golden opportunity to shed kgs from our packs.

What I am proposing is that rather than hiking with 'friends', we re-frame this as hiking with a 'herd' of human livestock that we slaughter at various points along the thru-hike to provide us with food. Human livestock is superior to any other animal as they are the only large mammal to be found in all terrestrial habitats and altitudes (and therefore your choice of destination or route are not restricted by the mobility of your 'herd'), and are accepted by all major airlines.

I was wondering if anyone on this sub has given this a go, and if so, what were the results? I can imagine your ultralight buddies were impressed by your negligible pack weight haha. Did you run into any problems with law enforcement or a training regime to make you physically dominant enough to overpower your human prey?