People stock blades and neglect the dull hazards: broken glass in the dark, hot cookware, a walk for water in bad shoes. Leather gloves, a real pair of boots, and a couple of rigid water containers will get more use than a trunk of tactical accessories.

Glass is what a blackout puts on the floor. A picture frame, a jar, a window that was already cracked. Gloves you can work in let you pick it up. Boots with a sole you trust let you walk through it. Sandals and another knife are a costume for a different problem.

A wagon or a backpack that can carry water without cutting your hands changes how far the household can live from a distribution point. Test the weight. Four gallons is thirty-plus pounds.

Rigid containers matter because soft ones split and are miserable to carry once they slosh. Two smaller jugs beat one container you cannot lift into the wagon. Walk the route you think you would walk, on a normal day, with the weight in it. The distance that looks fine empty looks different with water, and you would rather learn that in shoes that are already broken in.

First aid for this event is mostly wounds, burns, and diarrhea, plus the medications you already take. Pack to that list.

Wounds from glass and metal, burns from improvised cooking and hot water, diarrhea from the sanitation problem you hoped to skip. Add the prescriptions and the ordinary medicines you already know you use. A kit built for a cinematic emergency, and not for a cut, a blister, and a stomach, will sit unused next to the injury you actually have.

Blisters belong on the list because water has to be carried and the block has to be walked. Tape and a spare pair of socks will do more on the second day than another tool you do not know how to use. Pack the dull things where you can find them without unpacking the drama.