Do I carry a knife?
Since I was 8 years old, I haven't been without a pocket knife more than a few days. The first couple were three dollar Barlows from the local Five & Dime store. Picked up a Puma folder while in the service in Germany.
For the past 25 years, until last August, I have carried a Buck Titanium. Then I switched to a Leatherman Wave, (I am a contractor/Handyman, and it is fabulous as a belt carried toolbox). Actually carried both for about a month, then decided the Wave was good enough alone.
Somebody once asked me at church why I always carry a knife. I looked at them, and asked how they could get through life without one handy. You can open some locked doors and windows, clean or cut your nails, remove a splinter, open a can of paint or soup, cut your duct tape, trim a door, lever up a sheet of plywood, skin a boar, peel an orange or apple, carve a cane, chisel ice, open mail, open the top of a washing machine, the list just goes on and on.
On occasion I do carry smaller knives, I have a Kershaw from Snap-on like a miniature Buck 110 that is a pocket favorite, an actual three blade Swiss Army Knife with tweezers and tooth pick. And in my Red Cross bag a six dollar knife with a marlin spike for working rope, and one of those locking folders that uses utility knife blades.
My larger hunting knife was made by myself from a chain saw bar ruined by ash from Mt. St. Helens.
Flying in airports is without any longer, but there are rules around that. Online rules
sometimes allow for a plastic knife during a flight, so I make sure to have one. I also carry a print out of the rule page, which is something they recommend in the same rules. That way, if the TSA agent is dense, you can show them the rule allowing the item.
BTW, Disneyland is now forbidding belt pouche knives, and won't let you in with it. So I remove the pouch, and stick the folder in my pocket. They aren't frisking you, yet.
It may sound odd, but my way of thought is that anywhere that forbids a pocket knife is all the more reason to have it.
So, you didn't say, what do you carry?
First Big Foot
REMEMBER:
FOR THE PROPERLY PREPARED, DISASTER MAY BE MERE INCONVENIENCE.