The Flashlight Super Bowl
Tomorrow is Halloween. Halloween is one of best holidays of the year and huge deal in my house because my youngest son declared himself “the King of Halloween, a true Halloweener” last year, unaware of the play on words. Of course his older brother instantly let him know, but he now wears it as a badge of honor.
Halloween is also great because it is one of the few times of year EVERYONE is using a flashlight. As you wander from house to house, begging for candy, the way forward is lit by a flashlight. There are quite a few plastic tube lights and a few people bust out a Mag. There are a bevy of $1 Black Friday lights too. And they all do okay, throwing out blobby spot-filled beams that may or may not reach the end of a short driveway.
Then there is us, those of us that belong to the Church of Illumination and worship at the Altar of Photons. We are equipped with comparative howitzers when stacked up against the metaphorical BB guns everyone else is sporting.
For many years now my go to light has been the HDS Rotary. Year after year for the better part of a decade this was my torch of choice for the BIG NIGHT. Its balance of throw and spot coupled with its durability and insane ease of use, makes it an obvious choice. It also happens to not be so small that you will get carpal tunnel should you use and carry for longer than five minutes.
But this year there is a new King of Halloween Flashlights—the Fraz Labs Tiny Nugget. It is a bit smaller and a bit brighter, just as tough and, if possible, easier to use. Plus, it is in for review, so, you know, I have to bust it out. The other light that will definitely follow us on our candy-fueled peregrinations is the also-in-for-review FourSevens MXS. This torch is a heavy hitter and I am really looking forward to lighting up a house, a street, a neighborhood, and part of Metropolis with this thing.
For the boys, I am going to give them small, easy to use lights like the Lumintop FWAA (it is now easy to use given the much-superior Anduril 2 UI). The FourSeven Minis (I own both varieties) are also coming along. In all, I should have five torches with me because, well, this is the only time of year that us flashoholics can plan to flex on the rest of the lumen agnostic population.
All of this planning and carry is worth it, of course, when you hear one of three comments:
Kid: Dad, look that guy’s flashlight!
Wife: Honey, why is his flashlight so much brighter than yours? (no one seriously denies the phallic nature of flashlights, right?)
Dad: Geez, buddy, where did you get that thing?
Enjoy the Super Bowl of Flashlights. And watch out for spooky goblins.
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