Camping Discussion: WIN!

Once in a while shit works out!

A couple weeks ago I wrote Camping Gear Discussion: Restoring Old Friends And Buying Their New Counterparts and followed up with Camping Gear Discussion: Photos & Testing. People get into camp stoves. I even induced Filthie to start a poll.

All this because I was overthinking choices about and subsequently pleased as a peach with my new camp stove:

Ain’t she a beauty? (Yes, I use “ain’t” as a legit word… I can do that because I know it makes me sound like an illiterate troglodyte dipshit and am doing so ironically. That’s how I roll! What bothers me is that my spell checker corrects my placement of the apostrophe in a word that’s, in my humble opinion, not a word. My software simply accepts shit like that! This is like correcting my use of irregardless or former President Bush Jr. asking “is our children learning”. What a dumb world in which we live! Don’t you feel it too? Is it any wonder one of the more popular Squirrels characters is deadly grammarian Edna Kampsett? Spoiler alert, Edna is also known as “The Inspector” and will have another role in due time. Alas, I digress.)

The stove works great and I’ve been randomly brewing coffee in the house with it. Note: using a camp stove in a house is officially a thing that no sane person would recommend. I certainly don’t encourage you to play with fire on your kitchen table. I’m just saying I do it. Just for the record, the ensuing coffee is delicious!

I also whipped up one of these: Jiffy Pop! What a blast from the past! I’ve got an air popper like a civilized human being, but sometimes it’s fun to relive old joys. (Warning, the link goes to a case!  Don’t buy a case unless you want a case. I bought mine locally, not via Amazon.)

I had been planning to build a carry case for the camp stove out of sewer pipe. (Calm down, I’d buy new pipe at the hardware store!) Unfortunately, the stove won’t fit into a perfectly cylindrical object like you’d expect. The pressure pump sticks out on one side. I curse the asymmetry of it!

So I went on E-bay looking for a padded bag to hold for the Coleman 533. (I still have the padded bag for my Coleman 400 and it’s in decent shape. Not bad for a device that’s older than the Millennials that are taking over from Boomers as Gen X like me get skipped over… not that I’m bitter. Oh, did that come out in my outside voice? Whoops.) What I’m saying is that I have camping gear that’s older than the median living human and some of it works fine. There’s also a squarish plastic case that Coleman made back in the day but I’ve got one for my old lantern and I’m unimpressed with the design.

I found a padded bag made by Coleman and fitted to the model stove I have. I clicked on it and the price was $33. Are. You. Fucking. Kidding. Me?

$33 for a sewn bag? E-bay can kiss my ass.

I decided to search elsewhere. Somewhere in the bowels of the internet I got a hint. I tested it out and holy shit it’s awesome! I went to a local store and bought one of these. (Warning, the Amazon link goes to a six pack. Unless you have a half dozen camp stoves or really like Folgers, just buy one. Also I get a tiny kickback every time someone buys from an Amazon link on my blog, now you’ve been warned. Up next, blipverts.)

For reasons known only to the intelligence which created the universe, the “grab handle” on a 30.5 ounce plastic Folgers coffee container are the exact right size to counteract the asymmetry of the pressure pump on an otherwise round device. The height is more or less perfect too. The stove fits so incredibly perfectly that I just can’t get over it.

Just look at it!

If I sat down with a micrometer and attempted to 3d print a better container, I doubt I could do it! It’s a snug fit. Not too tight, not too loose.

The lid is (sadly) just friction fit, bit it fits on just right. There’s very little wasted space. With the lid on, it’s more or less waterproof (certainly just fine for a non-sensitive camp stove). Because it fits snugly, the stove doesn’t rattle around loosely. It’s a match made in heaven. Speaking of which, there’ just enough room in there for a small pack of matches or a small ferro rod sparker. Nice!

It’s not backpacking gear. The stove is a smidge portly and heavy, but it’s pretty good. I’d feel comfortable letting the Folgers protected stove roll around in the truck or sit on a shelf in the garage.

I paid under $9. Also, it came with 39 ounces of free… um… coffee. I suppose, if I were the zombie apocalypse, I could get over my coffee snobbery and actually brew Folgers. (Right now the coffee is in a plastic bag in the freezer and looks exactly like I’m trying to hide a package of cocaine from drug sniffing dogs. Is that a thing or did I just see that in a movie once?)

Anyway, if you ever see a big plastic can of Folgers on the tailgate of a Dodge at a campsite (or in the vicinity of a little Yamaha dirt bike), that’s me.