Of course I check my gear before going out, but when I'm gone from home for several weeks at a time doing back-to-back trips, things can and do happen. I actually use the pliers on my little 1.9 oz. multi-tool a lot. I don't have much gripping strength in the ends of my fingers, so every time I want to adjust a pack strap I need the pliers to grip the strap end when I'm trying to thread it through a buckle. I also use the pliers as a pot grip for my cooking pot. The order in which I use my multitool "blades" is: (1) pliers, (2) scissors, (3) file (for my perpetually splitting fingernails), (4) screwdriver for prying things and (5) very much last, the knife blade.

The worst injury I've ever seen while in the backcountry was when my father got kicked in the arm by a horse when I was 9. The arm turned out not to be broken, but he had a nasty puncture wound from the horseshoe caulk. Otherwise it has been blisters, slivers, small cuts (especially hangnails for me), a very minor burn or two, the occasional scrape. Now that I've given up boots for trail runners, I haven't needed the blister stuff any more, so I take a lot less than I used to.

Yes, we do tend to prepare for the last emergency, which is probably why I carry that little self-adhesive silnylon patch! On the other hand, if the emergency has happened several times (busted zipper or popped off buttons), those safety pins are a good idea. In the meantime, the safety pins work great as clothespins. Of course if the popped-off button can be found, it gets sewn back on with my dental floss.

Then there was the time I tried using duct tape to mend a rip in the seat of my pants. That was on a dayhike, and while I had the needle (in my first aid) I didn't have thread or dental floss. Yes, it worked, but on the way back to the trailhead the duct tape gradually unstuck itself from the fabric and stuck to my skin instead! That was a painful enough experience that I stuck a length of thread in my dayhiking first aid kit!