What a wonderful place. I spent last week in and around the Chicago metro area for a training class for work. It's nice knowing you are heading to one of the most dangerous cities in the country, and can't carry your concealed weapon for protection. What a wonderful place.
Since Illinois won't recognize any other state's CHL (Oregon must have taken that idea from their playbook) and won't issue a carry permit to non-residents, you're just completely hosed if you travel there. To top it off, I was travelling light, not checking my bag, which meant no knives or anything else for defense on my person.
So, I did the best I could do, I ordered some cheap blades on Amazon and had them shipped to my hotel - they were waiting for me when I got there. I brought a pocket sharpener and they quickly sharpened up - really sharp, I cut my finger
. Also got a decent, yet inexpensive Stanley pocket tool - all of this shipped, for less than the cost of a checked bag. And, at the end of the trip, I just grabbed a small box and shipped them back to myself. The whole deal was less than the cost of one checked bag. Not a bad alternative, and at least I got to have something on me during my time there.
2 Pack Knives - $4.50 shipped (free on Prime) - really decent quality for the price, better than I expected, and great for the short use I needed them for:
Stanley Multi-Tool - $12.10 shipped (free with Prime) - also pretty darn decent quality and came with a belt pouch:
I was originally just planning to toss them out, but it only cost me $6 to ship them back home. So, there you have it, under $25 to have a usable multi-tool and 2 half-decent knives as some kind of defense when in the Chicago area. And since I wasn't in the physical city of Chicago most of the time, I didn't have to worry about the blade length on the larger knife.
Oh, and it would appear they really only ban one kind of gun in the area - I saw these signs everywhere - they don't say all guns/firearms are prohibited Maybe I would have been okay carrying my M&P - feel free to correct me if I'm wrong (I may be), but isn't that a silhouette of a Beretta 92? The forward curved grip is throwing me a bit:
Since Illinois won't recognize any other state's CHL (Oregon must have taken that idea from their playbook) and won't issue a carry permit to non-residents, you're just completely hosed if you travel there. To top it off, I was travelling light, not checking my bag, which meant no knives or anything else for defense on my person.
So, I did the best I could do, I ordered some cheap blades on Amazon and had them shipped to my hotel - they were waiting for me when I got there. I brought a pocket sharpener and they quickly sharpened up - really sharp, I cut my finger
. Also got a decent, yet inexpensive Stanley pocket tool - all of this shipped, for less than the cost of a checked bag. And, at the end of the trip, I just grabbed a small box and shipped them back to myself. The whole deal was less than the cost of one checked bag. Not a bad alternative, and at least I got to have something on me during my time there.2 Pack Knives - $4.50 shipped (free on Prime) - really decent quality for the price, better than I expected, and great for the short use I needed them for:
Stanley Multi-Tool - $12.10 shipped (free with Prime) - also pretty darn decent quality and came with a belt pouch:
I was originally just planning to toss them out, but it only cost me $6 to ship them back home. So, there you have it, under $25 to have a usable multi-tool and 2 half-decent knives as some kind of defense when in the Chicago area. And since I wasn't in the physical city of Chicago most of the time, I didn't have to worry about the blade length on the larger knife.
Oh, and it would appear they really only ban one kind of gun in the area - I saw these signs everywhere - they don't say all guns/firearms are prohibited
Maybe I would have been okay carrying my M&P - feel free to correct me if I'm wrong (I may be), but isn't that a silhouette of a Beretta 92? The forward curved grip is throwing me a bit:
