Ordinarily, I wear the same black light all year jacket that I’ve worn for so many years… I was already wearing it in photos 17 years ago. After so many years, it’s gotten a bit thinner and worn in places that I’ve worried someday it’ll fall apart. But it’s fit that sweet spot of a coat that is light enough to wear when it’s chilly outside and warm enough that when it’s insufficient: switching to thermal shirts or multiple layers is both a solution and recommended anyway, lol. Like my hat, it handles wind and rain well enough that I rarely need an umbrella. Actually, I’ve rarely used an umbrella or a dedicated raincoat for at least a decade now because my jacket is close enough for 70% of my rainy weather needs not just keeping warm. I love my jacket because it made a pretty effective wind breaker in its youth and remains an all year ’round coat.
When it gets really cold and windy during the winter it’s layer duty. Typically, I will add a heavy-duty fleece and a scarf that I’m pretty sure is a few decades older than I am. The over the head fleece is bothersome and ineffective against water, but as a second layer over my regular jacket it works damn well until the wind warrants thermal underwear.
The other day, Amazon’s prime deal of the day just happened to be Wantdo Men’s Waterproof 3 in 1 Ski Jacket Warm Winter Coat Windproof Snowboarding Jackets with Detachable Puffer Coat for about 20% off its current pricing. It aligns well enough with what I’ve been thinking of in a new coat for several years, and priced as “Yeah, let’s give it a shot” while the sale lasts.
So far, this is looking to be a success!
Material wise it seems like it should handle water slightly better than my old jacket; certainly, no worse. Especially given that by wearing it since circa high school: my normal jacket isn’t getting any thicker or more water resistant with age. The removable “Puffer” liner looks like on its own and zipped into the main jacket, should replace use cases where I either switch to heavy-duty fleece or wear it over my old jacket. The change from a mesh lining to warm and cozy might make it less all-year wear than my old coat, but we’ll see.
Kind of happy to see that the zippers are far from the weakest point. My old jacket, shall we say fits in that gap between decent zippers either last almost forever or make you wonder about the value of replacing them. Not sure if the various draw string pieces will hold up any better than my old jacket, but I can live with that.
A sweet boon is that the cuffs are fitted with Velcro tabs that can be used to batten down the cuffs. I’ve been stuck for years having to make do with gloves and mittens as the only pseudo-work-around when it gets windy as **** out. That the hood zips to the back of the neck and Veclros under the collar bands is nice. Typically, I’ll prefer my Boonie hat to wearing my old jacket’s hood because of superior range of head movement. Except when it is brutally cold in which case I’m putting the hood up, hat on, and wrapping a scarf around the hood, lol. So mostly, it just serves as something to snag on or tell which end of the jacket is which, or an aide for the rare days when I forget my hat and it starts to rain.
Something that remains to be seen is whether or not the pockets will be kickass or useless. My old jacket’s pockets are good enough for storing gloves or snot rags but aren’t safe for things like my phone that don’t take kindly to bouncing off concrete nor reliable for holding things that you can’t have fallen out unnoticed. The zip shut pockets are both deeper than my old jackets, ideal for keeping the free hand warm while walking the dogs. Plus, the zipped breast pocket would be a good way to store my phone for such occasions because my BDU trousers aren’t very convenient for that.
All in all, not the worst ~$66 bucks I’ve ever spent.