As a longtime Toten Chip cardholder, I firmly believe that everyone should have a good blade with them at all times1. I recently got a new Gerber single-handed knife. With a 5″ blade, it seemed to be a very useful knife. The only thing I wasn’t really sure about was the initial 2 inches of serration on the blade.

Now you may think that serrated blades are good things. You are wrong. Knife manufacturers only make serrated blades because too many people are too lazy (or incompetent) to keep their knifes properly sharp. If everyone was able to keep their blades in good shape, you’d have a hard time finding a serrated knife.

Alas, that is not the case. It seems like everyone is making serrated blades and it is actually pretty hard to find a nice normal-bladed one-handed knife. So I bought the Gerber knife and hoped that maybe Gerber had found a way to make serrated blades good.

They did not.

A couple of weekends ago we were camping with friends and were getting ready to roast some hot dogs. There is nothing like a real campfire roasted hot dog (a real campfire roasted marshmallow being in a whole different league). While attempting to cut hot dog sticks I discovered that the serrated blade is nearly useless for that simple task. With a good straight-edged knife I would have been able to cut the stick in a single swipe and de-branch it almost as quickly.

That was definitely not the case.

So it is my plea to all of you on the Internet: please learn how to properly keep a blade so that knife manufacturers will start making normal-bladed knives again.

1 – Except on airplanes, courthouses and the like, of course

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