I hear what you're saying about hanging only with sheepdogs, and generally I do, but in both my career and a hobby of mine, I find myself surrounded by scared, angry sheep. And the ideas on field expedients is very worthwhile; I remember one of my first impressions of the lack of student action in their own defense as "nobody could have hurled a chair at this psycho?"
I like to remind people of what kind of damage that can be done simply bare-handed; makes some of them turn white.
The mind is the weapon; the rest is merely tools.