Trials and Tribulations of cycling

I was in good condition end of October after a late Mallorcan break with bike but colds and almost continual rain kept me mostly off the velo right up to year end. I've been trying to get things back on track but now it's ice and snow out there. However last week a seemingly inocuous mechanical grew out of all reasonable portion. Comingn up the hill into Abberley, by the Manor Arms there was a small 'click' sound and moments later everything came to a stop. The chain, a few months old and kept regularly cleaned and lubricated, had lost a small part of one link allowing it to open ever so slightly. It then jammed itno the rear mech bringing things to a sudden stop. My first thought was to pop out the link and stick in the spare connecting one I carry - unfortunately my link extractor was not in the winter bike 'spares' bag, but still in the one on my road bike back home. OK, I'll ring Mary and get her to come out from work and transport me and bike back to Cross Bank - BUT, for the first or second time only I had left without my mobile, so it was a trudge along the road for half a mile to a house and there I was able to use a phone. Later on and back home I removed the broken chain and saw that the rear mech hanger, made in alloy, was broken, so I drove down to Echelon in Pershore where I got the bike from a few years back and Tim kindly supplied me with a new hanger off a stock bike, plus a new chain. I picked up some winter socks too, and so the trip in total cost me around £50. The next day I fitted the new parts but found the rear mech not tensioning the chain correctly and on a VERY close examination found that a wee metal stop on the mech had also been broken off the rest of the body, so I had to order on line the cheapest equivalent I could find (Parker Int) which was another £55. Yesterday I was back on my winter bike, all now fixed, bank balance suitably reduced.
These new 9,10,11 speed blocks are all well and good, but the fact they use increasingly narrow chains seems to be causing a number of problems - I would hate to have a super slim chain break when out of the saddle whilst climbing hard, or in the midst of a bunch sprint.