I watched “Up in the Air” recently (the George Clooney movie), and loved it. For those who haven’t seen it, it describes the life of a businessman who has lived a life in airports, aeroplanes, and hotels so much that he has almost become divorced from the conventional world.
I was able to draw parallels with the time I worked in London, and commuted for 4 hours each day (2 hours each way). Although people recoil in horror when I tell them about it, I do kind of miss it. You get used to your routine very quickly - hanging clothes in the same place, walking across train platforms to a specific place, taking certain stairways.
You learn to be efficient. You get on an underground train at the right place to meet the foot of a flight of stairs several miles away when you get off. You have swipe cards in your hand as you approach barriers. You don’t use a trolley style bag (and you curse the people with them).
While thinking about the journey, and the things I carried, I am gazing idly across the desk here in the hotel - subconsciously counting the things I have with me.
An ASUS EEE Netbook, several years old now, but still working wonderfully, and I’m loath to retire it. It runs Ubuntu Linux, and just works. I’m writing this on it, I watch movies on it, I catch up with the children via Skype on it… it does everything and is small enough to throw in a backpack without making too much difference.
An iPod Shuffle, connected to small Sony headphones that hang from your ear rather than any in-ear design. When sat on trains, or studying in hotel rooms, it’s perfect to block out distracting noises.
A “City” Filofax, scribbled throughout with notes, calendar dates, etc. It started out as a bit of an experiment - to see if I would have any use for a paper based diary, and it’s become a Google Calendar backup of sorts.
A Blackberry Curve mobile phone - not as good as an iPhone, or one of the new Androids, but does what I need very well - I can even call people on it! I use the camera far more than I should - it’s not the best. It reminds me - via Google Calendar - to get up on a morning, to put the dustbins out at home, to renew domain names, and any number of other mundane tasks. I also copy podcasts onto it before long journeys to amuse myself along the way.
A Moleskine notebook - the closest I get to a real diary. It has the recorded thoughts that I dare not share on a blog - moments of anger, annoyance, disbelief, and incredulity recorded for the future entertainment of children and grandchildren to see what was really going through my head.
A USB flash drive, bought from Amazon several years ago, and attached to my keys to transport large files around the place. It also holds a heavily encrypted set of passwords that I dare not trust to DropBox, which has otherwise superseded it in day-to-day use.
That’s about it. Sure, there is other flotsam and jetsam in the bag, but nothing worth really mentioning. These are the main things that travel with me - that get put into any bag by choice.
So - it begs the question - what do you carry? Why not write it up, and link to your post in a comment ?