What's in your bag today?

I'm starting to fancy you Drom-
Verde que te quiero verde

Craven, you're exactly the sort of person who ends up needing my all-purpose hand bag. You may think that you have no use for a packet of salt or a shoe lace but one day you will, and I wont be there. I wont be there with my trusty scissors when you need to cut your way out a tricky situation and I wont be there with my fold away spoon when you find yourself with no way to eat your lunch but with your fingers.

I pity the world that does not have access to my hand bag.

Nah, I need free hands more.



I could buy them... wear slip-ons...



What's wrong with eating with your fingers? Heck, when my breakfast yogurt got delivered with no spoon I just made one out of the foil.



You've made a case for a small swiss-army knife, but not a bag...

I was and still am drawn to Craven's mode, but y'know I kept having my tiny less than wallet be in the other jacket, the other pockets.

Ah, I think for me it depends on my need for mobility. My present daily life is from work and back, a matter of blocks and some hauling. Camera, for example. I use my camera for both work and personal reasons. Work being sort of personal in my case. Thus a lot of truckin'.

If I am urban walking, I walk pretty free of stuff. If I go to work, I carry some baggage. If I am traveling to San Francisco, my car is loaded with goodies to read and write with and sounds to hear. If I can get on a plane to a far off place, I go spare.

Drom, you are moving around for an approximate year, and you are doing it with eight sachetti? (I almost named Pacco: Sacco.) I have envisioned your logistics a bit before now, admiring your cool for not even mentioning the transport dilemmas, but curious minds want to know how you deal with it all.........

I tried the Swiss Army knife for a while, but people were just too threatened by it (then again that may have been because of my then habit of dressing all in black with various frightening images graven in metal hanging about my person, or maybe it was just the big spiked cuffs that my best friend was wearing as she stood next to me).

No, I won't try that again, Debra. I still can't see out of my left eye after that silver dollar found its way to the center. I gave up sneaking up on women in phone booths and uzipping their dresses.

As a matter of fact, shortly after that incident was when I first began to experiment in bestiality.

Animals don't carry friggin' rolls of coin.

I haven't been hurt since. ( Well, emotionally maybe, but not physically)

Really? I heard those goats have quite a kick!

They kick, but the impact of their hooves is inexplicably soothing.

baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!

So, Gus, you carry a backpack?

Craven's got the right idea. The less **** I have to carry around with me, the better.

That's one of the minor inconveniences of living in New York. Without a car, you actually have to carry whatever crap you need all the time. No back seat to toss it into.

I like to travel light, too. When I go walking I don't have a bag... I have pockets. In those go a couple of tissues, my car key, my cell phone and leashes for the dogs. I usually come home with several rocks and shells that I've found on the beach.

I wish women's clothes were equipped with better pockets. Travelsmith and REI are the only companies that regularly sell clothes for women with servicable pockets.

I very rarely carry a bag. I keep whatever I need on my person, in my pockets.

This includes:

A wallet, which contains not only my junk, but my mothers'.

Tissues

A lipstick

a chapstick

My car keys

My house keys

I also keep my cell phone anchored to my waist (or whatever's left of it!)

I used to carry huge handbags, which got to be more and more ridiculous as time went on. I carried everything but the kitchen sink. Over the years, my back has suffered from this practice, so now I take only the essentials. In fact, when I try on clothes, I put my wallet in the pocket, just to see if it will fit. Manufacturers are very chintzy when it comes to pockets on women's clothing.

(Oh, so you thought that I looked a tad hippy, huh! )

Oh my! This was scary:

- wallet
- spare glasses
- spare sunglasses
-Qantas boarding passes
- box from Earplane pressure equalizing ear plugs (couldn't find the plugs themselves on the last flight - and my ears still hurt. They WORK!!!)
- analgaesics
- book of cinema free vouchers I got for my birthday - virginal as yet
- teeth cleaning gum
- cheque book
- anti-allergy tablets and drops
- funny make-up mirror with blue neon light on opening a friend brought back for me from Barcelona (I ASKED for a Gaudi building - sigh)
- comb
- the damn Earplane ear plugs I couldn't find yesterday, hunt as I might! Grrrrr
- 8 pens and pencils
- miscellaneous scraps of paper with telephone numbers on them, or receipts, or just rubbish
- tissues
- peppermint lifesavers
- perfume (Black Cashmere by Donnakaran - a gift, I assure you)
- an unpaid parking ticket (!!!!!!!)
- Book - "The Court of the Red Tsar" (fabulous Stalin biography)
- a torch
- mobile phone (in an old galsses case, which it fits into perfectly)

I cleaned it out before I went away, as you can clearly see!

I am absolutely serious.

Mine is a fabulous black leather bag, which can be worn as a back-back sort of thing - I love it, and do not use the lovely new one which was given to me for the birthday before the one before last (except I use the new one when I am going to see the friend who gave it to me). It is terribly worn, and I am going to have to surrender it soon - sigh - but I will have to buy a new back-packy one, since I walk a lot of kilometres with the thing, and also I have to have my hands free. It is a menace when I swing it over my shoulders to put it on my back - but long practice has made the manouvre safer than it looks.

It can accommodate my large work diary, and is used constantly by the damn men who are too proud to carry any kind of bag, to store their stuff in when I am walking with them - and when they buy stuff. Grrrrrrrr.

I believe I could use it as a defensive weapon, but this has fortunately not been tested as yet.

Piffka - when I walk for exercise, I only carry keys - and occasionally a little paper money tucked somewhere - not visible - no use being a target.

(Hee hee, damn men... to proud to carry any kind of bag...)

I'm still wondering about Drom's eight bags.

Dlowan -- teeth-cleaning gum? Am I totally out of it?... don't answer.... I've never heard of that. (But I want some.)

Ever since the dogs came into my life, I can't go anywhere without a bag. Today, when we went to the beach I had my regular little knapsack with keys, and papers and cell phone and flashlight and stuff - then my normal dog-walking waist pouch, with poop bags, a water cup for the dogs, and the dog-walking emergency money - then a tote bag with a bottle of water for the dogs, half a bottle of Ting for me, some Eukanuba treats and rawhide sticks, a towel for Cleo, a thermal mug that I'd transferred my Coffee Time tea into, and an apple fritter to share with the dogs after Cleo's swim. I was feeling rather encumbered - but I used everything in the waist pouch and the tote bag, other than the emergency money.

Hmm, piffka, Dentyne was (is?) supposed to clean your teeth..

ehBeth, that's the kind of bag I wouldn't mind carrying. Your dogs sound very much loved.

Roughly half the chewing gums on the market here these days seem to procalaim some miraculous tooth whitening power. I like the Extra sugarless variety.

'K. Thanks, Ladies... I am[/b] out of it! I was thinking this was some kind of Australian gum... maybe made with Tea Tree Oil.

Deb -- Do you carry a cell phone, too? I like to carry mine when I'm walking for exercise as I'm often in fairly deserted areas.