First of all, just in case you haven't been paying attention here on the blog, let me tell you that I've been doing a good deal of traveling recently.
In fact I'm heading out of town again for a two night trip next Monday.
Doing the math, it seems that I will have been away from my yard and my bed for half of the past month come next Wednesday.
And by passing through Ohio on my way to Maryland on Monday for a plant visit, then coming back through Charlotte on my way back to the Turbo Pup Compound here in Eastern Tennessee on the banks of the Mighty Tennessee River, I'll have seen parts of eight different states in the past month on the calendar.
In the mean time, I've purchased two pieces of luggage to support my jet-setting endeavors, a new folding/rolling garment bag intended to get part of my infrequently used collection of Joseph A Bank suits onto and off of an airplane at some remote destination, and...
Taa Daaaaa....
I also bought a new rolling computer bag to handle the old
I swear I was going to have a bad case of self induced scoliosis and look like the hunchback of Notre Dame if I kept up another five years of dragging that old machine around in airports and into hotel rooms with me without some wheels to take the weight off of my shoulders and spine.
Now add to that the requirement that I drag around a complete electronic technicians' tool kit including a fancy multi meter and an assortment of pliers and cutters and screwdrivers of various shapes and forms and fashions and well...you get my drift.
Come to think of it, since this trip is the first one I've made with my new and improved tool assortment, I guess I should check the TSA website and see what they limit....
....wait...
OK, as long as none of my tools are over 7 inches long I'm good to go.
Any way, back to the new luggage purchases, I'd like to ask if someone could please start a website and write articles explaining to me what half of the crap they give you in and on new luggage actually does or is intended to do?
Apparently someone has spent a great deal of time putting pockets and clips and straps and other doo-dads in this stuff I just bought, but unfortunately I have absolutely no idea what to do with half of the stuff.
I guess I can make things up as I go along, and through trial and error I guess that I can probably haul an additional 25 or thirty pounds of crap with me if I manage to actually find things laying around my bedroom and office which will fit in a little pouch 4 inches square by one half inch deep or in those odd shaped triangular pockets in the corners.
I also guess I need to find some bright colored scrap of ribbon to put on everything so I can find the stuff I've put in checked baggage when it comes back out on the conveyor because all of my new baggage is a lovely color of black...just like 97.3% of the other luggage you see that doesn't have duct tape holding the Velcro flaps closed at the airport.
Oh...I almost forgot...this trip involves a run from Baltimore up half way to Philadelphia on Amtrak...a government study in the inefficient usage of taxpayer dollars to move a few commuters around without burning foreign oil in a car.
THAT should be interesting, since according to their schedule it takes a train passenger over two days to go from Atlanta to Miami.
I know, because I tried to buy a ticket to do that once before and since it cost almost the same as a one and one half hour plane flight I just opted to drive for a quarter of the price and do the trip in a half day.
I hope only covering about 35 miles between the airport and Aberdeen will be uneventful and cost me less than half a day.
Then again, if the bloggin' is light next week and you end up missing me...someone notify the authorities or at least send up a flare...
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