Happy New Year!
Jan. 1st, 2024 09:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
walkitoutGuess what we did over the holidays.
I’ll catch up on blogging over the next few days. I’ve been doing laundry and while I loved a lot of how I packed over this trip, as always, I have some Refinements to Make.
Also, the Jettle arrived, a small electric kettle disguised cleverly as a portable beverage container. It’s pretty awesome, altho thermopen says that when you program it for 158 you get 150; I’ll do some more checking later so I know what I’m getting based on what it is programmed for. If this thing doesn’t die on me, I may be able to have truly excellent pour over coffee and/or black tea while traveling, even if I’m staying in a room that does not supply me with anything genuinely helpful in accomplishing that goal. I’m a little unclear on whether this thing is TSA compliant. I assume it is? But I should probably check.
ETA: According to this, it should be fine:
https://www.tsa.gov/travel/security-screening/whatcanibring/items/tea-kettle
ETAYA:
I spent a ludicrous amount of time today shopping for various things for the next / future trips to WDW and elsewhere. I really liked the Universal Studios 10x10 mini messenger bag as a theme park bag, especially along with the packable backpack which helped with clothing overflow. The messenger bag is big enough for umbrellas and water bottles and has various padded sections. I am really pretty upset about how badly my ancient DVC backpack performed on this trip. The zippers opened up on me and dumped stuff out while in the airport. The water bottles I use now are smaller than the mesh side water bottle holders (which are generously sized for Nalgene type bottles, which I no longer use), so those got dumped out, too. On the good side, there’s no stray metal in the DVC backpack to set off alarms. But dumping the contents of the things in the side compartments AND the main compartment is a bit much. I can adapt to the zipper problem (by leaving the zippers parked all the way to one side) but I don’t particularly want to because I like opening a pack at the top. So I looked at a bunch of options online and then impulsively purchased something Ahsoka themed at Heroes and Villains. We’ll see how that goes. I’m going to aggressively track it this time and complain early if it is slow to arrive. There is no reward for patience when it comes to e-commerce from specialty websites.
Then I spent a ridiculous amount of time Once Again shopping for a main bag. I used an ancient small rolling duffel that I bought probably a decade ago to bring souvenirs home in from WDW. The wheels are not bad, and the bag itself is very light, but the handle is too short; it is uncomfortable to use. I love the bag I bought for A. (travelpro compact carryon hardside I think it’s the Lite or something like that) and I was tempted to buy a duplicate for myself, but in the end, I have ordered a different Travelpro (in imperial purple, instead of orchid purple pink) that is softsided and somewhat lighter. If the specifications are to be believed, it is lighter than A.’s American Tourister underseater, that I have occasionally used and might have used this trip except I found that rolling duffel in basement and decided to try it out. A. is able to manage her own spinner and luggage-sleeve-attached-bag-on-top part of the time; if she’s overwhelmed, she can’t. ETA: If I have a nearly-identical height/behavior luggage setup, I am hoping I can manage both without stress (other than on escalators, but if A. is having a meltdown, I could just do elevators with her). The rolling duffel plus A.’s stack have a big enough height difference that it is a problem.
If the Imperial Purple does not come back into stock, I will probably buy the same bag in a different color; the style I picked has the magnatrac wheels and I kinda want to try those out and see if they are actually different.
ETA:
In addition to backpack / main bag shopping, I also ordered a couple of knock-off bandolier style phone holders. This is really -specifically- for UO, because they really want all your crap in the locker and then not having your phone while in line is a problem, and A. worries (correctly) about phone in shorts pocket falling out on the ride. I have a travel vest with zip pockets that fixes this mostly, but I fucking hate the vest, because I bought the lightest scottevest, it has too many of the wrong type of pockets, I don’t like the color (because it shows dirt very quickly), I tend to put it on inside out and then not understand why the pockets are in the wrong spot, and it is the wrong size, because while scottevest makes many of their vests in a really wide range, this particular one they do not. Obviously, the entire shopping day started with trying to fix _this_ problem, but I will not know if I succeeded until the vest I ordered arrives (far fewer pockets, a much prettier color, probably slightly too big if anything, _which is good_ in a layering piece) and if that vest does not work I am very uncertain what my second choice vest would be (I do not really want to pay scottevest prices for the men’s version of the lightweight vest because that won’t fix any of the myriad problems I have with it other than size and honestly might not fix the size problem either).
I also ran across some bonne maman single serve squeezers in a reasonable quantity, so I ordered those. I did the GG order for the next trip. I ordered some replacement slides for ones that are quite worn, and a new pair of Propets for A.
Finally, and honestly, I’m still not sure entirely why, I decided that as long as I am fixing every other problem associated with packing for complicated travel, I might as well fix the Purse for Going Out to Dinner Problem. I checked Nordstrom’s for what the current Look is, and learned a new word: Minaudiere. I am not packing a Minaudiere. Come on. So I gave up on any current Look, and went for, floppy and soft for maximum packability, with extra consideration given to any solution that is supposed to wrinkle on the theory that will camouflage packing related wrinkles. And that’s how I learned about Japanese Knot Bags. I got a really pretty one that had a color name of “Brown”, but it looks lustrously bronze to me; we’ll see what it’s like in real life when it arrives.
I’ll catch up on blogging over the next few days. I’ve been doing laundry and while I loved a lot of how I packed over this trip, as always, I have some Refinements to Make.
Also, the Jettle arrived, a small electric kettle disguised cleverly as a portable beverage container. It’s pretty awesome, altho thermopen says that when you program it for 158 you get 150; I’ll do some more checking later so I know what I’m getting based on what it is programmed for. If this thing doesn’t die on me, I may be able to have truly excellent pour over coffee and/or black tea while traveling, even if I’m staying in a room that does not supply me with anything genuinely helpful in accomplishing that goal. I’m a little unclear on whether this thing is TSA compliant. I assume it is? But I should probably check.
ETA: According to this, it should be fine:
https://www.tsa.gov/travel/security-screening/whatcanibring/items/tea-kettle
ETAYA:
I spent a ludicrous amount of time today shopping for various things for the next / future trips to WDW and elsewhere. I really liked the Universal Studios 10x10 mini messenger bag as a theme park bag, especially along with the packable backpack which helped with clothing overflow. The messenger bag is big enough for umbrellas and water bottles and has various padded sections. I am really pretty upset about how badly my ancient DVC backpack performed on this trip. The zippers opened up on me and dumped stuff out while in the airport. The water bottles I use now are smaller than the mesh side water bottle holders (which are generously sized for Nalgene type bottles, which I no longer use), so those got dumped out, too. On the good side, there’s no stray metal in the DVC backpack to set off alarms. But dumping the contents of the things in the side compartments AND the main compartment is a bit much. I can adapt to the zipper problem (by leaving the zippers parked all the way to one side) but I don’t particularly want to because I like opening a pack at the top. So I looked at a bunch of options online and then impulsively purchased something Ahsoka themed at Heroes and Villains. We’ll see how that goes. I’m going to aggressively track it this time and complain early if it is slow to arrive. There is no reward for patience when it comes to e-commerce from specialty websites.
Then I spent a ridiculous amount of time Once Again shopping for a main bag. I used an ancient small rolling duffel that I bought probably a decade ago to bring souvenirs home in from WDW. The wheels are not bad, and the bag itself is very light, but the handle is too short; it is uncomfortable to use. I love the bag I bought for A. (travelpro compact carryon hardside I think it’s the Lite or something like that) and I was tempted to buy a duplicate for myself, but in the end, I have ordered a different Travelpro (in imperial purple, instead of orchid purple pink) that is softsided and somewhat lighter. If the specifications are to be believed, it is lighter than A.’s American Tourister underseater, that I have occasionally used and might have used this trip except I found that rolling duffel in basement and decided to try it out. A. is able to manage her own spinner and luggage-sleeve-attached-bag-on-top part of the time; if she’s overwhelmed, she can’t. ETA: If I have a nearly-identical height/behavior luggage setup, I am hoping I can manage both without stress (other than on escalators, but if A. is having a meltdown, I could just do elevators with her). The rolling duffel plus A.’s stack have a big enough height difference that it is a problem.
If the Imperial Purple does not come back into stock, I will probably buy the same bag in a different color; the style I picked has the magnatrac wheels and I kinda want to try those out and see if they are actually different.
ETA:
In addition to backpack / main bag shopping, I also ordered a couple of knock-off bandolier style phone holders. This is really -specifically- for UO, because they really want all your crap in the locker and then not having your phone while in line is a problem, and A. worries (correctly) about phone in shorts pocket falling out on the ride. I have a travel vest with zip pockets that fixes this mostly, but I fucking hate the vest, because I bought the lightest scottevest, it has too many of the wrong type of pockets, I don’t like the color (because it shows dirt very quickly), I tend to put it on inside out and then not understand why the pockets are in the wrong spot, and it is the wrong size, because while scottevest makes many of their vests in a really wide range, this particular one they do not. Obviously, the entire shopping day started with trying to fix _this_ problem, but I will not know if I succeeded until the vest I ordered arrives (far fewer pockets, a much prettier color, probably slightly too big if anything, _which is good_ in a layering piece) and if that vest does not work I am very uncertain what my second choice vest would be (I do not really want to pay scottevest prices for the men’s version of the lightweight vest because that won’t fix any of the myriad problems I have with it other than size and honestly might not fix the size problem either).
I also ran across some bonne maman single serve squeezers in a reasonable quantity, so I ordered those. I did the GG order for the next trip. I ordered some replacement slides for ones that are quite worn, and a new pair of Propets for A.
Finally, and honestly, I’m still not sure entirely why, I decided that as long as I am fixing every other problem associated with packing for complicated travel, I might as well fix the Purse for Going Out to Dinner Problem. I checked Nordstrom’s for what the current Look is, and learned a new word: Minaudiere. I am not packing a Minaudiere. Come on. So I gave up on any current Look, and went for, floppy and soft for maximum packability, with extra consideration given to any solution that is supposed to wrinkle on the theory that will camouflage packing related wrinkles. And that’s how I learned about Japanese Knot Bags. I got a really pretty one that had a color name of “Brown”, but it looks lustrously bronze to me; we’ll see what it’s like in real life when it arrives.