...Travel? How Do I Do That?

I did go on that short trip to Sarasota a few months ago, but I haven't really traveled, traveled in the sense of "getting on a plane," since the Hawaii trip in January 2020. Such a long time ago! So much water under the bridge. And now here I go again, I hope I hope, all fingers and toes crossed. (I took a self-test today, just in case, and will probably take another tomorrow: I feel fine, but it seems like a good idea to be sure.)

I used to fly once or twice a year, so two and a half years seems like forever. I would already have forgotten how to pack for it, despite all my lists, and then you add on things like extra masks and covid tests and yikes. How do I do this.

But I've been working on it. As an added challenge, I am trying my hardest to go all-carry-on and not check a bag. It isn't so much the cost of it as the time waiting for bag check and the awful possibility of a checked bag going the wrong way and arriving late if at all, which I have read is happening more frequently these days. I just don't want to chance it, as a five-day trip has very little leeway for such things.

But it does mean getting all my liquid items into one quart-sized bag, which is its own kind of puzzle. And as someone who is naturally prone to the "bring it just in case" school of packing, getting everything into a carry-on size bag is a challenge in itself. Over the weekend, I did a lot of gathering things together, but I don't leave until Friday, so I wasn't going to pack completely, of course. Still, I feel decently prepared. Kind of.

The packing may not be 100% ready, but I myself am completely ready for vacation! Work is just so annoying this week--not that it is intrinsically more annoying, but I am more annoyed by it than usual. It's really hard not to check out.

Two more work days. And then to trot off and leave this one behind:

She will not be amused.