Slow Morning; Going Old-School for Travel

On work days, my alarm goes off at 6:30, to give this not-a-morning-person time to get up and get moving.

This morning at quarter of five, someone (ahem, the cat) decided to pat me on the arm to get my attention. Unfortunately for me, his claws needed trimming*, and it felt like a fine-gauge needle that hit a nerve in my arm**. The JOLT had me go from 1% awake to flailing and cursing in no time, while he sat there innocently, all puzzled by me. I stayed in bed for a while longer, but never fell back asleep, so I am a zombie today.
*Yeah, that got done today, thank you, ow.
**There was a dot of dried blood on my arm when I looked, so he really did get me.

Meanwhile, back to packing. I got a lot of organizing done over the weekend. My packing list is broken down by what goes in the checked bag, what in the carryon to access on the plane, and what in the carryon but not to access on the plane. I had already started gathering things together last week, but over the weekend, I began to sort out the actual bags and get things where they belong. The packing isn't quite finished, but I'm in a good place.

Side note: Yes, I'm checking a bag. I don't want to live out of a carryon for 10 days, that's not who I am. I know it can be done, like Elisabeth and her family going to Europe for four months with only carry-on bags. Bravo, but not for me.

Something I'm packing for on the plane is these:

• At the top, the dongle that allows the headphones to work with my phone, which doesn't have a jack; I thought about looking into ones that would bluetooth in, but you know what, this is easier, for me, right now. 
• To the left, the headphones themselves. When I was sorting through my messy drawer-full-of-cords (you know what I mean), I found I had multiple sets of headphones.

I used each of them to check the sound on my audiobook on my phone, and the best by far are the oldest ones, the Realistic brand that folds down. The others are doubtless airline-freebie ones, and not meant to be long-lasting, but still. According to Wikipedia, Radio Shack stopped branding Realistic items in 1994, so these things are OLD. But still going strong! And of course they don't fall out of my ears, as the others have been known to do when I make crazy moves like turning my head. I'm not sure if I have usual ear shapes, but I have trouble with such things, which is one of the reasons that I have never gone to wireless ones. When one of those falls out, it's gone! (I mean, I know, not 100%, but I'm not coordinated, I would be fumbling them at the best of times, and if they drop on the floor of the plane? Say goodbye. Ew.)

Anyway, the final item, on the right, is a wee little old-school MP3 player. Do I need to gather the kids around to explain what that is? I loaded a bunch of songs on it, so I can listen to music without apps and ads and all that modern technology. I will probably be multi-tasking on the plane, either knitting and listening to an audiobook, or reading and listening to music. 

One more headphone note: I got an email from JetBlue today with the subject "What to expect on your flight to Boston" and guess what? They're not going to be trying to push more junk headphones on me.

Not a problem for me!