This summer could see travel return to pre-pandemic levels as we Americans swarm out into the unknowns. We\u2019re looking to rediscover the open roads, the open skies, the open cruise ships, and how to go viral by getting attacked while feeding a chipmunk in a national park.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This pent-up travel demand means a lot of people are out of practice, and might need some refreshers on how to make the most of their journeys, or even how to do them. Yes, you will need more than one peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a change of undergarments. Which brings me to today\u2019s topic: Packing! It won\u2019t be enough just to figure out how to out-navigate the hordes of zombie travelers. You also need to out-pack them. So, I\u2019m here to offer friendly travel hacks from research I\u2019ve done and experience I\u2019ve gleaned during my own preparations:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 Be prepared: Amelia Earhart once said, \u201cPreparation \u2026 is rightly two-thirds of any venture.\u201d Unfortunately, she was lost over the Pacific shortly after, so maybe this was a bad quote to use. Instead, I will give you Abraham Lincoln: \u201cGive me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.\u201d This is much better. Except \u2026 who gives someone 6 hours to chop down a tree? And would it really take 4 hours to sharpen that axe? I could do that in 20 minutes. Anyway, the point is made. I would add to this that no matter how much you plan and prepare, you are still bound to forget your underwear or your wife\u2019s suitcase because you thought it wise to sit down and watch a soccer game. Dummy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 Forgetting other peoples\u2019 stuff: When your wife tells you her suitcase is ready and at the top of the stairs, what she means is: It\u2019s ready, it\u2019s upstairs and go get it! This is not just some random knowledge she is dispensing. She\u2019s not just saying this to keep the oxygen flowing in the house. She is communicating that all of her very important stuff is there at the ready for you to bring down. And you would be wise \u2013 VERY wise! \u2013 to stop watching soccer and go up there to get it. Because I can tell you, good friend, it is not a pleasant experience if you forget it, but remember to load your suitcase into the back of the car. It also will not be cheap when you spend the first day of your trip at expensive clothing stores replacing everything YOU left behind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 Packing cubes: Have you heard of these? They\u2019re all the rage now. The square nylon zip-up bags that allow you to supposedly organize and neatly pack more of your clothes that you won\u2019t wear into your suitcase. You are supposed to, again, \u201cneatly\u201d roll up your clothes, thereby preventing wrinkles, as well as making them more compressed and easy to pack. Plus, you can tell all your friends: \u201cI use packing cubes!\u201d The reality, and I suggest you just get-good with this, is: You\u2019re terrible at rolling clothes! You have no idea what this is all about, or how to do it, and when you arrive, your outfits will look like you balled them up and threw them in the hamper. This is OK for one very simple reason: No one else knows how to use packing cubes, either, so their clothes will also look like they\u2019ve been runover by a car. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 Overweight suitcases: If you\u2019re flying, you run the risk of overpacking and missing weight when you go to checkin. Should this happen, my suggestion is not to discretely pull off to the side and begin shifting stuff around. Rather, start yelling that there\u2019s no way your clothes weigh that much because you use \u201cPACKING CUBES!!!\u201d and then start waving your underwear around until the airline employees either relent and let you through \u2026 or call security. Either way, you\u2019ll be on your way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 Odds and ends: This is a really important one. Make sure to pack some things so well that you ensure you will never find them. For instance, a corkscrew. Or your medicine. Or your boarding passes. To do this, you really need to find those hidden compartments in your suitcase, or jam it way down into the parts you never reach. If you do it right, you\u2019ll never find it again. I did that with a flashlight about 10 years ago. I literally just found it while searching for my corkscrew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u2022 Be patient: I throw this in with packing because you need to realize that after all of this hard work, the airline is either going to lose your luggage or you\u2019ll do a shoddy job of strapping it to the roof and it will fly off the minute you hit the interstate. That is, if you don\u2019t forget it at the top of the stairs. But any way you look at it, you\u2019re going to be spending the first day of your trip at a mall buying a whole new wardrobe. So, just relax, go with the flow and remind yourself what Amelia Earhart said \u2026 right before she was lost over the Pacific.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This summer could see travel return to pre-pandemic levels as we Americans swarm out into the unknowns. We\u2019re looking to rediscover the open roads, the open skies, the open cruise ships, and how to go viral by getting attacked while feeding a chipmunk in a national park. <\/p>\n
This pent-up travel demand means a lot of people are out of practice, and might need some refreshers on how to make the most of their journeys, or even how to do them. Yes, you will need more than one peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a change of undergarments. Which brings me to today\u2019s topic: Packing! It won\u2019t be enough just to figure out how to out-navigate the hordes of zombie travelers. You also need to out-pack them. So, I\u2019m here to offer friendly travel hacks from research I\u2019ve done and experience I\u2019ve gleaned during my own preparations: <\/p>\n
\u2022 Be prepared: Amelia Earhart once said, \u201cPreparation \u2026 is rightly two-thirds of any venture.\u201d Unfortunately, she was lost over the Pacific shortly after, so maybe this was a bad quote to use. Instead, I will give you Abraham Lincoln: \u201cGive me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.\u201d This is much better. Except \u2026 who gives someone 6 hours to chop down a tree? And would it really take 4 hours to sharpen that axe? I could do that in 20 minutes. Anyway, the point is made. I would add to this that no matter how much you plan and prepare, you are still bound to forget your underwear or your wife\u2019s suitcase because you thought it wise to sit down and watch a soccer game. Dummy!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[579,561,565],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2022-nutshells","category-family","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2408"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2408\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2409,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2408\/revisions\/2409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}