Vacation tidbits

I've now been on 3 kinds of trips in the past few weeks- one to a nice hotel in Cambridge, one to a super fancy hotel in Paris, and now in a rental house in Lake Placid. As we've gone along I've been assembling a kind of shadow packing list as we've gone along and I'll share it with you here.

It is impossible to pack too much underwear. It doesn't weigh much or take up much room, and having the freedom to change whenever you want for whatever reason is very freeing. Socks are small and light too but you can re-wear socks if necessary.

Hotel rooms are funny things, bedrooms and bathrooms and dens all rolled into one, and require a peculiar set of supplemental objects. For me, the most important thing is a spoon. I take a fiber supplement that needs to be stirred into water and unless you have really long fingers you'll need something to stir with. Informal hotel might let you take a spoon from the coffee shop, but the nicer the hotel, the less likely that is. And if you're like me and prefer having some cereal for breakfast instead of a $10.95 continental breakfast, you'll need both spoons and bowls. Other handy items include plastic bags and a power strip if you have a typical assortment of electronics. And if you like watching TV from anywhere except the bed or the desk, bring a comfortable chair, a surprisingly rare item in hotel rooms.

Staying in someone else's house is a convenient thing to do if you're going to be staying someplace for a while. I've done it a bunch of times and it's pretty consistent what you'll need to bring.

Most of the items are kitchen-related, but many houses, oddly enough, even houses up here in the Adirondacks, do not have throw blankets (is that last sentence punctuated correctly?). I find this odd because even during the summer it gets quite cool in the evening in may places. You would also be smart to bring WD-40. I've never been in one of these places that didn't have at least one creaky door.

For the kitchen, first of all you must bring a sharp knife. I forgot this time and lucked out, because I found the one sharp knife out of the 25 assorted knife-like things in the drawer, so I use it for everything. Other kitchen utensils you should bring are a vegetable peeler, an ice cream scoop (if you have a good one) and a cheese slicer.

Foodwise, all you can count on in one of these places is salt and pepper. Rental houses do seem to accumulate a surprising variety of non-perishables. This place has several boxes of sugar, many, many teabags, 5 different kinds of vinegar, 3 jars of honey and several dozen barely used spice jars. All I can say here is do a thorough search before you go to the market. Nothing more frustrating than buying flour when the people from the following week left and unused package in the pantry.