Went out this afternoon and blew an insane amount of money on some new clothes and a pair of prescription sunglasses. Then (while watching the basketball game) I spent the evening trying to figure out how I was going to lug all this stuff around the continent. My rolling backpack thingy is crammed full, and weighs in at over 42 pounds.That's with the laptop, which I really want to take so that I can do classwork, post my photos online as we go, etc. But after picking that danged bag up a few times, I may just reconsider. (Times like these I wish I'd splurged on a teeny-tiny notebook, instead of my standard middle-of-the-road Toshiba.)

I'm actually going to unpack a bit of it to carry on the plane with me (probably the laptop, camera, one change of clothes, etc.), but I'm trying to make sure it will all fit back in when I get there.

I also still have a page-long typed list of things I need to do before I leave -- everything from xeroxing pages out of my textbooks to cleaning the litterbox to writing a paper. And since the first two days of the trip are all travel, I'll have plenty of time to stew about what I forgot to do!