Well it has finally come around for my turn on the “Whats in my Bag” game. I have to say I was really nervous about this, as I have read all the other posts for this little project, and I thought “I don’t have anything cool in my bag at all”. Everyone has computers, smart phones, nice head phones, and big fat hard drives. I have some of those things – they just don’t live in my bag. In comparison to my comrades here at Big Shiny Robot! my bag is pretty boring!

I am a girl – so I own many bags, and I change them out according to situation and what I can expect to need to carry. But this article features my current every day bag. While it looks more messenger style – it is basically a purse. A common off brand fake leather fashion purse I picked up on sale at a local shop (you are bored to tears already I can tell). I was really surprised though when I emptied out its many zippered pockets and primary pouch how much stuff I have been hauling around with me of late.

Starting Top Left and moving clockwise is firstly my sticker covered sketchbook. I have been drawing since I was 5 and carrying a sketchbook on me regularly since high school. I have not drawn as much of late as I would like to (the internet being the main villain in that plot) but I still carry it with me most of the time. The “Save the Trolls!” stickers are from the “Secret Device” ARG from Hellboy 2: The Golden Army. There is also a sticker with the logo for deltorofilms.com, a coffee company, a Radiohead “in Rainbows” sticker, a bunch of Threadless.com stickers (which they send you when you order stuff), and on the back which is not shown are a bunch of mimobot stickers. All of which I am enamoured of.

Top and Center is the book I am currently reading You Are Not a Gadget By Jaron Lanier. I bought this a while ago and am just getting to reading it. So far it is proving to be good brain food. Just below the book on the right are my collection of lip products which I will just skip talking about because it would bore you to death…. Then center it is a “safety matches” tin that I use to hold my gum eraser and extra automatic pencil refills. Left is my handy dandy on-the-go collection of Pilot V5 extra fine pens, a regular Sharpie, Sakura brush pens, a Copic two sided marker, and an automatic pencil. It wouldn’t make much sense to have the sketch book and nothing to sketch with.

Top Right is a stack of comics I have picked up of late and have been reading and rereading. I am really loving the most recent Chris Bachalo illustrated X-Men run with Spider-man. Other titles in the stack are the recent Mark Millar run of Avenger’s, Age of X story arch titles, and Amazing Spider-man. Then Top Right and Lower you have a note book also bedecked in stickers. I always like to have a note book because I always have the delusion that inspiration will strike and I will want to write something worth while on my lunch break. This never happens. Right now this notebook is full of odd notes such as the various prices of lumber , renovation,and landscaping materials (summer is almost here), phone numbers of new friends and contacts, the occasional URL, and lots of random crap.

Lower Right is my Tracfone. Yes that is right – I don’t even have a proper grown up cell phone or smart phone, I have a tracfone. I agree if you think that I take a penalty to my nerdiness for this. No, I am not a drug dealer, or other nefarious type. I live in a rural area – and we still don’t have a very good cell phone network up here. So while I like to have a cell phone for when I am traveling – lets say to a city, it makes no logical sense to pay for a monthly proper phone plan as I can’t even get a cell signal at my house. Next to the phone to it’s left is ANOTHER notebook. This lil thing is called a Wellspring Flip Note

Lower Center is a pile of loose change. ::shrugs:: The article is called “What’s in my bag” not “Only the cool/ worth talking about stuff in my bag”. Lower Left there is my wallet, which is old and near the time of replacing. I got it because it had a nifty pocket for my then brand new first generation ipod mini. Yeah – how long ago was that? Then there is the car charger for my phone. Middle Left are all of my keys with my UglyDoll Ice-Bat Keychain (small plush doll for key chain = easier to find an cavernous purse), a cough drop, a colgate wisp (which I highly endorse if like me you are the kind of person who will inevitably always have food in her teeth after a meal), and lastly – a wee little LED flash light. A BIG thank you to the small child that had a Halo Master Chief Halloween costume that was made of cardboard last fall; Who’s helmet that little flash light fell off of. It has proven hugely indispensable. And YES I know it makes me a bad person for keeping it.

NOT shown; After I took the photo’s for this I realized I forgot to check a pocket – so what you are not seeing is my prescription sun glasses. But really – that is no great loss. Nothing too geeky about them. They let me see the road well even when it is sunny. I know – REAL intriguing stuff no? And THAT is all that is in this nerd’s Bag. NEXT WEEK: Citizen-Bot!!!