No joke. I spent decades traveling for a living. I took pride in my packing ability and packing RIGHT but LIGHT. I lived my road warrior days by the credo that Antoine de Saint-Exupéry stated;

"He Who Must Travel Happily, Must Travel Light."

Believe me, I traveled light. I spent two weeks touring England and France about 20 years ago with nothing more than a small duffel bag on wheels (like an underseat bag) and a laptop case that fit over the handle of the small wheeled duffel bag. Yet when I was away for 10 days recently, I traveled like I was going on tour in the Outback, where you must bring absolutely everything you might even remotely think of needing for a six month stint. Granted, I traveled by automobile on this trip, and not by plane, but that never mattered in the past. Now, it seemed that traveling by car was an open invitation to throw everything in the car that could possibly fit in the trunk, and overflow into the back seat if required.

I'm not kidding. It was pathetic. I used to be a well-traveled man that toured the world with less than 25 lbs of carry on luggage. Yet on this last trip I brought what would barely fit in a steamer trunk and needed a bellman with a large luggage cart to get it all up to the room. And once there, it took me hours and hours to sort everything out. Everything I was not going to use in the next 10 days. And to find the very few things I was going to use, that would have easily fit in a small backpack. When I changed hotels for the last part of the trip, I actually left all but one smaller bag in the trunk, having thrown in the towel with excessive baggage.

So that did it. Next trip, I'm going back on the light packing wagon. A few socks, some underwear, two short sleeve shirts, two long sleeve shirts, two pairs of pants, one pair of shoes with toiletry kit in the small carry on bag, along with a Chromebook, a phone, and a Kindle with chargers in my computer case. That's it. Plus what I'm already wearing. Run out of clothes? Wash them at the hotel if there is a guest laundry, or in the bathroom sink if there is no guest laundry.