Packing, step 1: remove all the TSA-unsafe stuff from my backpack while still at home.
Posts in "travel"
SFO now lets you walk loved ones to the gate without a plane ticket
San Francisco International Airport is now allowing approved visitors without plane tickets to go past security, bringing back a once familiar airport ritual: walking loved ones to the gate and meeting them when they arrive.
This would (almost) win me back from OAK. That’s a brilliant perk.
I could either fly out at 5AM with a 1 hour layover, or 7AM with a 6 hour. And that’s why I’m sipping coffee at 0230.
If you get on a plane, stick your carry-on at the very front, then walk to the very back so that there’s no room for the frontward peoples’ luggage when they board and everyone has to wait for them to trek to the back and stow it and return to the front, you are a bad person and should feel bad.
The GL.iNet GL-AXT1800 travel router I bought a year ago is on sale today for 38% off. If you’ve been on the fence, get this now.
Summary: check into a hotel and connect this, instead of your phone, to the paid WiFi instead. Then connect your phone, laptop, Switch, whatever to the router’s WiFi. Only pay for the one device, have your own firewall in place, and route everything through your own VPN if you want (we watched American Netflix from Germany).
I’ll never travel without one again.
The afternoon’s adventure: Traveler’s Notebook aficionado nerdery.
![Photo of a page in a notebook: “- Went to a nearby stationery store to get a Traveler’s Notebook stamp” And a red stamp saying “Luiban Berlin, Germany […] Official Partner Shop Visit Pass”](https://kirk.micro.blog/uploads/2025/image-20250416-143601-53ed421d.jpg)
My wife and I went to the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe.
My god.
My god.
It’s never been so hard to make myself stay and learn about something important.
My travel project template
In an older post, I talked about making a project template for trip planning. The goal is to build a comprehensive list of everything I might want to prepare, pack, or do before, during, or after a business or vacation trip. Before I made this template, I was more anxious: Did I forget to do anything? Do I have everything I need? What am I missing? Now I can relax and concentrate on the fun times ahead.
Friends have asked me for my list to use as a starting point for their own, and this is that lightly annotated list. Regrets from past adventures inspired every item. The moment I’ve booked a trip, I copy this template into my to-do app, then delete everything that doesn’t apply this time. For instance, if I’m going to visit family, I can use their pillow instead of packing my own. If I’m going to Chicago in winter, I don’t need swimming trunks. If I’m traveling for personal reasons, I may not take my work laptop. It’s much easier to remove items I don’t need than to scramble to remember the things I do need.
As always, the “update the travel template” action near the bottom is the critical feedback loop that makes this all work. Every time I’ve wished I’d done or packed something, I made a reminder to add it to the list for the next time. If I were to start over with a new template having that as the only item, after a few trips that template would look a lot like this one.
As soon as travel is planned
- Schedule time off at work 1
- Call the vet to make pet boarding arrangements
Three weeks before travel
- Ensure airline has TSA Pre✓ info
One week before travel
- Notify the bank about travel 2
- Buy travel toothpaste
- Buy disposable razors
- Buy travel shaving cream
Two days before travel
- Get passports from safe
- Check in to flight
- Get $40 from an ATM 3
- Download reading material 4
- Stop eating spicy food 5
Day before travel
- Charge the USB battery 6
- Pack pants
- Pack shirts
- Pack undershirts
- Pack underwear
- Pack socks
- Pack shoes
- Pack jacket
- Pack sandals
- Pack shorts
- Pack belts
- Pack a wearing-around hat 7
- Pack swim trunks
- Pack a sun hat
- Pack a sun shirt
- Pack gaffers tape 8
- Pack water bottle
- Download podcasts and meditations 9
- Pack dopp kit 10
- Pack first aid kit
Night before travel
- Put passport card in bag
- Put backup credit card in bag 15
- Set wake-up alarm
- Charge laptop
- Charge iPhone
- Charge iPad
- Charge Apple Watch
- Charge AirPods
- Charge Switch
- Remove TSA-unfriendly stuff from bag 16
- Pack USB battery
- Pack passport book in suitcase 15
- Pack handkerchief
- Pack food bar
- Pack AirPods
- Pack Switch
- Pack magazine for plane 4
- Pack boarding passes
- Pack sunglasses
- Pack journal
Day of travel
- Wear my Apple Watch
- Turn on Fog of World 17
- Set the thermostat to vacation mode 18
- Pack laptop charger
- Pack iPhone charging cable
- Pack iPad charging cable
- Pack Apple Watch charging cable
- Pack USB charger’s charging cable
- Pack AirPods charging cable
- Pack multi-device charger
- Pack laptop
- Pack iPhone
- Pack iPad
- Pack pillow
- Buy airport stickers 19
The day before return
- Check in to return flight
The day of return
- Buy airport stickers
- Set the thermostat to normal mode
- Put away passports
- Update the travel template 20
After return
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This seems obvious but I always forget. ↩︎
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If you don’t do this, your bank may see transactions from an unusual location and freeze your debit or credit card. ↩︎
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I’ve never regretted having walking around money while traveling. ↩︎
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If I didn’t have something to read on a flight, I’d lose my mind. ↩︎ ↩︎
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Yes, the Thai curry native-extra-hot is delicious. Do you really want to be trapped in a plane while your stomach tries to digest it? ↩︎
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I take a plug-in charging block and a portable USB battery. If my phone is running low in the middle of a long flight, I can still charge it with the battery. ↩︎
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It’s vacation. I want to throw on a hat to step out for coffee or breakfast. ↩︎
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Ideal for covering obnoxiously bright power LEDs in hotel rooms, blocking light under the door, etc. ↩︎
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If it’s too bumpy to read, it’s nice to have something fun or relaxing to listen to. ↩︎
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See “Building the Perfect Dopp Kit”. ↩︎
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Hotel curtains never seem to close all the way. Bend them to your will. ↩︎
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Ever been rained on, had to walk around a lot in wet pants, and gotten chafed from it? Yeah, me neither. ↩︎
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“Ow, these new shoes are killing my feet and I’m walking way more than usual.” ↩︎
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Jet lag. Strange hotel. Travel excitement. These add up to difficulty sleeping. ↩︎
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Carry at least 2 forms of ID and 2 forms of payment in 2 separate places. If 1 set gets stolen, you still have the other to get home. ↩︎ ↩︎
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I have a tiny multi-tool in my EDC bag, and I don’t want the TSA to confiscate it. ↩︎
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This is a fun little app that records everywhere you’ve been. ↩︎
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Save money not heating or cooling your house as much while you’re away from it. ↩︎
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I collect them for my carryon suitcase. This is in here twice in case I have a different layover on the way home. ↩︎
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I take notes of things I wish I’d done or packed. When I get home I immediately update the list so that I won’t forget next time. ↩︎
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Do it while you still have all the receipts in one place. ↩︎
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Once the office has reimbursed me, the trip is officially done. ↩︎
Airlines Restrict 'Smart Luggage' Over Fire Hazards Posed By Batteries
Airlines Restrict ‘Smart Luggage’ Over Fire Hazards Posed By Batteries : The Two-Way : NPR:
“Beginning Jan. 15, customers who travel with a smart bag must be able to remove the battery in case the bag has to be checked at any point in the customer’s journey. If the battery cannot be removed, the bag will not be allowed,” American said in a statement on Friday. The same day, Delta and Alaska announced similar policies on their flights.
American’s policy dictates that if the bag is carry-on size, passengers can take the luggage onboard, so long as the battery can be removed if needed. If passengers need to check the bag, the battery must be removed and carried onboard. But if the bag has a nonremovable battery, it can’t be checked or carried on.
An FAA spokesman told The Washington Post that the airlines’ policies are “consistent with our guidance that lithium-ion batteries should not be carried in the cargo hold.”
Last month I wrote: “Listening to an ad for luggage with a built in USB charger, which may be the worst idea ever. Now your suitcase can grow obsolete. What if it breaks? Or a bigger battery comes along? And you always have the weight penalty even when you don’t need it.” I think we can all agree now that this is a terrible idea for many reasons.
Traveling with OmniFocus and OmniOutliner
I don’t travel a lot, so when I do I invariably find that I’ve forgotten something important (9 PM the night before: “say, dear, where are we boarding the dogs?” “I thought you were doing that!”). I wrote an AppleScript to copy items from an OmniOutliner document to an OmniFocus project so that I never have to forget again.
I love OmniFocus. It runs my life. But it lacks any kind of a template systems to let you quickly churn out copies of a project. That’s exactly what I needed here, though. Fortunately OmniOutliner fills that gap and gives me a nice way to describe that project. Here’s how mine starts:
When I run the AppleScript and say “I want to travel on June 24”, it creates actions like “Call the vet to make pet boarding arrangements, with the Phone context, due on June 3 at 5PM”. I add everything to this list:
- USB gadgets to charge
- Toiletries to pack
- Things to remove from my messenger bag (so I don’t find myself in line at security and realize I’ve still got my pocket knife)
- People to notify, such as telling my credit union that I’ll be using my debit card in some exotic place like Topeka and please not to block it as fraud
A magic moment for me was hearing Merlin Mann’s suggestion to add an “update this list” action:
A couple of days into my trip, I get a reminder to add anything new I’d forgotten or wish I’d done differently. This turns my template into a living document of exactly my own personalized requirements.