Packing -- Less or More.

In the 19C when people traveled they'd bring along trunks packed with about a gazillion clothes and toiletries.

I suppose it wasn't as easy then to pop out of your hotel and buy whatever you forgot from the same stores (with identical piles of tops and bottoms) that you'd shopped back home. And I know that Taiwan has malls and stalls and racks and stacks of anything I could want.

So this time instead of dredging my closet and drawers for every last sock and undergarment I've never never worn but might be indispensible, I decide to pack light.

To this end, I buy a small, red satchel on wheels and start packing early.

6 weeks early. My goal is to vet each item. Try on. Refold. Shake out. Pair with pants, same purse, shoes. Refine. Jettison.

At an Eddie Bauer Outlet I buy two pair of khaki pants "made for the traveler" with lots of zippers to hold oddities and Kleenex. I love them. I figure I can pair them with short and long tees in brown, tans, and yellow. I'm off to a good start.

Next I buy miniatures of Tide, Oxi-Clean, toothpaste, and hand sanitizer, as well as every other trial size pack sold in America today, including off brands. I read not all public restrooms have toilet tissue. I buy that too.

I need aspirin, acid reducer, and other bodily correctives. If I could find smelling salts I'd pick that up. Figuring the hotel will have shampoo and conditioner, I resist. For anything else, I've decided I will visit a Chinese herbalist.

Rust goes with khaki. Orange goes with khaki. Should I pack those shirts?

Purple goes with khaki. Pink does too. Which jacket? Purple, pink? Jean?? Raincoat?

If I take the purple jacket, maybe I should pick up the fuchsia blouse I saw on sale. As a matter of fact, the fuchsia would also look nice with the pink jacket.

The pink has a little turquoise in it, also gray. I have a long-sleeve gray tee. And a turquoise knit top. Hah! And a turquoise skirt!

Hat. Sunscreen. Sunglasses.