I think I may have managed to conquer the packing. It took most of the day, though, because according to my Twitter, I first started to “think about” packing my suitcase just before lunch yesterday. Here’s what I had by 10pm:

packing fail

In fairness, though, that goldy/bronzey thing is my makeup bag, and it took me a LONG time to pack IT, because that’s just my travel makeup bag or The Travelling Makeup Bag, as I think I will call it from now on. THIS is my real makeup bag. I mean Big Ass Box:

The Sephora Case o' Doom

Distilling the contents of this into that was a long and arduous task, and I guess the fact that I found it hard to leave the comfort of my computer chair, where I spent many a pleasant hour yesterday reading blogs, tooling around on Twitter and doing anything, really to not have to pack, made it even harder. Like, look, this is Pinky:

My main man, Pinky

Everyone say, “Hi, Pinky!”

Haha, I made you speak to a stuffed rabbit! Hee!

Pinky is my travelling companion. Well, other than Terry and my parents, obviously, but none of them are pink, and they don’t like being squeezed when I’m scared the plane is going to crash, which is all the time. So Pinky is like a kind of stress toy. He stands in for Ted, who doesn’t vacation with us. (He’s just at that age now, where he’s all, “You guys are lame, I want to party with my friends!” He’s going to Goa this year, apparently.)

(Note: Pinky came free with a handbag I got, and didn’t actually have a name until a moment of stress somewhere high above the Atlantic one year, when he was named in a hurry. And clearly I suck at naming things under stress. Another reason never to have children - I’d probably give birth and name it “Screamy” or “Bloody” or something.) 

Anyway, several hours later, I ended up with a packing win, of sorts. This is one side of the case:

Suitcase: one side of

Pretty full, no? But look! Here is the other side:

Suitcase, other side of

Lookit all that lovely space! Space which I will be able to fill up with… oh:

"Take meeeeeeeeeee!"

He’s going to stay with Terry’s mum while we’re gone. He will be treated like a small, furry Overlord there, and will eat much better than he does at home. But I will miss him, and every time I look at his little face, I want to cry. So, moving on, let’s weigh the suitcase (minus dog) with the handy gadget Terry bought for this purpose:

The Weigh-In

You can’t see from this photo, but it came in at about 14 kilos, which gives me 6 kilos of shopping to bring back with me.  Yay! I win! Although not really, because GOD, shoes are heavy, and I might want to buy shoes… If I do, though, I will also have access to The Shoulder Bag With a Face:

The Bag With a Face

Seriously, it has a face, no?

Ahhhhh!

It’s drooling at the thought of all of the lovely shopping it will carry. Or maybe it’s just planning to eat my head when I go to sleep tonight, who knows?

And with the packing of TBWAF (which is actually much bigger than it looks here and is a bit like a Mary Poppins bag) I was finally done:

Phew!

Time on completion:

whoops

So it’s a good job I don’t have to get up, like, really early tomorrow or…. oh.

Now I just need to take stuff out, put it back, add more stuff, remove stuff and then, at the last minute remember that whoops, I haven’t actually packed any knickers/sweaters/bikinis/delete-as-appropriate, and we’re good to go.

Anyway, our flight is early tomorrow morning, so we’ll be staying with my parents tonight, because they live closer to the airport, and also, because it means we can mess-up someone else’s house when we get up at stupid o’clock tomorrow, rather than our own.  Assuming we make it there safely, then, I’ll see you on the other side!

"Buh-bye!"

Ted is waving goodbye. Also: is clearly drunk. GOD.