If there’s more computing power in my smart phone than in the the first space shuttle, then I shouldn’t need a Sherpa to help me lug my gadgets. Still, as our tech gets smarter, our suitcases get heavier. The more clever the device, the harder it is to leave behind. Here are five tips and ten gadgets that let you pack light without a heavy heart. Read more…

More of my posts on Lifescoop:
Luxe Laptop Bags
5 Small Camera Bags for the Casual Photographer
6 Unique Tools for Better Photos

While I was away, I mostly ate. I managed to “outgrow” most of the clothes I brought with me. New Orleans is good for your butt.

I was in Louisiana to do a presentation with Erin Loechner and Liz Gumbinner, the women I also presented with at the Alt Design Summit. Our panel was “How’d You Get that Sponsor?” and I was really happy with it. (You’ll find recaps on the Mom 2.0 blog, and Work it, Mom if you’re interested in the business side of blogging.)

We ate some more.

We had cocktails.

We had more food.

The closing keynote on the future of media was excellent, and I’m still chewing on something Margaret said. She mentioned how personalization algorithms were getting so good that soon we’d have to seek out differing viewpoints on anything.

So maybe one element of the “future of content” lies in synthesizing and presenting differing viewpoints for people tired of hearing their own opinions echoed back. Do people get tired of that?

I also did my first reading! Oh my goodness, it went poorly. I read A 12-Step Guide to Threesomes, but while I was on stage shaking with fear, I realized that half the audience was sober, and I was in the midst of Operation Separation, and I was wearing a minidress (like a common whore), cataloguing a laundry list of ways in which one might fictionally seduce me. Had I actually been naked in front of my high school class, I don’t think I could have been more uncomfortable. In retrospect, I should have been much more inebriated, so I proceeded to do that backstage while Heather petted my hair, and teared up when she saw me tearing up, and did not bullshit me about how great I had been. This is why we are friends.

I stayed a couple extra days with Anna Beth in a gorgeous apartment on St. Charles. We went antiquing, ate some more, had red wine on the porch.

When I was a little kid, this is what I thought it would be like to be a grownup.

It was OK, I guess.

(More later today, when I can get my camera to start speaking to my laptop again. My laptop should never have told my camera that the 4GB flash card made her look fat.)

Helen Jane: Mah flight! It’s landed! En rote in five — where can I find your awesome face?
Me: Room 375!
HJ: Need anything?
Me: Black pantyhose. Otherwise, no. Wait. Wine.
HJ: I gotcher hose, and we should have wine waiting for us at the front desk!
Me: You are like a magical unicorn with boobs.
HJ: That is going in my bio.
Me: Synergy.

-Megan G.’s favorite childhood memory.

Your contest entries made me too happy to leave them in comments. A few that stood out:

My dad used to make dandelion butter with me, which involved stirring dandelions in a tin cup until it turned to butter. It wasn’t until I was much older that I realized a distraction and slight of hand were part of the magic. -Liz

My favourite childhood memory is of my father play-massaging my back after bath. He would spray a little fresh kiddie cologne and do light clapping and topping on my back, arms and legs. -Marta

I used to hide in my grandmothers drained pond from my brother and cousins so I could read. -Beks

My favorite memory is hand drawing and coloring paper doll clothes for my little sister. We would spend hours pouring through the JCPenney’s catalog so that she could choose outfits for me to recreate. -Tamra

Having a breakfast of brownies and decaf coffee from a Thermos on the beach with my parents and little sister. -Holly

My favourite memory was thinking Michael Jackson from his thriller video lived in my furnace room. I was always scared to turn off the lights at the bottom of the basement stairs. -Alison Kelly

I remember playing in a room with a brass bed and red curtains, and watching through the window as a train went by. -Amy Jo

The pure magic my dad would create for my sisters and me on the evenings my mom worked. Like blowing out an egg and filling it with Rice Krispies (in advance so we didn’t see) and then cracking it and BLOWING our little minds. -Katherine

My parents were redoing the walls so after the old paper had been stripped, they let us color all over the walls. We kept a bucket of crayons at the top of the stairs and we would draw big lines as we walked downstairs. -Miss K

My mom waking me and my sister in the middle of the night when we had gone to visit PEI and taking us outside, bundled in our coats and Dad’s mittens over our PJs to watch thousands of Canada geese fly across the full moon. -Ellen

My favorite childhood memory is the fishtank next to my crib. My parent used it as a psuedo-nightlight, the gurgling and warmth and buzzing pump and darting fish would lull me to sleep every night. -Daffodil Campbell

My grandmother had no rules: she threw away toothpaste caps and slept in her clothes. My mom was the type that kept the plastic on things. I loved being so free [at my grandmother’s house] because it always felt like I was getting away with something huge. -Martha

When my three sisters and I made a boat out of a kiddie pool and rowed it down the ditch with a broom for a paddle when the creek by our house flooded. -Tiff

I had this older brother type character in my life, a boy four years older than me who was my parents’ best friends’ son. We both went to this private school about 20 miles away and had a long bus ride together every day. When his 8th grade class read The Hobbit, he’d read it to me on the bus every morning and evening. -Robin

My grandmother transformed the empty lot beside our house into some wild forest/garden. Under one of the trees was what I thought to be a carpet of white flowers. Turns out they were all butterflies. -Michelle

My father used to hook up the hose to the top of the house, so that the water would fall into the pool like a waterfall. We would take turns jumping “through” it. -Natasha

My favorite childhood memory: completing a 2,000 piece puzzle with my Dad. We weren’t very close when I was growing up, he much preferred doing “boy” activities with my brother, but one day he brought this huge thing home and announced we would be working on it together. We cleared off the dining room table and the family ate in the kitchen for over two weeks while we worked on it after dinner every night. I remember exactly what it looked like still to this day. -Faetra

I remember being about 3 or 4 and taking a trip to Maine with my dad. One night he woke me up and brought me down to the lake where we laid on our backs in a row boat and watched shooting stars together. -Megan

My mom running from the car, where I was waiting, up through the dandelions in our yard to grab something else from the house. It’s the only memory I have of my mother walking; rheumatoid arthritis permanently bound her to a wheelchair when I was 4. -Guinevere

On warm summer evenings, my parents would sometimes fill the plastic baby pool in the yard with bubbles and my brothers and sister and I would take our baths outside. -Katie

Sitting on my grandfather’s lap, him asking how old i am, and me triumphantly holding up a single finger. -Jill

In the summertime, I would pitch a tent in the backyard and it would be my “room” for about a week. Since I was a scaredy-cat, I would beg my grandpa to sleep in it with me. My grandpa was a big guy, and this was a tiny kids tent. He slept in it with me every night and listened to my kid-talk and still got up in the morning at 5 to go to work. -Rachel

Hanging out in the garage with my dad, who is something like the ultimate handyman. We’d have to take “cat breaks” so I could sit on his lap in the rocking chair by the wood stove and pet kittens. -Lacey

Playing house inside a circle of mammoth sunflowers that my Mother would plant for us every summer. She’d plant them in a horseshoe shape and then tie the tops together. -KellyBrz

We moved cross-country when I was five, and I drove with my dad while my mom flew out w my baby brother… We ate a two-pound bag of Skittles on the trip. I made him eat all the yellow and green ones. -Kate F

During summer vacation, my best neighborhood friend, Marcie, and I would ride our bikes to the nearby feed store which was the best hangout in our rural Iowa neighborhood because they had a pop machine. we’d dig out some coins and buy two Like sodas, then play Family Feud. That is, I would be the host and try to remember the previous day’s categories and answers and she would play every family member on both teams. -Kate

When we were 9 and 8, my sister and I would steal into the den and dig fistfuls of coins out of the giant milk jug where my parents stashed spare change. This technique supplemented our meager allowances for weeks until my parents started to ask questions about all the new little stuffed monkeys and monkey wardrobes we were acquiring. -Margaret

Since My Grandfather passed today I will leave a memory of him. He used to let us chop wood with him as young as 8 or 9 we had our own little ax and everything. -Charlotte Lunsford

My grandparents came to visit us after a stop in Las Vegas. When they arrived my G-pa called me over (I was about 6) and said he had something for me. He said that while he was in Vegas “he took out a Special Quarter just for little Jilly” and played it in a special Slot Machine and whatever came out would be for me… and from behind his back he whipped around a HUGE paper bag full of quarters. And just as he handed the bag to me, the bottom fell out and they went crashing to the ground just like a slot machine spitting them out! After counting them, I had $67.00 even. -Jill

Catching fireflies with my big brother then putting them in jar and filling bottle caps with granola and water for them. -Mosiphine

I remember racing into the dance studio upon seeing it for the first time at age three and asking the instuctor if we were going to do thiiiiiiiiis? (spinning around and around and around on the shiny tile floor). “Of course” she said. -Anngeedee

Grandpa’s pipe smoke “to keep the mosquitos away.” -ErinTine

When I was little I LOVED riding the school bus to my grandparents house. My grandma was the kind that had a 5 gallon can of flour under the kitchen table; she was always baking something. One particular day it was rainy and stormy and when I got off the bus at the end of the driveway I could smell my Grandma’s homemade dinner rolls. I ran all the way up the driveway. My Grandma met me at the door with a towel, helped me dry off and then I parked myself next to the wood stove with an afghan and a nice hot buttery dinner roll to watch Scooby Doo. -Heidi C.

Pretending not to wake up when my mom masqueraded as the tooth fairy. -Mia

Riding my bike to the little corner grocery store to buy bagfuls of candy. I could shove five atomic fireballs in my mouth at once though. -Amanda

If you didn’t add your memories because you weren’t interested in the contest, go ahead and leave yours below. Yeah. Do it.

The Kids’ Stuff Giveaway Winner is number 165, Kate, whose favorite memory is:

“When I was a tween I stayed home sick one day and spent the entire day in my parents bedroom on their waterbed watching TV. When my dad came home he brought me 1) my favorite movie to watch (Mine, Yours and Ours starring Lucille Ball and Henry Fonda), 2) a king-sized Nestle Crunch bar and 3) some movie star teen magazine. It was completely out of the ordinary, sweet and made me want to be sick more often!”

Congratulations, Kate! Look for an email from me in your inbox.

A little late, but more picks from your suggestions. Hoping your weekend was just right.

Burn the City Down

No Children from The Mountain Goats

Tears Dry on Their Own from Amy Winehouse

Munich from Editors

Take Another Piece of My Heart from Janice Joplin

Weep Softly

Sleep Walk from Santo and Johnny

River from Joni Mitchell

How My Heart Behaves from Feist

New York’s Not My Home from Jim Croce

Suck it Up

One Eskimo from Kandi

Heart Like a Kickdrum from The Avett Brothers

Friday on My Mind from The Easybeats

Rill Rill from Sleigh Bells

Disco Dancer

(both via Ju-Ju Coop!)

Hank’s school had an auction benefit a little while ago, and I asked some Internet friends for donations. As a thank you to the folks who donated, I thought I’d do some giveaways here as well.

Wee Wood of the Month Club from Little Alouette

These pretty wooden toys and teethers feel good in the hand, encourage imaginative play, and aren’t finished with paint or varnish that will make your baby ill. Bonus. Some toys are unfinished, others finished only with a light coat of organic flax seed oil, so all the toys are utterly chewable.

Strongman from Dria Peterson

Dria Peterson’s handmade strongman protects your little one from nightmares, and encourages him or her to hang out with carnies.

Happy Trails Felt Doll Journal from Suzy Ultman

If you kept a journal as a kid, you know the pleasure of paging back through your gift wishlists, childhood heartbreaks, and lemonade stand earnings. This diary doesn’t have a lock, which saves parents the trouble of picking it.

Hand-Knit Pony from Woolies

This tiny hand-knit pony is just right for chubby little fists. Twice the appeal of My Little Pony, with none of the offgassing.

Play Scarves from Birch Leaf Designs

Simple play scarves to use as capes, forts, or baby doll blankets.

A Leaf Puzzle from Just Hatched

This handmade wooden puzzle has the names of the tree behind each corresponding leaf. Yeah. Your kid is gonna be smarter than you.

Letter Flashcards from Pollywog Learning Products

Tactile letter flashcards are made to help little ones trace the letters with their fingers. The letters are fashioned from sandpaper with a starting-point dot on each. Literacy! Hells yes.

Please leave a comment with your favorite childhood memory to enter, and please only enter once. I’ll announce the winner on Monday. Tune in next week for a science toys giveaway, and big thanks to all the artists and merchants for their donations.

When I got the key to my first San Francisco apartment, I did a keychain audit and realized all my other keys were defunct. I threw away the bike lock key for the bike that had been stolen, removed keys to the offices at my college newspaper, and did the same with about ten more, until I was left with only one. The key to my new front door.

Something about the symbolism of that that single key thrilled me. I felt the burden of all that ownership and responsibility lift off me. That solo key was the start of a new life in a new place, with all my options open.

I thought of that feeling this morning when I pulled my keys out of my clutch. It was like watching a clown car unload.

It may be time to reassess.