On my most recent big trip, I was struck by lightening. Right, not lightning.<\/p>\n
I walked<\/a> hours through a city I did not know with my trusty laptop carrier. It was after a daylong conference. Compared to most briefcases, day packs or messenger bags, the canvas Domke Reporter’s Satchel<\/a> is lightweight. After years of refining, I pack only the most essential elements. Heck, I carried an iPad instead of a MacBook.<\/p>\n As I slipped the strap off my shoulder onto the hotel room bed, I finally realized it was time to unload. There’s any number of writers, reporters and desk-jockey editors who carry what they need in their pockets. What did I need for this seminar anyway?<\/p>\n I have toted some kind of bag to work for quite some time. In fall 2010, I have to admit the most I take out of it daily is the work ID card. Once or twice a week, the Tums, some other first aid or a magazine. Maybe the calculator. Stuff like that. In a satchel or daypack (what I used before the Domke) that stayed half full.<\/p>\n I will not empty their contents on this page, but it seemed that essentials were what would be quite the nuisance if I had to go back home for them. That does not make these bits essential.<\/p>\n I began searching the Internet for ideas, and there was a fresh article<\/a> in The Wall Street Journal<\/em>. It was a Q-and-A for something to hold an iPad and just a little more. The author found two answers in history: the military’s map or document case and the musette.<\/p>\n The musette caught my eye. The army-navy type is too big, but a century ago the musette was appropriated by long-distance bicycle racers as a cloth lunch sack. The bike musette<\/a> has a long strap, and a racer’s crew would use that to hand it off to the speeding pedaler. After he ate his sandwich he’d toss out the musette, which would be picked up by a fan as a souvenir.<\/p>\n Nowadays, the updated ones have no pockets, just maybe a flap. No organizing pockets, padding, no frame. Otherwise you get weight and complexity, and you are up Eagle Creek (an otherwise great bag maker). Here is one<\/a> from Oregon. Another<\/a> is from England, where cyclists supposedly call them “bonk bags,” “bonk” there describing the queasiness from not eating and needing a crew member to toss you a full musette. In fact what it is in today’s terms is a small, flat tote bag, just the size of a magazine. It would force me to downsize.<\/p>\n It worked. I don’t need a backup pen to the backup pen to the backup pen. And so on. But room for a letter pad or other paper notebook. And the iPad, which I don’t always carry. The work ID. Gastric and headache remedies.<\/p>\n This is not a purse, man bag or murse, though I won’t be bothered if someone calls it that. It’s a minimalist satchel for a writer’s tools.<\/p>\n Besides, when I have an out-of-town meeting, the very full Domke satchel goes with me on the plane — cables, camera, books. But inside the Domke will be this little bonk bag folded up, for use after I unload at the hotel.<\/p>\n If you’re looking for a moral to today’s story, there isn’t one. It won’t fit in the musette.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" On my most recent big trip, I was struck by lightening. Right, not lightning. I walked hours through a city I did not know with my trusty laptop carrier. It was after a daylong conference. Compared to most briefcases, day packs or messenger bags, the canvas Domke Reporter’s Satchel is lightweight. After years of refining, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-american-culture"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1423,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2009\/07\/parting-shots\/","url_meta":{"origin":2483,"position":0},"title":"Parting Shots","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"July 2, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"VENTURA, Calif. -- Following are reflections that don't fit in the reportage articles from the weekend's annual conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. A proud moment came in helping select the year's scholarship contest winner. Paul Bowers of the University of South Carolina -- the other USC, was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Few Bullets More"","block_context":{"text":"Few Bullets More","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/ventura-2009\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":180,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2006\/04\/vote-doesnt-make-book\/","url_meta":{"origin":2483,"position":1},"title":"Vote doesn’t make book","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"April 13, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Allow me to offer a library post-mortem: Nyah, nyah, nyah. (This is so wrong of me. I've always loved libraries and our Blair Library is spectacular. But, to continue:) My wife and I -- though little special elections like this require lots of effort to remember when speeding past our\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Body, Home, Street"","block_context":{"text":"Body, Home, Street","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/body-home-street\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":146,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2005\/05\/confusing-the-issue\/","url_meta":{"origin":2483,"position":2},"title":"Confusing the issue","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"May 11, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2005 Ben S. Pollock Wednesday, May 11, 2005: Morning after a local millage election. The Fayetteville Public Schools lost its request for a property tax increase of 43 mills. This is one Arkansas town that doesn't hate tax increases. What was wrong with this one? The things this one\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Body, Home, Street"","block_context":{"text":"Body, Home, Street","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/body-home-street\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":83,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2004\/07\/separation-of-church-press\/","url_meta":{"origin":2483,"position":3},"title":"Separation of church, press","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"July 26, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Constitutional separation of church and press Copyright 2004 Ben S. Pollock Monday, July 26, 2004: I want to toss an endorsement to the defense of the First Baptist Church of Springdale and its senior pastor, Ronnie Floyd. An self-proclaimed do-gooder group is trying to sic the IRS against them, citing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "News, Spin"","block_context":{"text":"News, Spin","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/news-spin\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":258,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/01\/carve-buchwald-on-rushmore\/","url_meta":{"origin":2483,"position":4},"title":"Carve Buchwald on Rushmore","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"January 21, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"A great columnist passes. It's Art Buchwald, about whom I wrote nearly a year ago, when he'd been in hospice just a few weeks and well before he recovered enough to get thrown out. Actually he was a part of my master's thesis of spring 2003, which researched the apparent\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "News, Spin"","block_context":{"text":"News, Spin","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/news-spin\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":271,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2007\/02\/set-your-alarmist-clock\/","url_meta":{"origin":2483,"position":5},"title":"Set Your Alarmist Clock","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"February 5, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Several Bentonville [Ark.] High School students were suspended last week after being caught on camera in what school officials believe was a gang initiation, according to Bentonville Superintendent Gary Compton. Compton described the incidents as a possible 'gang jump-in' that took place Jan. 22 and 23 at the high school.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Education, Coarsely"","block_context":{"text":"Education, Coarsely","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/education-coarsely\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2483"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2483\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2490,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2483\/revisions\/2490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}