Ten things to go with the aliens.

[seanan_mcguire]

The aliens are here! And they're offering you an all-expenses paid trip to their home planet, where you will spend a mutually agreeable amount of time learning from their advanced culture before doing whatever it is you do after the aliens bring you back. Because they're friendly, they say you can bring three changes of clothing, basic toiletries

Comments

[beccastareyes]

1. An external hard drive. My laptop doesn't hold as much as it needs to -- the external drive holds enough, and it will give me a backup in case I lose the laptop.
2. My camera. I'll be taking data, after all. I'm assuming this covers the battery charger and cables to hook it to the laptop.
3 & 4. The Nintendo DS and a copy of Rune Factory, mostly because it's the one game I own where I can do repetitive task-management stuff*, rather than just play through it over and over.
5. My Big Box of Colored Pencils.
6. My little pouch of pens, erasers and normal pencils.
7. Paper. Unlined -- both for notes and for drawings.
8. My iPod.
9. & 10. This leaves two paper books. I think I'd have to go with one of the omnibuses because that is a lot more story -- maybe The Deed of Paksenarron and Miles in Love.

(I also wonder how many ebooks and scientific journals I can fit on my laptop and that external drive -- PDFs don't take up that much space.)

* It's a combination of fantasy RPG and farming sim.

[seanan_mcguire]

Nice!

[ash_of_roses]

1) Camera and associated stuff
2) My journal, the physical paper one.
3) The thickest spiral notebook I can find, for writing. (for some reason I find it very hard to draft poetry on a computer.)
4)Sketchbook-- again, the biggest I can find, preferably with a section of dark paper in the back.
5) My pencil-box of doom, containing pencils, pens, ink and a few brushes
6) a crochet hook and a few balls of yarn in various colors.
7) My acrylic paintbox, packed with as much board canvas as it will hold. For days when ink just isn't enough.
9) Carpe Diem, because I have the rest of the series in e-book and it creates an infuriating gap to be missing THAT ONE IN THE MIDDLE, even if I have read the series a zillion times.
10) a large stuffed tiger. Not a pet, per se, but very comforting.

I have to note that my dog Aurora would also be included on the must-have list-- hope for a planet with slightly higher gravity, where she might eventually run out of energy! (Siberian Husky puppy. I don't even know if high g would do it.)

[seanan_mcguire]

The gravity vs. Husky experiment must occur.

[dornbeast]

Being me, I'd probably start with my slow cooker, a bowl, and a spoon. The food samples would include a mess of uncooked food, and my laptop could store recipes. I have enough trouble when I get into a "meh, food" mood, so this way I would at least have variety.

Then, I don't know. I can put most of my music on my USB drives, save one for notes, and take a mechanical pencil, extra lead, and a few empty notebooks to scribble things down quickly. I mean, I'm going to learn from a culture that has FTL drive, right? Either I'll be too busy to need reading, or I can read A Mid-Winter Venture with T'Skaia Ishkarat or something like that.

[seanan_mcguire]

I appreciate your approach to interstellar reading material.

[lastwordy_mcgee]

I would only take one of my five pets -- my youngest dog, Mina. She is way too attached to me and my husband wouldn't be able to handle her on his own. He can take care of everyone else, though. Besides, Mina is party Rottie, so if it turns out the aliens are, in fact, going to try to cook me, Mina can help me fight.

1. Camera + sundry
2. iPod (can't function without it and it has audiobooks on it)
3. A small photo album
4. My foam pillow
5. My favorite towel
6. BPAL Devil's Night
7. My day planner because it contains both a notebook and pens/pencils
8. A box of ziplocs, a'la Everything is Illuminated
9. An umbrella
10. A completely impractical article of clothing, something with lots of sequins and feathers, for no other reason than wearing it when I take photos *with* the aliens. Because really, if I'm going to do this, I want to do it dressed like a drag queen made a baby with FrankNFurter and then let Dolly Parton raise it to be a burlesque performer.

[seanan_mcguire]

Your item #10 made me smile for like an hour.

[lastwordy_mcgee]

::bows:: I am a drag queen trapped in a straight girl's body. My burlesque persona totally takes the inspiration from the great queens, which is why I named her Regina Monologue. (www.thecorsettes.com, if you'd like to take a peek, as well as FB and twitter)

And someday when I can convince people that we need to do a horror burlesque show called Live Dead Girls, I will change her name to Regina Dentata. And open the show with a lounge version of Living Dead Girl. And have my girls crawl out from underneath stained, torn, dirt-encrusted tarps. Or I'll have them all on gurneys and I will whip the white sheets off each one as I introduce them.

Why does not one but me think this is the best idea ever???

[seanan_mcguire]

I, too, think this is the best idea ever.

[silvertwi]

I would leave my kitties at home with my mother, since I'm already living without them (college student, you know). I'm going to assume a very generous host-alien.

1. My flute
2. A big 3-ring binder with staff paper and as much sheet music as I can fit into it.
3. A pencil case with pens and pencils
4. The Den of Shadows omnibus
5. My iPod; I'll store music on that and make more space on my laptop
6. A small pouch with my favorite stones in it
7. My favorite pillow
8. A big, blank notebook
9. Flash drives
10. A first aid kit (because you never know what will come up)

[seanan_mcguire]

Nice!