A better bag.

Last time I took a field trip into my bag, it weighed over ten pounds. While watching the first debate between two candidates for California's next governor Jerry Brown and Meg Whitman last night, I dove back in to my provisions.  It turns out already being irritated (by pre-scripted and unpossible banter) makes for a perfect time to rid the handbag of irritating things. So thanks, future governor of California. You removed exactly six pounds from my daily schlep.

Previously, the bag weighed 10.4 pounds. It is all in a new, lighter bag and now weighs 4.2 pounds. One change however, the computer now lives in its own bag to split the weight across my shoulders. So, the net loss of weight is actually only three pounds, but I'd like to think it's smarter weight, not harder.

The highlights of new contents:

One pair sunglasses
One pair reading glasses
Small pile o' change
One orange reusable shopping bag (the stores I've been to in Denver don't offer bags for  purchases anymore, which is a lovely vote for the environment but one a shopper must prepare for)
One knitting project
A stack of papers, tickets, notes - I should probably buy a notebook
One cloth handkerchief, my vote for the environment.
A set of headphones
Two individually wrapped hygienic towelettes
One package Shesheido rice paper oil blotters.  My father once apologized for passing down the Reinhardt nose.  I need to get my mother to apologize for the oil-slick T-zone genes on that nose.
Dental floss
The only business card that remains is the dude at the Santa Monica Apple store. Thankfully, I enrolled in the best educational deal around, Apple's One-to-One classes so I can formalize my lack of knowledge into a student-teacher format. Poor guy.
One roller ball pen and sticky notes pad, which if I go crazy I can also lose and use the iPhone notepad feature, but I'm just not ready for this kind of advancement yet.
Hair ties and a hair clip
One Stila lip tint.  Even though this represents very little weight, I am very proud of the fact that I removed three of the four lip treatments from my bag.  This felt a little like addressing an emerging psychological disorder; painful, but relieving to face facts.
One wallet containing cards and never enough cash.
Not shown: iPhone, which I used to take the photo.