Dr. Helen has decided to ditch the purse for a wallet. In the process, she asks:

How has it worked out? It’s hard! The first day I carried just a wallet, I kept looking for my purse and feeling that I had forgotten something. By the third day, I was over this but I didn’t have all of the things I needed such as various keys, my chapstick, stamps, my address book, my pepper spray, various food, gloves — and carrying spare change in my pocket drives me crazy. It jingles and falls out when you sit down. Is this normal? Are there some tricks of the trade that I do not understand here?

Yeah.  I’ll offer up George Carlin’s response when he is confronted with the lament that someone’s “needs aren’t being met.”  Lower your f-ing needs.

• Keys: left pocket
• Chapstick: don’t need
• Stamps: don’t need
• Address book: don’t need
• Pepper Spray: don’t need
• Food: don’t need
• Gloves: don’t need
• Spare change: don’t need

Seriously.  I don’t carry spare change.  I collect what I get in the day, and when I get home, whatever made it home in my pockets goes in the bucket.

What do I carry?  Keys, a pocket comb and a Swiss Army Knife in my left pocket.  Wallet and business cards in right pocket.  Pen and iPhone in shirt or jacket pocket.  (One of the reasons I got an iPhone was that I could carry it in a jacket pocket without ruining the lines on a suit.)  I either hold my sunglasses or keep them in a jacket pocket.  Anything else I do without.

I’m sure that you have a briefcase.  Anything particularly bulky can go in there.  Gloves go in the overcoat pocket.  Won’t need one without the other.  Sometimes I throw gum in my right pocket.