We’re heading up to Boston for PAX East and every I manage to forget some Very Important Things so this year I am making a list. Maybe this year I won’t have to make any emergency trips to Best Buy on the way up!
There are a number of PAX packing lists, including an “official” one on the forums but they’re really just the same “so you’re going on a trip” list you find everywhere. And there are some very specific items I wouldn’t attend PAX without.
So here’s my list:
- Clothes for 3 days. I have gone on enough trips I no longer feel the need to break this out.
- Toiletries for 3 days. See above.
- A swimsuit I will not actually use but bring every year “just in case.”
- Exercise clothes. If I’m going to eat conference garbage for 3 days I ought to at least keep up with my workout routine.
- Exercise shoes. The exercise clothes are less useful without them. Ask me how I know this.
- A niceish outfit in case we want to go to a niceish restaurant. This really just means an outfit that does not include a nerdy t-shirt.
- Shoes to go with that niceish outfit if it is a dress.
- A Nintendo 3DS. Mario Kart and Tetris are the universal language of PAX.
- A 3DS charger. Mercifully there are a bunch of these you can usually borrow from folks, but it’s a lot handier to have your own.
- My cell phone.
- My cell phone charger. This is the #1 item I purchase at out of town Best Buy stores.
- My laptop (mostly just in case something comes up with work)
- My laptop charger. This is the #2 item no prescription online pharmacy I purchase at Best Buy stores.
- A deck of Magic: the Gathering cards. The little starter packs they give out always makes me long for my own deck, which incidentally I only ever play during the month after I attend PAX.
- An empty tote bag, useful for anything you might buy or pick up on the expo floor. I hate walking around all day with a backpack, tote bags fold nice and small