This Purse Sand Is Crusting Under My Fingernails
I Thought There Was A Hair Tie In Here But As I Blindly Rummage Around My Nerveless Fingers Grab Only Air
That’s Not The Chapstick I Was Looking For This One Leaves A Whiteish Waxy Coating On My Lips But Any Port In A Storm
THAT’S THE WRONG HAIR CLIP
My wallet isn’t here
This Pen Has No Cap On It And I Have Stabbed The Underside Of My Finger And Now There Is Blood And Ink Under My Split Nail, Christ Damn It
If None Of These Are Coins What Is Jingling
It’s Just Heavy Enough That My Shoulder Is Going To Hurt All Afternoon, I Think
I Feel Like I’ve Missed Out On Displaying The Correct Class Signifier In This Situation And Picking Up My Purse Is Only Making Things Worse
Oh God The Phone That’s Making Noise Is In Fact Mine
Something Is Open And Melted In Here And I Don’t Know What It Is
I feel this on a deep level. The other week I was trying to find my notebook and pen and somehow realized I had onions in my purse? Just, two onions, hanging out. In my purse. Totally normal place for onions to hang.
It turns out there are very few places where it is not odd to pull onions out of one’s purse.
My mom once put pats of butter (the kind you get at restaurants) in her purse to take home, then switched purses, then months later discovered the rancid butter at the bottom of the old purse.
She makes sure to put them in a doggy bag now.
A friend of mine once pulled a whole, raw potato out of her purse.
My mom once wrapped leftover mozzarella sticks in a napkin and then placed them in my purse “because the kids like them!”
Not so much when you forget they’re in there and pull them out at the cash register when you stop for coffee and can’t find your wallet. On the up side, I quickly figured out where the smell in my car had been coming from.
I put an onion in my purse, which was the style at the time.
They didn’t have white onions, because of the war.
The only thing you could get was those big, yellow ones.
Gimme five bees for a quarter, you’d say!
Once I put two fresh eggs in my purse. One of them survived.
One yogurt granola parfait entered, none left 🙁
two eggs enter, one egg leaves
In the wintertime, I often end up with clementines in my purse
I just found two clems in my tote bag.
This is an awesome thing to have happen!
And, blessed little fruits they are, when you forget about them they just turn to shrivelled stones instead of morphing into goo! (My purse is waaaay too big)
NOT FOR ME, WHY
For me they get that gross powdery green mold and the WHOLE BAG becomes full of gross powdery green mold.
I mean, probably that’s what would happen.
SAME. one time I breathed in a huge puff of that green mold. I didn’t die though?
I’m pretty sure there are a couple knocking around in mine too
It’s like Christmas morning, every day!
OMG this is the best. Thank you for sharing it. I’ve never had onions but I did recently pull out a pamphlet from my, uh, lady doctor’s office while sitting at a bar. Luckily not as awkward as one might think, because I was there with a female friend, but still.
Once I found a bikini top in February. ????
I had a grapefruit in my purse for a while, and then it rolled out under the bed, where I found it a week later somewhat dessicated. My intended was both amused and disgusted.
I just found a (used, by me) pregnancy test in my purse. What is wrong with me.
well? are you pregnant??
Hella.
I believe that is called PI – CRS – Pregnancy Induced Can’t Remember Shit
Last week I pulled a very large garlic out of my purse. It was one of the ones I bought two months ago for planting and I guess I forgot it.
The morning after a night that involved 3 bottles of wine (purloined from the wedding in the hall adjacent to the roller derby game I just played in) (I also consumed said bottles on my own), l found over a half-dozen mini jars of jam, 2 pairs of flip-flops and a sparkly cat mask in my purse. The wedding from whence I stole the wine was also giving out flip-flops and jam. It was a great night.
My wallet isn’t here
There is no truer or deeper feeling of panic than this one. I shudder even to remember what it feels like.
I think “My keys aren’t here” is worse.
I had that a few weeks ago. Turned out my purse had grown extra pockets for the sole purpose of swallowing my keys and giving me a heart attack.
My purse, rather than growing extra pockets, grows extra corners. I’ll look for my keys, they won’t be there, then I’ll look for them again, and they’re all jammed up in an angle of the fabric that didn’t exist before.
Depends on your life situation. If my keys aren’t there I a) have a partner who has keys, I just have to call her and be like “I need to meet up with you ASAP” or b) can still get into my place because I live inn a co-op and we have lock-out procedures. But if my wallet is gone… and I think it’s LOST GONE that means cancelling my cards, replacing everything, losing whatever cash was in it, etc
I have a spare house key in my office, two hidden on my property, one on each of my 4 regular sets, one on my work key, and two stashed with friends. I REFUSE TO BE LOCKED OUT EVER AGAIN.
I got into a car accident one night, about a year ago. Middle car in a three car sandwich, on a cold Friday night. Ended up getting a $100 cab ride home, to find that my keys were not in my purse. Thank god for a hidden set nearby. Then I walked into my bedroom in the dark and stepped straight onto cat vomit in my bare feet.
I do “WHERE THE FUCK ARE MY KEYS” every half-hour or so.
I left my keys on the kitchen table when I went out recently. Have you ever had to sit in your apartment building’s hallway, rather drunker than you should be, and wait for your spouse to come home and let you in? Because I have now had that pleasure.
this happened to me recently and i sat on my front step and ordered a set of lock pics on the internet from my phone
I am one of those people that needs many pockets in my purse and each pocket has VERY SPECIFIC items that go in them based on ease of accessing pocket, need of item, keeping things (like gum) from getting squished onto other things (like a hairbrush). But every once in a while I drop my keys into the wrong pocket and experience the panicky, heart-thumping terror of trying to figure out what to do if I can’t find my keys because I will be stranded forever (okay, not really, but it is a fear
“My keys aren’t here” in the middle of winter at 1am is a GREAT feeling.
I have experienced this moment at a subway station TWICE in the last month. It is harrowing.
I had to call my husband once and ask him to bring me some method of payment at the grocery store. Fortunately, it happened before I hit the checkout line, and I spent a productive half-hour until he arrived live-blogging weird things I found: peppermint kale chips. A whole monkfish on ice.
I hope these were real things on sale in the store, not the things you found instead of your wallet. I mean, a bag big enough to hold a whole monkfish, PLUS the ice, would really be something. Maybe you could have traded the monkfish for your groceries?
I do carry huge bags…the monkfish could THEORETICALLY be possible! But no, I just forgot the key phrase “around the store”. (It’s probably at the bottom of my purse.)
I biked to the train station and then realized I had left my wallet in my other bag. So I had to bike back, because I had no transit card or money to take a bus, and then bike to the damn station again because I had to go somewhere.
THIS IS MY WORST FEAR
Being blessed with ADD, “my wallet isn’t here” could easily be my theme song. Every damn day my wallet goes on walkabout: back pocket of jeans, kitchen counter, the car, purse, basement stairs….
The only thing worse is putting in a fancy updo, noticing it slipping after running or dancing or what-have-you, reaching into your bag for reinforcements, and realizing:
I left my bobby pins on the bathroom counter.
This week we had a fire alarm in the building and had to evacuate and stand in the 40 degree heat at midday for twenty minutes.
That morning I had taken the fan and sunscreen out of my bag, like ‘I’ve been carrying these around for a MONTH without using them’.
So karmically that fire was my fault, is what I’m saying.
I feel like this is me a minimum of 4x per day every single day
My mom is pretty far gone with Alzheimer’s; she’s mainly down to the occasional coherent word and usually not even that. We were at the doctor’s office last week and she kept looking down at the floor on either side of the wheelchair. I finally had the sense to ask “Mom, are you looking for something?” Out of nowhere, she looked straight at me and said “WHERE’S MY PURSE.” The lost purse fear goes deep.
The Lid Of This Lip Balm Has Come Off And The Stick Is Now Covered In Purse Gunge Sodding Hell
Similarly, “the lid came off my lipstick and now everything in my purse is stained Berry Blast, what the fuck?”
But I Will Wipe That Off And Use It Anyway For I Cannot Find Another One In Here
There Are Crumbs All Over This Tube of Black Honey But I Have a Meeting In Five Minutes And A Stack Of Napkins From Wendy’s, Let’s Do This
i KNOW THIS EXACT CLINIQUE COLOR it is the BEST (and also worst for Picking Up Stuff.)
truly my soul sisters on this here dot net.
WHY IS THAT LID SO LOOSE. WHY.
My current most-used purse has a little elastic loop which holds a lip balm parallel to and just inside the zipper opening, and it is the most beautiful thing in the world
Shortly followed by Now I Must Slice the Purse Gunge Off the With the Plastic Knife From a To Go Set of Utensils I Have in My Car At Any Given Time.
I dropped an open tube of lip balm on a plane once and when I found it it had a bogey stuck on the end.
When Did I Leave This Apple in Here and Why Is It Now Squishy on One Side?
Yup, constantly leaving fruit in there and thinking it will hold up better than it actually does. Protip: Don’t try this with peaches!
Favorite thing to put in my purse: http://ecochildsplay.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/…
*ETA: Actually a backpack, not a purse
I Have Twelve Lipsticks In My Purse And None Of Them Are Appropriate For This Situation And/Or Outfit
Corollary: I Had Twelve Lipsticks In My Purse And Why Can’t I Find a Single One Right Now Oh God
I try to remember to clear out my lipsticks every few days and return them to the big tray in my makeup drawer. I usually fail and keep tossing in the shade of the day all week.
There Should Be Twelve Lipsticks In My Makeup Bag And Why Is It That Only After Going Through Eleven of Them Do I Realize That The One I’m Looking For Has Fallen Out Into My Purse.
closely related college-edition: I Know I Put Pens In Here, But They Keep Turning Into Lipsticks And Highlighters??
At one point, I put three pens in a pocket at the start of the day and had three crayons at the end.
My students leave pens behind all the time, so I pick them up and put them in my laptop bag so that when the student who left their pen behind in their previous class comes to mine and realizes they don’t have a pen, I have extras. It’s like a giant pen do-si-do.
I Feel Like I’ve Missed Out On Displaying The Correct Class Signifier In This Situation And Picking Up My Purse Is Only Making Things Worse
Well played.
#accurate #tooreal
Corollary: This Poorly Designed Purse is the Correct Class Signifier And I’m Irritated At Myself For Carrying It Instead Of The More Useful Purse
(they don’t need to know I got it on saaaaale for $40 and am not actually of the correct class)
This is the bane of my life. Honestly.
Remembering the time I was referred to as “Elle Woods Goes to Theology School,” and feeling mad all over again at my purse betraying me.
I would absolutely watch that movie though.
Let’s be friends!
Clearly you are doing theology school right.
Who wouldn’t want to be Elle Woods, in any context?
I Forgot That a Backpack is Not an Appropriate Purse for an Interview and Now I Have to Scramble to Find that Leather Thing I Never Use
And then the joyous sequel, I Have Now Been At This Job Long Enough to Start Using My Fandom Bags
A Hundred Receipts, No Tissues.
(And I just learned that receipts are coated in something toxic, which makes it even better.)
Oh dang. I’ve definitely blown my nose into receipts. Probably some receipt-ink went up my nose and now I’m going to die of cancer.
Honestly, sometimes when I’m drinking gin or eating chips or binge-watching a show instead of exercising I think to myself, “Well, at least *this* is something that’s likely to kill me that I *enjoy*!”
Don’t worry. The ink up your nose won’t kill you. Receipts cause cancer from touching them. The cancerous agent is absorbed through your pores.
Feel better now?
Isn’t It Ironic, Don’t You Think?
It’s like black…something in your Burt’s Bees.
Crap, I’ve been blotting my lipstick on purse receipts.
Dammit Kid Why Is There A (Cinderella Magiclip, Stuffed Pony, Random Bit of Lego, Half-Eaten Pancake, etc) In Here.
or, in a more formal situation,
Dammit Self, Why Are There No (Cinderella Magiclips, Stuffed Ponies, Bits of Lego, Snacks, Crayons, etc.) to Keep This Kid Quiet For Five Minutes.
When my sister was a toddler she used to pick up pretty rocks and hand them to my mom, and Mom would put them in her purse without thinking about it.
At one point Mom weighed her purse and it weighed FORTY POUNDS.
This just reminded me, when I was a kid I carried a purse just to carry my pretty rocks around and I used it to hit boys who were mean to me. I regret nothing.
I know a toddler who really likes rocks. I might have to mention this idea to her mom.
I am interested in your ideas and would like to subscribe to your newsletter
When I was a toddler I was apparently a holy terror in restaurants, and to shut me up my mom would let me sit on the floor and play with her purse. She stopped doing that after getting home one night and discovering all the stolen restaurant silverware I’d shoved in there when she wasn’t looking.
Whenever I have to go out at night, my 3-y-o provides me with a Lego guy to keep me company/report on my activities. I never remember to give them back, yet somehow never have one to offer a bored/restless child…
I Wonder What This Pill Does?
Please Stop Complimenting My Bag, My Partner Bought It And He Has Better Taste Than I Do When It Comes To This Sort Of Thing
And the corollary: Please Stop Complimenting My Bag, My Ex Bought It And Now I Have To Acknowledge He Did At Least One Thing Right
LOL, my partner has been shopping for a new work bag for me for christmas, and won’t tell me what he’s considering but asked me for parameters. This is fine, because he also has better taste when it comes to this sort of thing. I’d keep carrying this increasingly tattered bag until it literally falls apart.
Ah, the parameters question. My mother and I have gone on the Quest for the Perfect Purse several times, and figuring out what makes it Perfect has been a life-long journey. My husband doesn’t even try anymore, because it doesn’t make a lick of sense to him why this bag and that bag are VERY DIFFERENT and this bag is unacceptable.
I recently realized that having straps with a drop longer than the length of my forearm, so I can bend my elbow and slip a purse onto my shoulder entirely one-handed, is CRUCIAL. Only after buying a purse which required me to hitch it up with my other hand, of course. And now I can’t find a good one anywhere and have resorted to crossbodies for the indefinite future.
THAT PARAMETER IS SO IMPORTANT. I accidentally bought a bag once that I could never get on my shoulder and it was the worst.
I have one superpower. I can look at any purse and tell with a glance if the drop will work for one-arm shoulder carrying. I can tell you if it’s 7″ or 8″ or 9″ without touching it. Can I estimate any other size, ever? Nope. How long is this piece of string? No fucking clue. Turn it into a purse strap, then I’ll be able to tell you. Don’t shop for furniture with me but if you need a new handbag- I’m your girl!
My fancy expensive bag only has either a long cross body strap, or teeny handles so you CAN’T actually fit your shoulder in there. So either cross body or dangling from hand carrying.
I spent a stupid amount of money on this bag and also had a week long meltdown about it (them signifiers, I tell you what) and it’s not big enough and the straps are dumb. HONESTLY.
It does get me good service in shops, though.
My mother-in-law bought me my first ever real big person purse (up until now, it has been either messenger bags or diaper bags. And that one tiny black clutch for weddings and funerals. Yes, I am in my 30s) and OH MY GOODNESS IT’S LIKE A GIFT FROM THE GODS
Big enough for a hardcover book? Yes! Enough pockets as to not be overwhelming? You bet! Pretty color? Eeeerrr, close enough.
I love my purse.
I get more dang compliments on my purse than on anything else I own. It’s a Haiku bag in lurid orange and green (MrChouffe knows that I would buy nothing but neutrals given the chance, so when he buys me wearables they’re always in Bright Colors) floral print, and it was his birthday present to me last year. It has enough room for my iPad, several books, my wallet, and my phone; and it has appropriate pockets for Keeping Folded Things Flat, Easy Access to ChapStick, Easy Access to Keys, Things What Need Securing With a Zipper, and Sunglasses. I love it an unreasonable amount.
That’s not a purse, that’s a miracle.
Mine is a weird purple-ish color Jessica Simpson (!!) hobo bag. I was worried about transition from a diaper bag to something more practical (since the kiddo is potty trained, it no longer seemed reasonable to carry one of those around), but having a really real purse is way more convenient than I would have assumed.
Especially since purse sand ALSO happens in diaper bags.
I found the Perfect Purse recently (Diane von Furstenberg Secret Agent Tote) and now I have a Google alert set for when it goes on sale. My partner thinks I’m insane.
That is a beautiful piece of purse design — clearly you have the Finding Gift and I hope a DvF sale comes your way soon to reward such finding.
I regularly empty my pill case onto my desk and start googling the codes on the pills trying to figure out which one is an antihistamine. This tends to get me some weird looks at school.
Looking through my bag with a headache brings a whole new, mundane level to Red Pill-Blue Pill debate.
Once again, Mallory has typed up my thoughts and published them on this page.
I mean, seriously, these are all things I’ve said, sometimes all in a single 24-hour period.
I have at least once dug around in my purse in an ultimately futile effort to find a hair clip while driving, but because I was driving, did so without looking in the purse, just feeling around with my hand, and then when I couldn’t find it, just emptied the whole damn purse on the passenger car seat in a fit of pique. Followed of course by sheepishly repacking the contents into my purse after reaching my destination (and never finding the hair clip).
I have about four hair ties round my gearstick for in-car hair emergencies.
That is brilliant
The little spot on the door that is intended to hold I-don’t-know-what is filled with hair ties and change in my car.
Mine has the de-icer scrapey thing, my chequebook, a pack of tissues, a birthday card that someone left in my car three years ago, and a de-mister chamois pad thingy. Change for parking is in the whatsit in front of the gearstick along with the cables for ipod an phone charger and a lip balm, and in the glove box are the tampons, hay fever nose spray, bumbag for phone carrying in summer when I have no pockets, a pack of plasters, deodorant and a spare head torch.
Me, control freak who insists on being prepared for every occasion? I have no idea why anyone would ever think that.
between this and your previous horsey comments I wonder if we’re somehow the same person.
Except that I also have multiple water bottles and energy bars for any sort of emergency situation, which might require me to live in the car for three days. (This quirk is directly linked to my mother’s need to have emergency supplies gathered at all times.)
In the boot there are wellies, spare trainers, a coat, halter and rope for horse-cotching emergencies, a first aid kit, atlas, road map of my town, all my car’s paperwork and a bag of shopping bags. No food other than tictacs (lots of), the ubiquitous half empty bottle of water that has been there for about a millennium and an everpresent bag of jelly sweets.
Wow, will you adopt me? A+ in adulting.
teach me
The tampons in the glove box…brilliant! And as someone who has toilet paper, baby wipes and hand desanitizer, my mind boggles why I didn’t add tampons to the mix.
Not to be a jerk by pointing out typos, but hand desanitizer made me chuckle!
HAH, thanks for pointing that out! I hate, hate, hate typos and thought there was something wrong with that word but couldn’t quite put my finger on it (see what I did there? HAH! x 2).
This is basically my purse. Every time I’ve played that purse game at a shower (like BINGO, but with items found in your purse) I have won because I have everything. And I’m not even a mom.
Mine is filled with ginger chew wrappers.
I do this!
I keep a few on my keychain for emergencies.
I have two dangling off each of the carabiners I use as keychains for my car keys.
In college, a classmate asked if I had a spare hair tie. “Of course!” I said, and dumped out my wristlet to reveal…four lipsticks, six credit cards, a breathmint, and no hair ties.
This might have happened to me more than once.
I’m 90% sure there’s a wormhole (similar to the one that removes socks from the laundry) that transports hair ties from the purses of long-haired people to the purses of short-haired people. “Why is this – I haven’t used one in YEARS?”
This theory makes so much sense to me. We should have a twice yearly Gathering to hand the hair ties from the short-haired people back to the long-haired people. And we can also do a ritual to cleanse my handbag of the mini claw clip with only one remaining prong that I swear I throw away but winds up back in there
I cut my hair short around two years ago and for ages there were always ponytail holders handy. Then I grew it back out and the heaps I had of them have vanished. I keep buying them and they disappear faster than I can even put them on my head.
I kept a bunch of mine in case I decided to grow my hair out, but at this point I’m pretty sure they’re all crunchy and useless. Will I throw them out? No, I will not.
Why Are My Business Cards Soggy
Not soggy for me but generally dirty and gross. Nothing says professional quite like a business card that has tarnish on it from the silver card case I bought at Tiffany when I got my first Real Job (TM)…
Is The Bottom Of This Bag Just Cold, or is it Damp?
Why didn’t I realize this tampon wasn’t lip gloss sooner?
Why didn’t I realize this lip gloss wasn’t a tampon sooner?
How did this tampon unwrap itself, and what substance has soaked into it?
Situational Transmogrification Of Cylindrical Objects The Trauma Is Real
(sometimes I just need a damned Tums)
I Could Have Sworn I Had A Pen
Not That Pen, A Different Pen
Why Are There So Many Pens
*throwing pens*
Not THAT Pen, I Had A BETTER Pen
Why Is There Only A Pencil When I Need A Pen
Why Is There Only A Pen When I Need A Pencil
Why Do I Only Carry Pens in Colors Like Purple and How Much Will Airport Customs Interrogate Me if I Use Purple to Fill Out Their Form
I have filled out Customs form with Purple pen…
My Good Pen is a lovely Waterman fountain pen…filled with purple ink. I find that if you write in purple, but with a fancy, grown-up looking pen, it causes enough cognitive dissonance that you can get away before people start asking questions.
I was a How Have ALL My Pens Turned To Lipsticks?? person until I got a little zip pencil case that I hoard all my good pens inside. Simply: Grab zippy case and Transfer into whatever purse/bag/backpack I am carrying with me.
(it’s only my art pens because those are the only ones I care about, so if I’m using my art pens to fill out your form, you can lump it, sir.)
I treasure my one island of pen sanity.
There Are So Many Pens Yet Somehow None of Them Work
At Least Three Pens Have Disassembled Themselves In Here, Shouldn’t It Be Possible To Build One Complete Pen Out Of The Scattered Pen Parts?
This describes my purse, my home, and my life.
I have a friend who buys one kind of pen, knows exactly where all of them are kept in his apartment, and knows when he should buy new ones. I once witnessed him putting his pens back in their individual places after a group used them to play a game, and I was a little awed.
is your friend a robot
Your friend and I are kindred spirits (I don’t have a place for each individual pen, but do have pen stashes throughout my place that are always stocked with quality, functioning pens. Because the only thing worse than not being able to find a pen when you need one is finding one that almost works, but not quite)
My boyfriend removed the pen caddy from the kitchen and now my whole life is falling apart. Ok not really but honestly I am disproportionately distressed by it. I need them just rarely enough that I never manage to put it back, but often enough that it throws me. And yesterday he took the tissue box out of there, too.
This is sort of me! We have a bunch of crappy pens that may or may not work that we keep in the kitchen, but I know where all of my pens are because they have places.
They have places because otherwise they disappear and I’m forced to use the crappy kitchen pens.
No, You May Not “Borrow” A Pen, I Only Have Three And THREE IS NOT ENOUGH
hashtag The Waitress Dream, hashtag Too Many Years Bartending, hashtag Pen Hoarder
Pen Caps Pen Caps Everywhere, But Not A Thing To Write With.
Where is The Pen That Works
All the stores and public buildings here are now doing bag checks for security and it is an embarrassing reminder that I need to stop carrying around any combination of my underwear, 18 assorted lipsticks, my overdue tax forms, bad fruit
Once I forgot to properly unpack my bag after using it to transport toiletries when moving house. A few days later I went through a bag check where a very unamused security guard pulled out a huge pack of razors and some thrush medicine. 😐
After our last car died (Froggy RIP), we had to do the frantic grab everything in the backseat and shove it in a bag/out of sight thing before getting it towed, and I had my everyday MegaBag with me. Used that same MegaBag as a carry-on for a flight about two weeks later, completely forgetting that there were things from the car in there. The security guard kept asking me what I had that was triggering the x-ray machine, and I honestly couldn’t answer. Turns out, my husband’s Leatherman had made its way into the corner of my bag.
My mum went through a bag check once and they found three penknives.
It’s always as I’m approaching bag check and have gotten too close to hide behind the people in front of me that I realize I should have hidden my knife in the side pocket under a tampon or something.
ETA: Hahaha, better than already being in line at TSA and realizing you have a giant pair of brand-new scissors you’re now going to have to let them throw away, hahaha.
overdue tax forms….
brb, stopping by Revenue Canada
Ha, I once realized too late into a museum security line that I had a dirty thong in my purse. I did not make eye contact with the guard.
There is chocolate in here that I did not put there.
(I had a confectionery stalker a few years back, I kept finding chocolate in my bag and car and I absolutely had not put it there. I was too scared to eat any of it.)
whaaat? at first I was like “oh that sounds nice!” but upon reflection it’s actually a little scary! especially because it’s too worrisome to eat the chocolates!
I KNOW! I found a Snickers on the front seat of my car, and I never buy them and hadn’t had anyone in the car with me for at least a week. Then a week or so later there was half a Milka Daim bar in my bag but the chances of me 1) buying it and not eating it all immediately or 2) buying it and forgetting, are absolute zero.
“I was too scared to eat any of it.”
We are very different people. Not eating it would never occur to me until after it was in my mouth, which is why I would be incredibly easy to murder.
I think if the first one had been chocolate I actually liked I would have been, but as it wasn’t, it put me on my guard!
It has often been discussed, by a number of different parties, that it would be very very easy to poison me. Just leave some tainted candy or cookies around, and I would surely be killed.
I once found a Reese’s cup on the desk I usually sat at in a college classroom, and the mix of flattery and paranoia was really wrenching. I think I moved it to another desk, but it was a really hard decision. Was I turning down chocolate/peanut butter AND a secret admirer?! Or did I save my life? We’ll never know.
This one wouldn’t phase me as my husband often leaves chocolates and snacks in my bag especially if I’m traveling since I have low blood sugar issues. The bigger problem is when I don’t find them and they have melted into a sometimes inedible mess.
I Can’t Find The Hole, So How Did These Coins Get In The Lining (And How Do I Get Them Out?)
How Could My Work ID Badge Fall Through That Tiny Hole (and can I get it out between here and the office door?)
A couple days ago I tried to put on the pair of jeans I stole from an ex years ago and they didn’t fit anymore! So now I have no pants with big pockets and am stuck even further in the terrible land of purse anxiety.
I realize I could buy my own pants from the men’s section, but that would involve shopping.
I am so glad I don’t use a purse.
CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR PERFECT LIFE RUDY
eeeee Mallory yelled at me!
It’s like that episode of the X-Files when that angel reveals his face and it’s so beautiful and blinding that everyone cowers before it.
I was coming down here to make this exact comment. Pockets 4ever.
I periodically decide that this is the time I’m going to be a Grownup Lady and carry a purse, and then I remember that my messenger bag is waterproof and big enough that I don’t need to struggle with like eight different bags like the poor lady on the bus yesterday who kept dropping things because “women’s” bags aren’t big enough so she had like six of them, and I decide I’m good with being an unprofessional slob.
Yesterday I had a gym bag, a lunch bag, my purse, and my laptop bag and oh, the weeping.
I nest them. I have a small emergency purse in my backpack, which also carries all the stuff a regular purse would plus my gym stuff. I also have a large tote which carries my lunch and sundry other things. I may not look professional, but I have both hands free!
like the poor lady on the bus yesterday who kept dropping things because “women’s” bags aren’t big enough so she had like six of them
That would be me. Purse + lunch bag + tote (sometimes 2) + occasionally something in a plastic bag. My purse is pretty big too I just don’t like having a lot of stuff in it. Makes no sense
I ride my bicycle nearly everywhere, and last year I realized I didn’t have any handbags–I’d been using a pannier with a strap (so I could wear it cross-body) for nearly five years.
I now have two inexpensive handbags.
I also ride my bike everywhere. I use either a detachable wire basket or a messenger bag for my stuff, when I’m actually carrying enough stuff to warrant it.
Approaching red alert levels of hangry and the snack that I swear I put in my purse this morning has evaporated into the purse ether.
It will show up in a week, half-unwrapped and sticky.
Yesterday, for complicated yet boring international reasons (and also because I forgot that wearing a camisole instead of a proper support garment means I can’t use my bra cups as isolation booths) I was forced to carry both my passport AND my original birth certificate in my tiny little clutch while visiting approximately one million crowded and confusing stores. My alert level was at a solid Terrified Cat Being Sexually Harassed By Pepe LePew the whole time. Never again.
I’m totally using, “My alert level was at a solid Terrified Cat Being Sexually Harassed By Pepe LePew” at some point. Sadly it will probably be useful in the not too distant future.
Did I take the knife out of my purse before I came to the airport? Also, why is it even in there?
My experience as a 20 year old at the American Embassy. Why do I have swiss army knife I swear I forgot that was there? Yes why AM I carrying three cans of soda that is a good question? I’m pretty sure that powder is just from my broken blush compact but I’m not gonna swear on it
I recently toured the US Capitol with my mom, who a) was carrying an enormous knife in her bag for some reason and b) climbed into the trash can outside the visitor center to retrieve it after our tour was over. This explains most of what you need to know about my upbringing.
Well, it’s a shame to throw away a perfectly good knife! When going through security at the courthouse to obtain our marriage license, my fiance was told by a guard he couldn’t bring in the Swiss Army knife on his keychain, but to “stash it outside” and we could get it back later. We laughed for a really long time, thinking of coming back with a metal detector to find all the buried weapons in the garden outside the courthouse.
Related: When you take the bar exam, you can’t bring phones into the room. A scene from 2013:
Me, to Harried Friend: Hey! Are you okay?
Harried Friend: I just realized I accidentally brought my phone with me.
Me: Give it to me! I’ll go to the bag check and put it in my backpack.
Harried Friend: …well, that would make more sense than what I did.
Me: What did you do?
Harried Friend: Buried it in one of the planters outside.
This reminds that I successfully smuggled a swiss army knife into the Vatican museum on my honeymoon!
I once went all the way through airport security only to find a knife in my purse that I had forgotten about. TSA didn’t catch it when they scanned my purse, which was both a relief and little bit worrying.
I borrowed a duffel bag from my dad before a plane trip once, and on my RETURN trip, TSA found THREE swiss army knives in a random side pocket I’d never opened. Thanks, dad.
My high school marching band went through the Atlanta airport (that had just had dealt with the idiot who tried to force his way past security to make his flight a couple days prior to our trip) Thanksgiving week two months after 9/11. Security was supposedly EXTRA tight, but my friend’s boyfriend at the time pulled enough rope to tie up an entire cabin crew out of his bag just after we got on the plane….
Last time I flew I forgot to take out my mini pocket knife. The second the security guy pulled it out and I started the usual, “I’m so sorry, I forgot it was there.” He just put it back in the bag. It wasn’t even noticed on the return trip. Airport security is weird.
The main reason I check luggage is so that I can have my Swiss Army Knife with me at my destination. Heaven knows, I might need the corkscrew or have to clip a hangnail with the tiny scissors. Come to think of it, Victorinox should sell “knives” that include everything except blades — getting them through airport security would no longer be an issue and those are the parts I use least.
Leatherman makes quite a few multitools that do not include knives. They’re specifically labeled as being TSA-friendly.
(This annoys me because I DO need the knife part on there and many of their mid-sized ones don’t have it, but perhaps it will help you!)
I think I have bought one that kind of was like that. It was the size and shape of a credit card and had all the little pens/tweezers/whatnot but no blade.
When I worked retail I forever and always had box cutters in my pockets and I would often toss them in my purse when I got home and realized I’d carried one away with me (again) and then I’d be going through my purse and wonder why on earth I had five box cutters in various pockets.
On a related note, I still have several of the boxcutters and they came in very handy when I was moving last year.
omg “purse sand”
I’m so glad this is a real thing that other people have/acknowledge. Where does it come from? Why is it there? Gah.
I’m so happy I finally have a term for it!
And how does it get so far inside the gum wrappers, anyway?
SO TRUE
My purse sand equivalent is bed grit. Where does it come from? Why can’t I get rid of it? My husband and I are not the best housekeepers in the world but our floors aren’t so dirty that we would routinely be picking up crud on the bottom of our socks and bringing them into bed with us.
I sleep barefoot and I brush my feet off before I get into bed because I HATE, HATE bed grit. You make me feel less alone.
I ALWAYS have to brush my feet off before I get into bed. When I was a teenager and my sister and I would do movie nights in my room I would make her brush her feet off before getting on my bed. It drove her crazy. But ew bed grit.
I bought a rug for my bedroom specifically for wiping the grit off my feet before getting into bed after walking barefoot on the laminate floors in my house (SO MUCH DUST. And hair. and grit. it all collects in corners and then I stare at it and feel depressed at my un-cleanliness.)
However, being a horse person bed-hay and bed-shavings (also actual sand) are very real problems I have had to deal with.
This is unpleasant but do you have a cat and a litterbox?
this phenomenon is the only reason i make my bed. the cat likes to clean her feet in bed and while i admire her desire for cleanliness, i don’t appreciate all the cat litter it leaves behind
I had so much bed grit when I lived in an apartment with wood floors and none in my current carpeted apartment.
I have some friends who hate carpets because they collect dirt. This is why I love carpets.
I feel like it’s a combination of wood floors & my predilection for barefootedness. I experienced significantly less grit after I put a rug next to the bed.
It’s literal sand from that time you went to the beach two years ago and it will never truly leave.
This is true. I used a tripod on the beach and eight years later still find grains of sand in the carrying case.
Some sort of interdimensional residue that is drawn to lip balm, I always assumed.
See also: Bra Lint
I think it’s part busted eyeshadow, part space debris from whatever pocket dimension my phone goes into? idk.
This! Exactly!
I mean, as a fairly gender-normative man, I rarely carry a purse per se — but the small pocket on my backpack serves much the same function, and it gets purse sand too, so I am likewise very glad to have a term for it and find that it’s not just me! And the small pocket does a lot of other things people have mentioned, and the pens all mutate from the colors I want to use into the colors I rarely do, and occasionally it provides me with bits of paper that contain notes that would have been really useful three months ago when I couldn’t find them.
(On that note: I’m not the only person who gets inexplicable black gooky wax buildup on their keys, am I?)
Oh, Look, an Avalanche of Tampons and Humiliation As I Pull My Wallet Out
Why Are There No Tampons in Here Now That I Need One
This Is Not Lipstick, This Is Pepper Spray
Well I Have Plenty of Tampons But They’re All Covered in Purse Sand
Mine is “Oh, Look, an Avalanche of Tissues and Napkins as I Pull My Wallet Out”
Mine is used kleenex because I am a gross.
are you me
ALL OF THESE
This is Not Hairspray, This is Pepper Spray (extremely glad I caught that one before making the entire ladies’ room at work)
Damn, Damn, Damn, I Got My Book All Dogeared When I Put It Away And It’s Been Sitting Like That For Hours Now Oh God It’s Ruined Forever.
Which Pocket Was My Scarf In… Wait It’s In My Coat Pocket (Which I Am Not Wearing)
And my personal favourite: Oh God Where Did I Put Those Train Tickets?
Ohhhh my precious books I feel like such a bad bookmommy after that 🙁
the purse I carried around for most of the last two years was decently sized, but not quite big enough for some of the books I brought, so a lot of them now have rumpled corners. I prefer to think of it as a sign that they have been well-read and loved.
And Oh God, It’s A Library Book
I Drove Here
So Where The Fuck Are My Keys
No Really
Where Did They Go
IT ME.
(Answers have been: in the purse pocket, in my pants pocket, in my sweatshirt pocket, in the coffee cup holder, in the door, in the trunk, in the pocket I never use, under the lining, still in the ignition…)
I just got a car with keyless entry, I can just push a button on the door handle and it magically unlocks, and it is the greatest invention since . . . I dunno, tampons. As God is my witness I will never dump out my purse looking for keys in the parking lot again.
Cousin of:
Where The Fuck Are My Keys? Oh, Wait, I Am Driving Right Now. They Are In The Ignition.
(I used to keep my car keys in the same pocket as my go-to lipstick. Do not do that anymore because of the panic it would cause when I would go to get my lipstick while at a stoplight…)
Better Not Throw Away These Movie Tickets, I’ll Probably Scrapbook Them At Some Point (I have never in my life done a thing with old movie tickets)
Also, does anyone get freakishly good at telling something is missing from their purse by the weight being slightly off? I’ve shocked my husband a few times by suddenly stopping just before we head out the door, lifting my purse a little then saying “hang on, I forgot my phone.”
Purse weight alterations are definitely A Thing. Yes.
Definitely.
I just switched from tablet+dumb phone to smart phone and my purse is so much lighter and it’s really throwing me off this week
I got a new work bag and I keep freaking out that my iPad isn’t in there because it feels lighter with the weight distributed better.
My bestie is creepily good at this. I change purses too regularly to realize i have forgotten anything until I am far away from being able to rectify it.
Yes. Winter messes with me because I’ll start chucking my phone or my keys or worse yet my wallet in my coat pocket or my sweatshirt instead of my purse and then wasting ten minutes trying to find said item instead of just checking my pockets.
I stick movie tickets in my journals and then years later it’s like “Why do I have a small blank piece of yellowish glossy paper in here?” That shit is not archival quality.
Alternately: Why The Fuck Is This Bag So Heavy?
Seriously, everything that has gone in is light, why is the cumulative weight a literal ton?
My Purse Has Fallen Open And Now Everyone In This Starbucks Can See My Tampons Oh Well
The One Day I Actually Need Tampons I Don’t Have Any And There’s No Dispenser In This Bathroom I Guess I’ll
Just Wad Some Toilet Paper Up There And Hope For The Best
Blue Goo In The Bottom Of My Purse: When Gelcaps Explode
The Last Time I Saw My DivaCup it Was In This Pocket, Where Is It Now That I’m Bleeding?
Why Are There Never Any Pads This Happens Every Month
Level 1: Why Am I Saving All My Receipts
Level 5: I Swear to God I Was Just Holding My Lighter But Now All That’s in Here is Crumpled Receipts
Level 200: [goes down giant slide at City Museum in St. Louis, purse slides ahead of me, I watch helplessly as it spirals around and around spilling all its contents]
this is unconnected to purse horror, but CITY MUSEUM! i went once on a day trip to st. louis 4 years ago and i have wanted to go back ever since!
A+ reference to City Museum and my city
much appreciate
same! I LOVE that slide, it is the best. I’m pretty sure we also have the best art museum ever in this city, I will fight anyone over this.
I remember loving the slide as a small child but then I went down it as an adult and it was way bumpier and more purse-jostling than I recalled. The caves, however, are still the best.
(I don’t even live in STL, I just have relatives in the general vicinity)
No, you do. I grew up a little ways away from STL, and visited SLAM a lot. Then lived in Chicago for a while. The Art Institute is impressive, sure, but you’d be surprised how irate I got when I found out they switched to charging freaking admission (they used to do suggested donations). Although I like supporting museums, I still get huffy about them not being free to the public. STL spoiled me.
YES! Like paying???? to look at art???? I thought that was why we have a government and pay taxes, so that there can be art in museums to look at as much as we want? Roads = unimportant; free art museums are ESSENTIAL.
I Haven’t Bought A Pack Of Gum In Months Why Does It Still Smell Like Cinnamon In There
When you solve that mystery, please come to my house and tell me why my microwave sometimes smells like maple syrup.
My best purse story: I was at a conference or day long meeting or something in a fancy hotel and I went to the bathroom. I put my purse next to the sink and washed my hands. As I was turning to get a towel to dry my clean hands I jostled my purse causing it to fall into the sink, but somehow not upside down so nothing fell out! As I was breathing a sigh of relief the automatic faucet turned on and proceeded to fill my lovely suede bag with water, really fast. I swear I took a moment to look around before grabbing it out of there because that would have been instant meet-cute/friends-for-life fodder but sadly no one was paying attention.
This is maybe the best story ever.
oh excellent story
terrible situation, but excellent story
this is PERFECT (at least as far as purse horrors go)
oh let’s look through the mail while stuck in traffiSPIDER!!!!!!!!
I can relate to this so hard.
I have lost track of how many times I’ve screamed, swatted a spider away, and then apologized to it while driving. I am the Queen Goddess of spiders, and my car is their temple, apparently.
My mailbox is Spider Temple, I guess, and I always check the mail & shove it in my purse.
Once I threw a black widow on an envelope at my friend, in a bad panic response. Glad to hear I’m not alone.
I thought spider while trapped in the car was bad, but reaching your hand into a dark (mail)box of spiders or a crowded, dark purse is way worse.
Every day is Fear Factor.
Once I unknowingly carried a rather large spider in my purse from my basement apartment to the very spare and white apartment in the sky of a fellow law student with whom I was doing a project.
I crawled out while I was cleaning the coffee I had spilled off the carpet. Humiliation everywhere.
THIS HAPPENED TO ME ON SUNDAY! A cane spider the size of my hand crawled past my face on the driver’s side window and I almost had a heart attack until I realized that it was on the outside of my car. I genuinely don’t know how I would have dealt with it if it were on the inside.
It me but backpack.
Outing myself a bit here, but here’s a backpack story. When I was just a wee babby teenage PJ, I was (and still am) very obsessive about Backpack Organization And Maintenance. Mine was always organized. One day, while sitting happily outside at lunch with a couple of friends, I asked if I could borrow a pen from one of my dude friends, An Artist. He waved to his backpack and said I was welcome to one if I could find one. By the end of lunch his backpack had been upended, sorted through, organized, and put back in place. The only reason there’s any record of this event is because, some 15 years later, he saw my mom in our hometown and told her the story. I have no memory of it whatsoever.
No I’m Not Going on a Hike This Backpack is My Purse
Oh God Another Hipster Girl Wearing My Swedish Backpack When I Pass Her On The Street Everyone Behind Us Will Judge Us
You have the kind of backpack with the cute fox on it, don’t you. (I have always wanted one. Yes I am also a hipster girl.)
of course I do! bought it after I saw a million cute hipster girls wearing it and googled “fox logo backpack.” cut to the present when one of my best friends and I both have the backpack in the same color and I’ve kind of had to get over this particular anxiety.
Fjällräven! <3 I have a messenger bag from them, and it is huge and full of pockets and I lug it everywhere.
I Put Two Gloves In My Purse and I Can Only Find One and I Just Bought These Gloves An Hour Ago
(AKA: Me this morning. I am very annoyed about my glove loss. One hour!)
I am prone to losing the left glove, specifically, and I’m not sure sure why. Does anyone else have the issue of losing a particular glove?
Also, there is some sort of rule where if you hold onto the single glove forever the rogue glove will never be seen again but if you discard the remaining glove the lost one reappears in your coat pocket within 72 hours. Same physics as lost socks and earrings.
This is why I have a small box of hopeful single earrings. Though once I did find the other earring which has just further justified me holding onto all these mismatched earrings.
Tampons Have Escaped Everywhere and Today The Bag Checker is Male, Old, and Disapproving
(may only apply if you work at a museum and bag checks are mandatory)
You know what, those people who give us shame-looks for having tampons or pads with us, I am so over them. Yes, I am a woman. Look at me sideways one more time and I will bleed on you, so there.
Gives me an image of the Ally McBeal scene where she is shooting babies out of her vagina at someone. A+ would picture again.
Though as mentioned above, those ppl are so useful when you are trying to smuggle your secret flask into events and what not.
When I sneak verboten things into concerts, I cover them in a layer of tampons and choose the line with a dude purse checker. They never dig past the tampon layer. Works like a charm.
When my office got desks with drawers, my coworker was very excited, until she realized our (male) boss would probably just rummage around in her desk looking for snacks, as she was the person known for having them. She buried them under a layer of tampons as preventative measure. It didn’t work.
That’s impressive snack hunting.
A friend of mine hides her chocolate in empty tampon boxes in her closet. Her husband never looks there (and tends to throw all chocolate/candy out when he’s in a “healthy mood”)
WHAT.
That is just plain not allowed. Do what you want with your own body/eating habits, but how dare you throw out (OH THE WASTE.) my tasty things that I have bought.
How rude.
Libraries, too!
Please, I Promise My Sad, Bruised Apple, Crumpled Health Insurance Forms, Receipts (Again), Hygiene Products Rendered Unsanitary and Unusable By Bumping Around In My Bag and Outdated Boden Catalog Are Not Library Materials.
A rant that is sort of an aside, but this seems like an appropriate place:
In the last year, I have decided that it is too bad for males if they cannot deal with tampons. I used to do that thing where you slide the tampon up your sleeve to make the trek from office to bathroom, but now I just hold it in plain sight in my hand and walk. And if I get diverted in the hall in conversation and a male sees the tampon and gawks and gets uncomfortable, that is just too bad. In fact, I have started buying those new Kotex kind of tampons that come in the really bright wrappers just for this purpose. I figure most of the men in my office have wives/daughters/sisters, etc., so it is time for them to just deal. After all, they’re not even the ones bleeding.
tl;dr, the old male bag checker needs to get over himself
I worked a job that meant that I and my coworkers sometimes would have to fly into mining camps. One particular one was trying to crack down on drugs and alcohol so would hand search all incoming bags. The problem is that to do that they’d put everyone on the in-going flight in a single room where we’d all stand around and watch as the checker would go through each person’s bag, so the mostly-male group would get to watch while they took out all the women’s underwear/tampons/etc. My female coworker eventually decided to fill every pocket of her bag with the biggest pads she could find. She told me it was because “if I’m going to be uncomfortable, they’re ALL going to be uncomfortable”
Yep. Right before my brother got married, I had to take care of him for two weeks while he healed from knee surgery. (This was fine; I like my brother and I had the time to do it). In those two weeks I taught him how to make every recipe I knew. I ALSO made him buy tampons and pads at the store as practice for when he was married. I said, “No one thinks they are for you. MAN UP AND DO IT FOR YOUR FUTURE WIFE.” He is pretty cool, so he understood that one day his lovely bride might run out of feminine hygiene products and maybe wouldn’t feel so great and that a wonderful way of showing his love for her would be to purchase Tampax. They are still happily married and I think it is probably due to my influence.
Everything’s Wet
Just
Inexplicably Wet
I have no tissue when I need one but everything is covered in tissue dust from the tissue I used to have floating around in here just in case
I Feel Like You Are Not Supposed to Use Purses This Expensive as Laptop/Gym Bags, Why Do People Buy Me Nice Things When I Clearly Fail at Adulting
“I Clearly Fail at Adulting” is my new phrase of the day/week/decade.
I would subtitle this: Why I Can’t Have Nice Things.
My Key Tag to Get Into Work Is About the Size of a Quarter and Every Single Day I Spend Half My Walk from the Subway to Work Looking For It in My Giant Ass Purse, Help
Sewing a Tiny Pocket on to Purse Linings Solves All Problems, a Memoir
my purse has a tiny pocket and it always falls out ;-; I need something that closes.
Velcro dots? You may have to sew them to their respective sides rather than purely trusting the glue, but it should work.
My suggestion is some kind of small coin purse or drawstring bag like you get wedding favors in. Also suggest Altoids box but you may want to ask the tech people if that will harm it. wrap fob in tissue or old small sock or something so it doesn’t clunk and tape the box closed (duct tape, obv.) I hope you find something that works for you!
Lanyard? That’s the only reason I haven’t permanently lost my car keys.
I think I would have to stick a hole in it which I’m afraid would mess with whatever technological wizardry is going on.
Stick a small keyring through the existing keyring hole, then attach the lanyard to the keyring?
Unless it’s one of those key tags with a hole that broke two days after you got it, of course.
Put it in a giant wallet-sized thingy. I was constantly losing my work fob until they got the ID-card style ones, and then it came on a lanyard, so I had to tie the lanyard in a series of complicated knots so it wouldn’t get stuck on everything in my purse.
oh yes, Pulling Out The Lanyard Which Has Become Entangled With Keys, Tampons, and Pens is also a purse thing.
I have none of these problems*, and I’m absolutely convinced the reason is that instead of purses I own only one (roomy) Osprey bagpack. I carry a small civilization around in it, and it’s a perfectly organized civilization.
* Ok ok, I have ONE very seldom problem, and it usually takes the form of “oops, I didn’t know I had a knife in here.” I’m glad I don’t live in the US.
I’ve gone from backpacks and smallish shoulder gym bags to a messenger bag to a purse about barely big enough for an iPad, mostly because I’m concerned about the weight. I also have a water bottle in there that I only fill with 100 ml because that should handle my usual water needs between home and work and more would add unnecessary weight.
(At one point I tried a rolling briefcase but it can be a lot of hassle.)
The weight was exactly the reason why I switched from stylish messenger bags to a bagpack. I carried everything around on my right shoulder, from the middle of my school career right through university. The right half of my body is visibly more muscular than the left, and I’m pretty certain my back problems stem from this fact. I switched to the bagpack in my last two uni years, and it was a revelation. Fortunatly, my workplace doesn’t care how I dress, so I’ll keep this bagpack until I die, or it dies. I’m pretty certain it will outlive me.
One of my neuroses is about keeping everything symmetrical, so I’m constantly switching which shoulder I wear the bag on.
That’s exactly what I should have done with the messenger bags, but I’m very much right-handed, and carrying bags on my left shoulder feels unnatural. I also have a very limited field of vision on the left, so everything of importance must be to the right of me (bags, fast moving objects, friends…) or I get uncomfortable.
I miss backpacks so much! Now that I’m not a student in any formal sense of the word I feel like I’m supposed to use a purse and not live out of my mountain equipment co-op backpack and it just never works out well. Can it be socially acceptable to carry a backpack around all the time pls?
We can MAKE it socially acceptable.
I’m not a student any more and I carry a backpack; frankly my back health is more important than any societal expectations of purse usage (I was using a handbag and my shoulders got really fucked up from carrying an uneven load while commuting. And then I read you can end up with permanent un-evenness from doing it for years. The backpack life is for me.)
I could probably do with buying a nice leather backpage or one of those fancy Herschel ones everyone has instead of my off-white filthy thing from Asos.
I carry both a backpack and a purse :-/
(At least to work and sometimes to the grocery store after work. It’s easier to get on the bus to the grocery store than to take the bus home to drop off my backpack and THEN wait for the bus to the grocery store.)
I historically remember to remove my Swiss Army Knife from my purse before I go to the airport, but I keep having to leave it with security at random government buildings. As a civil servant, I go to a lot of those.
See, I am living proof that you can carry a roomy backpack with plenty of pockets and still have all these problems (including the knife one!). You might just be an organized person!
Actually, I think the bagpack has its own consciousness, and it is WAY better organized than I am, because usually, I’m the opposite of organized. I constantly lose things when the bagpack doesn’t take care of them.
Haha, maybe Osprey just makes magical backpacks. I have to say that I rented a large backpack made by them once and found it surprisingly comfortable and well-made.
They’re pretty much indestructible. My current one is about seven years old now, and finally showing signs from wear on the straps.
I feel like worst of all is holy shit where is my purse?! My mother does this every single time she gets back into the car after food shopping dispute the fact that she never takes the purse off and has never once lost it. I have inherited her anxiety.
Of Course I Have a Lighter / Why Do I Have 6 Lipsticks and No Lighter?
This was literally the first time I realized I am femme.
Why Do I Still Want To Carry A Lighter When I Don’t Smoke?
Where else are you going to carry your electrical tape? You know, in case you need to suddenly splice a wire.
Also, if Canadian, you never know when you will need to light a fire in order to ensure your survival.
Slightly less call for life-saving fires in California, alas. People are also really judge here about smoking paraphanalia.
I… but don’t Californians smoke… other things?
And let’s be real. Avoiding the very real possibility of freezing to death every time you leave your house by not living somewhere were the climate is trying to kill you 6(ish, depending on your latitude) months of the year hardly seems to be something worth lamenting over 😉
I got my California job offer 1 week after the first time I ever shoveled snow off a sidewalk. No one even asked why I took it.
Am 6 Months Pregnant, Probably Safe to Remove the Fifteen Tampons From My Purse
Had Hysterectomy in April, Still Finding Tampons In Purses.
Had Hysterectomy Six Years Ago, No Longer Carry Tampons, Still Have Them In Bathroom Drawer.
Probably Not Though, What If You Forgot to Put Them Back After Baby Comes?
Haven’t Menstruated in Years, Still Carry Tampons Due to Unshakeable Adolescent Period Anxiety, Because What If Uterus Suddenly Forgets About IUD, What Then
You will absolutely save some poor woman’s day with this.
I would like to add “Oh dear, I don’t have room for this book AND my wallet, but which is more important?”
Corollary: “What if I get bored of the first book in here? Better stick a second one in, just in case.”
I failed this test today. :/ All I have is the old copy of Tacitus’ Histories I’ve already read three times and annotated extensively and I am not feeling it.
the book obvs.
you could be like that guy from the comments sometime last summer maybe? who used a copy of Catcher in the Rye as his wallet, only with your book du jour. (maybe not if its a library book??)
Yes! I totally thought of myself when I read that originally because I have done it. It wasn’t a strategy though…
This is the main reason I have taught myself to love reading books on my phone. I always have it, therefore I always have five or six unread books and two or more audiobooks in the palm of my hand.
I just can’t get myself to like it. I do it when I have to (thank the gods and goddesses for project gutenberg) but it makes me carsick faster than a real book (???) and it just feels wrong.
I can’t read in transit regardless, which is why audiobooks are my best friends. I check out ebooks from my library all the time, so my kindle / overdrive apps get heavy use.
Is This The Appropriate Level of Purse-Holding To Keep It Secure Without Appearing Overly Paranoid About Purse Thieves?
One Is Big, One Is Small, Buying An In-between Size Would Start Me Down A Slippery Slope of Xeno’s Paradox Purse-Buying
There Is Nowhere In This Diner/Bar/Restaurant To Set My Purse Down Securely Or Hang It Up So I’m Going to Hang It Off The Bend Of My Knee For The Duration
Is This Weird? That Other Lady Looks Pretty OK With Not Even Being Able To See Or Touch Hers, What Is Her Secret
My mom once had her purse stolen off her chair at a restaurant! Team Hang it Off Your Knee for life.
Not your mom, but me too! Team Purse Between The Feet 4Lyfe
I Got One Of Those Cute Purse Hook Things But Now I’m Worried They’re Too Bougie For This Restaurant
Oh God I’ve Been Using “Bougie” Incorrectly For Years
I got a purse hook from Daiso and sometimes I worry it’s not bougie enough.
I bought a purse hook (from the dollar store no less) and it is the best thing ever. I don’t care what it looks like because I don’t have to balance it on my knee or worry about it being stolen and I can enjoy my dinner like a non-crazy person, even if I am, in fact, crazy for the glee I feel over not having to worry about my purse.
My Mom Keeps Giving Me Bougie Purse Accessories And Purses, Still Trying To Find Way To Adult Without Excessive Bling & Safely Have Convo With Parent.
Purse hooks! I didn’t know those were a thing! I just went on an Internet crusade–MUST HAVE.
I stick a foot through the handles! With enough practice I can almost do this and then stand up again without looking impossible awkward, only as awkward as I normally look.
I do this when I’m traveling! Also on roller coasters.
My keys were right on top until I had to switch between my eyeglasses and my prescription sunglasses several times and now they’re lost to the darkness.
Oh gosh, same.
Once I couldn’t find my keys in my backpack and had to break into my second floor apartment by climbing my partner’s shoulder’s and pulling myself up on to the luckily unlocked balcony…they were at the bottom of the bag once we got inside.
There is no pain worse than the pain caused by blindly reaching into a purse and getting stabbed by a metal mechanical pencil tip. (Still not bad enough to make me switch to plastic mechanical pencils.)
Or the pointy corners of the little card that pills come on, and you’ve torn the empty ones off. For best results, jam it directly up your fingernail.
From this morning:
Why did I put my ugly practice crochet square in my purse last night?
“purse sand,” yes, finally there is a name for it.
Not Enough Room In Here For A Book AND Lunch, Guess I’m Not Eating Today
Did you know that AA batteries are the exact same size as chapstick? Also, I think I’ve been cursed by someone. All my chapsticks turn into batteries when they go into my purse.
Are they charged or new batteries, at least?
Almost certainly not.
That Bottle of Medication Has A Childproof Cap, But Not a Purse Proof Cap & It’s Everywhere.
YUP. Is it still ok to take the medication? I mean, obviously, but I worry about it still.
Ooh, I actually have a solution to this! I carry my ibuprofen in a repurposed Altoid Smalls tin, which has never once disgorged itself into my purse bowels.
That’s a good one! I usually use an old film canister, but if I ever lost it I’d be sunk, because I don’t exactly have a bunch of those lying around the apartment here in the year 2015.
That would certainly draw fewer weird looks than my strategy of “old ziploc bag that has been in there for years and yet still somehow holds the pills better than the bottle they came in, what the hell.” People look at you funny when you pull unmarked pills out of a plastic bag, for some reason.
THIS
Unfortunately my drugs are scheduled and can’t be carried outside their original bottles. Except when carried loose in my purse because said original bottle has disgorged them to fly free.
I…will admit to brushing all the lint and purse sand off my allergy medication and taking it anyway. It is EXPENSIVE.
Oh yeah, no shame in that! Also it’s not like you can just call your doctor and be like “yeah I spilled my entire script in my purse can you call in a new one?”
IT ME
I’m so glad to find I’m not the only one! This has happened to me multiple times this year alone.
But where does the purse dust come from?!
Gwyneth Paltrow.
eughhghhhh purse sand ughhhhhhhhh
Oh God, It’s A Spider! AHHH! Wait, No. Those Are Just My Falsies From Halloween.
I Spent 25 Dollars on This Lipstick and Now 23 Dollars Worth of It are Smeared Across My Phone
Here’s a thing I did a few weeks ago: I went to Starbucks on my way to work to get a coffee. As I walked in, I took my wallet out and tucked it under my arm for easier access. I handed my mug to the barista and ordered, then looked in my wallet for my purse. It was gone! I panicked. I said “Cancel my order! Cancel my order!” and he said it was okay, I could have it on the house. I thanked him very much and then proceeded to freak out about where my wallet could be. What if I got pulled over and didn’t have my license? Then, as I reached for my now-full mug, I noticed my wallet, under my arm. Now I can never go back to that Starbucks.
I use the Starbucks app to pay for my coffee, and something something boring to do with my online security but I needed to reload $ to the app and couldn’t figure it out, and instead of just, like, forgiving me the $.56 I was short, the barista told me to go back to my car to get my wallet & bring in the money, and I was insulted because it was my regular Starbucks, and dude. I am very thin-skinned about unnecessary barista kindness, it seems. I would go back to your freak-out Starbucks forever if that happened to me.
(I actually have gone back there and will continue to do so. They are very gracious.)
I have Generalized Purse Anxiety, in that carrying a purse gives me itchy, not-quite-right in the gender feels. When I can get away with it, I carry my wallet in my back pocket, and all is right with the universe. But. BUT. Purses are just so convenient! I have things! To carry!
My compromise is thus: my “purse” is a crossbody leather satchel, which, if it was juuuust a hair wider, could be a messenger bag. And I treat it like a survival kit, so there’s a multi-tool, at least one flashlight, a compass, and a mini first aid kit in there at all times. It’s not perfect, but at least I can carry my crap around without feeling weird.
YES to the awkward purse gender feels, but also wanting to be able to carry things around comfortably. It’s either pants/jacket pocket or full backpack for me, neither of which are ideal. Maybe I need to get a satchel/messenger bag?
If you ever find a perfect solution to this problem, please broadcast it on these here Toast airwaves so I can finally be at peace!
Up until I was around 23 I carried everything I thought I needed in an Altoids tin in my back pocket- because the tin had room for my lil lip gloss or lipstick. Paperback books went in my cargo pockets. Because I like having my hands free and my neck hurt a lot. I refuse the idea that bag-carrying or not is gender-related and I pity the men who want to carry all the cool stuff I now carry around but can’t because of the cruelty of society.
I have reached a comfort level with this issue via combination of rigid design parameters & a strict policy of referring to the object in question as a “bag” rather than a purse. Then I get unreasonably irritated whenever unknowing persons violate the second rule.
I carry a wristlet now, which has barely enough room for phone, one thin pen, one thin Burts Bees tinted balm, maybe two sheets of folded paper if I have tickets or whatever to carry, and the cards/cash/two bandaids so I can pull them out for strangers who think that I’m amazing for having a bandaid with me when I carry so little. My keys are hooked onto the hook with the wrist strap, and it’s like a glorified wallet and I love it.
But I don’t wear makeup / use hair ties / menstruate / have little kids, and back when all those things were true I couldn’t have gotten away with this. My phone has all the books in it, so unless I need to carry a passport or my computer, the wristlet gets me everywhere I need to be.
When you said “wristlet” I got all excited, picturing a kind of large cuff or vambrace with a pocket on it. But then I googled it, and yeah, a wristlet won’t work for me. I’d lose one of those before I left the shop where I bought it. Womp womp.
I remember in elementary school having some sort of tiny fanny pack for the wrist. Surely someone has made an adult version by now!
Now I want one like you describe
Melanie
I have one of these
Not big enough for a phone but still very useful.
This sounds like exactly the bag I’ve been looking for; I don’t suppose you have a recommendation for me?
I used to carry military mapcases, which are fantastic for keeping organized because in addition to their larger flat compartments, they have little slots designed to hold A SINGLE PEN and A TINY AMOUNT OF CHANGE OR WHATEVER, but A. I need more space; B. they don’t really mesh with my style these days.
I wanted to go the mapcase route (one of my friends swears by his) but I need more space. So I ended up with this bag which the internet tells me is a Patricia Nash saddlebag. I found it in TJ Maxx a few years back, and even there it was more expensive than any purse I’ve ever considered, but my partner at the time saw me admiring it and went back and bought it for me.
Oooh, that is nice, and slightly less utilitarian than others I’ve had my eye on. Thanks!
Tangentially related, As a femme, I have always been the one carrying my gfs’ shit in my bag. For my current gf, it is a style choice, as ‘messenger bags/satchels don’t go with this suit’.
She is slowly turning into a sort of Beau Brummel-style dandy, and after seeing Terry Crews carry a clutch, has big ideas about a series of leather pouches which she can coordinate with her pocket squares. But now she gets made fun of by our friends if she carries my bag because it’s very girly. Gender is weird and beautiful.
Why Do They Keep Making Purses With Black Lining When All My Stuff Is Black
Am I Too Busty To Decently Wear This Purse Cross-Body
Oh yeah, I always try to find the ones with brightly colored linings, but in the end I settled for a red phone.
This is the reason for my most-common purse anxiety, Is My Phone Really Missing Or Is It Just Camouflaged.
Cross-Body Bags Don’t Play Well With My Boobs But Other Bags Fall Off My Shoulders, Help
Too busty, but don’t care. I need to have both hands free, and bags will never stay put over my shoulder.
Oh god I never even thought about this. Is it indecent that my cross-body bag strap separates my boobs?
Maybe it’s just a sign that my bag is too heavy, but it actually stretches out my shirts in a weird way over my boobs when I wear it crossbody. :/
Why Do They Keep Making Purses With Black Lining When All My Stuff Is Black
To make you buy special purse flashlights. No really. I’m convinced this is an elaborate scam set up by the fashion / electronics industry.
I Feel Unjustifiably Safe Digging For My Pointed Metal Nail File Blindly
Got Pixie Cut Years Before I Even Owned This Purse
Why Is It Full Of Hair Ties
One time I sliced the tip of my finger off when a hastily-stashed and then forgotten razor sneaked up on me. I am now forever squeamish about rifling around in my purse, though I will certainly never put a razor in one again!
You may never put a razor in there again – but it will show up anyway.
HA! I mean, that’s not even remotely funny but it happened to a friend of mine.
“Where is my phone where is my phone oh god I can’t afford $500 for a new phone plus another $100 in digital train tickets oh god oh god” followed by the relief/embarrassment of discovering my phone is not in my purse because I am literally holding it, right now, in my other hand.
Also, stop trying to break free of the confines of the purse, birth control pills.
In case it makes you feel better: I once spent at least ten minutes searching one-handed for my keys with increasingly frantic gestures, never noticing
A. that jingling noise coming from the hand that wasn’t searching;
B. I was searching one-handed because my keys WERE IN THE OTHER HAND.
My then-partner just stood there laughing the whole time, and I can only begrudge him that laughter a tiny bit.
My mom once used the flashlight on her phone to look for her phone in the car until I went back outside to see what was taking her so long.
I have done this many times with both keys and phone.
I once said “oh no, I can’t find my phone” to my mom AS I WAS TALKING TO HER ON SAID PHONE.
I have done this! I was on the phone with a friend, and needed to make a calendar note re: plans. I then begin frantically searching my apartment, while continuing to talk in an increasingly distracted way. My friend asked what I was doing. I told her I was looking for my phone. Because she is a GOOD friend, she doesn’t remind me of this very often.
YES just the other day I was texting on my phone and freaked out, while texting, that I couldn’t feel my phone in my pocket omg where is it.
I Offered the Person Next to Me a Pen/Gum/Tampon and It Is Taking Longer-Than-Is-Socially-Acceptable to Find It
Corollary: I Told My Coworker I Didn’t Have a Pen/Gum/Tampon But Later My Purse Falls Over And Drops One
(rummages through purse)
Ugh I hate doing this it makes me feel like Grandma
But I love Grandma
Why should it be a bad thing to feel like a grandmother
Ugh, now I’m confronting my own internalized sexism/ageism AND I STILL NEED LIP BALM
My grandmother consistently berates me for having such a heavy purse (because apparently just watching me carry it hurts, even though it’s not that heavy to me).
In a different vein, my mom has taken to carrying a small purse and then right before we get into the store, she’ll say “oh, can you put all of these coupons in your bag?” This also applies to smuggling snacks into the movies for her.
People who purse-shame but then ask you to carry their shit, those people are the worst.
Oh, THERE Are My Earbuds–But Wait, One Of Them Has Lost The Tiny, Infinitely Compressible Foam Tip Into The Purse Vortex
(I will say, though, that purses with d-rings are the BEST. Clipping my keys, my little card holder with my most-used cards, and a small pouch which would hold said earbuds and prevent said tip-loss (if I weren’t so lazy about putting them away) after using them onto separate rings of my Tom Bihn Cafe Bag on the weekends lends added purchase to my grip on sanity.)
“All these giant CVS receipts because of my loyalty card and then all of the loyalty cards they kept giving me when I lied about not having a loyalty card because I didn’t want the giant receipts.”
OMG yes. I use the self-scan checkout ONLY to avoid showing the card and getting the damn receipts.
Yeah, my usual “oh, I don’t go here that often” excuse for turning down loyalty cards doesn’t work well when I’m refilling a prescription for the 80th time…
Why Did I Decide to Downgrade to a Smaller Purse in an effort to Simplify My Life, Now Nothing Fits
and her cousin
Why Did I Get a Bigger Purse, I Can Find Nothing in This Neverending Bag of Random Pointy Objects
And the related: This Purse Would Be Perfect If It Had Only One More Pocket / This Purse Has So Many Pockets I Can’t Remember Where Anything Is.
Not to mention: I Had No Idea That Was In My Pocket, Since When Have I Had Little Kitty Glittens(glovemittenthings)?
OR
What Is This Pocket Even For Anyway
Also, Why can I not find any pens in the whole house, who has all the pens?!? Oh wait, they are ALL in my purse.
Why Do I Have a Grapefruit Spoon?
My college dining hall had a single rogue grapefruit spoon that you might happen to pick up every once in a great while and it was always very exciting. (I went to a small liberal arts college in the midwest, if that’s not obvious from this story.)
I also went to a small liberal arts college in the midwest, so that sounds very normal and lovely to me. My friends and I could determine what type of day it was going to be based on the types of sandwiches available in the grab and go section of the cafeteria.
one time in a Dick’s sporting goods store, I pulled my phone out of my purse to show the clerk something specific I was looking for, and a literal ROLL of condoms that I had in there (why???) somehow worked their way out and fell on the floor at our feet. I am now dead of embarrassment and writing this from the ether, BTW
This sounds like a fanfic prompt and I LOVE it.
it DOES that would make a perfect Johnlock fic.
(Everything would make a perfect Johnlock fic.)
the detail that this happened at Dick’s Sporting Goods elevates it into anecdote-perfection.
My Old Purse Was Too Small, But Now I Can’t Find Anything In This Big Purse.
You’re Laughing At Everything I Carry, Until You Need A Tape Measure or a Set of Tweezers.
That 2nd one is literally my mom all day every day. The THINGS you can FIND in her bag!
to be fair- the mini tape measure is a handy thing to keep a curious small child occupied- in addition to whatever other measuring needs you might have while out and about.
If there was ever a post that merited the “The Shudder of Recognition” tag…
I dated a man once who was wrong for me in almost every way (except for being tall and having a beard I guess woo STANDARDS), but I liked him very much for a time, and it ended rather abruptly and I was pretty sad for a while.
Fairly regularly I have memories that make me think WHAT WAS I THINKING. One of them: Fishing around desperately for my keys in my purse, which are almost always there, but almost always take some time to fine. And this dude says to me “You know, you should put them in the same place every time, that way you would be able to find them.”
I should have just turned him into dust that moment and never looked back.
HE DOESN’T UNDERSTAND THE PURSE WORMHOLE, FIE UPON HIM
I Put My Purse On The Passenger Seat But I Had To Brake Too Quickly And Now It’s Tumbled End Over End Onto The Floor Of The Car And Spilled Everywhere, You Will Never Find That Lipstick Again.
You speak only the truth.
other possible additions:
– What Is This Loose Pill (and Should I Take It?)
– Granola Bar Broken Into 523 Miniscule Pieces is Still a Granola Bar
– Oh That’s Cute, When Did I Acquire a Knife?
– Bent Business Cards Now Only Good For Entering Free Lunch Raffles
– Four Totally Necessary Tubes of Nude, Pink-Nude, Mauve-Nude, & Maude Lipstick with Hint of Shimmery Finish
– Tiny Pocket Graveyard of Defective Lighters
– … Wait, Where Can I Get More of the Loose Pill?
Chronology of candy in my purse:
OMG Why Is My Phone Covered In Chocolate
I Swear On Everything To Never Even EAT Candy Again
6 mos. later:
I Can’t Put This Random Fun-Size Hershey Anywhere Else, Oh God, Just Have To Put It In My Purse.
*stern eye-contact with wrapper, as gently lower into cleanest, smallest pocket*
2 weeks later:
Oh God There’s Been A Chocolate-Based Murder In My Purse.
This Is The Opposite Of Magical
Why Does It Seem So Much More Like Poop Than Chocolate Which Is Objectively Nice.
Repeat cycle, until purse objectively ruined.
Only solution: eat all chocolate immediately.
I use my purse to carry around my wallet, cell phone, and a pile of trash.
No, But Really, Where Are My Keys, I’m Going To Be Late For A Thing
No, But Really, Where Are My Keys, I Just Want To Get Inside And Lie in My Bed
No, But Really, Where Are My Keys, I CAN HEAR THEM JINGLING WHERE ARE THEY
Also, TA version:
Do I Have A Whiteboard Marker In Here?
Whiteboard Marker Came Open In My Purse. Do I REALLY Have To Get A New Purse?
Switched Purses this Morning and the One Thing I Need that I Never Ever Need is in the Other One
That’s always the keys to the shop when everybody else has to leave early, I’ve found.
I take great joy in pulling out the most random object possible from my purse. I never put them in there for that purpose, but I sometimes don’t take them out for my own future delight.
Recently, said item has been a hockey puck.
I almost always have extra socks in my purse. They’re so useful.
I had socks in my purse for a long time after I thought I was going to go bowling and then didn’t.
I had a squishy toy hockey puck in my purse for two months, so I’m very glad I’m not the only one!
I have looked through every pocket of my purse 3 times to find my phone and now I am panicked. When I look a 4th time the phone is magically there. What is this mysterious portal?
My MetroCard Has Evaporated and I Can Hear My Train Pulling In
I Don’t Remember Putting That Fork in There
I Do Remember Putting a Fork in There and Yet It is Now Gone
I Don’t Even Think I Saw This Play, Why Do I Have the Playbill
Yet Another Pair of Broken Sunglasses
How much does this purse weight, anyway? Will my shoulder ever heal?
I Brought a Clutch to this Party and Somehow it is Making me Sit Demurely with Ankles Crossed and OH GOD it May Actually be Turning me into my Mother
a.k.a. WHY does this dress not have pockets?
a.a.k.a. Sod this, I’m wearing a tux to this thing next year.
Clutches are fucking bullshit.
I have never carried a clutch, but if I did I think I would spend the whole evening exaggeratedly *clutching* it to my chest and occasionally tilting my face upward toward the fashion gods and yelling, “Am I doing it right?” If anyone tried to offer me food or drink I would tell them with a mournful expression that as hungry as i was, and as lovely as their food smelled, I must devote both hands to clutching my clutch.
Hahaha, yes. It’s already hard enough to adequately eat/drink my anxiety at fancy parties. Why make it harder by taking at least one hand, and possibly both, out of commission?
At least I finally remembered to take the ears out of my purse.
I…what?
Wait, is this a silk purse/sow’s ear joke?
Halloween costume. Just thought I’d leave it sans context for a while, but not long enough to actually be arrested for anything.
Ahahaha…deletes 911 from phone 😉
Van Gogh?
Me with: backpack, laptop bag, coat pockets, and most recently car. (Not “this part of the car”. The ENTIRE car.) I am clearly unqualified to own portable containers.
This is closely related to
I Definitely Put My Passport In The Seat Pocket And Now The Plane Has Landed And It Is Not HERE
I can’t believe there has been only one comment about squishy fruit and nothing at all about big purse + commuting liquid container + looking for metrocard/phone/keys in purse = gentle, unnoticeable spilling until oh my god the entire side of my body is wet. Why does no one make completely leak- (and idiot-) proof commuter mugs?? Is this too much to ask? #patriarchy
I started stuffing my thermos in socks that lost their friends to at least attempt to contain the leak (so far it’s working!)
Contigo! Does not leak. Ever.
Holiday gifts for EVERYONE! It’s my good deed for the year.
I never feel less like I have my shit together than when tampons have escaped their wrappers and are floating around my purse willy nilly.
Slut round! (All things that have actually occurred in my backpack)
Oh No, The Lube Exploded
Something Is Vibrating and It’s Not My Phone
Coffee Grounds for Some Reason?
-My Purse is Simultaneously Too Big and Too Small For All The Things in it
-The Zipper Got Stuck and Now It’s Shredding the Insides Oh God I Need Scissors
-I Tripped and Everything Fell Out of My Purse Oh Why Does Everything Have the Same Closure?
-Oh Shit, Some Things I Have in My Other Purse I Forgot To Transfer To This Purse.
-My Hand is Feeling All The Things In My Purse But I Can’t Identify Them Without Seeing Them But I Need a Flashlight or I’m Going To Have to Dump Everything Out Right Here.
-My Contact Solution, Glasses, Key and ID and Phone Can’t Fit in This Bag
-I Just Want a Briefcase or Backpack and Have it Be a Neutral Choice
-This Strap is At It’s Shortest and It’s too Long.
-The Ziplock Bags Inside My Purse Failed.
Why Are My Keys Never In The Corner Of The Purse In Which I First Decide To Scrabble? Why Have They Always Hidden Themselves In ANOTHER Purse-Corner?
One of my coworkers recently had her purse snatched so my very sweet boss bought us all pepper spray. I carried it in my purse for awhile until I realized that it was roughly the same size and shape as my asthma inhaler.
Also I am continually purging my purse as I refuse to allow myself to go over a certain size due to my eternal fear that otherwise they will just get bigger and bigger and eventually I will become my grandmother and start stuffing kleenex up the sleeves of my cardigan.
I keep mine on my keychain (or I did until it was confiscated by TSA, along with a jar of pecan butter I forgot I had in my bag). I kept it in my purse until I had a vision of me politely asking a robber to wait one second while I dug in my purse.
Oh God Is That Gum
So Many Condoms When I Drop It And My Mom Is Looking, But Never Any Condoms When I Feel Like Having Sex
Why Are There No Hooks In This Bathroom, WHY?
“Where the hell is my public transit card, why can’t I ever just put it back in my goddamn wallet when I KNOW I’m going to need it to exit the turnstiles” as I stand awkwardly by the turnstiles excavating all the contents of my purse is my personal favorite.
My second favorite is when I pick lemons from a neighbor’s rarely-harvested tree and stash them in my purse and then find them days or weeks later.
Yup, that first one is my life.
Do Not Tell My Physiotherapist How Heavy My Purse Is (or he will keep trying to make me get a backpack)
When My Massage Therapist Knows What Shoulder I Carry My Purse On By The Muscle Knots
Junior year of high school, the friend who always drove me home in the afternoons always asked me for gum. I never chewed gum. So she gave me a pack of gum to keep in my purse so I could have gum when she asked me for it.
Because I don’t chew gum, I forgot that there was a chance I would be carrying gum when I went to summer camp with that same bag.
Imagine my surprise when I opened the purse to discover that everything was adhered together with melted gum.
Some day I will have both the perfect purse and the perfect bra, but today is not that day.
The Sponge for My Powder Compact is Soaked in Naked Juice Smoothie Oh That’s Because It Just Spilled All Over My Purse
My Waterbottle Was Not Closed Tightly and Now Purse Sand Is Purse Mud.
My Lotion Cap Cracked And Now Everything Will Smell Like This Lotion For All Eternity
Oh yes, and I forgot, There Was No Hook So I Propped It On the Toilet Tank, This Purse Doesn’t Close on Top, It Tipped Over, And Now I Must Pick Things Out of Toilet Water and Decide What to Save
The cap came off the advil and now all the pills are gritty and black, but I have cramps so I’m going to gag them down anyway.
My car was once broken into and my purse stolen. I reported it to the police, who asked about the contents of my purse. I paused before noting sheepishly that all it had in it was a can of Chunky Soup.
The best life decision I have made as an adult was purchasing a small, light, very plain purse with 7 pockets. I’ve kept my commitment to keeping only one – max 2 – essential things per pocket.
Pros: Stuff doesn’t get lost, no surprise tampons/rotten fruit/useless crumpled receipts, easy to grab a ringing phone or debit card, no anxiety from touching that nasty purse sand
Cons: Can’t stuff in baked goods nabbed from the conference table, can’t sneak snacks or alcohol into the theater, when I do a sleepover and don’t wanna put the bra and panties back on the next day they have to awkwardly stick out of the purse on the metro ride home
As it happens I just posted a comment on FB about my relationship with my purse(s). I also remembered back in the day we all smoked my friends and I referred to the crud on the bottom of a purse as “purse cheese.”
FB post as follows:
I’m just not good at purse. Usually I have the important items in my pockets so I have my hands free, and, I’m not likely to be the victim of a purse snatching. So I got dressed today and was looking fine and I thought, to add to this awesomeness, I needed an accessory at about waist level Belts are out of the question as I have no actual waist. I pulled a likely specimen out of the closet and set out to load it. Please remember that I am grossly out of practice. I tried to remember what, exactly one puts into a purse, and began gathering compact, lipstick, mints, wallet, reading glasses, shopping list, cell phone … and I couldn’t remember anything else. After I put things in their little designated compartments it still looked pretty sparse in there.
The second I was out the door I was reminded why I had discontinued the practice of dragging around this designer knock-off faux leather burden. The handles over my arm make me look like I fell out of the nursing home, and the shoulder strap keeps slipping off my shoulder. If I have to get anything out of my purse it requires that I set it on a counter or table because I need both hands to rummage through it, which is time consuming and annoying to people behind me. I pull out my cards, make my transaction, then throw the cards back in, loose, and take off. By the time I get home it’s a mess, I leave my makeup in it, forget where my wallet is and really? I was better off being less fashionable. I do not purse well.
“
I have a spare house key in my office, two hidden on my property, one on each of my 4 regular sets, one on my work key, and two stashed with friends. I REFUSE TO BE LOCKED OUT EVER AGAIN.
My students leave pens behind all the time, so I pick them up and put them in my laptop bag so that when the student who left their pen behind in their previous class comes to mine and realizes they don't have a pen, I have extras. It's like a giant pen do-si-do.
I have two dangling off each of the carabiners I use as keychains for my car keys.
are you me
Late to the party, but:
Oh Crap Oh Crap Oh Crap Where Is My Purse, Oh It’s in My Hand.
I have two small boys who sometimes must be entertained at restaurants and now there are so many toy trucks in my purse that I have to take them all out on the counter of this sock store to find my wallet, and look there are like 10 of them, a little ambulance and a little steamroller and a little delivery van and a little … and now the sock saleslady is laughing at me.