Pilot testing

Take me to the pilot of your soul, April 2012

No, not testing pilots to see if they know how to fly the plane. In my old life, "pilot testing" was when you tried out a new system on a limited set of users or under controlled circumstances to see how well it works. Given the number of new things I'm using and bringing on this trip, and the difficulty or expense or inconvenience of replacing some of them, I've been trying to pilot some of them. Preferably in concert where appropriate. In this context, the pilot is a short trip where I will either only suffer for a short period to easily remediate the problem.Last week I had another of these short business trips that seem to be creeping into my life. My plan was to test:

• My new camera bag
• My new wash'n'wear underwear
• My new washable travel and hiking wear

How did I do? Honestly, it was a mediocre test. As I wrote the other day, the camera bag order got screwed up and didn't come in time. And part of the wash'n'wear test was going to be around reuse of gym clothes. Since my hotel reservation also got screwed up, I didn't get to test that. All I was able to do was wash a pair of shorts, and they dried - and therefore passed the test. The good news and bad news is that it looks like I'll have one more flight before we Go Away. And the new backpack actually arrived. It looks good, and I'm expecting that it will be as helpful as I hoped. I'll post later exactly what that test will look like. That will cover some of the four scenarios that need dealing with:

1. Traveling from home to our first stop by air, returning from the last stop
2. Traveling from point-to-point in the car, with all the stuff conveniently accessible
3. Traveling with the wife at various places, where there is walking or light hiking, and bringing the big camera kit
4. Hiking without the wife, which will be strenuous and use the lightweight camera kit

I'm also going to retest the clothing/laundry bits. The more you can put together, the better the test represents the ultimate real situation.