This coffee shop still life comes to you from Coffee & Company at 53 Pricess Street in Kingston, Ontario. Impressively, it has no web site. Which is not to say it’s unwired; most of us are bent over screens of one size or another. “The password is bagel,” the barrista answered when I asked if there was Wifi. He spoke to the side, as if SMERSH agents might overhear us. “All lowercase?” I asked, lowering my voice as well. He nodded. So I’m back on the net after a frustrating 24 hours at the periphery, ever since we breezed past the border at Port Huron/Sarnia yesterday. Nothing to declare. No WiFi at the Comfort Inn last night in Oshawa, and spotty results at the one today in Kingston, where we checked in early at noon and napped.

The Profession by Steven Pressfield dropped from the Whispernet to my Kindle today. I have paper proofs and now the much-preferred Kindle version. Darlene left her colorful sunglasses case and Claire (unseen in photo) behind while she checks out the shops on Pricess Street. That triangle shape is the case/stand for my iPad.

Travel is disorienting, especially on a trip like this one that won’t have time to develop much of a routine. When we used to travel in a small motorhome, a Rialta, we’d pick out an RV campground sometime in the early afternoon and arrive before dark, so there was plenty of time to hook up the water, electrical, and other connections. No hauling of suitcases and gear up the stairs of a Comfort Inn. No packing and unpacking. On this trip, we try to stay a day ahead of ourselves for hotel reservations. Since tonight will be our second stay at a Comfort Inn, we’re due to get our next night free, thanks to a special promotion I spotted on the breakfast table in Joliet, Illinois. So disorienting, yes. But that’s what travel’s good for – to shake things up and see what remains. For me, perhaps sadly, it always comes back to the net. Gotta get back online. First thing I do in a new hotel room is fire up the devices. I get jumpy when I’m offline. So sue me.

Three days before our departure for Johannesburg, I am honing my collection of tech gear for three weeks in South Africa and Botswana. By my standards, this is traveling light!  Here are the main elements, clockwise from upper left:

1. Moleskin writing notebook, with pocket sidekick from Staples and a uni-ball Signo 207 gel pen.

2. Dell Inspiron Mini 10v netbook.

3. Kindle latest generation 3G in a Cole Haan leather case.

4. iPhone 4

5. Wireless Microsoft mouse for the netbook.

6. Sierra Wireless USBConnect 881 modem, which I hope to equip with a SIM card in South Africa that will provide reasonable, pre-paid internet service.

7. South Africa electrical converter.

8. Edirol CS-15 microphone for interviews.

9. Blue Snowflake mic for voice-overs in GarageBand.

10. Olympus LS-10 recorder.

There are accessories in the suitcase, not to mention a nest of cables. But this is the guts of my gear. I’ll keep my clothes supply modest, so everything will fit in a carryon suitcase and a knapsack.  Darlene and her sister Deb, who arrives tonight from Omaha to travel with us, will be toting big bags full of who knows what. We are into the granular details of the trip–making sure we know how to call our friends in Botswana when we arrive at the Jo’burg airport, finalizing my reservation on the Blue Train from Cape Town to Pretoria, and checking for potential glitches in the blogging connection.

I have just one more podcast to create and upload, Kindle Chronicles 118, and then I’ll have my first big break since I began the show more than two years ago. Three episodes are “in the can,” scheduled for delayed posting each Friday while we’re gone.  Although I’ll have plenty of gear to upload audio and video if the opportunity demands, I’m bending toward paper and ink for this sojourn in Africa.  I’ve promised Darlene I will not disrupt our travels with obsessive hunting for WiFi connections.  If the Internet’s available, okay.  If not, okay too.

I’m looking out my window in Cambridge this morning at signs of early fall — a few leaves on the grass in the park but most of them still clinging to the trees. On Thursday next week we will step of the plane from Heathrow into early summer.  It will be like hitting the seasonal rewind button.  Meanwhile, I’m listening to African Essentials Radio on Pandora, and my current Kindle read is Ways of Dying by Zakes Mda, an award-winning South African writer of my generation.

Back to packing!

I can’t stand to look at images of oil-smothered birds and beaches soiled by black blobs. They make me nauseous, as does the media’s recent focus on whether the President is emoting enough.  I can’t even imagine the pressure building every hour and day on executives of BP, Obama’s team, and the people of the Gulf.  I pray for the unsung BP heroes working round the clock to stop the leak.  Maybe we’ll get some good news this week about an idea that will stop the oil flow before August, when the relief wells are completed.

Meanwhile, what can we do?

Go green, is what occurs to me on a green-gray morning in Cambridge.  Buy bicycles. Walk more. Turn off the air conditioning unless the heat gets crazy.  Turn down the heat.  Till now, I will confess that I have been mainly a talk-the-talk environmentalist.  This mess makes me hard-core.  The BP spill marks the end of my personal complacency, because every single small green act is a way of doing something in the face of excruciating tragedy.  If the images and facts of this calamity are not enough to turn the consciousness of the nation toward sustainable growth, then we are simply doomed.

I don’t claim a rational link to my next intention, but I also plan to start eating more green stuff.  As I approach 60 this summer, I know I need to reboot my eating and exercise.  Most of what I love to eat is not green.  Donuts, cookies, toast with honey, hard salami, Ritz crackers, Jarlsberg cheese, chili, root beer — those are some of my favorite foods, balanced by the occasional virtuous dinner of fish.  I’ve heard you can establish a habit by doing it for 30 days in a row, so I’m going to eat something green every day for the next 30 days.  Bring on the lettuce, broccoli, spinach, and asparagus.  On our next trip to Whole Foods, I’m going to simply buy anything green, including green tea.

I’m going to look for the green in every scene, like the one outside my window this morning.  That’s an oak tree closest to me, and beyond it glow the rich green grass of the park and the muted green of the famous Sycamore trees that line Memorial Drive along the Charles River.  I also notice my green-covered One Laptop Per Child computer, which I use in tandem with the one I gave my grandson.  The text messages I send on my iPhone appear on a green background.  The top index card on my hipster PDA is green. The traffic light in the intersection outside my window just turned green.  It’s time.

Green doesn’t get mad. Green grows toward the sun. Green loves the rain. Dave Brubeck is green, or at least that’s how a Pandora mix based on his music sounds this morning.  My birthday on August 30 will have a green theme–I’m not sure how, but something will occur to me.  Real green has to start somewhere.  Why not today?