Last year — and again earlier this year, I fell down a bit of a hole watching everyday carry videos on YouTube. Over time, this led me to think about the things I carry on me on a daily basis. Presented for your enjoyment is my September 2021 everyday carry.
iPhone 12 Pro (128 GB/Space Gray)
I’ve been very open about the fact that I spend a few years away from Apple’s phones, following the announcement of the iPhone X. I found my way back to their phones right before all hell broke loose last year and I couldn’t be happier. When I first came up with the idea for this post in mid-2020, I was actually rocking a 128 GB iPhone 11. When I decided to get the iPhone 12 Pro instead, I paid off the 11 and gave it to my father. It was his first iPhone after using Android devices for as long as I’d had iPhone. It turns out, he loves it! For Christmas last year, my mother and I even got him an Apple Watch SE and it has become one of his favorite pieces of technology. I’ve heard many times how he pays for his coffee at Wawa with Apple Pay and feels really cool! You go, Dad!
Apple Watch Series 5 (40mm/Space Gray/WiFi)
My first Apple Watch was a Series Zero that got delivered about two months after they were first released. The backorder was bad. When I came back to the iPhone last year, I knew I needed to get a watch. During my time on Android, I had tried several different wearables and none of them were as good as the Apple Watch.
I’d first picked up a Series 3 — Why, I don’t know. But when my mother expressed a desire to get an Apple Watch again (she was also returning to the iPhone), I decided to pass the Series 3 onto her and grabbed a Series 5 at Target. Considering my watch face of choice is Infograph with all eight complication spots filled, I think that was probably a good move on my part.
AirPods Pro
When the first AirPods came out, I really didn’t like them. In all fairness, I was never a huge fan of Apple’s ear bud offerings, dating all the way back to my first iPod. I’d always used third-party options. AirPods Pro were what I had hoped AirPopds would have been. Alas, they came out during a time when iPhone was not in my vocabulary. I wound up getting a pair of Galaxy Buds instead. The Galaxy Buds were fine, but when I started walking a lot while I was out of work during the pandemic, I decided that I wanted to take it up a notch, and thus I got a pair of AirPods Pro.
In all honesty, they’re one of my favorite products that I carry around with me. Not only do I enjoy them when I go on walks (or don’t want to be disturbed while shopping), but the fact that they work with my Apple TV means I can watch a movie and have an amazing sound experience without disturbing anyone around me.
Wallet (PopWallet+ for MagSafe)
When I got my iPhone 12 Pro, one of the products I considered getting was the official leather MagSafe wallet. I never went a head with it, though. I’m a big fan of PopSockets and when they sent me their new MagSafe compatible line to check out, I thought that I wasn’t going to get much use out of the wallet. Boy howdy, was I wrong.
I came to realize that there’s not a lot of cards that I need with me in my day to day life. The two biggest are my drivers license and my debit card, though even the latter has somewhat fallen to the wayside as I tend to use Apple Pay on my Apple Watch whenever I can. My insurance card and AAA are both stored inside of apps, my credit card is linked to Apple Pay in case I need it, but I tend to only carry it if I plan to use it, and thanks to the pandemic as whole, I try to avoid using cash whenever possible. Once you realize you only need to carry two cards with you daily, that opens you up to some great possibilities. With no exaggeration I can say that the PopWallet+ for MagSafe is one of my favorite iPhone accessories of all time.
I think the reason I like it so much is that because it is MagSafe compatible, I can take it off of my phone when I want to stick it on a wireless charger or throw on my PowerCore Magnetic 5K from Anker and then return it to my phone when I’m ready. With the traditional PopWallet, I imagine I’d have to remove my entire case if I want to charge. I don’t have the patience for that, day in and day out.
Keys
If there’s one area of my everyday carry that I need to rethink, it’s my keys. I’ve always been a “jumble of keys” person, to the point that a co-worker once nicknamed me “Jingles”. I know there exists different things you can buy to put multiple keys in a more compact space, but I haven’t decided which, if any, I would like to try.
As for what I do have on this mess (conveniently separated a bit for photography purposes):
- An AirTag in a silicon holder I got off of Amazon. Not a problem in the summer, but in the fall and winter I sometimes leave my keys in a jacket or hoodie pocket. I have a lot of these that I wear that time of year, so having an AirTag attached makes finding them a lot easier. It already saved my behind a few times when I left my keys in a backpack after a day trip.
- Bath & Body Works Hand Sanitizer. Hand sanitizer is something that was important before the pandemic but essential since. I’ve never been a fan of most hand sanitizers as they would often have a strong smell or leave my hands feeling dry. The little bottles of hand sanitizer that they sell at Bath & Body Works, by comparison, smell great and leave my hands feeling fantastic.
- Touch Key. I haven’t been using this as much lately, but early in the pandemic I was using this everywhere I went for opening doors, pressing elevator buttons, etc.
- Misc. Keys. While I’m not going to go over every key that I have on my keyring, know that I have a few, including one for my locker at work.
- Car Keys. My car is one of the ones that you still have to put a key in to turn on, so unfortunately I can’t pocket my key separately, but my key fob does take up a pretty decent part of my keychain.
Everything on my keyring is secured to a Nintendo 64 Carabiner that I got at GameStop. You can tell it has seen better days, but it still holds my keys to my pants when I’m out and my backpack when I’m at work, so I’m going to keep rocking it!
That wraps it up for everything that I carry as part of my everyday carry. What do you have with you everywhere you go? Let me know down in the comments below! And if you have any suggestions for what I can do with my key situation, I’d love to hear that as well!
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Dan Stransky 