[Cyclefrance]

When I saw the name of this thread, I wasn't quite sure what to expect, and I must admit that the title brought immediately to mind my encounter with this particular item of travel gear about two weeks ago.

My son had vacated the 'studio' (in reality a converted garage - but studio sounds so much more inviting) at our place in March this year, leaving behind the usual chaos of youthful departure (take what you need - normally about 10% of what's there - and leave everything else). The opportunity finally to turn it back into the office it had intended to become over a year ago (when said son departed for a life in Australia - a very short life as it transpired – but that’s another story) seemed to acquire no urgency. That is, until three weeks ago.

Younger son had left his parental home after returning from a holiday with his then girlfriend in Hawaii (all right for some!). They left unattached but returned engaged (those island sunsets have a lot to answer for!), and had then negotiated the right to return home in August for an engagement party. That event happened over the past weekend. Our nephew from Spain was scheduled to come to stay sometime during his holidays and it didn’t take long on hearing the date that he decided to arrive so that he could attend the party.

Mrs CF hit on the idea of redecorating the ‘studio’ so that he could stay there. Now when Mrs CF says ‘redecorate’, what she really means is ‘totally gut and refurbish’. She hurriedly located a decorator who could fit the job in so that the place would be ready two days before our nephew arrived. The decorator needed a good week to do his bit, but, naturally, he wanted a clear room to work in.

Younger son was instructed to clear his stuff out of the garage. I should have realized when he said ‘all done’ after only an hour of activity that his idea of ’all done’ wasn’t the same as mine (or anyone else’s for that matter). Negotiating his return to finish the job, however, was a predictably lost cause. A whole weekend and two evenings later I had the room down to bare essentials – lots of black sacks, some odds and ends of re-usable furniture (shelves mainly), a set of tom-toms, endless assortments of computer cabling, old games consoles… and a suitcase that was lying inside the wardrobe.

The suitcase was quite heavy – I imagined it had a smaller case or two, Russian doll style, inside. Might as well check their condition – the outer case was in bad shape, so I wasn’t expecting much (so important to manage expectations). But, then, it revealed itself not to contain any other cases – far from it – it actually contained (and promptly regurgitated all over the 'studio' floor) the clothes my son had taken to Hawaii, nearly six months ago. And a fine assortment they were. Plenty of ‘Diesel’ wear, and ‘Abercrombie’ and ‘Nike’ and ‘Adidas’ and ‘Tommy Hilfiger’ and… well it went on and on. Not only that, there were some of these items still in plastic bags, unopened and sporting price tags in US Dollars (clearly purchases while on holiday).

Now my son is always pleading poverty, so to discover this e-bay treasure trove of prospective funds was quite two-fold surprising – on the one side pleasant, because he had access to a fairly prompt injection of cash, but on the other dismaying that these items had lain for so long incarcerated and oblivious to mankind, and in fact had almost been consigned to the local tip!

Emotions-tugging enough! - and there now remains but one problem. How do you convince a son who has left such items unattended for several months that he should now find the enthusiasm to turn such gems of the designer world into the cash he claims to need so desperately for his pocket?

Suitcases often contain and transport more than their obvious contents…