• Shoes--and keep them on unless you're sure your feet don't smell.

• A willingness to at least attempt to keep your toddler/child under control.

• Headphones that only you--not the entire car--can hear.

• Restraint with the cell phone.

It can be from an old Official Railway Guide or from the Handy Railroad Atlas of the United States (a small but helpful Rand McNally publication) that I picked up in a regular bookstore 20 years ago.

Of course I rarely travel with the originals now.....I xerox the specific routes I'll be on ahead of time.

I was going to suggest toothbrush, but that has been taken, by the aforementioned fellow.

OK, the rules say I can only list one thing that hasn't been mentioned by somebody else (though that rule has already been broken, I will still abide by them).

And my answer is: A change of underwear.

------------------
Sing to the tune of Humoresque:
Passengers will please refrain,
From flushing toilets while the train,
Is standing in the station,
I love you.

1) Route timetable.

2) Duct tape. (The cure for shrunken sleeping car curtains, assorted rattles, and squeaks)

3) Battery powered fan. (My fan uses four "D" cells. Very powerful. Essential for stuffy sleeping cars in summer)

4) Small, medium-weight plastic carrying bag. (The kind you get when making a purchase at a hardware or liquor store. It's not classy, but it keeps potentially leaky "grooming essentials" separate in your suitcase. Hangs on the hook inside Amtrak restrooms or shower compartments for easy access, too)

5) Sweatshirt. (Essential for overnight coach travel, even during the summer)

6) Cell phone. (For calling ahead to friends or hotels when my train is running late)

7) 99 cent shower flip-flops. (For trips to the shower and the restroom. No need to put on and tie your shoes!)

8) The famously spooky, 1949 black-and-white photograph of two New York Central passenger trains meeting, at midnight, at Buffalo Central Terminal. (When traveling by sleeper, I always hang it in my room for "atmosphere.")

9) My finely-honed, survival-of-the-fittest ability to "move fast" when boarding Amtrak coaches. (Amtrak seats are not identical. Many align poorly with the windows, others are flatter than a pancake. If you dawdle on the platform, and board behind the rest of the pack, your fellow boardees are likely to have grabbed the more desirable seats, leaving you with whatever's left over)