Ten (Comparatively) Fun Things To Do With An Airline Sick Bag
On Saturday morning, before I’d even stumbled out of bed, I was greeted by an offer of tea. P had shaken his fever and was sporting the newly-reinvigorated disposition of the recently sick. He was smiling. He was offering beverages. He was looking for excuses to climb on the kitchen benches and crawl through the pantry.
But then T got all hot and started vomiting, which was bad for her and not as much fun for the rest of us as you might initially assume. On the up side, it did cause me to reflect upon how much more fun you can have with airline sick bags when you’re using them for pretty much any other purpose than being sick.
1. Mystery object
The Game: One person puts a “mystery” object into a sick bag. The other person has to guess by feeling it.
You Need: An object and a sick bag.
2. Rubbings
The Game: Put a coin, or other flat object, into the sick bag. Use a crayon to make a rubbing. Marvel at the rubbing.
You Need: A crayon and a sick bag.
3. Envelope and Letters
The Game: Write a letter or draw a picture on a sick bag, fold it, and put it into another sick bag. Deliver it to your seat mate.
You Need: A writing implement and TWO sick bags.
4. Telescope
The Game: Roll a sick bag into a cylinder. Look at stuff through it. Say, “Ahoy!”
You Need: A sick bag.
5. Origami
The Game: Show off your origami skills by folding various shapes out of a sick bag.
You Need: Origami skills and a sick bag.
6. Puppetry
The Game: Make a sick bag puppet. Put on a show.
You Need: A sick bag. Helpful: a crayon.
7. Shelter
The Game: Build your sick bag into a hat, teepee, tent, cave, or other shelter. Have various items shelter in your sick bag from monsters, strong sunlight, or simulated rain.
You Need: A sick bag. And stuff. Like a bottle of water with a narrow spout that won’t gush too quickly as you’re trying to pour a little onto your fingers to flick off as simulated rain.
8. Clever Disguise
The Game: Build disguises, such as eyeglasses or beards, out of a sick bag. Talk in funny voices.
You Need: A sick bag.
9. Snow Scape
The Game: Build a snow scape using tiny, rolled-up pieces of a sick bag.
You Need: A container (such as an empty meal tray) and a sick bag. And a crew of flight attendants who won’t freak out when they see all the tiny, tiny pieces of paper.
10. Signal Surrender
The Game: Wave a little piece of sick bag like a white flag to show you’d like someone else to take over the entertainment now.
You Need: Someone else and a sick bag.
.
You’re someone else. Can you run with it from here?
But not too far! I have even more tips for travelling with young children!
This post appeared first at Journeys of the Fabulist and was shared as part of Laugh Link at Five Frogs.
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This is HILARIOUS Bronwyn, I can’t wait to try it, I’m flying on Saturday and will try to get a sick bag, do one of your tricks and blog about it!! I’ve never actually been sick in one, the thought grosses me out! Thanks for linking and see you over at my blog for the linky next week 🙂
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Yes, definitely try them out and let us know! (And happy flying.)
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You can use them to pick up dog turds when you walking too. Sad you only get one per flight. Might need to fly more to build up the stores.
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Yes. Fly more, and do a whip-round of your fellow passengers as well. See if anyone says no when you request extra sick bags, afterwards explain they’re for dog turds, then leave before any followup questions come your way.
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Excellent ideas! I might pack a few extra sick bags next flight. Rachel x
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You never know when (or how!) you’ll need an extra sick bag.
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Ha! Awesome ideas. Now I need to go buy some sick bags… Thanks for linking up!
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N0 need to rush – tuck it away for the next plane ride. Watch the expressions on your fellow passengers’ faces when you keep asking for more sick bags.
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ogni volta che passo dalla tua casa trovo idee molto originali e divertenti, e per me è un vero piacere
passa una notte felice
every time I pass by your home I find very original and funny ideas, and for me it’s a real pleasure
passes a happy night
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Thanks! I certainly hope your next experience with a sick bag is a pleasure!
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So much more creative than I! We’ve used them for coloring and for carrying out our trash. My kids think they are the latter and so far we haven’t had to use them for their original purpose:).
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The rubbish bag is always a good one. I’ve found out the hard way that sick bags need to be separated into “art and craft” and “rubbish” purposes at the beginning. Nothing like trying to trash your toddler’s hand puppet towards the end of the flight when it comes to drawing ill-will from nearby passengers.
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I’ve used sick bags for a variety of things– top two favorite: wrapping all the Christmas presents I brought back from China, and vomitting up three mini-bottles of red wine on my flight to Frankfurt. That was fun.
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Ah! Christmas wrapping! And on a similar theme: birthday wrapping! Or what about… Valentine’s Day wrapping! So many possibilities.
Good to hear you enjoyed using them for their intended purpose as well. Sounds like an absolute barrel of laughs. (Those mini-bottles can be dangerous – it’s like having “just one more” teensy-tiny slice of cake.)
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Once I was so sick in the hospital and puked so much into this barf bag; I’m pretty sure I fell in love with it. Though I may have just been delirious from the drugs.
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Fever will do that to you as well. Or just the emotional overload of being heavily sick. Let’s not blame the innocent drugs – what have they ever done to anyone? More drugs!
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These are great! Love these unique ideas. I wish I had through of half of these when my kids were younger. I’ve only ever used it as a puppet and coloring object. Hope your T feels better soon.
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Thanks, she’s back on her feet (just in time for Chinese New Year holidays).
Puppets and colouring probably account for most of our sick bag time.
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I have nominated you for the Wonderful Team Member Readership Award because I think your blog is fabulous: http://aspoonfulofstyle.co.uk/2014/01/30/wonderful-team-member-readership-award/
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Thanks! Honoured to have been nominated.
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OMG!! You have my heart… xxx
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Not, I hope, in a sick bag.
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Hmmm! This should be interesting! Must start collecting barf bags. Hehehe!
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It’ll take a while to beat the record, apparently (see comment from The Blackberry Boys, above).
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Wow you are so creative! i wish you were on plane journeys with us!!
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I wouldn’t speak too soon. You haven’t seen my comparatively cranky, off-putting and retributive things to do with a sick bag yet 😉 .
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Ha! The only thing I could come up with when I read your title was Hand Puppet. You schooled me.
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New tricks for your next trip! (Getting schooled sounds awfully harsh, though… sorry about that?)
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When I was little I thought airline sick bags were merely garbage bags. At the end of each flight to San Diego to see my grandmother I’d have it filled with candy wrappers and broken crayons. I could never understand the look of horror from the stewardess when I passed my bag to her at the end of every flight.
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Haha – oh gosh. Yes. Those flight attendants don’t always get the glamorous work, do they? People must sometimes hand them sick bags which have been used for their intended purpose (and then that must be better than when the person doesn’t have a sick bag to hand). I don’t think I’d make a very good flight attendant.
You were a tidy little traveller, though.
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Brilliant, as always. Number 10 is my favourite 😉
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Definitely. Although I’ve noticed it works better if you do numbers one through nine first…
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😀 Thanks for the laugh!!
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Oh I have use a sick bag many times for keeping unfinished on board meals. Also, use it as a rubbish bag for tissues clearing my super sensitive nose. You are really creative! I have got to introduce a few to my kids for the coming trip 🙂 I can imagine my hubby will blow into it and burst it. Then the kids will do likewise and we’ll be blacklisted.
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Yes, true! Meal bag or rubbish bag is a very practical use, and a lot more fun than being sick as well.
Hope your supersensitive nose and bag-banging family stay off the blacklist…
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The last one is my favorite 🙂 But you might need a crayon or two and some TSA-approved scissors for #8.. Or maybe that’s where the origami skills come in?
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Yes, the last is definitely my favourite, too. A pair of scissors would definitely be a boon for #8, but from experience you can bodge your way through if necessary. I don’t have any origami skills so I couldn’t say 😉 .
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Add that to your list of things to pick up in Japan…
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🙂
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Wonderful ideas Bronwyn! I’ve definitely done the puppet thing, and we also started making masks – leaving the bottom to go over your head, tearing out eyes, nose and mouth – then popping out ears. ~Terri
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Ah, masks. I never realised how well-suited the sick bag was to amateur dramatics. From props to sound effects to costumes. Something for the high school speech and drama teacher in there. Great suggestion.
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Also hope you all feel better soon xo
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Thanks, much better already. I think I got off lightest of everyone.
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You are hilarious – love #2 there is something magical about it plus it can really look cool if using different currencies. What about using 2 sick bags and some string to :
– play the telephone
Or
– wrap your fists into the bags and pretend to be a boxer or not to have fingers (might be a good containment strategy for toddlers who touch EVERYTHING !!!)
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I love the can’t-touch-this mitts. I have visions of what my kids would do with pretend boxing mitts so I won’t go there. The telephone one is brilliant, though.
No, I’m definitely going to use the can’t-touch-this mitts, if only as a threat…
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Ooh! I’m not sure what about your comment made me think of this but you could also teach basic first aid. Bandaging. Slings, maybe. Educational!
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Brilliant – totally my cup of tea there! xo
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Ok I read the title and felt like being sick (no offence intended) you see I suffer awful air sickness and use those bags regularly and then Alex also has this same affliction so if it’s not one it’s the other. I couldn’t even think about using the sick bag for ‘fun’ will never happen but good to know.
I hope the germs/vomits and high temps are not hanging around and your all on the mend
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Ooh, sorry… No, I would’t use up the sick bags in a case like yours. Perhaps there’s a few things you can do with a flight safety card? You haven’t been involved in many “incidents”, have you?
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🙂 no thank god! I’m seriously thinking of taking a zanax for the flight home and letting the kids fend for themselves because hubby will sleep right through- bastard!! So days I just shouldn’t comment, should I!
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You’d take the xanax just for yourself, or you’d share the pack with the family??
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Didn’t think you could give it to kids??
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Well, admittedly I haven’t checked…
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Oh but I just did and it’s probably fine:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3315169
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Ohh this could change everything about flying for Alex and I.
Thank you!!
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*With his own prescription prescribed by a real doctor* etc etc etc.
🙂
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Yes of course! Ha, you’ve judged me
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Less for you than to mollify the legal department of my brain. 🙂
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🙂 isn’t it sad that it’s come to that! I promise no legal action will be taken
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Common sense isn’t what it used to be. By which I mean “assumed”.
I think we’s cool, though.
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🙂
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Not that, er, I mean… don’t… you know.
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I hope you all are feeling better now. I love the ideas you have here, especially the puppets! I am not that creative so I have nothing to add but know that I will be stealing your ideas.:)
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Definitely steal any you want, and don’t forget to trawl through the comments for the rest.
We’re feeling a bit better today. T is having a bit of a sleep this afternoon though so not 100% yet.
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Simulated rain and snow with children in a confined space?! That’s what I would call an advanced parenting manoeuvre. May the lurgies pass from your house soon…
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And Angelina Hue, above, suggests adding to the drama by creating a thunderclap effect using a blown up bag! Couple this with Sue Slaght’s drama game/the clever disguise game and you could soon have a very involved show.
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Pretend it’s Halloween and take it trick-or-treating to be filled with random household items.
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Ooh! Good idea! Wonder what response you’d get from airline passengers if you went trick or treating through economy class. Or from flight attendants if you knocked on the entrance to the galley, ditto.
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Fold the bag in half, and half again, then half again, and perhaps one more time.
Take out a pair of scissors, and start cutting randomly – the corners, square holes, triangle holes, etc. Don’t cut through/the paper in half. After cutting, open the paper, viola!
Whatever comes out depends on your imagination. 🙂 I usually end up with “snowflake”.
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Snowflakes! That blows my snowscape idea out of the water. On a plane you just have to pinch bits off with your fingernails instead of using scissors.
I’ve never been able to make anything other than a snowflake with that technique, but you’ve got me wondering…
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I originally learned it for cutting Lunar New Year celebration decorations. You can cut them into characters, animal shapes, and all kinds of crazy things. I obviously don’t remember any of the patterns. 😛
For a more believable snowflake, cut the inner most corners off so when you open it, it would have a hole in the middle. I used to do this in the office when I have useless paper lying around. Instead of the shredder, I would just cut them into random shapes and use the cut up bits as confetti.
Fun stuff!
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_paper_cutting
Oh, before I forget, Happy Lunar New Year! 😀
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You too! And thanks!
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Considering how many days (weeks?) I’ve spent in the company of barf bags, it’s amazing I haven’t done all of these. When I was younger, I’d send a letter to my BFF in one (using it as an envelope) every summer. It occurs to me now that she’d never been on a plane and probably thought that’s what Spanish envelopes were like. I guess that’s another use: confound people with no flight experience! “It’s got a waxy coating on the inside… what could it be for?”
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Haha! Maybe someone explained it to her… I hope.
Confounding people is a good idea. You could also apparently try confounding people who only ever fly Ryanair (per Expat Eye, above).
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Cut two holes in it and put over a cat’s head on halloween? An easier thing to do with it would be to blow into it and smash the bag *POP*!
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Aha! Thunder claps to add to the simulated rain and snow! It’s an all-weather sick bag fest!
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Brilliant! It is amazing what we parents can come with we need to (ie when stuck in a confined space with no toys and bored a whining toddler and baby). One day I will share my Six Fun Things To Do With A Scraper and an Empty Sandwich Box- created while in a two hour traffic jam.
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Do that. I will definitely share that knowledge around. Myself, I can mainly think of one and it’s sort of violent.
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Turn the sick bag into a prop for an in flight drama presentation. Begin gagging and holding the sick bag as if about to use it for the intended purpose. Have another player count the number of glances turned your way…or possibly the number of people fleeing the area. 🙂
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Oh, brilliant! And you can assign points and turn it into a competition and everything.
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Yes…and prizes…..I see prizes 🙂
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Would the prize be made out of a sick bag?
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I think by that point we may have hammered the sick bag theme to bits. If I’m playing could the prize be chocolate?
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Could we first use the chocolate in the mystery item game?
(You mean there’s such a thing as enough with the sick bags?)
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Well I am a bit biased. I LOVE to travel but the sick bag and I know each other very well….so yes there can be enough 🙂
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I’ll defer to your obviously-greater insight on the subject. 🙂
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🙂
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Ha, that was so dumb and so funny! 🙂 I’m flying next month but Ryanair doesn’t do sick bags – otherwise I’d be all over these!
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They do not do sick bags? Don’t they know this discourages a whole segment of the market dedicated to collecting them (per the comment by Blackberry Boys, above)?
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They don’t even have pockets on the seats so there’s nowhere to put them 😉
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That is so inventive!! 😀
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Necessity is the mother of it 🙂
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😀 I used to have a boss who collected airline sick bags. So I would always bring him some from my trips.he should read your post, he sure has alot to use up 😛 Luckily I have never used one before for its primary function, but once I was sitting in the middle of 3 seats and a girl sat down beside me, drinking some pink beverage, I remember thinking that might not be a good idea, and sure enough, we lifted up and out came the pink puke…ofcourse none of the 3seats had a sick bag….poor thing…
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I have heard of that hobby, I think on the internet (where else?).
Is there, like, a group or something? Some sort of community? Are they allowed to do things with them or they’re strictly for popping in weird sick bag albums or display cabinets?
Pink puke sounds only slightly more fun than the usual chunky yellow stuff. Don’t want to ask where it ended up…
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he doesn’t do anything with the bags. The pink puke ended up in her lap, but she brought a pillow, so on her pillow, mainly. Luckily none of it landed in me 🙂
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OMG, there’s a whole world out there (from google):
https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=airline+sick+bag+collector&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
Note the first couple of links. The Virtual Airsick Bag Museum:
http://www.airsicknessbags.com
There’s a Guinness World Record for it:
http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/largest-collection-of-sick-bags/
And it goes on…
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Wow a Guiness World record 🙂 That is too funny. If I hear from him, I will have to tell him about this.
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He might want to go for it 🙂
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oh but I died laughing! Those are all so much better uses of a sick bag than the original purpose! I hope T gets to feeling better soon!
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She seems to be getting there. Sleeping it off a bit at the moment. I’m optimistic she won’t get the relapse P did…
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I’d try #6 to get us through the latest school closure if I could rummage up spare sick bags.
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Well desperate times call for desperate trips to cafes which serve food in brown paper bags (also useful for puppets: empty coffee cups, just noting that out loud here…)
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