Must-Haves in Today's Digital World

I am a purse-rummaging pocket patting person. The reason is I must know at all times that I have my essential stuff--billfold, camera, phone. Today I loaded my faithful canine amigo, Ringo, and struck out on a 3+ hour drive to spend a couple of nights with Dad. I stopped, as I always do, at Buckee's in Giddings, TX. If I were to pass it by, I think Ringo would revolt. That is where he gets his walk, and he recognizes the outermost outskirts of town. After we got back on the road and I was happily guzzling my Diet Coke with the best fast-food ice in Texas, I began patting around my general surroundings looking for my phone. I was not going to make a call--am trying NOT to engage in this dangerous pursuit--but rather just needed to know where it was. A cursory check did not yield my iPhone. I began to feel uneasy...looked and rummaged around more. No phone! Now I began to worry. It has fallen out of my pocket before...and I was just at Buckee's! What if it was lying in the parking lot or even in someone else's pocket by now? I pulled over into a parking lot on the edge of the next town and seriously rooted through my belongings. There was my phone, on the floor, passenger side. I breathed a huge sigh of relief and resumed my drive with a lighter heart. But the experience caused me to think. I. really. must. have. that. phone. If I leave the house without it, most times I will go back for it. This device is definitely the one item that I really feel I cannot get along without.

Thinking about other things that I feel so strongly about, I asked myself what computer application I would top my list. For me, it would still be email. I love all the other means of communication that I use, but email still reigns in my life as the one application that I value above all others. Finally I asked myself what Web 2.0 service or presence is the one you would miss the most, the one you would most hate to live without? This was my hardest question. One strong candidate would be del.icio.us, because it holds a history of my recent learning, and allows me to find things I need and reconstruct previous experiences. Other candidates would be networking sites such as Twitter, blogs, wikis, As much as I love Twitter and think it is important, I am going to demote it to highly desirable and declare a three way tie for things 2.0 that I value: social bookmarking, blogs, and wikis.

Overall, this mental exercise was interesting to me because all these things, with the exception of email, are things that I did not use or value as recently as five years ago. It is one more example of how technology has impacted and will continue to influence my life and the way I live. Wonder about everyone else's must-haves? I would love to hear from people:
1. What is your one (or maybe 2) must-have gadget/hardware/gizmo/appurtenance?
2. Same question, but for computer applications? Again top one, or maybe a couple.
3. Ditto, for Web 2.0 services--and I am very curious about this!