A notebook (Moleskine pocket, are my favorites) and a simple gel pen (Stabilo Stylist). It fits in (almost) any pocket : great for mobile writing 
BTW, the reward warning on the front page of the Moleskine does work ! I got back one notebook I lost a few days before, for a few bucks (and a coffee). I was so happy !
I am not sure loosing an iPhone in the street I may ever see it again 
Electronic: the Dana, by Alphasmart. Full keyboard, runs on Palm OS, reads and writes Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files, e-mail and IM via Wi-Fi, compatible with Mac and Windows: $319. alphasmart.com/Retail/
Manual: the Pocket Briefcase, by Levenger. Stores pen and 3 x 5 note cards, many sizes and styles, from shirt pocket up to notebook: $38 and up. levenger.com/
Recently got one of my moleskines back too, what a relief it was
for the price of the dana you might consider this new asus
technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol … 842607.ece
runs on linux out the box
Wow, exceptionally cool. I’d rather have one of these ultras than an iPhone. It has a full keyboard for writing, and possibly I could install Skype for free/cheap phone calls. Wish Apple would build one!
The EEePC has Skype on board.
Franz
Just came back from a writing retreat and my gadgets of choice (and ones that I used) were:
I thought about taking my Sony eReader and my Alphasmart Neo but didn’t. The first because I didn’t want to get distracted reading stuff I can read at home, and the latter because I had my notebook with me and didn’t want to take too much stuff. I think next time I may take the Neo along with the notebook. I would not, however, take just the Neo though I like it a lot. (I don’t have my Dana anymore.)
Thinking of getting a psion revo. It’s small, it got real keys, smaller than ordinary keyboard keys but they aren’t small and rubbery at least…
fits in a pocket, has a fairly descent screen, and with a word processor developed for it, I can edit on the fly and not worry about a battery dying
Oh and how much writing I have done on it?
Well my RPG books that I publish… I’d say half of the writing has been done on it
my laptop is an old G3 ibook which lasts about 3 minutes on battery, and I’ve not installed Scrivener on it yet (although I am sure I will), but I do have a trusty A5 notebook and my favourite pen.
I still use a Psion Series 7. Great for note taking as the keyboard is simply a joy to use (why don’t Apple make one this good?). At nine years old, the battery still lasts for a full day. There’s no software available to handle file transfers to a Mac (none that I know of that is), but I simply save my documents to a compact flash disk as plain text, then slot the disk into a card reader attached to the Mac’s USB slot and, bingo! Instant notes to work with and format as I choose.
Proves the adage: - If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!
I was an avid Psion user - I had a 5 and I made quite a few of my friends buy a Revo (although the Revo keyboard is a bit too small for serious typing IMHO). I wrote several of my early scripts using nothing but a Series 5. I didn’t even own a computer, but I could get up to 60 wpm on that tiny keyboard and I worked out how to send emails from it etc. It was my personal computer. I’m still considering buying a second hand Series 7 for the days when my G4 12" iBook just feels too big 
Some people might be interested to know about an incredible article theregister.co.uk did on the (largely self-inflicted) demise of Psion. The silly bastards - to this day there’s still no subnotebook that can touch that line of machines. I averaged 30 days battery on the Series 5’s two double A’s.
That link: theregister.co.uk/2007/06/26/psion_special/
I still regularly use my Psion 5. I’ve got a bit of software on it which converts the internal word processor format to rtf and vice versa - and it normally gets the formatting right - so a card reader is all I need for Psion / Mac goodness. Great little machine, although the screen can be hard to read at times.
Must admit, that little Asus looks pretty good though. Shame it’s not in stock anywhere that I can find, despite the release date being (apparently) eight days ago. Sold out, or not yet released, I guess.
I’ll hold off until the new year to see what Apple are bringing out (the rumours are mounting there’s a subnotebook on the way, although it is very unlikely to be as small as the toys we’re talking about here).
But the Asus does look good. Shame their website thucks aaath: I can’t find any mention of the aforementioned gadget. And I’d have to run Windows or Linux which is about as thrilling as…
… trails off
I wonder if it might be an iPalm…
Can’t see Palm finding that a workable prospect 
Perhaps a Newton? Then again, perhaps not.
perhaps the iTablet?
They seem to get product naming right more often than not. Although iPod does not seem intuitive yet has become the defacto brand name for all MP3 players.
Not to mention the term “podcast”
It’s a huge shame the newton never took off when it was released. I am watching how the iPhone pans out, because I’ve wanted a PDA for ages, but it needs to be something that I just stick in a dock, and it totally syncs with my mac. No hoops and hacks to force it to work - just plug and play.
I mistakenly got a samsung phone (because it was pink and shiny!) and it doesn’t sync with my mac at all. My old Ericsson worked so smoothly - I was all set to upgrade to the cybershot phone. But when I saw the pink shiny one, which also had 5 megapixel camera, I changed my mind at the last minute.
It does slide into my back jeans pocket neatly. Although one day i’ll sit down and hear a “snap!” and it will be all over!
And worse, I switched to orange and signed up for an 18 month contract, when I’d been with O2 for years. Orange have been simply woeful, and O2 even went out of their way to make sure my closing with them was smooth. What a stupid mistake!
talk about Bimboemiajeeezz!!
wow, I googled “Bimboemia”, and only this topic shows up. That must be googletastic!
Edit: Hey wait, are you calling me a bimbo because I sabotaged my communication and organisational setup over a pink shiny slidey phone??
In The Hairyarsed Weders Lexicon…Bimboemia means: “Gorgeous but needs looking after and shouldn`t really be let out on her own.”
Try Googling fluffy Skunkmunster 8) we`re famoush blue eyesh