All airlines in the age of the suicide hijacker are now restricting the amount of liquid passengers are permitted to take with them in their hand-luggage or about their person to 100ml. In other words, you can take several different 100ml containers with different liquids in them with you; you just can’t pour several similar 100ml liquids into a single large container. So, what should you take? What liquids are vital, as opposed to just desirable?

Immediately, the meaning of the word ‘vital’ is up for scrutiny. What may be vital to me may be trivial to someone else. I once had a colleague who clearly found oral hygiene a decadent luxury; a few words from him in a confined space could induce rapid unconsciousness, possibly followed by convulsions. But for me, the idea of going without toothpaste (and floss and mouthwash, to be neurotically honest) for anything over twelve hours would be tantamount to cruel and unusual punishment.

Readers beware: any list like this will be inflected with the writer’s hang-ups and preoccupations to some extent. But, these days, I’m fairly confident that most people regard toothpaste as a staple rather than a luxury or a silly fad. So here are some items I think most of us will regard as pretty vital.

Keeping you below 100ml…

Top of the list, as you might have guessed, is toothpaste. It makes you feel ready for sleep at night and human in the morning (although it seems to me that humans are the only animals who seem to acquire the most hideous, weapons-grade breath by daybreak. Do hamsters get morning breath?). Just don’t leave without it (and the stuff you buy in France or Spain never seems to taste the same – I always feel I’m using broccoli flavoured paste when I’ve bought this stuff; or maybe haddock). I personally feel that 100ml of mouthwash is also essential – especially if you can’t fit a bigger bottle into your hold luggage.

Anyone who is prone to dry skin like me will not regard emollients as luxuries, unless you want to step out of the shower and find your skin has turned to ancient Egyptian papyrus within minutes. At least two – and preferably four – of your bottles should be filled with equal quantities of face cream and body lotion.

Next, don’t scrimp on your vanity enhancers. Shampoo and hair conditioner – especially if you use a specific product – definitely fall into the vital category in my book. And equally important in this department is taking enough of the hair styling product you use to get you through the holiday (quite a lot of us have spent years of trial and error before settling on just the right one for our particular Barnets; we aren’t going to let it go without a fight).

Whilst many of us who are still struggling to let go of our Neanderthal natures may find the next few suggestions surplus to requirement, many of the ‘female persuasion’, as Basil Fawlty once put it, will regard them as absolute essentials.

If you’re travelling to go on holiday, or even on business, you’re going to want to look your best as often as you can. And, especially for women, elegant nails are essential details of chic and elegance. Never, ever travel without both nail polish and nail polish remover, or you’re going to feel as though your slip is showing or even worse, that you’ve accidentally tucked your dress into your knickers.

…prevents you doing this.

Another essential which men, I believe, can be persuaded to try out is skin toner. Ok! So I’ve been persuaded to try it out; why are you looking at me like that? It really, truly refreshes and enlivens your skin after you’ve washed your face at night and makes you feel just peachy (oh my God – did I really write that out loud?).

To recap, my top ten essential 100ml liquids to take on a flight are:

• Toothpaste
• Mouthwash
• Face Cream
• Body Lotion
• Shampoo
• Hair Conditioner
• Hair Styling Product
• Nail Polish
• Nail Polish Remover
• Skin Toner

To make some concessions to dissident perspectives (and don’t forget, with weight restrictions on hold luggage too, you may not be able to carry additional supplies of some or any of the above), here are some permutations. I’m not going to suggest which ones to drop – that’s down to personal preference.

Too big! Get off my plane!

Young mums, though, may be grateful of a good slug or two of baby formula or expressed milk for when that delightful little sleeping cherub wakes up and starts hollering for a feed. And if you’re going somewhere infernally hot, especially if, like me, you go from light blue to boiled lobster red in the blink of an eye, some sun screen might be more than simply handy.

Bizarre options which I’ve come across include hot pepper sauce, mayonnaise, fountain pen ink and linseed oil. Who knows why these were selected as vital items for hand luggage liquids. I can see how someone might get addicted to hot pepper sauce (I used to know someone who used to shake a few drops into his Budweiser), but the attraction to fountain pen ink and linseed oil defeats my imaginative resources, unless one person was a calligrapher and the other a cricketer, carrying his beloved bat in the hold. And anyone who brings a supply of Vodka, Gin and Vermouth in 100 ml bottles probably needs professional help.

In short, we’re all different and we’ll all have different priorities at the end of the day. The list above is not meant to be exhaustive, just suggestive. But anyone who chooses mayonnaise over toothpaste has serious emotional problems, in my considered opinion.